Esports: an overview of a new(ish) frontier in digital entertainment
photo: © Riot Games
Pardon me: an e-…what?
According to the definition in the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, an esport is “a video game played as a competition for people to watch as entertainment”. Albeit with some approximation, this definition captures the essence of the phenomenon and helps us introduce this first very important point: any videogame (whether it’s a virtual simulation of a traditional sporting activity or not) can be an esport.