Game On: Connectivity, Creativity & Community with Huawei UK By Huawei

Bye good morning and a very warm welcome to you, I'm Kate, Russell tech, reporter and aging gamer, and I'm delighted to be hosting this very timely discussion today about the unsung hero of British innovation, the gaming industry. If you ask most people in the street today to describe a typical gamer, they are likely to dish up the stereotype character of a teenage lad raging at fortnight in his bedroom. But in truth, if you look at the more than 2.5 billion gamers around the globe, the average gamer is 34 to 36 years old, owns a house and has children and in many territories approaching half of them are women. I have been playing computer games since the dawn of home computing elite on the BBC micro. I'm willing to bet a fair few of you watching can probably say the same, and I started reporting on tech back in 1995. As a games' journalist, it has been fascinating to watch the sector grow and morph and exciting to see how many of the cutting-edge technologies developed to satisfy gamers demands for more immersive experiences have been used across industries to drive innovation and growth.

Gesture control, computer vision, mixed reality: they were all made mainstream because of their value to gamers. Hollywood's producers are using game engines to create big screen. Entertainment and epidemiologists are using data from World of Warcraft to make more accurate mathematical models for the spread of a real virus. Let's face it far from being a bedroom hobby for awkward teens gaming is an important part of the global economy and the backbone of countless innovations we use in daily life. So the video games' industry has grown up, and we shouldn't really be surprised.

It is over 50 now, after all, its denizens are also grown up with disposable incomes, as they start heading in on mass into retirement in a couple of decades. From now a lot of disposable time as well, are we ready to cater to that kind of opportunity and growth? The pandemic, too, has accelerated change across the world. People had to get down with technology if they wanted to take part in life and as a byproduct of trying to survive, they realized how much fun a game of among us with your friends could be. Experts are saying we might have left forwards, 10 years in tech, innovation because of the pandemic, and I think it's clear that the future is not going to be less online than it is today. The future of the games' industry is definitely online, whether its digital marketplaces and communities or gamers competing against each other in permanently online titles like Fortnite or overwatch or streamers, using platforms like twitch and YouTube to entertain huge audiences watching at home, even coders and designers working remotely on developing a game.

It all relies on a fast, stable connection to the internet. Historically, the UK has done really well in the gaming sector right from the start, pushing the boundaries in genre-defining ways, it's become a world leader and is a vital part of the UK economy, creating highly skilled jobs across the country. But as we move into the next generation of games and gamers with new demands, new challenges and new opportunities are we sure we know the games' industry well enough to be ready? That my friends is the question we are going to have a stab at answering today I'll, be joined by specialist journalists. Analysts developers and gamers themselves to discuss how the UK can continue to support the growth of this exciting sector. All that's coming up in game on.

Are you ready player one since the 80s from arcade consoles from PCs to mobile gaming, has made a lasting impression on culture? It now dominates the global entertainment sector and is comparable to revenue as sports and entertainment media. Last year, gaming was a near 160 billion dollar industry and in the next two years it's projected to surpass a 200 billion dollar mark, driven by ever-increasing demand from the 2.7 billion and growing gamers from around the world, 36 million of whom are in the UK. Not only does UK consume. Video games in great numbers is also a hub of creativity. The UK is home to over 2 000 games companies directly employing more than 20 000 people.

In 2020 alone, the gaming sector contributed a massive 7 billion pounds to the UK economy. That's up by 26 as one of the few outlets where friends and communities could interact and enjoy each other's company during lockdown, lockdown highlighted the need for next generation connectivity. Gaming is at the forefront of the digital evolution. Gaming is mainstream. It's where creativity, community and connectivity meet, but does the UK have the infrastructure to support the creators and the communities in 5, 10 or even 20 years from now? Can the UK maintain its position in this sector and how do we ensure players enjoy the gaming experiences that other countries will rich rewards are here to be unlocked, and new bonus levels are ready to be discovered, so lots to think about there.

I guess we should dive straight in joining me for our first panel discussion is George Gigi easily, who is principal games' analyst at OFNI media covering areas including cloud gaming subscription services AR VR and wearable technology. George's welcome to you also joining us is podcaster presenter and all-round tech and gaming enthusiast shay Thompson, hello shay, hello, hello, welcome both of you. Thank you so much for being with us. Perhaps we could start by talking about how the sector has changed and shifted in the 18 months during the pandemic. Um shay, let's start with you who is playing games at the moment.

Do you think? Because there is this sort of typical idea that it's maybe still a bedroom uh, you know teenage boys in their bedroom. Isn't there uh? It's also grown women in their bedroom. I'm coming to you live from my bedroom right in front of me. I've got my Nintendo Switch, my PS4, you know it's this thing where you know for a long time, it was considered to be this kind of solitary experience that only yeah boys did, but I, like you, said earlier on. You know it's very much split down the middle with women, men and other marginalized genders, making up like a big chunk of you know who are playing these games and yeah.

