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The Olympic Esports Games will begin in 2025.
At their 142nd session in Paris, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) approved the creation of the Olympic Esports Games. The IOC’s vote was unanimous, with not a single member voting against or abstaining.
With this result, not only will the new competition be created, but the first host country has also been decided. As put forward in the officialproposal, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will be the event’s only host for the foreseeable future.
The first Olympic Esports Games will be in Saudi Arabia
The IOC has previously entered a partnership with the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of Saudi Arabia. In exchange for receiving financial support for the new project, the Middle Eastern country will regularly host the Olympic Esports Games for12 years, starting in 2025.
Currently, Saudi Arabia is hosting the Esports World Cup in Riyadh, with a record-breaking$60 million prize pool. They will now be the regular annual hosts of two large-scale international esports events.
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First-person shooters will not be present
Neither the IOC nor the NOC have published an official list of competitive titles for the Olympic Esports Games. However, renowned esports insider Rod “Slasher” Breslau has a few educated guesses.
In a recentTweet, he claims that the FPS/shooter genre of games will not be included whatsoever. He says that the “likely” list of games will include League of Legends, Rocket League, Street Fighter, Tekken, iRacing, NBA2k, FIFA, and several mobile games.
FIFA, NBA2K, and iRacing are the least surprising from the speculative Olympic Esports Games list since they align very well with real-world sports. Rocket League and Street Fighter also make sense due to their previous inclusion in the 2021Intel World Open, a global event officially supported by the IOC. Although the IOC does not have much of a relationship with Riot Games, League of Legends, as the largest esports in the world, is an easy target for any international event.
Slasher believes that Fortnite may receive an exception to the no-shooter rule thanks to the IOC’s relationship with Epic. However, VALORANT, will not receive the same treatment regardless of Riot Games' League of Legends being present in the Olympic Esports Games.
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