Music has always been a vital part of the sports industry. If you think of WWE, you know John Cena’s theme. Every baseball player has an anthem their home stadium plays as they step up to bat. Sports associations make music videos by splicing together clips of different plays in games and setting them to an upbeat, hype song. The digital age makes it far easier for sports and music to blend together, to pump up athletes and fans alike. The rise of esports carries on this tradition of integrating music with the sport, and to an extent, esports are taking it to a whole new level.
Early in September, Fortnite studio Epic Games announced that it will introduce a three-week long concert series called “Spotlight” within Fortnite Party Royale that began Saturday, Sept. 12. The first act in this series was singer Dominic Fike on the first Saturday, and just recently, Anderson .Paak performed Saturday, just recently on Sept. 19. Slushii will perform this upcoming Saturday, Sept. 23 to wrap up the Spotlight series.
Even though Spotlight is coming to an end, this isn’t the first time that Fortnite has hosted virtual concerts through Fortnite Party Royale. Diplo, Deadmau5 and Steve Aoki had previously taken the stage in the game to provide an online concert experience to Fortnite players. In fact, according to The Verge, Marshmello and Travis Scott’s large concert events in Fortnite both drew in over 10 million players, shattering past records of concurrent players for the game. The Verge also writes that Epic Games is shaping up to make Fortnite a notable venue for musical acts to promote music and perform. Fortnite is bringing music to the forefront of the game, and they aren’t alone.
League of Legends is another noteworthy online game that has been making strides in promoting music. In 2018, the League of Legends World Championship was held in Seoul, South Korea, and Riot Games, League’s parent studio, promoted the championships through the creation of a pop group: K/DA. K/DA took four fighters from League, Akali, Ahri, Evelynn and Kai’Sa, and turned them into performers with the help of two American and two Korean singers who inhabited the voices of these characters. Soyeon and Miyeon of Kpop group (G)I-DLE voiced Akali and Ahri respectively, while western artists Madison Beer and Jaira Burns filled the shoes of Evelynn and Kai’Sa.
These four singers took the stage at the World Championship in Seoul and were accompanied by virtual reality models of the League characters performing alongside them on stage. This performance, plus the new song “Pop/Stars” that was unveiled just for the championship, went viral in gaming and music communities alike. This led to Riot Games attempting to recapture this energy with the group True Damage for the 2019 World Championships.
Not only that, but Aug. 20, Riot Games launched Twitter and Instagram accounts for K/DA, marking the group’s comeback. The group, with Soyeon and Miyeon returning as their characters and Evelynn and Kai’Sa finding new voices in Bea Miller and Wolftyla, launched a single titled “The Baddest” for a Aug. 27 release. This single was a pre-release track, building hype for the new K/DA Extended Play (EP) due later in 2020 that will feature other League musical acts as well.
While K/DA is voiced by real artists, the release of their new EP will mark one of the first times video game characters have graced the music scene. While Epic Games and Fortnite are bringing musical acts to their game, Riot Games and League of Legends are bringing their game to the music industry itself.
Esports as a whole have incredible potential to cooperate with the music industry, and Epic Games and Riot Games just so happen to be pioneers in the gaming community in blending games and music together in a way never seen before.
