Two Million Dollars Playing Video Games? With Skillz, It Happened.

Steve Anderson : End Game
Steve Anderson
The Video Store Guy
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Two Million Dollars Playing Video Games? With Skillz, It Happened.

Not so long ago, we heard about the arrival of Skillz, a gaming platform that allowed players to compete for actual cash by playing games. But a new update suggests that the idea of playing games and taking home cash for the winner is catching on, and harder than many might have thought. The newest report suggests that, since the start of this year, the company has meant fully $2 million in prizes to those competing in Skillz's array of competitions.

Further, the company reported that it plays host to over 100,000 separate tournaments every day, with a variety of games serving as the battlegrounds in question. Games like Survival Run with Bear Grylls  are just part of the action, and the company also revealed some key information about its demographic operations as well. For instance, nearly half of Skillz's players are female, according to the company, and the demographics got more interesting from there. 38 percent of the players on Skillz are married, and nearly a third—30 percent—are parents. What's more, the bulk of the system's players—65 percent—are between 25 and 44 years old. Over 300 of Skillz's players are over 65, and nearly half of the whole finished college.

It's not surprising to see that kind of wild distribution of demographics, especially given how many different games are part of the Skillz library. What's more, many of these games are also casual in nature, and casual games tend to draw more of a crowd to play said titles. Games like Bubble Shooter!, Diamond Strike and Real Money Bowling tend to draw the kind of crowd that is looking for a quick game of something, and doesn't care too much about the content of said game as long as it's reasonably entertaining. Most of Skillz's lineup looks to fit into just this category, so a wide demographic appeal would make sense on its own. Throw in the allure of the shot at extra cash, and it's clear that this is the kind of thing that should appeal to big numbers.

It's not exactly what most people would think of when the phrase “e-sports” comes up, and not without reason. But at the same time, it makes sense. This is e-sports for the masses, and the demographics make that clear. While it doesn't exactly have the same kind of allure that the Call of Duty World Series Ultra might have, is there any less appeal in watching Strike Real Money Bowling than there would be in watching actual bowling? It might well work out, and considering the kind of savings that would be involved in moving actual sports to online settings, a thoroughly reasonable prospect.

While it will be some time before we see where games platforms like Skillz end up, the idea that they may well take off isn't out of line. Will our future sports viewing be mostly online, electronic, or both? It's more likely than you may think, and 100,000 tournaments a day with a cumulative purse of $2 million says all that needs to be said on that front.



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