List of esports games
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Fighting games
Fighting games were among the earliest games to be in tournaments, with the founding of what would become the Evolution Championship Series in 1999.[1]
Competitions in the genre are generally individual competitions with both players providing input to the same machine. The genre originally focused on arcade play, but has gradually moved to console play as arcades have declined. The
Fighting game enthusiasts generally prefer the moniker "competitive gaming", and often eschew the term "esports", citing cultural differences between the predominantly PC-gaming esports communities and the older arcade-gaming community.[3]
Members of the fighting game community are generally especially cognizant of their cc to the old arcade-era competitions, wishing to prioritize the preservation the spirit of those competitions over simple monetization of fighting competitions.[4]
Street Fighter
The Street Fighter has one of the earliest and longest running professional gaming scenes.[1]
Professional Street Fighter players include
Super Smash Bros.
Marvel vs. Capcom
Marvel vs. Capcom (MvC) is a fighting game series developed by Capcom that features characters from Capcom games and Marvel comic book characters. The series was played at the Evolution Championship Series from 2000 until 2017.[9]
Tekken
Namco's Tekken series is known as the lightning chess of fighting games, having a large player base in Asian countries. Over the years Tekken has been cited as the most technical among fighting games. Praised for its balance, strong basics, depth and one of the few fighting games to feature a real 3D design, it continues to be featured in various championships. The "Master cup" series of Japan, "Final round" series of U.S.A, "Strongstyle" series of U.S.A, "UT" championship series of Europe are a few examples of events that are, or started off as exclusive Tekken events, and still hold it as a main game. The "King of Iron Fist Tournament" is a Tekken only tournament hosted by Namco themselves. Apart from this, other shows such as "Tekken Crash", "Tekken Strike" are Tekken only shows held in South Korea on the esports channel "Nice Game T.V". Tekken has made it periodically into the Evo Championship series, and since 2013 has become a permanent part of the event. Although it has a lesser player-base in the west, it seems to be steadily rising. In the east it dominates the arcade scene today leaving other games of its genre miles behind.[citation needed]
Killer Instinct
The
In January 2017, Ultra Arcade enforced a ban on taunting and teabagging in major Killer Instinct tournaments which sparked controversy among the fighting game community with some stating that it is considered impossible to enforce due to certain players' playstyles.[14][15]
First-person shooters
Doom
Doom is a series of multiplayer 1v1 and free-for-all deathmatch games developed by id Software. Doom is notable for establishing the arena-style deathmatch format, and also was partially responsible for the first online FPS community through DWANGO, an online gaming service officially endorsed and partially worked on by id Software. People also played Doom deathmatch online through other BBS services.[20] The Ultimate DOOM and Doom II, alongside Heretic, were played in the Deathmatch '95 tournament, sponsored by id Software, Microsoft, and DWANGO. This tournament, perhaps the first PC esports tournament of its kind, was played through the online DWANGO service. Finalists from the US and the UK were flown to Microsoft headquarters to compete in a LAN party format event, named Judgement Day.[21] Dennis Fong, best known for his victory at the Red Annihilation tournament for Quake, won Judgement Day, marking his first entry into esports. Doom II was also played in Cyberathlete Professional League and QuakeCon tournaments.
Doom 3 featured a 1v1 mode which was played professionally at QuakeCon 2004, QuakeCon 2005, and CPL Winter 2004, but was ultimately replaced by Quake 4 and Painkiller.
Quake
Quake is a series 1v1 PC based games developed by
Quake Champions was opened for Closed Beta Test on April 6, 2017, it was thereafter released as Early Access within Steam's early access program on August 22. Bethesda announced the availability of a free-to-play trial at E3 2018 downloadable on Steam. Players who signed up during the free trial period got to keep playing for free after E3. During Quakecon 2018, it was announced that Quake Champions would be free-to-play and open to all players on August 10, 2018.
