eSports continue to surge

eSports have momentum, especially with young demographics, perhaps most visibly in the Epic Games battle-royale phenomenon Fortnite, with the largest payer base and the biggest audience. In the month of August 2018, Epic Games hosted 78.3 million Fortnite players.

The eSports, which racked up 300 million viewers worldwide last year, is on track to surpass a billion dollars for the first time this year, across all markets, and not just from indirect revenue sources, like advertising and sponsorship. Merchandise sales, ticket sales, and other items that consumers purchase directly make up about a quarter of that income.

 In the first week of that same month, viewers on the social streaming platform Twitch watched an aggregate 28.5 million hours of Fortnite play. But as more broadcasters spend to fit eSports into their programming, they may learn that eSports — and the video game platforms on which the industry is built — are more complex than they appear.