Did you want to know more about EGC, how we came about being, and our plans for the future? Our founder Pesti sat down with ChatGPT to answer the best 10 questions it could come up with!
ChatGPT: Can you tell us about the origins of your organization? How did you get started in the esports industry?
Pesti: Sure! I had actually been a huge Age of Empires III fan for a number of years prior to starting EGC. I first got into it when a bunch of Belgians from my office introduced me to my first ever experience with the game. We all brought our computers into the conference room and they showed me how to play before we started a 4v4 in what I now understand to have been my first LAN experience!
I ended up driving them nuts wanting to play until I had to go and seek others to feed my addiction and began playing on Gameranger for MAC (I didn’t even know there was another world of people playing on PC!). During this whole process I also became addicted to Aussie Drongo YouTube videos where I learned how to lame Sweden.
At the beginning of the pandemic I had the opportunity to take a gaming computer home from our offices, which then became the AOE III computer. Thousands of hours of gaming later, I DM’d Drongo saying I wanted to put on an event called ‘Table Topper’ and that I wanted him to host it and EGCTV was born. What started off as a small project to put on community events took off during the launch of Age of Empires IV and our GENESIS event which saw a combined peak viewership of over 70,000 and the rest is history!
ChatGPT: What sets your organization apart from other esports organizers and broadcasters?
Pesti: Well I would say that our combination of simultaneously maintaining serious professional broadcasting standards but also a warm homely feel is something that really differentiates us from many others. I want our audience to experience a well produced and exciting event but feel like they’re visiting old friends at the same time.
ChatGPT: Can you walk us through your process for selecting games to feature in your tournaments and broadcasts?
Pesti: Good question ChatGPT! Well up until this point, our choice has been entirely based on what I personally fell in love with playing. Ultimately I started EGC because I was (and am) such a fan of Age of Empires. Going forward we’re going to continue having Age of Empires at the heart of what we do but also explore games that we think our existing audience will enjoy. This can be hit and miss and we’ll do our best to figure that out, but we feel we have a good grasp on what our audience will like. For now you can continue to expect to see a lot of Age of Empires dominating our broadcasts.
ChatGPT: How do you balance the needs of the competitive players with the desires of the casual viewers in your broadcasts?
Pesti: A scarily good question from our AI Overlords. This is indeed one of the most important and difficult challenges facing us when organizing esports events. I would surmise the question with a simple conclusion that I’ve made after years of contemplating this, and that is:
‘The product for the casual audience is the most important aspect of defining our success, but when professional players are enjoying their experience, the product usually ends up being better’.
To break this down, what I have learned is that when professional players are finding the rulesets to be good and fun to play, they usually play better, promote the event better and create a more interesting spectacle for the casual audience. It’s a fortunate conclusion to reach as it also means that I see the competitive and casual interests as being aligned.
ChatGPT: What challenges have you faced in the esports industry, and how have you overcome them?
Pesti: Well the number of challenges has honestly been too long to list in an article like this. Everything is a challenge and every day we wake up with the mission of creating beautiful events while tackling these challenges head on. Whether it’s community relations, player relations, broadcast production, rules and administration or anything else, there are certainly no shortage of challenges.
This has obviously also all taken place in a difficult climate for the esports industry in the midst of a challenging economic situation. But I feel building this organization at a time like this has also ensured greater resilience long term. We’ve had to build this to last and I’m confident we’ve done so.
ChatGPT: Can you speak to your organization’s approach to diversity and inclusion in esports?
Pesti: We’ve not done enough, and improving on this is one of our major goals for this coming year. Though we’ve always attempted to promote inclusiveness and diversity, when I look at the statistics of our viewership it continues to lead me to believe we’ve fallen short of providing an experience that feels inviting for everyone. One example of this is that our YouTube audience is over 98% male, something that to me indicated a problem in our appeal. We’ll do better.
