Important moments throughout the history of esports that share a glimpse of how the industry has grown and changed. Made for a senior capstone project.

1. October 19, 1972
Stanford University
Credit: Rolling Stone
Played on a Digital
Equipment Corporation
PDP-1 minicomputer,
mostly known for
programing.
Bruce Baumgart won in
the five-man-free-for-all
tournament
Tovar and Robert E. Maas
won the team
competition, making them
some of the first esports
athletes
The world’s first known video
gaming tournament was for
a game programmed by
three MIT alumni called
Spacewar!

2. November 10, 1980
Los Angeles, Time/Warner Building
Credit: La Nación
The Atari 2600 Space
Invaders National
Championship was the
earliest large scale
video game competition
backed by Atari.
Over 10,000 people
participated, but
Rebecca Heineman (a
Whittier, CA native)
became the national
champion and first
widely-recognized
esports athlete.
Taito Corporation’s Space
Invaders popularized the
use of a persistent high
score for all players

3. July 25, 1983
Ottumwa, Iowa
Credit: Variety, All In Color For a Quarter
Helped promote video
games by publicizing high
score records and helped
create the U.S. National
Video Game Team in 1983
Helped run competitions for
Guinness World Records,
which established the
competitive nature of
games as a viable form of
entertainment
Influenced the types of
promotional events that
would serve as the basis for
marketing within modern
esports today
Twin Galaxies was a high score
record-keeping organization
founded by Walter Day

4. May 1997
Credit: DondeQ2
Atlanta, Georgia
Quake (1996), the
successor to the wildly
successful shooter Doom
(1993), was one title that
exploded
The 1997 Red Annihilation
Tournament for Quake
was important because
esports champions, like
Dennis "Thresh" Fong,
garnered popular media
recognition
People saw the potential to
compare and compete with
players worldwide, and
not just within your inner
circle
Video games, especially PC
games, benefited from
internet connectivity
increasingly spreading across
the globe

5. Nov. 2002 - Mar. 2003
Credit: Panasonic OSL
South Korea
Cyber cafes sprouted
across the country = more
access to the medium and
larger competitive pool
Starcraft was a
phenomenon in South
Korea, so much that
corporations with extra
ad dollars bankrolled
esports events
Went from packing cafes
to packing stadiums
South Korean gaming
culture was further
developed because of the
mass building of broadband
Internet funded by the
government

6. Sept. 2006 - Nov. 2008
Credit: DirecTV Championship Gaming Series
United States
DirecTV launched their
Championship Gaming
Series, on their own
channel with their own
international league
Closed after two years
given corporations did not
yet know how to sustain
this gaming broadcast
product
Early lesson that gaming
wouldn't live on cable at
that time
The United States took note of
South Korea's esports ventures
and wanted to replicate that
success with Counter Strike, a
first-person shooter that drew
international attention.

7. June 6, 2011
United States + Global
There was also an
increase to the number
and scope of
tournaments
happening around the
world
Funneling millions into
broadcasting one
game across TV
channels wasn't
needed when online
platforms could host
multiple and do it for
free & with more
reach
This decade is marked by
the emergence of online
streaming services like
Twitch.tv

8. 2010-2020s
United States + Global
Nintendo, notoriously
known for cracking down
on tournaments for older
titles, hosted the Wii
Summer Games in 2014
Halo developers planned
and executed reviving
their esport scene through
the Halo Championship
series
Both Riot Games and
Blizzard Entertainment
invest in collegiate
outreach programs
Video game publishers started
to embrace the potential some
of their products had to be an
esport as people continued to
search for entertainment