On May 18, Congressman Dong-su Yoo of the Democratic Party of Korea proposed a revised bill for the esports industry to prevent esports circuits from being shut down unilaterally. The revised bill states that game companies must make an announcement prior to shutting down their esports circuits or changing the host.. 

Congressman Yoo stated, “If a game company decides to no longer support the competitive league of a game title, they’re capable of shutting it down, even during the middle of it all. There are instances where the rights of the related businesses, esports pro players, and the viewers’ rights are being violated through unilateral changes to the ruleset and even unannounced shutdown of the league.

A prime example of such is the ‘Heroes of the Storm’ esports league. In December of 2018, Blizzard shut down HGC, the official esports league of HOTS. This announcement came out of left field, as pro players and HOTS esports personnel were all unaware of it. Most teams were preparing for the next season of the league and submitted their rosters; all HoS pro players were left jobless.

He further commented, “While we cannot force anyone to donate their game as public goods, we need to prevent all related personnel involved in the game titles’ esport from facing damages due to the developers’ arbitrary decisions. This especially applies to pro gamers, who invest a lot of time in their 10s and 20s, which tends to start when they’re minors; laws must be in place to protect them from unilateral damage.”