Competitions have been held at Dreamhack and on QuakeCon, at first in Duel, Sacrifice and also 2v2. In 2019 there was announced that a Quake Professional League (QPL) would start at QuakeCon the same Year and then would be running with four stages with a stage final after each stage and a big final at QuakeCon 2020. QuakeCon 2020 was however cancelled as a LAN-Event due to the COVID-19-Pandemic and the final was held online with players from Europe, CIS, North America, South America and Australia competing. During 2020 and 2021 the QPL is running every week and broadcastsmon Twitch.[citation needed]
Counter-Strike series
The
Counter Strike is consistently at competitions such as DreamHack and World Cyber Games as the 1.6 version released in 2003, despite newer versions having been released by Valve over the years.[19]
Call of Duty series
The
Unreal Tournament
Beginning with the release of the first game in 1998, the
Halo series
The
Painkiller
Battlefield series
Crossfire
Crossfire is a Korean-developed shooter similar to Counter-Strike that is most popular in East Asia. Crossfire Stars is the name of the highest professional league.[39]
Overwatch
Overwatch has attracted attention as an esports title including teams being picked up by professional teams. Blizzard Entertainment has founded an official Overwatch League for professional, salaried players.[40]
Team Fortress 2
Team Fortress 2 is a class-based shooter that has been played in several online leagues, notably ESEA League, RGL, UGC League, ETF2L, Ozfortress and Asiafortress in a 6vs6 format and a Highlander League 9vs9 format. The game has made appearances at DreamHack due to support from Razer Arena[41] Team Fortress 2 has also held annual international LAN events at the Multiplay Insomnia Gaming Festival during the summer since 2012.
Rainbow Six: Siege
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege is the first esports game in the series. Official competitions of Rainbows Six Siege is Rainbow Six Pro League run by ESL[42] and Ubisoft.[43] Recently ESL hosted the Rainbow Six Siege ESL[42] 2022 Six Invitational, in which Team SoloMid were crowned the winners.
Alliance of Valiant Arms
Alliance of Valiant Arms (A.V.A) was a first-person shooter most popular in Asia. Developer Aeria Games sponsored a world championship, and there were also some other independent offline events held. The game shut down in 2018, as well as its successor one year later.[44]
Special Force II
Valorant
Valorant is the first first-person shooter released by Riot Games in 2020. Currently the majority of Valorant events are organized by Riot.
Multiplayer online battle arena
Multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) games are historically a spin-off of real-time strategy games, but are different enough that they are now generally considered a separate genre. While traditional RTS games feature many units controlled by a single player, MOBAs are typically team focused, the model being five players on a team, each controlling a single "hero" unit. MOBAs are generally played on personal computers.
League of Legends
Riot announced a prize pool of US$5 million to be paid out over Season 2, allocated to tournaments featuring League of Legends.
In season 3, the total prize pool was US$8 million.
Dota 2
To ensure that enough Defense of the Ancients players would take up Dota 2 and to promote the game to a new audience, Valve invited sixteen accomplished Defense of the Ancients
By the end of 2011, Dota 2 was already one of the highest-paying esport games, second only to
Dota 2's influence in the Southeast Asia (SEA) region has been steadily growing, with key events marking its progress. The Manila Major in 2016, the first Major held in SEA, was a turning point, showcasing the region's passion for esports. Moving ahead to 2023, the region's enthusiasm for the game is further emphasized with the introduction of the Bali Major.[citation needed] These events not only highlight the growth of Dota 2 in SEA but also its significant impact on the global esports scene.
Smite
Smite is a third-person MOBA developed and published by Hi-Rez Studios. Prior to release, Smite was kept in an extended beta that resulted in over 74 million hours of playtime and the realization of a robust competitive community.[71] Throughout the beta, Hi-Rez hosted a series of LAN and online events with cash prize pools.[72] Smite was officially released in North America and western Europe on March 25, 2014.
The weekend following its release, Hi-Rez hosted a Smite Launch Tournament in Atlanta where the eight best teams from Europe and North America played for a prize pool of over US$200,000, half of which was raised by the community from sales of a character skin.
In May 2014, Hi-Rez announced the Smite World Championship Series (SWC). The SWC began with three months of regional qualifiers, which culminated into two separate US$50,000 regional LAN events for Europe and North America.[77] The SWC took place on January 9–11, 2015 at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in Atlanta, and featured a prize pool of US$2,612,260, raised from the community through the sale of digital cosmetics and special edition items. The World Championship featured teams from North America, Europe, China, Brazil, and Latin America.[78] After several matches, the North American team COGnitive Prime (Now Cloud9 G2A) took 1st place earning US$1,306,130, with Titan, a European team who began their run to the SMITE World Championship in the open amateur scene, coming in second place.[79] Afterwards, much like the Smite Launch Tournament, a branded cosmetic skin was released to honor COGnitive Prime and an invitational competition scheduled in their name.[80]
Heroes of the Storm
Heroes of the Storm is crossover multiplayer online battle arena game, developed and published by Blizzard Entertainment, released on June 2, 2015. Heroes Global Championship (HGC) was main esports event in 2017 and 2018, until Blizzard's cancellation of all its plans for tournaments in 2019.[81] However, Tespa Collegiate series continued to support Heroes of the Storm competitive scene.[82]
Vainglory
Vainglory is a multiplayer online battle arena released for iOS and then released for Android, Microsoft Windows, and macOS. Developed and published by Super Evil Megacorp (SEMC), Vainglory has attracted some interest as an esports game, including the sponsorship of a team by SK Gaming.[83] It boasted the largest prize money awarded for a mobile game with $350,000 from tournaments around the world in Fall 2015.[84]
Arena of Valor
. The game first released on October 14, 2016.
