In ancient Greece, the Olympics provided an opportunity for warriors to prove their lethal war-fighting skills in nonlethal competition. Two thousand years later, couch-bound video game warriors may soon have a similar opportunity. At the end of October, the International Olympic Committee announced that multiplayer video games played in front of spectators — an activity better known as esports — "could be considered a sporting activity." With that matter settled, the IOC will begin a process that should bring video games to the Olympics as soon as 2024.

While the idea of handing out medals for pushing buttons may sound ludicrous to many, it's an overdue development. TV ratings for the Olympics and other traditional sporting events are in decline, whereas competitive video gaming is growing fast, especially among young people across the developing world, especially in Asia. In recent years esports tournaments have sold out major sporting venues, including Madison Square Garden for two straight nights in 2016. If the IOC is to have any hope of remaining relevant in a world where leisure is migrating from playing fields to phone and video screens — and importantly, attracting more viewers from Asia, which outside of China and Japan has traditionally lagged in medal counts — it needs to find a way to integrate gaming into its other offerings.

Competitive video gaming has its roots in the early 1990s and the emergence of networked PCs and games that allowed teams to play together. Esports first took off in South Korea, following the government's investment in internet infrastructure that — among other things — allowed for better gaming. Interest grew so fast that South Korea's Ministry of Culture established the Korean Esports Association in 2000. Multiplayer fantasy adventure games like "Warcraft" in which players choose a character and do battle together became massive international hits. Wealthy suburbanites in the U.S. played them on their home PCs; so, too, did young members of China's emerging middle class, who flocked to tens of thousands of internet cafes to play on rented computers with teams of friends.