State of Gaming

Gaming In the 80’s

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Gaming now

Gaming Industry

The Gaming Industry generated close

to $180 billion in revenue in 2021.
With projected revenues exceeding
$200 billion by 2023.

By comparison - the combine revenue

of the top 11 professional sports
leagues is $56 billion

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Gaming Ecosystem

Gaming Industry in Canada

• Canadian revenue from the gaming

industry has also grown every year
• 2019 - $3.6 billion, 15% increase from
2017
• currently there are over 690 active video
game companies in Canada employing
over 48,000 full time position with an
average annual salary of $77,300

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Gaming Industry in BC and Lower Mainland

• BC represents 17% of the game

development studios and overall over
5900 employees directly connected with
the video game industry.
• BC is home to over 170 game
development studios
• Vancouver specifically is home to
offices of some of the largest game
developers in the world - EA, Take Two,
Nintendo, Microsoft

Careers in the Gaming Industry

Development
- programmers
- designers
- project managers
- marketing
Main - etc. Content Creators
Career - streamers
- sponsors
Options in - marketing
Gaming Esports - editors
- Competitors
- Tournament
Organizers
- Broadcasting
- Coaching
- Managers
- Commentator
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What is Esports?

Esports is organized,
competitive video gaming. As a
form of sporting competition, its
scale ranges from
neighbourhood pick-up games
and tournaments to professional
leagues culminating in high-
production-value finals played in
stadiums packed with tens of
thousands of fans, and watched
by millions more.
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Esports Viewership

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ESPORTS in BC

• Similar to esports in a larger context, acceptance of esports in BC has been growing,

numerous grassroots esports communities have been developing throughout BC
• There are now 30-40 companies whose primary service/product is related to
esports - tournament organizers
• in 2018 Vancouver hosted one of the largest Esports championships ever - The
International - over 6 days at Roger’s Arena - with over $25 million in prizes awarded.
• Vancouver is also home to the Vancouver Titans - a professional esports team own
by Canucks Sports

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Gaming Content Creation

• Content Creation is the largest source

of revenue for most professional
gamers.
• Gamers stream content on the
platforms like Twitch, YouTube and
Facebook.
• Streamers like Tyler “Ninja” Blevins
career earning top $100 million from
Adidas, Red Bull, Uber Eats, and more.

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Who are gamers?
• 2.5 billion active gamers around the world (projected to
cross 3 billion by 2023 - 350 million Fortnite players alone
• In Canada over 23 million Canadians played a video in the
past 4 weeks. - 1.5 million of these gamers watch esports
at least once this past month.
• female gamers in Canada is on the rise - in 2018 50% of
gamers were female
• 71% of parents played video games with their children in
2018 - increase from 68% in 2016
• 26.5% of gamers identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual,
pansexual or asexual

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Diversity

• Diversity and inclusion is an area of growth for the gaming

industry and for esports
• High level esports is still mostly dominated by males although
events are not exclusive
▪ There are now over 100 female esports advocacy organizations
(Women in Games Ambassador Program)
• in the area of content creation and streaming, some of the most
successful streamers are female – such as Pokemane who has
over 7.5 million followers on Twitch and close to 6 million followers
on Instagram.
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 Diversity

Documented number of video games containing LGBTQ+ Within the games there is a greater
By decade emphases for representation.
▪ LGBTQ2+ representation in
many AAA titles
▪ Last of Us 2 – gamers played
from the point of view of an
LGBTQ+ character – Winner of a
GLAAD Media Award for its
accurate and positive portrayals
of LGBTQ+ characters to life.

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Accessibility

Accessibility is also becoming a

prominent topic for the gaming
community.
▪ Both economically and physically
▪ Growth of Free-to-play games
▪ Greatest advances in accessibility
for gamers with disabilities
– Xbox accessibility controller
– Color blindness
– In game sign language
interpreters

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Mental & Physical Health

The effects of video game on player mental health as gained a deal of

attention recently
- some studies coming out about the social and community benefits to
gaming (depression, anxiety and others)
- in 2018 the WHO recognized “gaming disorder”

Increase attention is now being placed onto player health and well-being
- esports teams and school are now looking their esports players just
like traditional athletes (Diet, physical training, rehabilitation, mental well-
being)
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Business and Gaming Entrepreneurship Lab

PROPOSED LAUNCH DATE SEPTEMBER 2022

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Overall Esports/Gaming Strategy
District Administrator

Esport Coordinator

Recreational Competition Talent Development

School Based Student

North Shore Scholastic Gaming/Esport Academy
led Clubs
Esport League (NSSEL)
Provides practice Potential for
and team building students to be
for the involved in the
competition management and
teams organization or the
NSSEL 19

Goal

To provide students with the business education and practical

knowledge require to succeed not only within the Gaming Community
but in any business environment they may pursuit. Striving to become an
industry leader for bridging the education and industry.

