A Spectator Sport

When I was growing up I would occasionally find myself watching one of my friends play a video game for brief periods of time if it wasn't a multi-player game or just didn't interest me that much but I never really went out of my way to sit down and watch someone else play a game. More often than not I'd vastly prefer to play the game myself rather than just watch someone else do it for me. However, nowadays we have seen a massive surge in the popularity of spectating games of all kinds; anything from multi-player games like Starcraft 2 or League of Legends to single player hits such as Amnesia: The Dark Descent.

Why would anyone want to watch these things? Well I find myself particularly attracted to watching certain "Lets Plays" by various people on YouTube, my personal favorite is Cry. I find these interesting simply because they aren't games I would normally play. I also enjoy the commentary on these videos as they add to the experience.

The recent surge in "Lets Plays" on YouTube has also created careers for the more successful channels, the most popular one reaching upwards of two million subscribers (Tobuscus/PewDiePie). More popular YouTube channels can enter into a partnership with YouTube that allows them to profit off of their videos and they are quite profitable when each video can hit over several hundred thousand views.

In addition to YouTube there are also sites like Twitch.tv that allow gamers to stream their gaming sessions live to large groups of people. This format is much more common for multi-player games as the appeal is wider.

Another point of interest is the developing world of e-sports which offers some hefty prizes (The World Championship prize for League of Legends was three million dollars). These kinds of games are extremely competitive and other players watch and follow specific gaming teams in the same way one might follow a sports team.

I'm interested to see where things go from here as we move forward with competitive gaming. With new games coming out so frequently there will continue to be an increase in content for people to spectate and enjoy.