SHS is presenting a new club to its students: eSports Club. eSports Club is an exciting way to play video games in a competitive environment with like-minded people.

The eSports community has been growing ever since its first tournament in 1980, where Atari held a competition to promote the game Space Invaders. It was critical to the growth of eSports because it helped popularize competitive gaming as a whole.

In 2013, it was estimated that approximately 71.5 million people worldwide watched eSports. This number is largely due to popular streaming sites, such as twitch.tv, where a viewer can watch competitive games live. In addition to this, an observer can watch an individual play games themselves.

This is the Aves eSports Club’s first year, and it was founded quite recently by seniors Kyle Ballman and Benjamin Swart and junior Mark Decile.

“The idea came from fourth bell choir when the three of us saw JJ Sam playing League Of Legends in class. From that the idea popped into my head, ‘Hey, wouldn’t it be a good idea to start an eSports team?’” Decile said.

The boys scavenged the internet, hoping to find a high school competition to compete in. Finally, they had found “High School eSports League” (HSEL), which the club is now partnered with. The Tuesday before the signups for HSEL were due, they found Mr. Benjamin Vore to advise their club.

There are two main points of the club. One is to give members visibility to colleges and professional teams. The second is to win awards for scholarship money.

One of the first members and captain of the League Of Legends varsity squad, senior Aidan Reckamp, had heard about the club when the idea was just being formed. Reckamp is a former Challenger tier player in the popular game League Of Legends, which made him the 64th best player in North America.

When he had first heard about the club from the founders, he was instantly in.

“It was cool because up until that point eSports had mostly just been a random discussion here and there with people, but now that it was going to be an actual club, I was pretty happy,” Reckamp said.

Reckamp said that his main concerns are keeping the club going after the year ends.