Korea’s geek gladiators get their own colosseum

Korea eSports Association, which organizes and hosts computer game tournaments here, announced yesterday an auditorium specifically designed to host game tournaments will open today. The facility, which the association claimed is the first of its kind in the world, covers 1,157 square meters (12,454 square feet) of space on the ninth floor of Hyundai iPark Mall at Yongsan Station in central Seoul. Along with the main stage for professional players, there are two smaller rooms where some 80 computers are in place for amateur players. The main auditorium includes 500 seats, and a 150-inch screen is available for the audience to watch games that are played on computers on the stage. The association said the auditorium’s connection to Yongsan Station should help make it easy for fans from outside Seoul to watch the live game tournaments. The game market is huge in Korea, and professional players such as Im Yo-hwan and Hong Jin-ho are household names. They are mostly sponsored by cell phone-related companies such as SK Telecom Co. and KTF Co., and their annual salaries rival those of senior executives at major companies. The replicas of the uniforms they wear in game tournaments are popular items at online shopping malls. by Chang Chung-hoon