Kiriko, a hero in the video game "Overwatch 2."
Business Wire / AP
Prairie High School in the Battle Ground School District is headed to a statewide tournament this weekend. But it’s not for a traditional sport like soccer, baseball or football — it’s for esports. Esports, like many other sports, have players compete as individuals or in a team in a video game against others. Prairie High School took home first prize in a statewide championship last fall in “Overwatch 2,” a team-based hero shooter game. On Sunday, one of the teams will head to Lynnwood to compete again for another statewide title.
Simeon Redberg is a science teacher at the school and the coach of the team. Cody Sigler is a senior and team captain who was recently awarded an esports scholarship to attend Winthrop University in the fall. They both join us to share more on the world of esports at the high school level.
Note: The following transcript was transcribed digitally and validated for accuracy, readability and formatting by an OPB volunteer.
Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. Prairie High School in the Battle Ground School District is headed to a statewide tournament this weekend, but it’s not for a traditional sport like baseball or track and field. It’s for video games. In esports, a multi-billion dollar global industry, players compete as individuals or as a team. Prairie High School took home first prize in a statewide championship last fall. That was for a game called “Overwatch 2,” a team-based hero shooter game. On Sunday, they’ll compete again for more statewide titles for “Super Smash Bros. Ultimate” and “Valorant.”
Simeon Redberg is a science teacher at the school and the coach of the team. Cody Sigler is a senior and team captain. He was recently awarded an esports scholarship to attend Winthrop University in South Carolina. They both join me now. It’s great to have both of you on the show.
Simeon Redberg: It’s good to be here.
Cody Sigler: Yeah, I’m excited.
Miller: Cody, can you describe what esports looks like from the outside for people who’ve never seen it before?
Sigler: Yeah, so I think a lot of people who have never seen or don’t know what esports is, their first assumption is that it’s just a bunch of people kind of just playing computer games and they don’t really put effort into it. But I think it’s anything but that. There’s so much complexity and so much depth that goes into every different game that people compete in, and there’s so much skill that is required to actually perform at the highest level.
Miller: Simeon, how much of a gamer are you as a coach of the high school’s team?
Redberg: I’m mostly a casual gamer. I didn’t really get into esports to try to pass on my knowledge. I mostly got into it to make sure it could actually happen because I think it’s important and we need to have it here at the high school level.
Miller: Why? Why did you want to make sure that it was happening there?
Redberg: I think esports provides an opportunity to a lot of students to be part of that team experience, learn the communication and leadership skills that a lot of students don’t get because they don’t participate in, I guess what you might call, normal sports. So I think esports opens up a place where an underrepresented group of students can get those experiences and get those skills.
Miller: So, Cody, how likely is it that your teammates on the esports team also play traditional sports?
Sigler: Well, depending on the person, very likely. I know at least two of my teammates do track, they’re very active. Esports and regular sports are not mutually exclusive for sure, but you also don’t have to be very athletic to do esports at the same time. So you kind of get a mix of both people.
Miller: What about you? Do you do a traditional physical sport as well?
Sigler: Me personally, I don’t do any traditional sports at the same level as I would compete in esports, but I do play sports from time to time for fun.
Miller: Simeon, Cody mentioned that people who’ve never really been exposed to this may just think this is people playing video games and not really taking it that seriously. And he said it’s not like that – we practice and it’s much more rigorous. What happens at practice?
Redberg: It depends on the day and the team. But one of the things that all the teams do is they look at gameplay of their games, VODs [video-on-demand], and they break down their gameplay and find where they made mistakes, where they can improve. They work on communication skills, strategy for how to take different points. In the “Super Smash Bros.” side of things, they look at frame data. They’re actually going down to how many frames does it take for this character to do this move, at what frame can you cancel the move, at what frame do you have invincibility or super armor. So …
Miller: When you say frame … and they’re like 24 frames a second or something?
Redberg: Yeah.
Miller: Huh, so you’re going to that level of detail?
Redberg: Correct, yeah. To get the timing right on pairing a move or making sure you can get a certain combo off, you have to know the timing of that and at what point during your animation sequence you can actually pull that off.
Miller: Cody, what does happen in “Super Smash Bros.,” for people who haven’t seen this game?
Sigler: Well, me personally, I’m not a huge “Smash” player. I more lean into the “Valorant” and “Overwatch.” But for “Smash,” I know it’s very fast-paced. You choose a fantasy character, and they each have different powers and abilities. You basically try to outmaneuver, outplay, the other opponent. And because of the variety and the amount of characters and things you can do in the game, there’s really no cap to how good you could get. If you played your character perfectly at all times you could beat everyone consistently. But everyone strives to get as good as they can, so that they can be as consistent as possible.
Miller: But as you said, that’s not one of your games. “Valorant” is. What is “Valorant”?
Sigler: The best way I could describe “Valorant,” and similarly, “Overwatch,” would be as a very fast-paced game of chess. So, in “Valorant,” you are trying to plant a bomb on a site, and similarly, you have a bunch of characters with abilities and stuff. So a big piece of “Valorant” is the way you maneuver around the map. You want to put like three people here and then two on a side angle. It’s like you’re investing in certain areas of the map and that’s where a lot of the strategy goes into. You could use this ability to take this bit of space or maybe just push with your whole team on one angle instead.