It actually skews a lot older than people think uh. There was a story recently about a guy who, like an older guy, who he played the entire mass effect, legendary edition, which is this iconic trilogy for the first time, because he was able to play it on an easier difficulty, and he experienced this wonderful world and yeah. It was a perfect time for him, and you know we're seeing more and more stories like that and shows well, I remembered seeing a story from green man gaming like ages ago about how they have the genres that people are buying are shifting, and actually it's not competitive games that have been going during the pandemic, but cooperative games and puzzle games. Is that your experience from what your audience is? You know, sort of in your streaming are expecting you to play as well, yeah, absolutely so yeah. You see a lot of uh puzzle games in particular and narrative driven games stuff.

Like the last of us. You know we talk about like animal crossing as well, in a time when we can be physically connected with each other. It was a way for people to keep up with their friends. I know it's the same thing for me. I had so many group chats going like talking about like turnips, which is one of the currencies in game and yeah.

You know, and those are people who hadn't really bought consoles or played games before um, so yeah. It brought loads of those people into the fall to play loads and loads of different types of games. George, in your experience, obviously, your company does a lot of research and you sort of keep your eye across multiple different um. You know sectors and also regions. How does gaming compare with other entertainment sectors in terms of how much has been impacted by the pandemic? Well, just like um, just like all industries, video games and has been positively impacted, you could say so.

We actually saw an average of 20 year-on-year increase in terms of money being spent on games, which is really, really impressive, and I completely agree with what you guys have discussed because of pandemic. More people did turn to gaming and actually, according to our research, we saw that almost 90 percent of 16 to 70-year-olds actually tried gaming in the last year or 18 months, which is quite amazing and in terms of gender split in UK. It's its basically 50 50. Yeah. The is always surprises.

People when I speak to them about the gender split, because you know I don't. I guess look like the typical in most people's minds, a gamer um, but the other thing that the typical gamer will have experienced over the last 18 months. George is um the connectivity issues um, you know not just for gaming, but you know the whole neighborhood is streaming all sorts of movies Netflix. You know all the rest of it. How has the usage of data shifted during this pandemic time, and how's that impacted the gaming industry? Yes, so the network companies really had to work a lot to keep up with this increased demand.

So, for example, at the beginning of the pandemic in Italy, I remember there was a case where Fortnite dropped, a large uh free, update and telecom Italy. Uh actually said that they saw a massive spike in usage, and they had that. I had to actually deal with that spike, and that was all due to this massive update and as the games are getting better and better as the fidelity gets better. The game, sizes and downloads are getting larger as well, so telcos have to invest in their networks and into things like machine learning and AI. To spot this kind of spikes and deal with them proactively, George I've been arguing with my service provider like gamers across the world, I'm sure during the pandemic, about the sort of like the way that the connection will suddenly just choke, and you know they're saying weight of traffic because of the pandemic.

You know its extraordinary times: we're not going to refit our infrastructure um, but do you think that that's you know so? Do you think it is going to lighten off once the pandemic? Lockdowns all end um? Are we going to continue with this sort of issues around data? I don't think that issue is going to go away anytime soon, if anything, more and more people will turn to gaming in the future as well, just as they have during a pandemic. So I don't think that's a good excuse. I think the reality is that the network operators have to continue investing into their network and improving it because, as I said, the gaming is becoming more immersive requires a lot more data, and we have things like cloud gaming on a horizon as well with services like Stadia and game pass and subscription services as well, which is all reliant on game downloads. So, if anything, we're going to see a lot more downloads, absolutely shay I mean in your work. You must rely more and more on the connectivity and not only for playing games, but also for allowing your audience to connect with you have what's your, what kind of experiences are people enjoying with gaming now, and you know, do you think that we're moving away from a sort of world where you can play games offline? It's going to be all online um, I think like it was destined for you know fully online gaming to be the thing like things like Stadia and um.

You know cloud. That was supposed to be the future, but you know, as we've sort of said, like the infrastructure. Just isn't there yet uh, so I think you know I think you'll have a sort of hybrid uh. What I'd like to call a hybrid of the two, so you'll have people playing you know single-player games, but playing it in a way that is kind of you know, reminiscent of co-op um or like kind of couch co-op, where you kind of pass controller back and forth. You can do stuff like that on the PS4 and PS5 um sort of sharing the controller um.

You know I've done streams like that, where you know I'll, let people help me make choices in um narrative games that let you do that. So I think you know we'll see a bit of a hybrid for the time being in terms of like content, that's put out, but I don't think fully online gaming. I don't think we're there just yet. This is really depressing for me, George, because when you look at other countries around the world, I mean I've been lucky enough to travel to Japan with BBC click, and you sort of compare the situation that they have. You know they're sort of running around sort of you know doing AAA games on their mobile phones, for goodnes?s sake, while they're waiting for the bus um.

Do you think, George, that we know how fast do we need to start running if we want to keep up with the world in terms of connectivity and infrastructure? Well, I think overall, UK is doing quite well, at least when it comes to gaming. So UK is in the top five markets for gaming in terms of the spent on games, so that's china, U. S. , Japan, South Korea and then UK, but I actually wanted to show you just one slide actually uh in terms of uh, the spend that we are expected to see and how that's going to grow over the next few years. So, on the left hand, side just kind of that peak that you're, seeing on the 2021, that's uh spent on game consoles in UK.

