International
Esports: President of France wants to take gaming to Summer Olympics 2024
Emmanuel Macron even dubbed the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris a “historic opportunity” for France. Let’s check everything we need to know about the statement that the French President made around esports and gaming.
Esports is making huge strides towards acceptance in mainstream sporting events like Asian Games and the Olympics. This shift to global competitive sporting events has only been possible due to the increasing popularity of the industry. Now, a major development has just taken place on the international stage. Emmanuel Macron, the president of France just expressed his desire to see esports events during the Summer Olympics 2024 scheduled to take part in the country. Macron made it specifically clear that he wants to develop the nation of France as “the country of video games.” Let’s check everything we need to know about the statement that the French President made around esports and gaming.
French President Emmanuel Macron wants esports events in Summer Olympics 2024
Macron shared his thoughts on gaming and esports in an interview with The Big Whale. He even dubbed the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris a “historic opportunity” for the country. The French president wants the country to take advantage of this opportunity to create a link between real-world sporting events and esports events. He wants the country to host the CS: GO Major Championship, “Worlds” League of Legends tournament, and “The International” Dota 2 championship, all in the same year. Macron said that he will begin his work for esports promotion in the country as soon as he gets elected in the upcoming presidential elections. He is currently competing against Marine Le Pen in the second round of the elections.
Looking back, Paris hosted a League Worlds group stage in 2015 and The Worlds finals at Accor Arena in 2019. According to DotEsports, Paris Saint-Germain FC, one of the top French football clubs has already partnered with Chinese esports organization LGD Gaming. This partnership has pushed PSG.LGD team to win the 2nd spot twice, first at The International in 2018 and then in 2021.
The French President of France did note that he isn’t "a very active gamer". However, he does belong to “a generation that grew up with video games”. This has helped him to better understand video game culture and what it means to the youth of the country. He went on to state, “We are one of the great nations of video games. We are fortunate to have a powerful French video game industry (Ubisoft, Quantic Dream, Voodoo,...).”
Video Game Tax Credit, Web 3, and more
Macron continued to add, “I don't forget, either, to what extent video games are part of the question of mastering advanced technologies. This will again be true with Web3. Above all, video games are an important component of French cultural soft power, of the image of our country throughout the world.” Macron thus wants to “have a strategic approach to continue creating the conditions that will make France THE country of video games.” He also shed light on France’s recent adaptation of video game tax credit to continue financing and training in the esports sector.
Macron believes the French excel in the esports domain and mentioned the likes of Team Vitality and Karmine Corp. Team Vitality is widely popular as a CS: GO team but also has its teams for League of Legends, Rocket League, Fortnite, Valorant, and FIFA. The esports team has won over 100 awards on the international and national stages.