Arena of Valor tournaments have been held in numerous regions, with each region having their own local leagues such as Garena Challenger Series Pro League (GCS) in Taiwan, Realm of Valor Pro League (RPL) in Thailand, Arena of Glory (AOG) in Vietnam, Arena of Valor Star League (ASL) in Indonesia, Arena of Valor: Valor Cup (AVC) in Malaysia, Singapore and Philippines, Arena of Valor: Valor Series (AVS) in Europe, North America, and Latin America, and Arena of Valor Japan League (AJL) in Japan.
Arena of Valor also has two annual world championship tournaments; Arena of Valor International Championship (AIC) and Arena of Valor World Cup (AWC). AIC is a tournament where teams from across the world participate to earn profit and glory for their own esport organisation, while AWC is a tournament where teams participate under the banner of their national flag to represent their own country.
The first AIC was held in South Korea from November 23 to November 26, 2017. The event attracted more than 36,000,000 online viewers, breaking mobile game records worldwide and has since become the leading standard of mobile eSports. The game occupying the top positions of mobile game rankings in Asia for months has also received the honor of Google Play's Best of 2017 Game award in Europe.[85] The second AIC tournament was held in Thailand from November 23 to December 16, 2018. The tournament increased the number of competing teams to 16, with teams competing for the title and a proportion of the prize pool worth $600,000 (£460,000).[86] The third AIC tournament was also held in Thailand from November 5 to November 24, 2019. It featured an additional all-new 1v1 competition, where one player represents each team and the winner walking away with $5,000.[87]
The first Arena of Valor World Cup (AWC) tournament was held in Los Angeles, United States, from July 17 to July 28, 2018.[88] A total prize pool of $500,000 made AWC one of the largest mobile eSports tournaments in gaming history. A total of nine regions competed for the grand prize, which includes Taiwan - Hong Kong - Macau, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia - Singapore - Philippines, Indonesia, South Korea, North America, Latin America and Europe. Additionally, the tournament host selected three Wildcard teams to participate in AWC.[citation needed] The second AWC tournament was held in Danang, Vietnam, from June 27 to July 14, 2019, with the same total prize pool of $500,000.[89][90] The second AWC also marks Japan's first participation in an AOV international tournament since the game introduced their Japanese server on November 30, 2018.[91][92]
The third Arena of Valor World Cup for 2020 was canceled due to COVID-19 pandemic.[93][94]
Mobile Legends: Bang Bang
Racing
Formula 1 official games
The Formula One official games, currently being developed by Codemasters, has hosted many series, some of which are officially endorsed by Formula One, such as the Formula One Esports Series and Virtual Grand Prix, a series of races involving several real-life motorsport racers and global celebrities created to substitute the cancelled Formula One Grands Prix during the COVID-19 pandemic.[96]
Gran Turismo Sport
iRacing
NASCAR hosts an affiliated annual video game competition since 2010 known as the NASCAR iRacing.com World Championship Series, which had a grand prize of US$10,500 in 2011.[98]
Trackmania
Trackmania has had a competitive scene since 2006, when Trackmania Nations ESWC was released for ESWC 2006. Between 2006 and 2020, the game's prize pools consistently dwindled although the game continued to draw crowds at live events such as the ZrT cup and ESWC. Since 2020, when the series' most recent iteration, Trackmania, released, the esports scene has seen a revitalization with the debut of the developer organized Trackmania Grand League. The Grand League consists of three tiers of play and it runs two seasons each year with the Trackmania Grand League World Cup run in the offseason.[99]
Project CARS
rFactor 2
rFactor 2 had hosted the Formula E Race at Home Challenge, which was involving Formula E drivers, as well as several pro eSports players. The virtual tournament was broadcast on various Formula E social channels along with selected television partners.[101]
Kart Rider
Real-time strategy
Competitions involving traditional
StarCraft
StarCraft was used at several tournaments including the Professional Gamers League. However, its expansion pack StarCraft: Brood War was far more popular than the original.[102]
StarCraft: Brood War was foundational in the establishment of esports, and along with StarCraft II, remains among the most popular series in competitive gaming. StarCraft competitions did especially well in South Korea, which remains central to the competitive scene as a whole. Professionals in Korea achieved a status similar to professional athletes.[103] In the west, StarCraft enjoyed significantly less competitive popularity. StarCraft was the very first game to have been accepted into the World Cyber Games tournament, and had a tournament at their events every year until it was replaced by StarCraft II in 2011.[104] In Korea, prominent StarCraft competitions included the Ongamenet Starleague, the MBCGame StarCraft League, and Proleague. Finals for these league attracted tens of thousands of fans, and became very popular on Korean cable TV.
