Riot Games And MTV Bet On Southeast Asia’s eSports Rise

The Asean-centric festival, which is backed by Singapore’s Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth (MCCY) and the National Youth Council (NYC), will take place in the Singapore Indoor Stadium on August 4 and 5.

The event will also feature the region’s inaugural League of Legends tournament with national teams from 10 Southeast Asian countries competing for the coveted title. Besides, top-notch gaming action, the festival will also feature live performances by musicians as part of the MTV Spotlight programme.

Both Riot Games and MTV are banking on the emerging popularity of eSports in the region to expand their respective audiences by attracting new fans.

Paras Sharma, senior vice president of Southeast Asia, Viacom International Media Networks, said the event was a timely initiative as esports is “growing at a rapid pace in Singapore and across Southeast Asia”.

“There is a natural synergy between esports and music and with MTV’s expertise in creating compelling music and pop culture experiences, we are amplifying the discovery of a new entertainment experience in the region. With Hyperplay, we are looking to connect with new audiences in the esports genre through a bespoke music platform featuring a diverse range of talents, and the distribution of music and esports content to a much wider audience base,” said Sharma.

Johnson Yeh, managing director of Riot Games, Greater China and Southeast Asia, said the event aims to introduce a broader audience to esports and gaming. “Riot has been engaging in musical collaborations with great artists for years. A lot of gamers are also music fans, but it is exciting to see that a lot of talented musicians are also gamers, with whom we can create tailored music experiences within our game universe.”

In recent years, eSports has emerged as one of the fastest growing properties in the globe—according to eSports research agency Newzoo, the industry has 148m players and will be worth US$905.6m this year, a 38% year-on-year growth. Hence, it no surprise to see state-based initiatives sprouting across Asia, particularly when the streaming audience numbers have been encouraging. In fact, last year’s League of Legends World Championship drew 33 million viewers, compared with 20.4 million who watched the NBA Finals.