Esports

Prizes in the top esports tournaments have reached tens of millions of dollars. The major tournaments sell out arenas and are streamed for more than a million viewers.

If players or teams are playing video games against each other to compete for prizes, said games must be considered “games of skill” in order to comply with Canadian legislation.

In the United States, each state has its own rules about what is considered a game of skill, including the predominance test (i.e., does the game have predominantly more chance or more skill), and the material element test (i.e., does chance play a material role in determining a game’s outcome).

In Canada, because gaming is federally regulated, we have one set of rules that all provinces must follow. The test was first set out in the 1968 Supreme Court case Ross, Banks and Dyson v. The Queen, [1968] SCR 786 and built on through subsequent cases. Essentially, we must examine the type of chance present in a game. Does the video game rely on a systematic resort to chance or the unpredictables that may occasionally defeat skill?

If you’re offering a competitive platform for players to play video games against each other, you should chat with us. We’ll learn about your business model, and review how it fits in with Canadian gaming laws.