StarCraft II
After its release in 2010, StarCraft II competitions gradually replaced the prior Brood War competitions. For example, StarCraft II has replaced the original game in the WCG, and the initially Brood War-focused Proleague mixed StarCraft II into their competitions, before finally phasing out Brood War entirely. Initially, disagreements between Blizzard and Kespa prevented many players in Korea from moving to StarCraft II, but conditions improved, and were ultimately resolved by 2012.
Many leagues and esports organizations in Korea and across the world host StarCraft II tournaments, including the
In 2012, Blizzard Entertainment created the StarCraft II World Championship Series. In the tournament's initial 2012 season, Korean player PartinG beat Creator to win the $100,000 grand prize.[105] As of 2013, the WCS system divides players into three leagues: WCS Korea, WCS Europe, and WCS North America. Players earn points based on their performance in many different tournaments, including the ones mentioned above, and the 16 players with the most points advance to world championship at BlizzCon.[106] In the 2013 grand finals, sOs beat the crowd favorite Jaedong 4–1, winning the $100,000 grand prize.[107] The 2nd-place finish for Jaedong awarded him $45,000, making his total prizepool earnings $489,384.83, the highest of any esports player at that time.
Warcraft III
Sports games
FIFA series
Furthermore, the
Madden
The Madden NFL series of American football games has been used as esports. Game developer Electronic Arts sponsored a $1 million Madden NFL 17 Championship Series.[112] The television series Madden Nation was an American reality television show, created as a joint effort between EA SPORTS and ESPN Original Entertainment and focused on the competitive scene of Madden.
NBA 2K
In February 2017, the National Basketball Association, in conjunction with Take-Two Interactive, announced the creation of an esports league centering on the NBA 2K franchise called the NBA 2K League. It began play in 2018.[113][114][115]
Pro Evolution Soccer
Rocket League
Third-person shooters
Gears of War
PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds
Garena Free Fire
Splatoon 2
Splatoon 2 is an online multiplayer third-person shooter developed and published by Nintendo. Official tournaments have been hosted and streamed on YouTube[119] by Nintendo since 2017[120] until 2020. Official tournaments have included players from Japan,[121] North America,[122] Europe,[123] Australia and New Zealand.[124] There is also an active non-official online community which hosts tournaments across the world, a notable host being LUTI (Leagues Under the Ink).[125]
Card games
Hearthstone
Shadowverse
Shadowverse is a digital collectible card game by Cygames released in 2016. Cygame along with Avex Inc. hosts seasonal esport tournaments for the game, including annual World Grand Prix. The game also has its own pro league.
Magic: The Gathering Arena
In 2021, discontinuation of professional Magic league was announced.[132]
Others
Pokémon
The Pokémon series of strategy video games are played competitively.[133] A Pokémon Company-sponsored world championship organized by their Play! Pokémon division has been held annually for several years.
Puyo Puyo
Puyo Puyo was approved as an esports game by the Japanese esports Union in March 2018. The first esports tournament for the game was held during Sega Fest 2018 from April 14 to April 15 of the same year.[134]
Tetris
There is a Classic Tetris World Championship for the puzzle game Tetris.
War Thunder
War Thunder (WT) is a cross-platform MMO combat game for PC, PS4, Mac and Linux, dedicated to World War II military aviation, armoured vehicles, and fleets developed by Gaijin Entertainment that was first released in 2012. War Thunder held the first season of its Thunder League tournament in late 2015.[135] The tournament prize fund was directly funded by the players of game through the purchase of special in game goods, with the final prize pool reaching a sum of $57,425 distributed between 6 teams.
World of Tanks
World of Warcraft
Blizzard's
Clash Royale
Clash of Clans
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft's Excel is a proprietary spreadsheet program that was adapted for esports use in the Excel World Championship, in which contestants (most of whom are in the mathematics and financial services industries that rely on spreadsheets as part of their jobs) need to solve a series of "cases" within a set time frame. The Excel World Championship was televised on ESPN2 as part of the network's ESPN8 The Ocho block of unusual competitive programming beginning in 2022.[145]
Geoguessr
See also
- List of video game genres
- Mind sport
- Video games notable for speedrunning
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