What Is the Difference between E-Sports and Virtual Sports

The sports industry transforms together with the latest tech innovations. The same holds for the sports betting sector. Together with live betting, the previous decade has seen a rise in e-sports and virtual sports. Both of these concepts play an important role in sports betting; however, e-sport is a broader phenomenon.

While many people use these terms interchangeably, these two are entirely different things. Old school sports enthusiasts may see e-sports as a failed attempt in pushing the boundaries of what is considered sportsmanship. Others see it as a legitimate type of sports activity. Virtual sports is computer-generated sports emulation. In the following paragraphs, you’ll learn a bit more about their unique features and differences.

What is e-sport?

Video games used to be entertainment. Nowadays, the playing of video games has turned into something more than just a leisure activity. Yes, watching a movie or eating your favourite food isn’t considered sports. But playing CS: Global Offensive or CoD professionally is readily accepted by a growing number of people as a legitimate sport.

The exact date of the first e-sports event isn’t that heavily contested. Most people see Atari’s Space Invaders Championship in 1980 as the birth of the modern e-sports movement. Over 10,000 players came together to play the now cult classic video game in a competitive setting. These days, some significant dollars get awarded in these events, with the top prizes exceeding $10 million.

What are virtual sports?

Virtual sports is a concept tied to the sports betting industry. Compared to e-sports, the “players” take on a passive role in the sport. Instead, they will try to predict who wins a horse race, football match, etc. The curious case here is that none of the games or races takes place in real life. All of the action and results get generated by automated computer software.

Virtual sports software work on a random number generator (RNG), which effectively delivers unexpected results. However, each team or player still has some stats and likelihood of winning coded into their virtual beings. The best virtual sports software products create a fascinating miniverse for excited sports bettors. At the end of the day, virtual sports are self-generating computer games used to spice things up on betting sites.

The Bottom Line: E-Sports vs Virtual Sports

E-sports and virtual sports often get mixed up because both are prominent in sports betting sites. A decent online casino NZ with a sports betting section is going to offer both for betting purposes. While e-sports has real people playing video games against each other or a computer, virtual sports rest on computer-generated sports emulations.

Some bettors say that virtual sports help them to pass the time whenever nothing interesting is going on in their preferred sports; for instance, there’s no big tennis tournament taking place. Virtual sports is not something that anyone considers as a type of real sports. When it comes to e-sports, the players and their fans insist playing video games against each other should find its way into the Olympics one day.