Ukrainians are building an e-sports arena in California: what they will play there

Dota, Counter-Strike, Fortnite are popular video games. They are not only a hobby for teenagers, but also a new kind of sport. Everything here is the same as in football or boxing: teams or individual cyber players undergo long training, compete in the arena for prizes, and cry from victories or defeats, he says "Voice of America".

During the pandemic, eSports is gaining popularity even more rapidly. Companies that organize and broadcast e-sports tournaments on the Internet earn millions of dollars in advertising and compete for championship. And one of these companies is the Ukrainian-American Weplay Esports, whose founders have been living between Kiev and Los Angeles for a year.

“In 2020, a virtual field was added to the sports that humanity had in the past. When the internal combustion engine was invented, a sport related to cars was added - Formula 1. The same thing happens in esports. We have one team or one player, a second team or player and the task is to win. Only we don’t have grass on the football field, but grass on the field at Doti,” says Yuri Lazebnikov, co-founder of the company.

Yuri says that on some days this sport can be watched by tens of millions of spectators simultaneously. Although most viewing takes place online, eSports tournaments have real arenas where teams gather and experts commentate on the game during breaks. And Weplay's job is to make these breaks interesting for viewers.

“Most of the companies that are now in esports come from the gaming industry. We differ from them in that 90 percent of our production team are people from television, cinema, and theater,” says Maxim Bilogonov, general producer of the company.

Photo: video frame YouTube / Voice of America. Ukrainian

For example, at the international Dota-2 tournament in Bukovel, the spectators were shown trembits, and the presenters drank cocoa in Christmas sweaters. Another Dota tournament was held in the style of the Greek gods.

“Say, if a tournament takes place on Valentine’s Day, we go into the studio, and our commentators, analysts, all in pajamas, are lying on a pink sofa. If it’s James Bond, then the studio is in tuxedos and the band is playing jazz,” says Maxim.

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The more people watch the game, the more advertisers are interested in broadcasting. So, after the coronavirus, the company began to produce 4 times more content. Esports has become the only sport not affected by the pandemic. A year ago, the company decided to expand its geography and began building an arena in Los Angeles.

“America is one of the largest markets in the world, and the situation is similar for esports. Firstly, when we chose how we would locate our central offices, we considered countries where transparent work would be possible from the point of view of the interests of the investor,” says Oleg Krot, co-founder of the company.

And it all started with one computer club in Troyeshchina.

“I have loved computer games since childhood, at some point people who played the same game began to get together. Usually it was in computer clubs. We played all night as part of a championship that we created ourselves. That is, it was a group of people who loved games and, thanks to their organizational skills, became the center of the local community and were then able to transform this into a business,” says Oleg.

Now advertisers such as Pepsi and McDonald's are signing deals with them. The founders of the company themselves say: esports has a great future. Yuri Lazebnikov, who built a successful business long ago, still plays video games. Regarding the harm of gaming to humanity, Yuri replies, they say, this is nothing more than a prejudice.

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“When a person plays Counterstrike or Dota, two hours later the same person can take his bike, ball or surfboard and go outside for a ride, or invite a guy or girl to the cinema. And these will be analog things. It’s just that another type of entertainment has been added, and there’s nothing wrong with that,” explains Yuri.

In the near future, the company plans to host tournaments in Latin America, Brazil, China, and Australia. The Los Angeles arena is expected to go live this spring.

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