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Education Rationale

The North Vancouver School District has developed a robust specialty academy program,
offering students a wide range of enriching educational experiences. The Gaming and
Business Entrepreneurship Lab would further the school district’s position as a leader in
offering educational programs aimed at preparing students for future lifestyles and careers.

Through the Gaming and Business Entrepreneurship Lab students will be able to gain first
hand business knowledge and experience to engage in the growing esports and gaming
industry in BC and around the world, directly connected to two of the School District Priorities (
Modernizing Curriculum and Career Development.) Although taught through a gaming lens,
the business knowledge, skills and experience students gain will be transferable to any
industry they wish to pursuit later in life.
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Education Rationale

Following the findings and recommendation of the BC

Esports Skill Development Program conducted by the
Vancouver Economic Commission, there is a need for
the creation of a “talent-development model that maps
esports careers and the skills required.” Our goal is to
provide students with the knowledge and experience to
achieve the following in a gaming, and esports
perspective:

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Program Summary
Grade 10 Grade 11 Grade 12
• Location - Handsworth
Secondary Career Life Education 10 * Marketing and Promotion 11 * Career Life Connection 12 *

• Teacher - John Vatougios Entrepreneurship and Digital Communication 11 E-Commerce 12

• Start Date: September Marketing 10 *

2022 Computer Studies 10 Computer Information Systems Entrepreneurship 12

• Grade levels 10-12 11
Media Design 10 Media Design 11 Work Experience 12
• within a semester system -
2 blocks every other day Web Development 10 Work Experience 11 Computer Information Systems
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• within a linear system - 3
Digital Media Development 12
blocks every other day
• including physical and
mental health education
* = required

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Partnership

Volcanic Media Group.

Volcanic Media Group is an experience designer, esports strategy
builder, and innovator.
Volcanic is a community-builder, currently growing as an organization to
include community safety, regulation, and resource tools into its future;
essential aspects of building a strong and safe scholastic esports
environment.
Volcanic Media was the first group in Canada to award a highschool
esports scholarship in 2019. Later, Volcanic’s President and Founder,
Shawn Caldera was selected as the Vancouver Economic
Commission’s Esports Coordinator, helping to spearhead Canada’s
first federally funded esports research.

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Partnership

The Gaming Stadium

The Gaming Stadium is first of its kind esports Stadium in Canada,
located in Richmond BC. TGS partners with Fortune 500 brands,
schools, and tournament organizers to build out their esports
community via tournaments, broadcast production and events.
TGS is currently working with some of the biggest brands in the
world, including Red Bull, HyperX, Pepsi, Shaw Cable, Telcel, and
Ubisoft to expand their reach into the esports 18 to 34 year-old
audience.
As a leader in esports, TGS has organized over 500 events, with
over 50000 players participating in TGS events

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Services Provided
• Onsite consulting & guidance regarding esports-centric and tech related areas
• Onsite technical support & collaboration
• Curriculum development and deployment support
• Research & marketing support
• Learning hardware & tool provisions such as laptops, accessories, and peripherals
• Networking infrastructure provisions for flexibility in classroom environment
• Weekly instruction and engagement throughout the program length
• Assignment and evaluation creation
• Facilitation with career development programs and services to support student post-program
• Partner and sponsor acquisition and engagement for program
• Industry network and collegiate pathway creation

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Logistics and Additional Partners
Through our partnership with Volcanic and TSG we have been able to secure a number of additional partners that have not
only lowered the initial infrastructural cost but also greatly connect students to industry professionals.

Each of these partners will be supplying the academy with part of our infrastructure needs:

Lenovo - Will be supplying the academy with Gaming level laptops. These laptops will remain at the school, and can be use
for other esports/gaming needs for the host school. However, these laptops cannot be used by other courses due to
networking concerns.

Shaw - One of our concerns was bandwidth and stress on the school network. Shaw will be supplying the academy with
5G cellular hubs, exclusively for the use of the academy

HyperX - As a leader in gaming peripherals, HyperX will be providing the academy with peripherals

Linus Media Group - Linus Media group is a full service production company base out of Surry, BC with decades of media
and content creation experience. Linus Media Group will be assisting the Academy as a content and mentorship partner.

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Finances
The yearly cost of the program is $1750 for the full program - $175 monthly in the linear calendar

Volcanic and TGS will be absorbing the capital cost of getting the academy up and running. SD44 will be
responsible for providing the space (a standard classroom) and a teacher who will deliver the curricular content
through a gaming/esport lens.

Breakdown of student cost:

Maintenance ($400), per student,

• $135 going towards hardware provider’s premium care and onsite service
• $165 for TGS side repairs and part replacements (TGS-procured, like user-upgradeable parts like HDD, SSD, etc)
• $100 Networking support and setup (TGS-procured, for issues like networking problems, troubleshooting etc)

Service provider ($1350), per student

• $700 for instructor salary (may be supplemented)
• $400 for organizational overheads (such as honorariums for bringing in industry experts to speak, etc)
• $250 for admin, taxes, boring costs

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Thank You

Questions and comments.

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