INTHEBLACK April 2022 - Magazine - Page 45
GAME ON:
THE METEORIC
RISE OF ESPORTS
STORY JESSICA MUDDITT
THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN TRADITIONAL
S P O R T S A N D E S P O R T S I S B L U R R I N G , T H A N KS
T O S K Y R O C K E T I N G PA R T I C I PAT I O N R AT E S A N D
S AV V Y, H I G H - P R O F I L E I N V E S T O R S L I N I N G U P
T O G E T I N V O LV E D .
D
arren Kwan was sports mad as a kid. He played soccer and
rugby, and competed in athletics throughout school and
university. When he started playing video games at the age
of 15, he approached it with the same competitive mindset.
“I have one of those competitive personality types. When I play a
game, I want to become good at it,” he says. “As a teenager, I didn’t see
the difference between playing soccer with my friends or playing video
games – I wanted to be better than them.”
Kwan competed in esports tournaments right up until he graduated
with a degree in economics. He then quit esports to focus on his career,
which began at a boutique finance firm.
“Ten years ago, a career in esports wasn’t possible. It wasn’t the big
industry that it is today,” he recalls.
By its sheer economic size, esports is an industry that is increasingly
hard to ignore. Gaming is worth more than US$145 billion (A$199
billion), making it by far the largest entertainment industry.
Kwan continued playing esports as a hobby, and in 2013 he founded
the Australian Esports Association. Three years later, he left the world
of finance to devote himself full-time to esports. He is now president of
the association, as well as executive producer of the Australian Esports
League. In 2016, he oversaw the first televised broadcast of esports in
Australia, the same year that the first esports teams went overseas to
compete in the nation’s most popular game, Counter-Strike.
intheblack.cpaaustralia.com.au April 2022 45