Performance Enhancing Drugs in Competitive Gaming

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Source: www.Reignesports.org

So this is meant as sort of an opener into a discussion into the topic of doping and general performance enhancement in the world of electronic sports. Competitive gaming is something that has really blossomed in the past 20 years as games like Quake, Counter-Strike, and StarCraft started to form competitive scenes. Players from all over the world have gathered around corporate sponsored tournaments to compete for prize pools of money ranging up into the millions with the dawn of newer games such as League of Legends, StarCraft 2, and DOTA 2.

Games like these often require that players remain focused and at attention to catch any little flash of movement. Some of these games also require that actions be inputted into the computers at lightning fast speeds, and milliseconds worth of wasted time can often cost players their tournament lives.

In this new atmosphere of competitive gaming, e-sports athletes are basing their careers and livelihoods on their results from these games and often times winning or losing determines whether they have continued support from their sponsors, teams, and fans. This is the difference between whether they get to eat at the end of the night or not.

Adderall, Ritalin, and Modafinal are the most common drugs used for attention deficits, popularly known as “smart pills” amongst high schools and college campuses. These drugs are known to boost alertness and concentration levels amongst users. It is an increased worry that e-sports athletes are now abusing these drugs to perform well in their respective games.
Source: Pro Corner, discussion between StarCraft professionals about doping in esports

So here are some recent discussions popping up about the issue. How do you think performance enhancers will have an affect in the increasing growth of competitive gaming? Will it place a black spot on the scene? Is it something that is relatively non-problematic or is it an issue to be concerned with moving into the future?

Links:

http://www.reignesports.org/performance-enhancing-drugs-in-esports/

http://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/21c9gc/performance_enhancing_drugs_in_dota/

http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=1958737

http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/8568397735

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5 Responses to Performance Enhancing Drugs in Competitive Gaming

  1. Pingback: Yanis Varoufakis: nothing but more game time for Capitalism | Alien Fiction

  2. muh5000 says:

    I remember when i used to follow starcraft 2, Evil geniuses , DEMUSLIM talked about how he could never last long enough for the MLG tournaments specifically the Raleigh and Columbus ones. He stated in an interview that he really had trouble finding the balance of putting his all into the game and flat out burning out or giving it a more easy going approaching while hindering his performance. Back then , if you where not one of the invited professionals in the MLG sc2 tournaments , you had to play from what was referred to as the “Trenches.” Basically it was a 3-day morning to night slag fest to get into the invited group stages; this often was more of a test of endurance rather than raw skill.

    If such awful systems like the MLG lower bracket and ect. did not exist, i think we would see less and less instances of drug abuse.

  3. blw5180 says:

    This honestly does not surprise me. Any kind of professional athlete is always looking for something new that will give him an edge over the competition. Whether this is a new type of gear that allows you to run faster or even a drug that lets you hit harder. With the rise of professional gaming, it really doesn’t surprise me that these players are looking for any kind of advantage they can get. With steroids not having any effect on the e-sports, the next logical drug would be the concentration drugs. Even, professional sports like football and baseball are now having trouble with drugs like Adderall. As the sport grows, tournament holders will have to start making the players take drug tests or the e-sport craze is going to have a bad stereotype of all the good players need to take drugs to make money.

  4. atk5102 says:

    At this point in time, you can’t exactly make a direct comparison to professional sports, but the idea still holds somewhat. If the e-sports professional gaming industry continues to grow, then I’m certain that some sort of drug testing will be adapted. Until these drug tests are actually thought about and implemented, the industry will see very little change in the growth I believe. Again, without the tests on the players, it’s near impossible to tell how big of a problem it is, or it will be. How many of the players are taking drugs? 1%? 50%? All of them? None of them? Without any real information, it’s more or less speculation. Personally I think it’ll be like how professional sports is. When the industry was just starting out, there was little concern with steroids or performance enhancing drugs. But, as the industry grows, more rules and regulations will be put in place, and these questions and problems will be addressed at that time.

  5. Timofei Bogatchev says:

    There is no question that these drugs give an unfair advantage to gamers that use them, especially in long tournaments where it becomes very hard to focus towards the end.

    I think considering the possibility of drug testing would not be an extreme move, especially in tournaments that involve thousands of dollars in prize money.

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