So that's a new record in in in 2021, thanks to the new generation of Xbox and PlayStation consoles, reaching 1.6 billion dollars in 2021. That will obviously pick peter off over the next few years. As the price of hardware goes down, however, the spend on content will go up, as you can see, on the right hand, side and, as you can see, there is a growing trend over the next five years, so the total market for games will grow from 6 billion to 7.3 billion supported by new technologies such as cloud gaming. We saw this didn't we with office computing, you know where it used to be terminals. You needed a terminal that you know was good enough to run the software you needed it to run, and they needed to be everywhere and, as we began to put everything cloud side, you almost can reduce yourself to a dumb terminal um.

You know you just need that fast connection and the ability to um sort of port that data backwards and forwards successfully to your machine shade. Do you think that um, the technology that you have available to you at the moment is going to be sufficient um to continue sort of like really enjoying the games? And do you find that your? Your viewers as well, are finding that they're sort of like being left behind a little with tech um. I think there have been um kind of circumstances that have attributed to that. So you know it's really hard to get like powerful graphics cards, for example. Just because of your know, manufacturing issues with the pandemic and stuff.

So you know there's a big bottleneck with trying to get stuff like that um and then even with consoles. Like you know, I'm one of the lucky few. I have a PS5, but you know not a lot of people do, and you know when I go back and forth like when I play stuff on my PS4. You know my good old people. There is like a noticeable degradation.

It's not something that people um necessarily like to point out, but sometimes it is really egregious. You know you had games like uh cyberpunk that were just completely broken, like unplayable on old uh generation consoles, so your Xbox ones, your PS4. So you know that was a huge deal um. So I think there are like special circumstances where people will. You know absolutely not entertain that at all, but I think it's I think it's more people are more forgiving nowadays, just because of the kind of manufacturing issues at play.

But I guess manufacturers are only going to be able to use that as an excuse for a limited amount of time now, as we head out of the pandemic um, okay, Georgia, who do you think, is in looking at the gaming world, and you know, sort of how we're going to progress in the future, not where we're at now, but where we may be in 10 years, 20 years from now, which country is poised to really be leading the pack um. Well, as I mentioned those countries that are already ahead of UK, particularly Japan, South Korea, of course, and china, they are so advanced in terms of technology and smartphone adoption and things like 5g rollouts as well, I think, is important. I always say South Korea is, is a great market to have a look at like an um crystal ball in terms of kind of show you what is to come in other markets. So if you look at South Korea and how quickly they managed to roll out 5g and their ability to deliver things like cloud gaming to millions of uh people in the country, that kind of gives you an indication of what is to come and what countries like UK should be striving for. What do you think we can learn from countries like that um to help boost our own ability to meet demand and grow with the market here in the UK uh? Well, there are many uh challenges overcoming, as I mentioned, be that uh, you know uh, making sure that the things like fiber, roll-outs and 5g rollouts are done at a good pace and has a good coverage in whole country.

So that's of course, one of them and other one is things like supporting the local gaming scene, so a local gaming development companies and publishers, and so on. I think this is something that these countries have done really well, and the UK is doing that to doing what we're in that regard, but I think, as always, you know that they could be doing more yeah. We've definitely got the talent, and we've got the history as well um Shea. If there was one thing that you would like the powers that be to do to help us push forward. What would be the one thing that you would like the omnipotent god of gaming to do um just to kind of get on my soapbox for a very short amount of time? You know video games as a medium are interesting, because it's the intersection where technology and art um you know sit.

Countries like Japan and South Korea have folded gaming into their mainstream culture. You know if the UK took games seriously like uh, both technically and culturally. We could see that same push, and then you know we'll see it come from the top down from the government. You know from just people's like perception of games that would lead to you know more gaming content on like mainstream outlets. Um- and I think that then puts gaming in people's minds, and then it's like yeah.

We should do more stuff with this, so hopefully that's that's the time that we'll be seeing in the next year or so frustrates me. So I would jump, sorry. I would just. I would recycle those comments, particularly with South Korea. The interesting thing that happened in South Korea in early 2000s is that, because there was a widespread piracy of games, they essentially invented the whole free-to-play genre to counter that, and of course it really doubled down on esports as well.

So I think as a whole country as she has just mentioned, so these I think these are kind of the lessons that can be learned. Yeah, yeah. I agree it's so frustrating to me. I think, as somebody in the media, I have responsibility as well, because you see so many parents afraid to let their girls game and stuff like that. So we need to take it more seriously.

Um shay George! Thank you so much for joining us. It's been brilliant speaking to you, pleasure, okay time to hear from an industry insider now, Texas-based developer, fire bridge games was created in 2017 by a team of executives from top video game and media companies. Since then, they've developed, cutting-edge experiences for steamer and Nintendo Switch Sony, PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox earlier I spoke to their executive producer Donald Harris to give us a developer's eye view on the lay of the land and began by asking him how gaming is changing as we move into a more hyper-connected world. What you'll find is like a lot of the games that are coming out or almost always have a multiplayer component um. It's where you know it's where the trends are going, getting people even more connected and delivering bigger and better experiences, and so um you know internally.

