WITH SETH SCHORR AT THE DOWNTOWN GRAND
pit to their steak house – but our steak house is off the property. We have created something more open, and more interesting – you have to go across the street to the steak house. People love it, they can sit outside and eat, there’s a lovely patio… It’s a very different experience. We encourage you to go out and explore downtown Las Vegas and engage with the whole area, the entire community. We have done the things we have done to create an urban environment where people can explore, but also to leverage all of the great things in downtown Las Vegas.
CI: You have already evolved in the three years the hotel and casino have been here though – you have a focus on eSports and are the world’s first hotel to have a dedicated eSports area. SS: We have a focus on eSports and the ‘millennial’ without losing focus on the core gambler, and that is super-important. Every time I talk about eSports, I think it’s an important disclaimer, we are not taking our eye off the best slot product, having great quality steaks – those things are key. But while maintaining that we are also bringing in an experience that’s relevant to someone under 30, who is into video games, who finds the slot experience to not be so compelling; it’s a big audience, it’s an exciting audience, and they bring a great energy to the casino floor. It doesn’t conflict at all.
CI: That dedicated area is the main reason we
wanted to speak to you. You’re of a generation that has grown up with console gaming, which was a massive leap from anything that had gone before it in console terms; you’ve grown up with a sophisticated form or entertainment with a high level of interactivity. It’s the opposite of a slot machine in many ways… We ask for more time on device for our money, we want more back. SS: The slot manufacturers have hung their hat
since 2002 on intellectual property. It’s worked well, we just put in the Game of Thrones slot machine and it does very well; by no means am I knocking it. But the millennial is not interested in that – it’s still a slot machine where you hit a button and very little else. You mentioned time on device and the opportunity to win more money; some of the millennials aren’t even interested in winning money! We really have to rethink this. I’ve seen some eSports wagering sites that exist
internationally, unregulated and not something we are doing at all, we are completely in the regulated market. I see it to watch the consumer behaviour and see what the experience is like, what’s popular. A handful use virtual currency as their goods. You wager your special $600 knife against someone else’s goods; it seems tricky, they got around the law this way… But also, the people that want to bet on these things actually want the special knife or the special gun, more than they want $25. It was not my logical or first thought, but it’s true. Since we got into eSports, I knew nothing about the industry and I have been learning from the
experts. We have learned a lot. CI: We walked past your eSports section early
Saturday evening, it had a great atmosphere – not kicking up a storm, more one of chilled community, like-minded people being together and enjoying themselves. How long has the section been there? SS: About six months. We’ve been running
tournaments since January, so we have quite a bit of experience in that now; we only started operating on Saturdays in May, before that it was just Fridays, June saw it open five nights a week with something going on – it might not be a contest every night, it might be a viewing experience or whatever, but we are trying to cultivate a community vibe, which you witnessed. That’s what the eSports community has been missing, nobody has created a space for them to come and just hang out, be social, drink a beer… Maybe they play, maybe not. We knew going into it the eSports enthusiast would travel, that’s been proven for years in these major tournaments. But nobody has tried to do this on a regular basis. Interestingly, most of the time a third of the people
attending are women, so the myth of the computer geek in the basement is well and truly exploded.
CI: eSports is a team sport – it’s social by default, so it seems strange that nobody else has tapped in to what you’re doing. SS: Even though millions of people can watch a
stream on Twitch, it’s more fun to watch other people as a group. What we are doing on a Friday and Saturday, it’s a
casual contest though we get a pro in now and again. We do cater for the professionals in a different way; we have two professional sponsorships, one is a local team called the Las Vegas Neon. The second is the LA Renegades. What we have created there is an environment for them to practise and live together. The Renegades are from Perth, Australia and they have moved to LA. They have room to train together and bond, and work as a team. The next thing we are going to do with other teams is create a boot camp environment… Come to the Downtown Grand for a week, meet some like-minded people, form your teams. Nobody is catering to this. Competitive gaming is not new, it’s gone mainstream because of streaming, it’s at the next level now. Endemic sponsors have thrown in some big money, but as excited as we are and as big as it is, it won’t change the economic needle tomorrow – it is a long-term play.
OCTOBER 2016 29
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