In most minds, the 2008 Beijing Olympics torch relay is going to go down in history as an embarrassing fiasco, thanks to the activists that have plagued the run by attacking carriers in cities like London, Paris, and San Francisco.
But gamers may end up reflecting on it as a small milestone for so-called “e-sports.” The BOCOG (or the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, if you aren't into the whole brevity thing) has added ten professional gamers—including Jaeho “Moon” Jang (pictured above), a top Warcraft III player sponsored by PC peripheral maker Razer—to the roster of torch bearers carrying the Olympic flame on its journey through China.
Razer is characterizing the event as “symbolic of how much e-sports has grown,” adding that it “is great for the advancement of e-sports not only in China, but around the world.”
And, indeed, it is a minor coup to have gamers representing at the world's most prestigious athletic event.
But does this mean we're mere years away from millions of viewers across the globe huddling around their televisions to watch their countries' top ogres and elves battling for a spot on a virtual podium?
Of course not.
Aside from the fact that game titles come and go and there is no one game that can accurately gauge a person's skill at video games in general, there's the little problem that video games aren't actually an athletic activity, which is sort a defining criterion for all Olympic events (though who knows what will happen once Wii Fit lands in our living rooms next month).
Besides, gamers already have several international competitive gaming organizations, including World Cyber Games and the GGL Global Gaming, the latter of which is holding a tournament called Digital Games '08 as a “Welcome Event” in Beijing, which, in my opinion, is about as far as the hobby realistically ought to horn in on the Olympics.
Still, given the popularity of video games in China (interactive entertainment is apparently considered the country's 99th Official Sport, according to the Global Gaming League), it is fitting that the Beijing Olympics is the first to make a point of including professional game players in some official capacity.
