Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

On October 8, when the "Digital Torchbearer" reappeared, the sacred flame of the Asian Games was slowly extinguished, and the Hangzhou Asian Games came to a successful conclusion.

The Asian Games officially entered Nagoya time as representatives of Aichi Nagoya, the host of the next Asian Games, took over the flag of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) from acting President Raja Randhir Singh.

In July this year, e-sports was confirmed by the Olympic Council of Asia as the official event of the next Asian Games, but the specific items have not yet been determined. "who will be selected for the next Asian Games" will be a topic of concern for all e-competitors in the next few years.

The first show of "e-sports entering Asia" is perfect.

E-sports became an official event for the first time in the Hangzhou Asian Games. Arena of Valor Asian Games version, Football online 4, Jieba 5, Game for Peace Asian Games version, Mengsanguo 2, League of Legends and Dao Pagoda gave birth to a total of 7 gold medals. Among them, the Chinese team got a good result of four gold medals and one bronze medal, ranking first in the gold medal table and medal table.

More importantly, e-sports entered Asia for the first time, not only adding gold and silver to all participating countries in the medal table, but also demonstrating the charm of digital sports to a wider audience in Asia.

During the e-sports competition of the Asian Games, no matter which event was held on the main stage, the e-sports Center in Hangzhou, China, was very popular. Inside the venue, e-sports enthusiasts with families can be seen everywhere, or fresh and curious journalists at home and abroad. Outside the venues, e-sports games through CCTV, South Korea KBS and other mainstream media live reports, walked to the home of the public.

From venues to direct broadcasting, all aspects of e-sports have reached the standards of the Asian Games, online and offline to provide the audience with a good "first experience of e-sports in the Asian Games". With the success of e-sports in this Asian Games, more head e-sports events are expected to be on the stage of official events in the Asian Games.

Who's next?

Looking at Asia, e-sports are showing a trend of rapid development in all regions. Some e-sports events may not have been selected for the Hangzhou Asian Games, but their own influence should not be underestimated.

The Dauntless contract, a tactical shooting game, has swept the world in the past few years. Relying on the mature e-sports system of the fist game, the fearless contract has attracted the attention of many e-sports enthusiasts since the closed test. According to the statistics of overseas live streaming platforms by data organization Esports Charts, the 2022 Dauntless contract Global Championship will be in the top 10 in terms of viewing time and peak audience, holding e-sports 's head position in the PC game.

In the list of the most popular e-sports events in the world, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (referred to as MLBB), as the representative of Mobile e-sports, has achieved remarkable results. In January this year, the peak audience of the fourth MLBB Global Finals (M4) reached 4.27 million, making it one of the overseas viewing history TOP3 of e-sports events. As of today, this result still ranks first in the global e-sports competition in 2023.

As a mobile MOBA, e-sports, MLBB has more than 100 million monthly active users and has a large user base in Southeast Asia, South Asia, Central Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, Eastern Europe, Turkey and Mongolia. The total viewing time of the professional league MPL Indonesia in the 12th season exceeded 100 million hours, making it the longest watched national mobile e-sports professional league in the world (except China).

If ranked according to the number of peak audiences, MLBB's MPL League, Southeast Asian Cup and Southeast Asian Games all attracted more than 2 million people, directly winning the 2nd to 4th place on the list, which can be called one of the hottest mobile e-sports events overseas.

In the Southeast Asian Games, MLBB was successfully selected as the official medal event in 2019, 2021 and 2022, and the viewing data has been ahead of other e-sports events at the meeting. In the 31st and 32th Southeast Asian Games, more than half of e-sports 's watching time was contributed by MLBB.

The MLBB women's event at the 32nd Southeast Asian Games this year received a lot of attention, with a peak of 1.36 million viewers, breaking the global record for women's e-sports events on overseas live streaming platforms. After returning home after winning the championship, the Indonesian women's team was received by Indonesian President Joko and won the gold medal and honorary prize issued by the state.

Indonesian President Joko Meets members of MLBB Women's National team

The Southeast Asian Games and the Asian Games are also under the jurisdiction of the Olympic Council of Asia. So for the Olympic Council of Asia, MLBB is not a completely unfamiliar project. The precedent and experience of being selected for many comprehensive sports events in Asia will naturally be seriously considered by the people concerned.

Asian "National e-sports" is expected to compete in the Nagoya Asian Games.

In the knife tower final of the Hangzhou Asian Games, the Chinese team beat Mongolia 2-1 to win the gold medal. The strength of the Mongolian national team left a deep impression on everyone.

In Mongolia, where e-sports 's atmosphere is becoming more and more intense, nearly 20 per cent of the total population of 3.35 million are playing MLBB, and a group of dreamers have emerged.

In order to improve its own level, Mongolia's first MLBB professional e-sports team, Positive Gaming, has gone to Turkey, Southeast Asia and other places for training and international competitions many times under the sponsorship of domestic businessmen, which is known as "the Hope of Mongolia MLBB e-sports".

By the end of September this year, the Mongolian wild card competition of the MLBB M5 World Finals attracted more than 6000 applicants from more than 1000 teams. The offline final was held in UG Arena, one of Mongolia's largest indoor sports and entertainment centers, and more than 2000 spectators witnessed the birth of the Mongolian team, far exceeding expectations for Mongolia's e-sports.