We call it games as a service. That's one of the particular models that we build games on, and so, when you think about it, you think about buying a game. Once you take it home, you play it. Those days are gone right. You buy the game once, but you're going to be playing this game.

For years at a time and we're going to be adding in things to make, you want to connect with your friends or people down the street or just random strangers to play and enjoy these games with. So as time has progressed uh, the trends have definitely gone to just. We want to bring more people together in games. One of the problems with the sort of like the rise of the online multiplayer game um is that all Internets are not created equal right. I mean I've played um.

You know competitive first-person, shooter games with people and if you've got an an a bad internet connection, then you're not going to win, but also you're, perhaps not going to be um as drawn to the kinds of game that require a hefty internet connection. Do you think that that is impacting the way that we think about development and the way we think about being gamers, absolutely um yeah? So it's funny that you bring this question up because working currently working on some multiplayer games back to the office um there are during our development phase. We pick and choose literally which data that we want to send across the wire right. If it's something that we can avoid descending across the wire to make that transmission faster and therefore leveling that plate that that that field um. We put a lot of thought in into that.

So whereas someone may be on a slower internet connection, that would make us like what we try and do. Are we try and plan out man? We don't need to send every bit of data that we got you know to their computer and then have them, send it back to us and then back to the server so forth, and so on so yeah it's an it's very impactful on the way we design our games. Um features that we want to put into the games that we know hey if we have a certain feature we're going to eliminate like a large part of our player base, and so we don't want to do that um so yeah, it's its heavy on the mind, especially when you also talk about different platforms right, so we've got mobile, PC, um and your console, so even those dictate what kind of features we can put into a game as far as network and multiplayer. So what do you think um when it comes to sort of user experience, um the bandwidth and the connectivity that you're giving people it can have a serious impact on their um on their experience? Do you see a point at which it will be absolutely imperative that you have to have an internet connection, or you can't be a gamer? Is that coming at all? Oh? Ah man, that is a that is a big question. Um I in some ways I do see that I think with so, for instance, if you look at all the current platforms that are out there again going back to PC, um mobile and console all of those have digital libraries, where you don't even buy physical games, you need an internet connection to get the game.

Um. So saying that there is coming a point to where you know: you're going to need an internet connection. Are you not going to be able to play games? It could be likely, it could be likely um, it's just easier for game developers like myself to make games and deliver them over the wire um. I don't have to deal with physical publishing. I don't have to deal with inventory yeah that day could come now that you're making me think about it.

That day very well could come. Are those whole slaves of the population of many countries will be happy by that, but also many who will be very, not happy um, but when it comes to game development, let's, let's think a little about you as a sort of development studio, um drawbridge choose their talent um, you know. Do you have talent working outside your office and in which, in which case, what are the internet connectivity issues that you have to deal with, and is that a factor in choosing somebody to work with you? Yes, uh? Well, you know we're all going through the pandemic and currently our office. We don't have an office, we're all remote workers um and that very, very much was an important piece of how we were going to set up our now virtual offices right so um. Most of our team members are within side of Austin Texas.

We do have a few folks that are spread out um around the US, and then we had one person that was actually located in Hawaii and barring time zone issues um. There were some situations to where we had to like accommodate slower internet right, because he and actually not only was he in Hawaii, but he also lived on a farm. So it's like when you're, adding up different difficulties on internet connectivity and being in a rural area and on an island um. There were times when you know he during his overnight time. He would be downloading large packets of data from us so that he can work on different parts of the game.

You know, and so, but it's its tough, it's its challenging. We can. We can have talent that is located in the part of the world where there's not. You know not significant internet uh bandwidth, and we can't work with them, it just it would be impossible it would. It would be impossible.

It was difficult with the person in Hawaii so yeah. Do you think that um politicians, and even actually parents take gaming seriously, not enough as an industry, you know with viable careers uh, you know greater generating tax and income, and do you think that we're taking it seriously not enough as a society to really uh give the rocket boosters that it needs for us to keep generating great gains so taking myself out of that equation, absolutely not enough right? Obviously, in my household I take it very seriously. I know that if my kids want to stream or if they want to develop games, I know that they can make a sustainable lifestyle for themselves. I think politicians and parents in general still think of games as being fun and just a hobby which they are, and that's that's great and that's one of the reasons why I like making games but um with the rise of esports and things like that and the money around those industries. Furthermore, I don't, I don't think politicians and parents are really taking a strong look at it and saying hey.

My child can make large amounts of money more money than me. You know playing games and- and that's that's exactly where we are and that you know um ESL is a great example of that, like that that organization there the amount of money that they make the amount of money that the players make it's its a lifestyle. It's its a very lucrative lifestyle for sure, and I don't I don't think people are taking it serious enough. I just want to round off the talk. They get a bit more back to sort of like the future gazing about how we can look at fixing the digital divide, how we can bring more people into the industry and how we can perhaps get a wider variety of people more accepting of the idea of gaming as a serious career option and a serious business.

