Video gaming in South Africa is the largest market in Africa. The market is overtaking the market in movies and music in the country.
Whilst the American market for video games has declined, it is increasing in South Africa.
South Africa boasts Expos, relatively big LAN's and a growing community of gamer's. South Africa's biggest LAN event called the NAG LAN of the former magazine company moved to Cape Town in 2016 which had an impressive turnout. Another LAN event was held in Cape Town which was only slightly smaller than the NAG LAN with 400 people. Although the gaming community in Cape Town is big, the uncontested giant in South African gaming is Johannesburg, with Gauteng in its entirety housing more gamer's than the rest of the country.
Plans are also laid out by SuperSport to start an eSport channel with GINX eSports TV as the demand for steaming eSports keeps on growing.
Thanks to big tech companies like MWEB and Telkom whom host local server game servers which improve gaming allot in South Africa. This helps local competitive gaming to improve and bringing the local gaming community together.
One problem that South Africa is undertaking is the struggle to get protection from the government for Game Developers. There is a "ball-passing" going on at the different departments. The Dep. of Trade, Arts and Culture and Sports are still discussing which one will take the authority of handling the rights of game developers.
Compared to the rest of Africa
South Africa's video gaming compared to the rest of Africa is unchallenged due to large amounts of wealthy South Africans living in cities like Durban, Cape Town, Pretoria, Bloemfontein and Johannesburg. With internet infrastructure being more than sufficient to support the sport. With Fibre being almost fully integrated in cities and wealthy suburban areas the growth in online gaming can only be motivated. Video game developing in the country is not doing well, but events and eSports organizations like Mind Sports South Africa, the Digital Gaming League, Orena and LANX have jumped up in 2015 with the big demand for eSports tournaments and other gaming events in large cities. However, it is only Mind Sports South Africa that continually holds events in all the provinces and runs school events. With gaming in schools also in the rise, Mind Sports South Africa reports that there are now over 30 schools that participate in the official league, with school teams competing on an equal footing with many of the best private clubs in the country. <
Nigeria, Kenya and Uganda is the other top game developers in Africa. The gaming industry is bringing millions of dollars in for their countries per year. This is in all categories of gaming: mobile, PC, XBOX, and PS. Because it was not the culture of the African people, the people is slowly growing into the gaming entertainment.
South Africa also being dominant in sport in the continent and all over the world, and the country too has made its mark on the eSport scene as the national South African team has participated in every International e-Sports Federation world Championship since 2009 over a varied amount of games and platforms. But Mind Sports South Africa has admitted that the gaming scene needs to mature.
Further proof that South Africa is highly respected is that Thomas Brown was selected to referee at the 2016 World Cyber Arena (WCA) in Beijing, and that on 31 July 2016 Jason Batzofin was elected onto International e-Sports Federation Athletes' Commission.