Outside of Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore, Indonesia and the Philippines, MLBB has almost become one of the most extensive e-sports projects covering Asia and even the world. In Mongolia, Nepal, Kazakhstan and other Asian countries, as well as Eastern Europe, Turkey, Latin America and other regions of the world, MLBB e-sports has become a popular sports and cultural project for local people.

In Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city in Central Asia, the MCC S2 playoffs just ended on October 8. This is the first MLBB offline professional event in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, and the number of peak spectators has doubled compared to S1. Nearly 2500 e-sports enthusiasts are still cheering for the team in the stadium at 1: 00 in the morning.

In the Middle East and North Africa, the MPL MENA League covers 21 countries, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait and Iraq. This year's spring finals began in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, with Team Occupy from Egypt winning the championship and a ticket to the MLBB Southeast Asian Cup.

If you pay close attention to the international events of pupil, the participating teams are not limited to Southeast Asia, where MLBB is traditionally strong. In Mongolia, Central Asia, the Middle East and even the Americas, more and more emerging markets are being integrated into the e-sports family of MLBB.

In May this year, the first MLBB North American League ended successfully in Las Vegas. This spring competition attracted a total of 96 teams from North America, and the champion was finally won by BloodThirstyKings, the top four M3 teams. The autumn champions belong to TheOhioBrothers, who will represent North America in the M5 World Finals at the end of the year.

The growing international influence has prompted more global third-party events to choose MLBB as the event. On September 3 this year, the IESF 2023 World Championships ended in Romania. More than 50 countries around the world have signed up for IESF's MLBB project, and Gamers8, commonly known as the Saudi "Oil Cup", has also included the Asia-Pacific qualifying tournament into the event. Through the selection of continental competitions, 16 MLBB national teams finally came to Romania to participate in offline competitions, and the highest number of online viewers at the finals exceeded 700000, setting a record for the highest ratings of this year's IESF e-sports tournament.

With strong e-sports ratings, mature competition system and broad mass base, MLBB, which has deeply cultivated the Asian market, has handed over a resume that can not be ignored to the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA).

E-sports went out to sea: e-sports of China stepped onto the international stage

In recent years, China's e-sports has actively gone abroad. E-sports enterprises push their products and events overseas as a whole, constantly expanding the influence of e-sports of China.

Take NetEase as an example, there is not only the robbery Cup with a total prize pool of more than 1.5 million US dollars as the flagship event, but also a series of regional competitions such as the European Shadow Jade Cup, the North American Heavenly Man Cup and the Asian Invitational tournament. The Wild Operation, which also belongs to NetEase, also successfully held Knives Out Pro League in Japan at the beginning of this year.

Tencent's PUBGM / Game for Peace project also has a broad mass base in Asia. From Chengdu, China to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, S-level international competitions such as PMGC and PMWI have left the mark of e-sports of China in all parts of Asia over the past few years.

Behind the MLBB, which is popular all over Asia and even the world, is also from Chinese game manufacturers-pupil technology.

Starting from December 2017, mu pupil e-sports gradually walked out of Southeast Asia and began to build a "globalized" international e-sports system. He was also one of the first batch of Chinese manufacturers to "e-sports go to sea".

At that time, e-sports in Southeast Asia was in the ascendant. In the process of promoting MLBB and establishing MPL league, the pupil combines the experience of e-sports of China with the actual local situation to popularize e-sports 's knowledge, improve infrastructure, cultivate relevant talents, and help establish the local e-sports ecosystem.

From the first grass-roots event held in the mall to now more than 80 international teams and more than 500 professional e-sports players around the world, hosting more than 600 games a year, pupil has created a professional, international and ecologically rich e-sports competition system. Thanks to the popularity of MLBB, more people began to understand e-sports, and more countries formed a good atmosphere to support e-sports 's development.

Perhaps some Chinese e-sports enthusiasts will worry that once MLBB is selected into the Asian Games, the mature MPL e-sports system and talent reserve of Asian countries may make the Chinese team's road to gold medal face greater challenges.

Fortunately, there has been news in April this year, Mu pupil got the version number of MOBA product "win the pinnacle" in China. I believe that the game is not far from the meeting of Chinese users.

The fifth MLBB World Finals (M5) will also welcome the debut of the Chinese team for the first time. Of the eight places in the M5 wild card competition, one will be given to the Chinese team, which is also the first time that a Chinese team has stepped onto the MLBB world stage.

The Chinese team's participation in the M5 wild card competition is just the beginning. "everyone is looking forward to the Chinese team joining the MLBB global e-sports system, because in history, no matter which e-sports project China participates in, they will be very competitive." Andrew Cheong, creator of Malaysian e-sports content, told people e-sports.

Reviewing the seven e-sports events of the Hangzhou Asian Games, no matter from the point of view of manufacturers or athletes, China occupies the head position in Asia. Three years later, at the Asian Games in Nagoya, Aichi, more Chinese e-sports products represented by MLBB are expected to be selected in the Asian Games. It is believed that e-sports 's social attention and fierce competition in the Asian Games will rise again.

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