So what more can we do to help um the world reap the societal benefits of gaming? I think, with respect to game makers, people who are building the games and developing the games. I think um there's lots of opportunity there that we can use our platforms to help improve society right um. Furthermore, I think number one teaching and building games that teach uh teach good habits and outreach into the community. Furthermore, I think uh going into our communities as game developers. So like a lot of the times when I'm not speaking on technical things like we are today uh, I go and speak uh about diversity and inclusion, and I go into different communities and I try and spread the word of gaming and game development and show off the opportunities I think uh.

We all have some responsibility in doing that right, and so on of the things I used to say way back in the day was that if you want different video games to play, you have to get different people to make them uh and so going out into the community getting different people that that's the way that that cycle works. Donald. Thank you. So much for your time. Thank you.

Far bridge executive producer Donald Harris there talking to me earlier what a lovely man he was and if you would like to hear more from Donald about his work, getting more diversity into gaming, as well as his views on the future of the sector, then the full version of that interview will be available in a standalone episode of the tech podcast by Huawei in the coming days. Details of how you can subscribe will be coming at the end of the program, but now thousands of you are watching online um. You know as if to prove our point that the online and the community around gaming is so important. So shout out to you: stick the hashtag in whatever your platform of choices and let's get the conversation going online as well, and we've heard a little this morning about the needs of you gamers. But it is time now to hear the truth.

Direct from the horse's mouth. We went to central London to visit beyond gaming arena in oxford street, where we asked the gamers to tell us about what drives their passion since growing up. It's a way me and my dad connected from taken to racing games and all sorts competing in FIFA east sports. It's very good to have that hub of people, especially with being locked in doors for most people. Furthermore, it means friendship.

Really you have. You know your discord channels. You have like the people, you speak to every day. I know people from like Denmark to Belgium to all sorts like from Europe and stuff, and it's a very comforting thing, because no matter like what happens kind of thing, you always have that to fall back on it's quite good. You meet quite good people in there fun nice, a funny post on Twitter or post some art, like I do on Instagram and stuff, and see how much support and love people have content.

That's created outside the game, not just in the game. More people are getting involved with said communities making it more enjoyable for everyone. I was using the house Wi-Fi, and it would just disconnect me every three minutes I hated it and I couldn't go anywhere because I couldn't bring my laptop and the Wi-Fi, and it was just horrible. You know you can play the game better, but when you lag, and it keeps you at the game, then it's you know not that great. It's the difference between those little moments that could win or lose your potential game, and especially when you're really trying hard to like to improve your rating.

Every moment matters. The most important thing like obviously next thing the actual game is, the connection is really is the most important thing because it's like even at home. Sometimes the connection will just be like it will be good for a bit and then boom. It goes down for a bit, and it's like well, what's going on, so it's just nice to have a kind of smooth relaxing gameplay. Wasn't that lovely and don't forget, you can add your own thoughts to that question.

What's your passion about gaming just use the game on and let everybody know well for our final discussion this morning. We're going to be focusing on the fast emerging esports sector, the world of professional gaming is an increasingly important part of the industry with competitors from around the world facing off, in landmark events for big cash prizes before the pandemic. Many of these events could, of course, happen on location, but the changes of the last 18 months have seen the sector shift its focus to discuss these issues. I'm delighted to be joined by Oliver max field, who is a pro tour mobile and game manager at ESL gaming, Ella Romanus, who is CEO of fundamentally games and with me, is Tampa Malik, who is an arena manager with our hosts here at belong? Who, of course, are very keen to see the turn return of gamer football um well, to start off with um I'd like to sort of talk about how the pandemic has altered the landscape of competitive esports, Oliver Leonid, just how big are the e-gaming and esports industries? Now hey guys, yeah. Thanks for having me on the panel um, I mean it's hard to overestimate how big um, esports and gaming is right now, just to kind of frame.

The opportunity a little, I've brought a couple of slides and I think for me, these numbers really blew me away when I first saw them um. So I think there's there are two important factors right, one is the opportunity and I think the second part is how that opportunity actually translates into mobile gaming and esports right. So there are approximately 4.2 billion smartphone users right now in in in the world and as a subset of that, a derivative of that 2.7 billion are playing games on one or more device so um. I think you know that that is the opportunity right to to to reach 2.7 billion people who are playing games and also, on top of that potentially grow out and reach the remaining to make up the 4.2, and I think the second part, the crucial part, is actually how that translates into the real world of esports right. So I just wanted to give you an idea of where mobile gaming and esports has come in the last say, 12 months or so um.

So, in July, of 2020, four out of the five top uh tournaments in terms of viewership were all mobile titles right, mobile legends, PUBG, mobile arena, valor and free fire, of course, um, and even just this past may, the the free fire Singapore championship saw over 5.4 million at peak concurrent viewers. So I think that really highlights the both the opportunity in terms of mobile gaming, but also the size and the viewership that we're seeing now mobile gaming and mobile esports isn't something that is. You know, uh on the sidelines. It's actually the main event now, which is super happy to see. Oliver, do you think this sort of the world both this? You know financial, world and people who might be sponsors or supporters, but also you know parents whose kids might be interested in going into professional gaming.