So there’s a lot of complexity and, like I said, I think the best way to describe it would be like a very fast-paced game of chess.
Miller: But if I’m understanding correctly, with multiple players, in this case all from Prairie High School, on the same team on that board.
Sigler: Yes, so it’s the five of us.
Miller: As Simeon said, communication is one of the things that you work on. What kind of communication do you have during a game?
Sigler: So one of the most important pieces of communication, I think, is communicating timings. So like, if you’re trying to take some space on the map or push on to an objective, you wanna make sure that you’re doing it together and you’re not going in one by one, or that you’re by yourself. So you will communicate timings, like, “OK, I’m putting up a smoke wall now and then you can push,” or you can count down “three, two, one,” and then we swing together and try to find a target.
So that’s part of it. And then another part would be, before anything’s happening, before we’re in an actual fight, we talk before the round to figure out what we actually want to do … like, OK, we noticed they’re playing this way or they’re leaving this space of the map open, so let’s try to take that space and then use that to our own advantage.
Miller: Simeon mentioned watching tape of previous plays, which is something that is now pretty common in professional physical sports, either watching what you did to see if you can improve it and prevent some mistakes, or watching how another team plays to figure out how to play against them. Do you do that with esports? Do you watch how other high schools play to sort of learn their tendencies?
Sigler: Yes, yes, for sure. A lot of times for our high school matches, it’s sometimes harder to get good footage on them, just because either the games don’t get posted all the time or it’s just really hard to get access. But speaking towards the team I have online and just esports online in general, we are always looking over games of other teams that we might be playing soon, trying to figure out what their play style is and how we can change how we play into that. And I think it’s a very important piece. I could talk about the logistics and stuff of esports in general for hours.
Miller: We don’t have hours, but we’ll get as much as we can in the time that we do. Simeon, what do you see as your role as coach? As you noted at the beginning, you’re more of a recreational gamer. So what do you try to give to your students?
Redberg: Probably the biggest thing I give to my students is time. It’s a big investment in time for a person to be here for two hours, four days a week for 12 weeks, or however long I’m here. So a time and then the space for it to happen. I’m also coordinating with the league that we’re a part of and other coaches to make sure our matches go off the way that they’re supposed to.
Then just, I don’t know … as a classroom teacher, bringing that experience in. My biggest strength, I think, is building relationships with people, and trying to create a culture where students can cooperate with each other, and just grow, get better and learn together.
Miller: Cody, I’m sure you’ve heard people question the word “sport” in the title of this, people saying versions of, “I’m glad people are playing these games. I don’t totally understand why it’s a spectator event, but it’s not a sport.” What do you say to those people?
Sigler: I’d say that their idea of a sport is probably too …
Redberg: Narrow.
Sigler: Too narrow. I think a lot of times esports, depending on the game, has even more complexity, speed or just reaction time needed than traditional sports. So, I think … sorry, I’m trying to process my thoughts.
Redberg: I’ve actually thought about this quite a bit, if it’s all right for me to jump in here.
Miller: Yeah, please.
Redberg: So when you look at the traditional sports and what’s really required for that, obviously natural skill is important, improving on that skill, working as a team, communicating, understanding the rules. And then you can’t tell me that these kids, playing these games at a competitive level … you can’t tell me their heart rates aren’t getting up. It can be very stressful. You’re making a thousand decisions a second. Eye-hand coordination is there as well. So, I mean, other than a bunch of cardio, we’re doing exactly the same thing that any other sports team is doing.
Miller: Cody, when you started playing video games … Well, actually, how old were you when you played your first video game?
Sigler: Well, when I was probably around 9 or 10, I got a PS3 [PlayStation 3]. I would play “Skylanders” on that and that’s kind of where I started. I mean, that was mainly just for fun, kid stuff to keep me occupied.
Miller: Did you ever think you’d get a college scholarship from video games?
Sigler: No, no, not until like this year, or 2024 at least. So I always say I never played in order to try to make this a college thing, or be my livelihood or anything like that. But I just enjoyed competing and then I got to a point where I’m like, hey, OK, I can really take this somewhere.
Miller: Simeon, my understanding is that because of the time this takes, you’re actually gonna have to step aside from this in the coming year. What is that gonna mean to you?
Redberg: Oh, yeah. That’s still a raw question for me because leaving this is not easy. [Pause] Sorry, get a little emotional over it. Yeah, it’s a huge investment and a lot of time, a lot of stress. And it’s time for me to give some of that back to my family, so that’s why I’m stepping away. I still love esports. I think it’s incredibly important and it needs to continue, but I think my time as the head here is over. It’s time for me to do something else.
Miller: Cody and Simeon, congratulations. Good luck on Sunday and thanks so much.
Sigler: All right, thanks.
Redberg: Thank you.
Miller: Simeon Redberg is a science teacher at Prairie High School in the Battle Ground School District and the coach of the school’s esports team. Cody Sigler is the captain of the team. He is a senior.
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