The League of Legends 2022 LCK Spring Regular Season officially started on the afternoon of January 12, and at the opening ceremony of the new LCK season held on the same day, LCK Game Lol PARK welcomed two special guests, Yoon Seok-yeol and Lee Joon-seok.
Yoon Seok-woo, a former South Korean attorney general, announced his candidacy for president in June and won the party primary for the Country's largest opposition party, the National Power Party, in November as the party's presidential candidate. Lee Joon-seok is a rising star in South Korean politics and a close confidant of former President Park Geun-hye, who was elected head of the National Power Party last June. Interestingly, the two politicians, although the same party, have previously been infighting, with the two sides reaching a settlement last week, claiming to work together to win the March presidential election.
One of the things the two did after reaching a settlement was to attend the opening ceremony of the LCK Spring Games together, personally watch the match between the T1 and KDF teams, and take autographs and photo promotions. According to the official statement of the National Power Party, Yin Xiyue is very concerned that e-sports has become an official project of the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games, which is a move that shows the care and love of the two politicians for e-sports.
After all, the five-yearly South Korean presidential election will be held in 2022, and Yoon Seok-yue is also trying to solicit votes from the huge e-sports community, and he released a speech on the development of the Korean game industry this week, saying that he wants to rectify the unreasonable rules and regulations that hinder the development of the game industry, improve the unreasonable institutional provisions experienced by game users, and provide a win-win path for game practitioners and users.
The reason why the two politicians came to LOL PARK to watch the offline competition is also because the LCK official decided to hold offline events in this year's LCK Spring Games. Lee Jeong-hoon, head of the LCK committee, said fans can come to the LCK venue to watch the game, and they can accommodate up to 287 live spectators while complying with the government's epidemic prevention rules. Players who have been vaccinated at least twice and have a negative nucleic acid test within 48 hours are allowed to enter the game.
This is the first time since the outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020 that LOL PARK has welcomed 200 live spectators. The LCK League only allowed 10% of the total capacity of the venue to enter the first round of the 2021 Summer Tournament, and later returned to the offline format without spectators due to the further spread of the new crown virus.
However, South Korea does attach great importance to the e-sports project of the Hangzhou Asian Games. Many e-sports organizations and game companies have been cooperating to prepare for the Hangzhou Asian Games in September this year, and South Korea is the most active, because e-sports in the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games is regarded as an official award, not only can win gold medals, but also the professional players who win the championship will also enjoy the benefits of exemption from military service. To this end, the Korean esports association KeSPA began preparations for the Asian Games very early.
Judging from the press release of the Korean media INVEN this week, KeSPA's role is not limited to South Korea, other countries and organizations will also follow the guidelines for the asian games representative selection process formulated by KeSPA, but it should not include China, and South Korea may give guidance on e-sports to some other small countries or regions to strengthen their previous status as "e-sports powers". The Korean Sports Association has listed KeSPA as a full department, and the two sides have launched a marketing cooperation and selection plan for representative teams.
Many League of Legends pros want to be selected for the Asian Games Delegates, so the LCK League has negotiated schedules with KeSPA to complement the Asian Games and selection process. The LCK League previously had only 4 match days a week in the second round of the regular season, but this year it became 5 match days. According to South Korean media, LCK is to match the yet-to-be-determined Asian Games qualifier schedule, reducing the number of LCK League play weeks, and they have learned from the experience of the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta.
In addition to this, the LCK Spring and Mid-Season Championships may be in conflict with the national team selection time in terms of schedule, and Fist is trying to adjust the schedule in a direction that helps professional players. Every e-sports project participating in the Hangzhou Asian Games has become a sub-committee to select the coaching team and players, and the specific selection time has not yet been determined, but from the schedule, there will be movement in February.