Do you think the world takes gaming as a sport seriously enough? Yet is that beginning to shift? I I think the simple answer to that question is yes, I think I will caveat that by saying. I don't think it matters what uh people's people think it will be. It's its ultimately, it's here. It's here to stay, it's growing exponentially, and it's giving millions of people the opportunity, as we say in ESL, and it's one of our pillars to go from zero to heroes so to go from couch to stage to play for hundreds of thousands of dollars. So uh, I think yes, people are warming to it.

I think, but I don't think that really matters at the end of the day. It's its here, and it's only going to grow, we're gonna, do it with or without your help right exactly I mean here at belong. Obviously you guys must have been impacted, a lot by uh the pandemic for obvious reasons um. But what do arenas like this bring to the public that they perhaps can't get at home? So I think obviously, lockdown has shown us how much gaming can like really bring us together, and it gave us an opportunity to do those like kind of teamwork and activities um. I think one of the great things about belong, though, is we've set up an infrastructure for grassroots esports, so people that are looking to be part of a team, whether they think you know we get people walking in all the time.

Thinking they're not good enough to be part of a team, and we show them that. Actually, you might potentially you are, and you can come down and play um. But I also think that, although gaming online is great when you're gaming other people, I think, coming in and um playing as part of a team that you do see in person, whether you're playing against other people, that you can't see is such a unique experience and being able to like when you get a win or whether it's a loss like being able to celebrate or work on things and talk to each other. You know face to face is something that we do offer here and uh. We have arenas all through uh up and down the UK um that provide that uh competitive esports experience where you know you can play for Saturn like we are here, um against another London team, or even a team up in Scotland, for example, and when you talk about the experience is this, you know, is there a comparison that could be can be made with football with real football like Premier League? If, if you know if ESL's the Premier League, what are the people who play here um, I really do.

I think we have a lot of games that have come out. I think Fortnite's a good example of something that's so accessible and so easy to watch by a lot of people. Furthermore, I do really believe that there is something coming that will be on that level, a game that is so accessible that I think even people that wouldn't consider themselves gamers would be interested in watching um. Furthermore, I do think we have a few of those games already, but I wouldn't be surprised. We see something in the next couple of years that is so uh popular and accessible.

That kind of everyone will be watching the same way. You watch the euros on the weekend. Um would be a similar kind of environment that we'd watch, something like that. He had to mention it Ella. How about you? What are your thoughts? Um? You know on what you've heard already from the two chaps um yeah, I mean you know uh from the sort of game developer side of things you know.

Games are now bigger than films and music combined. You know. Obviously, uh games has been growing on year uh, but particularly during the pandemic um, I think, from the development point of view you know, making games designed for esports um is a different way of looking at games, but in particular, watching games has become a key part of this, so obviously we're making games that people want to play competitively, uh and professionally, but also we're making games that are good to watch as well as play, and that creates different challenges and opportunities um, but has really caused a dramatic shift in the way that we think about the games that we create yeah. Absolutely I mean I think, about the games that I like watching. Um people play, and it's the games that give you ways to view the game.

Action beyond just sort of you know, sort of looking through a traditional screen um. What do you think are the sort of like the key things that you think about as a developer when you start looking at um developing a game, is it audience, is it players or is it something else entirely yeah I mean its audience, but it's it is it's not now just the people who are going to play it's the people who are going to watch and also how they're going to play in the environment? So we look a lot at what we call mode of use. So that's everything from the device where you're going to be when playing also to lifestyle fit. So, are you going to be playing this on a bus on the way to work or probably not anymore, but you know um, or are you going to be playing this in an arena watched by thousands of people, so the environment and the context in which your audience is going to play is as important as the audience themselves. Absolutely um Tamar here at belong you've.

Obviously you know made adjustments um through the pandemic. We can see that there are people who are, you know able to come here and game. What did does belong offer to ease the frustrations of home gaming yeah? I think we were completely blown away since reopening how many people were eager to get back in. I think, if you look at the UK in general, I think even domestic and at home still don't have access to superfast, reliable internet, and that is something that, as long as the top-end hardware, we do offer a really, really stable connection, a really fast connection um, especially for like some gamers behind me. When we talk about latency, you know your connection to other players when playing competitive gaming.

You know what's considered good latency and bad legacy could be within the milliseconds and that's really, really important to gamers, and that is something that we do offer it's like, really, really low, latency and the technology as well, in order to play competitively that they might not have at home, and most people say I don't know if anybody at home has had this experience too. You know you're playing a game, and it can actually, your connectivity can change throughout an hour session, depending on who else in the house is on Wi-Fi, or you know who else on the street is streaming things up or down um Oliver? How can you ensure a loving level playing field for your gamers when it does seem like the infrastructure? Are you know it's so variable, absolutely um yeah? I think there are two parts to this. I think one is the uh, the connectivity and the technology part, and I think the second part is the know the competitive integrity right and I think, on, on the first part, what we've been doing. Um we've been focusing a lot on mobile gaming and esports. So the way that we see it is more of a that's more of a democratization of esports right now, it's its available to everyone um, and it's really about um.

