Put your Money where your Mouth is: How to Play Competitive Games Online for Cash

Last year was a banner year for competitive videogames... or “eSports” if you will. League of Legends had a mind blowing prize pot of 8 million dollars for season 3. Starcraft II World Championship Series saw a 1.6 million dollar prize pool. EA Sports holds a yearly tournament for their sports titles with 1 million dollars in prize money. The largest fighting game tournament, Evo, managed to raise over $225,000 for breast cancer research... along with a somewhat modest $65,050 in prize money.

Meanwhile, online poker has become a multi-billion dollar industry. It was inevitable that these two worlds would overlap eventually. The name of this inevitability is Virgin Gaming.

While Virgin Gaming has been holding online tournaments since 2010, only recently have they started featuring head to head online matches for a wager agreed on by both players. The service originally started with a lineup of sports titles... but February saw the notable addition of Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition and Mortal Kombat.

The “money match” is nothing new to seasoned fighting game players. The prize money at fighting game tournaments obviously isn't on the same level as other genres, but after hours matches are an entirely different story. There have been money matches with stakes as high as $50,000, to having to retire the name you've been playing under. The stakes aren't quite as high with Virgin's $1,000 maximum bet, but the ability to do this from the comfort of your living room is still pretty revolutionary.

The online aspect of this system definitely has its share of problems. SF4 (and especially MK) don't exactly have perfect netcode; a lag spike can easily cripple even the most skilled players. A salty loss to lag has already seen its share of broken controllers... factoring in a loss of money isn't going to bring out the best in many people. Virgin also isn't monitoring your matches, so it is up to the players to provide the proof of who won by either a screenshot or video. Disputes are bound to happen... but likely not in enough volume to hurt the service. Things like accepting/declining challenges, number of matches, and wages are all managed through the site.

There is also the matter of fees. Virgin Gaming is a free to use service, however they will automatically pocket 12% of your winnings and there are transaction fees to remove money from your account. Premium Memberships are offered to eliminate the 12% fee, which also enters you into monthly drawings and the ability to join leagues.

Virgin also claims that you'll be able to play against other players of your own skill level. In the case of Street Fighter, a look at someone's BP/PP is a clear indication of how much time has been spent playing online... but what's to stop someone from using a secondary account? Professional players like EG PR Balrog and Arturo Sanchez have been streaming Virgin matches on Twitch.tv... so there's surely plenty of other silent killers hiding their identity.

At the end of the day though, it boils down to just having fun. The matches I observed being played by Eduardo and Art were averaging $5 for a 2 out of 3 set. This really goes back to the roots of fighting games in the arcade where betting and side betting a couple bucks was just to make things more interesting. Really in the arcades you had to put money into the machine to play, so even at 50/75 cents... there was always money on the line.

Fighting Games and Sports titles still have a relatively small online player base in comparison to MOBAs and FPS titles. Virgin Gaming has hosted various Halo tournaments in the past, but has yet to lock down one of these titles for regular head to head play. The player base for League of Legends and DOTA 2 dwarf any other game being played online. Selling items in popular MMORPGs for real cash has also been a booming business for many people. If Virgin (or a similar service) could manage to secure one of these titles... it will definitely change gaming forever.

The technology for online play has also drastically improved in recent years... games like Killer Instinct have near perfect net play. Xbox One and PS4 can also record gameplay and upload it online without the need for a computer... a Virgin Gaming app could easily tap into these features.

Major online tournaments are for the first time really viable online. Of course there's less to spectate, but the pool of players is vastly larger. Players who aren't physically able to make it out to tournaments could finally have a way to showcase their skills.

But what about the kids?

Virgin Gaming has strict policies against players under the age of 18, and will seize the winnings of anyone proven to be underage. A very large portion (ie a seemingly majority) of online players are teens and children. With many mobile phone titles already designed to target parent's accounts with in game transactions... having an easy to access gambling app could easily gain a bad reputation.

Just as online poker isn't a profession for most people, online money matches aren't likely to be more than a hobby for most people. Gambling addictions are however a very real thing, and the obsessive personality it takes to spend the hours mastering these games doesn't mix very well with that. Let's just hope the safeguards Virgin has put in place will help prevent someone from losing more than a couple bucks and a chunk of pride.