One of my students sent me a link to this story. This guy plays Warcraft III, which isn't as popular as it once was in the states, but remains a favorite among professionals, and outside the U.S. -- apparently especially in Korea. Here is the lead tot he story:
"22 year old Jae Ho 'Moon' Jang, a Korean WarCraft 3 professional gamer who was dismissed from the MyM team just over a week ago, was rumoured to have negotiated a contract with WeMade FOX,a Korean gaming organisation.The rumour was confirmed yesterday with Moon signing a 700 million Korean Won contract (£350,000 GBP, €390,000 EUR or $470,000 USD) over three years. There were thousands of people present during the signing, where he also was presented with his new uniform, the typical WeMade FOX colours: green, white and black.'
This isn't exactly what top professional athletes get paid, but still pretty impressive. The gaming business, as most of you know, is huge ... bigger than the movie business by some calculations.
Thanks for sharing. I think Korea has just as many PC gaming cable TV channels as they have sports channels (similar to ESPN out here). The newscasters and MC's are quite a trip - "Will player number two upgrade his spores in time to block Player 3's zergling rush?"
"I don't know Chung, we'll have to see about that one. It looks as though he's going more for mass units than defense, but as we all know, it'll only be successful if he outnumbers Player 3's hydras. Plus, he needs air support because Player 3 looks like... I think he's going Mutas, right?"
"Indeed he is..."
Posted by: Theresa | March 20, 2009 at 03:51 AM