You know I think countries like the UK to kind of lead the way in terms of technology and connectivity to bring you know, for instance, 5g uh and the story of low-latency gaming, but also you know, playing games chatting and streaming all from one device right. I think that's a future that we can all look forward to. So I think that's the that's. The first part right, giving everyone the opportunity to participate in esports to go from couch to stage and to earn. You know thousands of dollars.

I think that's that's super important, something that really did not exist even as uh. You know uh 2017 2018. This is really when these phenomena started to to to start. I think the second part is right, like from a competitive integrity, standpoint um. We really work with our uh with our tech teams to make sure that we have the best technology to make sure that um one the tournaments are played on low latency, two that there's no um cheating or ringing going on and three will, of course, work with our publisher partners to to to ensure both those things as well so yeah.

That would be my kind of two-pronged answer to that question. Ella. Obviously we heard from Donald earlier about how um games producers are working really hard to try and figure out. You know the load and what data needs and needs not be sent to try and improve connectivity issues um. But what do game developers need? You think, to really break barriers and start innovating for the next generation of gamers.

Sure I mean like Donald said earlier. You know. Games are now mostly what we call either kind of living games or games as a service um, by which we mean their services rather than products, so they're run from the server with content updates, player actions uh often in real time being sent to and from the device and the server um, as well as many games now using cloud streaming. Services like Xbox game pass and so on. So you know we're relying on internet connections not only being fast but also being stable, and it's actually really important to note that this doesn't just apply to games used in esports with huge audiences and player numbers it also.

It applies to all types of games so, for example, Candy Crush. You know that that game operates from the server as well. Um know, developers can already use the combination of device and server to create amazing experiences for audiences. That's kind of been one of the know main drivers to the growth of the industry, but the current infrastructure is an issue, and you know inhibits the development and distribution of you know new groundbreaking experiences, and it's also particularly frustrating for day-to-day. For teams like us who work remotely that presents challenges for us on a daily basis, and it really risks undermining where UK developers have to date been world leading.

Do you think the people who can sort of like change infrastructure? You know, wherever you feel like the the responsibility lies? Do you think that there is enough being done? Do you think they're working enough with games companies? Do you? Do you speak with them? Uh? No! No! I don't. I personally feel that there should be more done um. Furthermore, I think that you know games being as big as it is um you know. Perhaps you know there needs to be more done to look at how you know we can facilitate industries such as this, which not only audiences love, but it's also a great place for careers and for talent growth within the UK uh. So there's so many positive things that games bring to the country.

Um that you know really. We should be engaging more, and you know I think more of the focus needs to be put on how uh industries such as ours can be supported and, of course, feeding the pipeline with great talent by taking it more seriously at the educational um stage as well. Um. Okay, I'm going to ask all of you now um. This is sort of you know future gazing.

But where do you see the future of gaming going, and I'm going to start camera with you? If I may um? As I said earlier, I do really think it will be something that everyone does get involved in. I don't think it will be just exclusive to whatever the current stereotype is. I think there will be games that will come out that will invite everyone along um. Furthermore, I do see a world in which is where we're you know all playing from home, but also you know me people meeting on plane, as teams um, as Oliver quite rightly touched on that sort of couch to stage uh gaming, where it's really about encouraging people that you can be a part of a team, no matter what level you're at um, because I do think that that kind of competitive gaming experience that you get um is really unique, and it's real. Furthermore, I mean it really does bring people together in ways that, if you're, not a gamer, you wouldn't necessarily expect, I think Ella.

What do you think? Where? Where is the future of the gaming industry lying? So you know, for me, games often leads in innovation within technology, because you know, as an industry, we use technology, art psychology narrative to create unique experiences, but it's not just about you know experiences that people can play together. It also, you know, provides new ways and can create new ways to learn uh and to communicate uh and grow talent in the UK in general. So I think you know from my point of view, I'm really excited to see what innovation the games' industry can bring not just to games, but also to social experiences, and we've seen that the positive effects that games has had on people's well-being during the pandemic and particularly how it provided a way to socialize uh when other memes were obviously not available that all obviously existed before the pandemic. But you know we've seen how it has become more mainstream, and I really hope that we can have the tools, infrastructure and support to kind of further reduce barriers to entry and make games as accessible as possible to everybody to play and watch. I couldn't agree more Oliver.

How about your future of gaming? What would you like to see sort of gaming evolve into in the future? Yeah? I think it's a fascinating question. Um, I think. As an industry, we sometimes tend to focus on the cherries, and I think we should be more celebrating and focusing on. You know baking the cake. First, we need the cake, and then we can add the cherries on top.

So, just to echo the sentiments of the other panelists right, we need better technology, we need better connectivity, we need better support. We need less stigma. Uh. We need to have more opportunity right. Furthermore, we need to to to have more tournaments, more broadcasts, better, better tools, um more geographies, bringing gaming uh to everyone, uh and esports everyone around the world, um yeah.

