A 30 or 60 minute weekly segment on SpikeTV on Sunday afternoon...at best.

Most likely just featuring MLG on Gamespot...which it already does. There is NOTHING in the article that states MLG will actually be on an actual television channel. All the article says is that CBS as a company, through CBS interactive which owns Gamespot, will distribute content from MLG.

So most likely we'll just see more MLG stuff on Gamespot than we already do now, and given the view count and comments there, MLG segments/contents haven't been popular on that site.

CarpetmoOse

United States22 Posts

June 10 2012 21:00 GMT

#122

Sweet, glad to see with all the other branching off CBS is doing, that they are willing to venture in and possibly help the growth of eSports!

Koshi

Belgium38799 Posts

June 10 2012 21:19 GMT

#123

Damn sexy!
There is something growing around MLG.

morbvs

Germany358 Posts

June 10 2012 21:24 GMT

#124

Well... IEM had a show on Eurosports, zdf info (german) broadcasted german EPS playdays and IEM matches. 5 or 6 years ago there was a weekly show on Giga (german cable channel, does not exist anymore afaik) showing the wc3 EPS. And german DSF (sports cable channel) had a weekly show broadcasting a Fifa Soccer league. It never really made a difference and it did not help eSports breaking through in normal TV. The ESL had quite a few projects with eSports in TV throughout the years and I am pretty sure it never really paid off and I am pretty sure it never will.

I don't think eSports will ever be successfull in standard TV and I don't think it has to be. TV will be around for some other decades but it will change drastically. I am pretty sure that in some time all TV Signals will be broadcasted via internet anyways and traditional TV will more and more have to adjust to the modern broadcasting techniques and media that eSports uses already today and which are "natural" to eSports... And not the other way round.

We'll see which channel they will use. MTV seems like a good guess, since MTV already broadcasted a major eSports tourney in the past.. It was the WSVG (World Series of Video Games) in case you don't remember and guess where WSVG is now? Yep, they went bust... Just like some of the other major US organisations that tried to market eSports very aggressively and conquer the market for themselves. I hope MLG's plans are a bit more sustainable than CPL, WSVG or CGS.

And maybe you can reach a lot more households via cable TV... But the additional people you reach are most likely not interested in eSports. Everyone interested in eSports is using the internet for entertainment anyways. And ppl that are not yet into eSports won't watch it on TV.

PlosionCornu

Italy814 Posts

June 10 2012 21:27 GMT

#125

I hope there are going to be restreams, if/when this actually goes down, for us non US residents.
I get that would not be in the full respect of cbs' rights maybe, still, "pirate" viewers is better than less viewers overall..

snakeeyez

United States1231 Posts

June 10 2012 21:30 GMT

#126

It would be lucky to get on tv at all even random channel 70 something. I do think starcraft is deeper and more complex then poker, but the problem is poker has image of being cool with lots of money involved. Also who has never played poker? Its a game with mass appeal because everyone plays cards and it has history. Starcraft does not have that and its a tough barrier to overcome if it ever can. Starcraft is much more appealing to watch if you play the game yourself
Anyone that thinks television is going to away or radically changing has been watching too much star trek or star wars its a basic thing everyone uses its not going anywhere in next decades.

KillerSOS

United States4207 Posts

June 10 2012 21:47 GMT

#127

Sundance is taking a more conservative view, interesting.

Laneir

United States1160 Posts

June 10 2012 21:50 GMT

#128

this is great eSPORT is getting it name out there in every way

solidbebe

Netherlands4921 Posts

June 10 2012 21:54 GMT

#129

I guess it's a small start, but gotta start somewhere

UrukMortos

1 Post

June 10 2012 22:07 GMT

#130

This will end up on ESPN 8 "The Ocho"

Doodsmack

United States7224 Posts

June 10 2012 22:19 GMT

#131

lol @ all the people posting in here who didn't read the entire OP to see that Sundance said it isn't set in stone yet.

Youtakenocandle

543 Posts

June 10 2012 22:21 GMT

#132

Doubt this will be a succes if it happens. People that follow Esports barely watch TV anymore. And people that watch TV don't care about Esports. Even gamers in general don't really care about Esports. Just check out replies to the (rare) sc2 articles on IGN. Lot's of bashing about 'lol why watch others play'.

HawaiianPig

Canada5155 Posts

June 10 2012 22:23 GMT

#133

There's an elephant in the room here no one is acknowledging...

If MLG is broadcast on TV, then is it not likely that the free stream will no longer exist? What other sporting event has a free stream online in addition to a television broadcast?

Nuclease

United States1049 Posts

June 10 2012 22:24 GMT

#134

That...is so fucking cool.

I will definitely be watching that.

quaffle

United States249 Posts

June 10 2012 22:26 GMT

#135

Interesting point, HPig. I would think MLG wants to make a safe transition, so a majority of their content will still be streamed in their current format. Free to watch, pay for HD/extra content.

Further down the future, though? Remains a complete mystery outside of MLG and their partners.

maliceee

United States634 Posts

June 10 2012 22:37 GMT

#136

On June 11 2012 07:23 HawaiianPig wrote:
There's an elephant in the room here no one is acknowledging...

If MLG is broadcast on TV, then is it not likely that the free stream will no longer exist? What other sporting event has a free stream online in addition to a television broadcast?

MLG did something similar to this with halo on USA channel, and the event was aired on TV later and wasn't live. It had production value and such, wasn't like watching a live stream.

Jisira

470 Posts

June 10 2012 22:47 GMT

#137

Sweden will do this on national television during Dreamhack Winter, Dreamhack Summer is featured on the website of the SVT-channel's web service. I understand that forcing e-sports out there is rough, but it can still create awareness and inspire a huge amount of people. Then again, haters are always going to hate.