Competitive Gaming

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Competitive Gaming is like an adventure in a big open world game where you can explore a lot of different areas and get in touch with a lot of different competitions with different fighting styles.The competitive gaming community is getting wider and wider and there is a variety of possibilities in taking part in this community. What happened to be a "nerdy" thing, playing a game for weeks in the basement with yourself emerges and forms a bigger challenge for players all over the world. Every player can take part in this competition to demonstrate their skills and to show their power.

Introduction

Training Mode: How to Competitive Gaming?

Competitive Gaming is a game mode mainly connecting to multiplayer-based video games, where players compete with each other in different types of game mechanics, skillsets and settings.

The spectrum of competitive gaming interconnects with the wide field of video games in various sections. Often associated with professional monetized e-sports tournaments in first place, competitive gaming can be located in way more casual or intermediate gaming circumstances. There is a variety of types of gaming for competitive gaming like MMORPGs, MOBA (Massive Online Battle Arena), Browser Games, Casual Games, Strategy Games, Fighting Games, Racing Simulation or Sports Games. Other types are: Hot Seat, LAN-Party or Online-Mulitplayer Sessions.

In the scientific and professional literature on video games competitive gaming is lacking profound research and recognition. ^[1]

The Story behind: Competitive Gaming History

With the game Spacewar! the AI Labs in Stanford University in Silicon Valley started the first tournament in October 1972. Atari followed 8 years later with first major game tournament. In the 1980's there were a lot of tournaments coming up and in the 1990's the emerging of the home consoles changed the accessibility for players. They could play in the arcade halls or at home. Great game like Counter-Strike or Starcraft initiated a new era in the 2000's. Intel Extreme Masters or Major League Gaming started their tournaments. With the launch of Twitch TV and other Live- Streaming platforms for gameplay the viewers and players could watch from all over the world. With League of Legends ´, Fortnite and Dota 2 the competitive gaming world is still expanding.^[2]

Connected Research Approach

Round 1: Professional Electronic Sports

E-sports is a big industry which hosts worldwide tournaments in stadiums with millions of viewers in local or at home. Professional video gamer fight as single player or in teams competitions against other gamer or other teams. The tournaments are not just for amusement but first for money and prestige and admiration.^[3] As like the winner or the winning team takes it all. These tournaments One can discuss how durable these tournaments or this phenomenon are. Genres which are most viewed are MOBA, fighting games, first-person shooters and real-time strategy. For watching the e-sport events there are platforms like Twitch, YouTube or Mixer.^[4]

One can discuss how such events are produced and what influence teams or games have. There are also possibilities for the figure of the gamer. They have all nicknames and there are teams from all over the world. In some countries there are schools for e-sports, so there is a training for player. They are trained for competition like for example football players train for the next game. Even the football clubs have not just their teams for championships like champions league or the national division, there are also teams for e-sport for FIFA for example. So the gamer do not just coming upstairs from their basement gaming, they are demonstrating their skills and take part in competition all over the world and the identify maybe more with their skills and their fans. Even admitting that they play video games and getting hyped for it is different as it was in the past. They show their membership or their belonging to a game and a team and they take part in big produced events where sponsors invest a lot of money.

One can assume that professional competitive player gain higher skills for example like problem solving, prosocial behavior or enhanced short term-memory as in other areas or professions.^[5]

Round 2: Spirit of Competition

Thinking of the word competition we should get closer to the origin of the greek's word agon. It means competition, contest or challenge. Roger Caillois uses four classifications for games: Agon (football or Billiard), Alea (Roulette), Mimicry (acting Hamlet or a pirate) and Ilinx (dizziness or vertigo).^[6]For competition there is to consider, what game or play mean because it is a difficulty in describing. There are different theories through the history to study. For example Plato located play in relation to education, Schiller searched play in being human, and Huizinga ascribed play as a forming culture function. So how is competition part of a game or play? Discussing the fact that a game is more based of rules and play is free and childish, there is even to differ in the meaning of words. Using again agon and Caillois again, for a fight or a competition, an equality of opportunity should be given, hence there are the best conditions.^[7] According to Joël Kaczmarek all the contestants have the same chances. The competition or rivalry is at a high point.There are the attributes of sport: like a competition in the real world^[8] like football or athletics.^[9] By searching a way to the competition in competitive gaming, we have to consider these aspects. Game and play have a long tradition. Huizinga as mentioned sees play with shaping function. Moreover he described some rules and boundaries for play. There is a time setting, a limited area and there are rules.^[10]Games and Rules seem to be connected. Hence there are ways of cheating.

For competitive gaming, next to the tournament's area or hall, besides we have the home of the gamers as an area of fighting for the competitive gamers at home.

There is a variety of fighting forms: against the game or against the boss in the game which maybe is another entity of the game, against other players or teams and their avatars and against yourself.

Round 3: Cheating

There seems to be a long tradition of cheating, which is connected to the history of games. Why is it that players want to cheat or use some cheats for their pleasure of gaming or their successful outcome? In Mia Consalvo's essay about cheating, the practice of cheating is stated as not easily identified or defined.There is also a conflict for players with cheating, but there are practices or events definitely marked as cheating in the eyes of players or developers while cheating is developing in a new way.^[11] By thinking of cheating there are different forms, so for example using cheats to get a lot of money for building a big house with full furniture for example in The Sims 4. One can also disturb a player while they are taking part in a racing simulation. There is also the question if cheating is always negative? Can cheating generate new forms of gaming or what if all the players in the gaming round would use cheats? There could be a contest just about cheating. And what is with modding? Is it also like cheating or do the modders participate as developers in the game? Because some games exist because one modder acted and the industry tightened.

Round 4: Violence in Games

Players and non-players discuss these terms. They seem to emerge out of the videogames and their players. How to use violence for a game and how to eliminate the violence so there is a safe area for the players.

What are the effects of gaming? Is there always violence in games? Aesthetics of violence?

Competitive Gaming

From GameLabWiki

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