So I would get an echo, I think, the sentiment of the other panelists there. Oliver, when we, when we talk about um, sort of inclusion, diversity, uh, you know sort of the community aspect of gaming. What role do you think, especially because esports is you know, potentially such a high profile way of gaming? And I know that the audiences are still quite niche, but it's growing, you know, as the sport grows in size, um what are esports leagues and um companies like yourself doing to really help promote diversity and inclusion and get more people from different walks of life and different age groups involved in gaming yeah I mean that's actually a super important topic for us. We have um, you know internal work groups on diversity, inclusion, um, and I think what sometimes we should all focus on is the success stories in in in gaming and esports around diversity inclusion. There are people of all uh race, creeds and genders that are competing in esports, and we just need to do a better, better job of storytelling.

We need to focus on those people, you know build content around them, show them on broadcast, celebrate them um, and I think you know through that um. It will be. You know a natural progression where you know we'll have more and more people um participating across uh all of our tournaments, so anyone Oliver who's watching who thinks that they might sort of try their hand at esports. What would be their route to finding out if they're right for it? I think everyone's right for it. Um I mean in three months you can go from just through you know, ESL mobile open, which is our grassroots level tournament.

You can go from just playing with a few friends as a bit of fun to going on to playing an ESL model challenge, which is the product we released this year, which is tech, taking your game play to the next level and competing for thousands of dollars and then looking into the next year. We're also looking to potentially uh add on top of that in ESL mobile masters, which is a little teaser going to be a mobile mega event right. So this is a clear progression right. You can go from an open tournament that is really open to anyone through to a mid-tier tournament into challenge and then into masters into mega event, and you can be you know the stars on the stage you see at aim, Katowice and ESL, one cologne, brilliant and Tamar, I'm guessing. If people haven't got the right connection at home to be able to do that, they can just pop down to their local arena.

Yeah, it's a bit of a's meant to be a warm safe environment as well for them to come down and do that, and maybe we're at home. Maybe a lot of people experience difficulties in which that might hinder their experience. You know whether it's like you know, maybe parents or siblings, that bought them.24 7, if you get interrupted in a game, especially something that uh at a competitive level, can be really frustrating so yeah, and are you seeing this sort of diversity of people coming in and joining in these sessions? Is it beginning to change yeah? We see all walks of life um one of my favorite customers in old German. He comes in. He plays um like a Star Wars, online game constantly, but we have all walks of life that come in all different types of games, and we try and facilitate that as good as we can yeah.

I strongly believe that it's actually going to be the retirement home activity um of the generation not too long from now. Um final thought then really quickly. I'm going to give you a 30-second thought. Ah, Ella. Finally, thought from you: what's the most important thing: if you want people watching this to take away from the conversation, I think that gaming is um a really positive uh activity, particularly on the social side, and I think that you know exploring.

If you haven't already exploring games uh and finding out, you know what they can bring to your life in terms of social but also uh. You know in terms of learning and communication uh and, ultimately you know we want games to be as accessible as possible to everybody and, if you're in charge of the infrastructure get with the program. Basically Oliver, how about you final thought, yeah, I think um just get involved right um. This is an opportunity for everyone. I think everyone on this is on this panel is an example of someone who is um.

You know gone from playing in their bedroom, competing or just with friends and moving on to having a career in the games' industry. So I think there's plenty of opportunities out there um, and it's its our responsibility as an as the gaming industry to doing to. You know display those opportunities and to increase those opportunities, but they are available for those that are um. You know looking for them perfect. Thank you so much and of course, final word in the studio Tamar very quickly, final thoughts, um yeah, I would love to just stress uh, similar echo in that sentiment that I wish, for example, when I was younger that was made more apparent that this kind of careers were available.

We're not just talking about games, development, or you know, infrastructure, work and networking. I think there are so many uh jobs relating to gaming. You know even to the guys that are you know here. Filming today is something that is necessarily gaming specific, but it's in that world, and I really do want to say that, no matter what your interests are, there is a place for you in the industry, brilliant what a lovely thought to end on and, of course, if you've got any thoughts that you want to add to the mix, use the hashtag. Your final thoughts, please on social media.

Thank you, everybody for joining us. That brings us to the end of a fascinating morning of contributions from across the games' industry before you go, I would like you to know that highlights from this morning's discussions will be available in the coming days on the tech podcast presented by Huawei, the first three episodes are already available and explore the economic recovery post pandemic and the home versus office debate for the future of working details of how you can subscribe are coming very shortly. For now, though, I would like to thank you all for watching and for joining us this morning and our superb contributors for their thoughts. It's clear that this sector is a substantial success story for the UK and the opportunities are there for the games industries to continue to thrive, the brains, the passion and the know-how are already present in the UK, so the future will likely be determined by external factors. So I ask my question again: are we ready for that kind of opportunity and growth? Do we understand the games' industry as it grows old from within, and are we ready to support it with the talent, training and, crucially, the infrastructure? It needs to keep winning, I hope so because, as a gamer, I kind of like winning.

Thank you, everyone for joining us goodbye. You.

Source : Huawei