IOC aiming to add esports games to Olympics once more

The International Olympic Committee have sought approval to add Esports titles to the Olympics once again to create “Olympic Esports Games” for the upcoming Paris Olympic Games 2024. This comes as an attempt to attract a young audience towards the Olympics.

“With the creation of the Olympic Esports Games, the IOC is taking a major step forward and is keeping up with the pace of the digital revolution. We are very excited how enthusiastically the esports community represented in our Esports Commission has engaged with this initiative,” said IOC President Thomas Bach.

Esports community unfazed

Unsurprisingly, esports fans are indifferent due to the lack of traditional esports titles that garner millions of followers. Olympic esports have been stuck at bringing and representing “non-violent” video games like e-football, Zwift, Tennis and other physical simulation games that usually do not appeal to the majority of esports fans.

Also Read: Why should traditional sports leagues care about esports?

Apart from the Olympics and events hosted by the International e-Sports Federation (IESF) these games also do not have large events. As such, the announcement is just being called as IOC trying to ride the esports wagon at a time when it is peaking.

“This will be terrible. Not because an esports Olympics is a bad idea, but because the IOC has no respect for esports,” one of the comments said, which is quite true. While these events are a great way to provide opportunities to people who are involved, if they truly want to grow, they need to add other popular titles with more appeal to the Olympics.

The Olympic Esports Week in Singapore last year saw a massive success, reaching over 6 million views as per the Olympics. However, this could easily go way beyond that with the addition of even just a few popular esports titles like League of Legends and Dota 2. These games bring in a large amount of viewership with every tournament.