Of the top 100 players in terms of prize earnings, what game do you think most competitors got their money from?
Perhaps StarCraft, one of the first modern esports that’s been around forever. Maybe fighting games, as they seem to have tournaments every day around the world and EVO 2019 was massive. Surely League of Legends tops the charts as they’ve been selling out olympic stadiums for years. Maybe Fortnite is up there; didn’t that one kid win $3 million? Actually, according to esrportsearnings.com’s statistics, 82 of the top 100 players got their earnings from Valve games, mostly DOTA 2.
According to esrportsearnings.com, of the top 30 players in terms of prize earnings, 29 of the are Dota 2 players.
Although Valve games have a significant viewership, that alone doesn’t explain the tens of millions of dollars they give out in prizes each year. In fact, only a small percentage of the prize pool comes from the company.
So, where does the rest come from? From you, you the players, you, the ones who love to watch competitions, some more than others. Everyone can contribute to keeping their favorite game alive for much longer than the average esport. And the way is simple; the way Valve uses which managed to top every prize in gaming history: crowdfunding.
The Fortnite World Cup had $30 million in prizes. The International 2019, DOTA 2’s world championship, had a prize pool of over $34 million and the base prizing was only $1.6 million. Valve pledged less than five percent of the total prize pool, ended up saving millions, topped the largest prized tournament in history shortly after Fortnite’s prizing was announced, and most importantly, made millions in sales.
That’s the important part to remember; the money doesn’t come from thin air. Players don’t directly contribute to the prizing, but a percentage of certain sales do go toward the prize pool, similar to how companies give small parts of their sales to charity during special events.
But again, this isn’t charity. All the money going into tournaments helps the developers in one way or another. The obvious primary benefit is sales. Business 101 dictates you’re a clown if you don’t get increased revenue during special events like Black Friday, clearance sales, and, you know, the yearly world championship of your game.
The secondary benefit, advertising, is increased through crowdfunding. Business 102 dictates if you have a stake in something, you’re more likely to participate in it. So, crowdfunding directly increases viewership, and you’ll probably get a few eyes when the million number comes up in casual advertising.
Well, why doesn’t Blizzard do this? It already does so for Masters Tours, but they don’t crowdfund other tournaments like the world championship, and support is capped at $250,000.
About three paragraphs ago you may have been wondering if this was a Hearthstone article. Don’t worry; I brought it back buddy.
So, why do they cap contributions and why do they only crowdfund for Masters Tours? Beats me, but I’d imagine it’s because they either don’t see a significant jump in sales, or more likely, they’re still experimenting and analyzing the numbers.
Well, let me tell you the things strict sales numbers don’t account for and why capping contributions is counter productive.
First, you have to understand competitive players are the best brand ambassadors you can ever ask for. They’re vocal, likely stream, and will literally fly across the world to play “a children’s card game™.” Their loyalty and love for the game can move product like nothing else.
And you know where a huge portion of these competitors reside? Twitter.
Every event, I see my Twitter feed blow up with players asking for support, luck and dank memes. Especially during tournaments where you can pick a player to support and win packs, my social media starts popping.
With capped crowdfunding, the goal is expected to be reached automatically, meaning there’s little incentive to mention it.
Now, imagine how Twitter and other social media will look like if crowdfunding is uncapped. ‘Watch me compete in the @PlayHearthstone Masters Tour and don’t forget to buy some packs to support ya boi!’ This is a world where professionals and competitive players are literally advertising sales for you. A world where you’re making stupid money because influencers are voluntarily advertising for free. Basically the fashion industry with extra steps.
And don’t you hate those pesky competitors and journalists complaining about not having travel costs covered? With the current system, every player is guaranteed $500 for just showing up. You know what’d be really cool? Getting double that just for signing in. Things large amounts of money can be used for in foreign environments include, but are not limited to: plane fare, baggage fees and other miscellaneous costs associated with bringing electronics to a tournament, lodging, short-term travel like taxis and ridesharing, access to locations for social media, food and other travel costs.
Travel expense is by far the number one complaint I hear about Masters Tours. I’m not sure, but providing more money directly or indirectly for travel may motivate more players to participate in tournaments.
Fornari, I’m sure they don’t sell enough merchandise to justify uncapping contributions.
Great, let me give you some ideas that will really get people spending money. First, let me just open my Masters Tour Vegas special packs, with my Masters Tour Seoul card back, that came with my Masters Tour Bucharest limited time promotional emote package, with my 2019 world championship game board, signed by Hunterace of course, with my legacy Grandmasters Warrior skin, while I hoard my celebrational esport arena tickets.
And you don’t even need to completely remove the cap. You can implement a soft cap at the current $250,000 total and take a smaller percentage from sales after that.
So, to review, uncapping crowdfunding in conjunction with new products and a little more PR will lead to more sales, and more social media impressions, which leads to more sales, and more tournament participation, which leads to more sales, and happier competitors, which leads to more sales, and of course, a big number you can brag about, which in-turn, probably leads to more sales.
I’m not completely sure about this though. Maybe Blizzard should wait a bit more and continue letting what’s essentially a minigame beat it in viewership and drop below 10,000 viewers on Twitch. Either option seems reasonable honestly.
The Hearthstone World Championship could be the next $10 million tournament; what’s stopping it? If for nothing else, sometimes we do things because they’re cool, and that’s alright. Or, in this case, because it’ll potentially make a ton of money, bring the game to heights it’s never seen, make it one of the most successful esports ever and have it dominate Twitch once again.
Whatever motivation is fine, as long as I can get a few more dollars for my boys who dedicate their lives to playing Hearthstone, spend their weekends grinding tournaments and travel thousands of miles to test their skill.
