The End of the Gaming House Era

With the current trend towards professionalism in a bid to legitimise the scene, the esports industry has been consistently moving away from some of its previous successes. The most recent change is the move away from gaming houses and into multi-million-dollar, state of the art facilities. Does this mean it is truly the end of the esports gaming house era? Many of the big organisations such as TSM, Team Liquid, EnVy, OpTic and 100 Thieves have all revealed their own takes on the new trend of gaming facilities over the past 2 years. Whether it is a place for their teams to practice, content rooms or front-end shops for merchandise, these facilities are considered the peak of an organisation’s success. Although these facilities are truly incredible and emphasize the huge growth that the industry has had, old esports fans will no doubt miss the old gaming houses.

Gaming houses were some of the first steps to legitimise esport brands. The idea was to put your team’s players and content creators in houses together, with the main motive being to promote team building, friendship and create content. At the forefront of this trend were TSM, one of North America’s most famous League of Legends brands and OpTic Gaming, the biggest name in Call of Duty esports. Teams realised early on that they could use the houses to create vlogs and documentaries following their teams in the houses and their daily interactions. Viewers got to see unprecedented behind the scenes footage of their favourite players in a way that had only ever been seen before in reality TV. Seeing the friendships and funny moments alongside the hardships and struggles made it feel like fans could get to know their favourite players in a deeper way. This ultimately led to these teams creating die hard fanbases and was no doubt one of the big factors behind the early growth of the esports industry.

Sadly, with the move of the scene to legitimise itself and becoming more professional, gaming houses are slowly becoming a thing of the past. The new gaming facilities are seeing organisations invest millions of dollars to create their own takes on the trend. These facilities are hugely popular with players and content creators who want to separate their work from their homes and move away from gaming in their bedrooms. Having an office or space to go to seemingly creates a much better work ethic and helps normalise a very irregular industry. Many creators have spoken about this, for example in OpTic where many of the creators would rather go to the “Heczquarters” to stream/practice then stay at home. The sense of normality is most likely a great way for creators and players to avoid burnout or feeling lonely/isolated.

This is certainly not the only reason that organisations are moving to create these facilities. While gaming houses served as the original medium for the organisations to create content, the desire for content from fans has not slowed down now organisations have moved away from houses. In fact, esports content is continually booming, and more organisations than ever are creating documentary series following their players and teams. Gaming facilities offer an even better medium than the gaming houses ever did in one single way, and that is quality. Having actual studios built into the facilities means organisations can ensure they the are creating the best and most consistent content possible. A great example of this is seeing 100 Thieves investing millions of dollars on their studio to have LED screens in the background as well as state of the art cameras, lighting and microphones. All these features mean that any videos posted by the organisations are extremely professional and are beginning to rival television standards of quality. The reason for doing this is very obvious – to incentivise sponsors and investments.

Whilst the scene is continuing to grow, there is space to argue this huge push for professionalism is all for naught. Could one argue the scene’s unique nature means it does not need to be as professional as other industries? It is sad as a fan who grew up with the content from the old gaming houses to see them becoming a thing of the past. Nostalgia alone makes me personally miss the old content style that came out of the houses. But nostalgia will not grow the industry, and it is impossible to argue with the package that gaming facilities are providing. I think there is an interesting balance being struck between growth of business and fan service. Ultimately with the money invested, organisations clearly see the facilities as the future. But is the move towards professionalism killing esports? I will be investigating this in future blogs, so be sure to keep an eye out for those pieces.