Japan eSports Union’s Vice President Talks Overseas Cooperation And Future Plans

Japan eSports Union Vice President Hirokazu Hamamura was present at Taipei Game Show to talk about cooperation with overseas game companies, and their future plans for eSports in Japan. [Thanks, Bahamut!]

Here are the highlights below:

On whether there are any plans to add overseas games to the current lineup of recognized eSport games:

Hirokazu Hamamura, Vice President: “At first, how it was handled was that Japanese makers would come to us, and ask us to allow pro licenses to be granted for their games, such as with Tekken. Overseas makers didn’t request to do so, plus as the Union has only been established for a short time, manpower was limited, so we did not proactively reach out to overseas companies. Now that the Union is more stable, we can try recognize overseas titles.

The principle is that game makers who wish to join the Union can get their games recognized, but as we have considered the need for Japanese players to participate in overseas tournaments, we can allow overseas games to be recognized as well.”

Can you tell us what JeSU has planned for this year?

Hamamura: “Thanks to promotion last year, compared to 10% of the population before who knew about eSports, now around 50% know about eSports. After promotion, we would like to further support JeSU’s 11 branch offices to organize more competitions.”

Does the Union have plans to hold the top eSports tournaments in Japan?

Hamamura: “As I mentioned before, the eSports Challenge Cup is our first attempt, and we’d like to this Cup to continue in the future. We hope to increase communication between Japan and Asia via these versus tournaments, but we still need to see how this current Cup does. As it will be held [tomorrow], we still don’t know if this will continue, so I cannot answer your question right now.

That said, Tokyo Game Show will have eSports events, and these will continue on every year.”