With new titles released every year, and older titles fading into obscurity, the esports betting environment requires adaptability to stay relevant. In the 90s and 00s, real-time strategy (RTS) such as Starcraft and fighting games such as Street Fighter reigned supreme and dominated esports. However, fans and gamers interests have shifted towards first-person shooters and multiplayer online battle arenas (MOBA) like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and League of Legends.
Each year more games are being released and developed, and some are regaining a new surge in popularity. Keeping up with this can be difficult, but good websites such as GGBet alleviate the issue by always offering betting options on the currently popular games. The question this article aims to answer is: What is the best eSports game to bet on in 2023? Continue reading to find out.
Real-Time Strategy (RTS)
As mentioned before the heyday of RTS games has long since passed, but that isn’t to say it is a dead genre. Starcraft II still hosts multiple tournaments and is incredibly popular overseas in places like South Korea. In Europe and America, another RTS game, Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition (AoE 2), has seen a massive surge in popularity and has had a positive popularity trend for the past four years. For Westerners, AoE 2 has had many tournaments sponsored by big names such as Redbull with thousands of dollars in prize pools; and is the best option for those that want to get involved with betting in this genre.
First Person Shooter (FPS)
First Person Shooters are the new massively popular genre for esports. The history of FPS in esports has gone all the way back to the early days of Quake but was overshadowed by Starcraft and Warcraft. However, throughout the years and more so lately, games like Counter-Strike, Overwatch, Valorant, and Call of Duty have taken the genre by storm.
Overwatch recently had a sequel that had overwhelming negative press and caused it to fade in popularity. Call of Duty has a popular scene but isn’t typically seen as an ‘eSports title’ because of the lower skill ceiling and performance issues.
This pivots us toward the big dogs of the genre, Counter-Strike, and Valorant. Valorant is a recently released game that is very similar to Counter-Strike. Both games feature an insanely high skill ceiling and require exceptional teamwork to succeed, making them phenomenal esports titles. Both games have an insane amount of popularity, and both are fantastic options to bet on. It is worth mentioning Counter-Strike will be receiving a sequel very soon and will likely become an even better option for esports.
Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA)
The last genre covered will be MOBAs. The origin of MOBA is from the RTS game Warcraft whereas the game Dota was created as a mod that became incredibly popular. MOBAs are the perfect bridge between the high-skill requirements of an RTS combined with the ease of accessibility of an FPS. There are only two big names to bet on in this genre, League of Legends and Dota 2.
Conclusion
Aside from the release of Valorant and the fall of Overwatch and RTSs, the esports scene hasn’t changed too much in 2023. Valve has consistently released and developed eSports titles so paying attention to what they’re up to is a valuable investment of your time. Below you will find our list of recommended games to bet on. Remember to bet responsibly and safely.
• Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition
• Valorant
• Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
• League of Legends
• Dota 2
