Our mission

The Arena Research Cluster (ARC) is a global community that connects researchers and industry stakeholders who share a focus on innovation in esports

We facilitate knowledge exchange, collaboration and impact driven research. ARC is the vehicle through which researchers and professionals can connect, share resources and start new partnerships and collaborations.  

We define innovation as introducing novel approaches, technologies, and means of knowledge generation that explore, enrich or otherwise advance understanding in or across the three interlinked pillars of esports (and sports) entertainment: competitive play, content production and audience experiences

With innovations from esports translating into traditional sports (and vice versa) ARC’s remit spans esports, physical sports and motorsports.

Our story

ARC was founded in 2019 by one of the world’s largest esports research teams at the University of York, UK. 

Recent years have seen a wealth of research that focuses on esports from a variety of disciplines including computer science, business, media studies, artificial intelligence, cultural studies, broadcasting, psychology, sociology and visualisation. There is however, no defined field of esports research. 

Through its community, ARC provides the starting point for defining esports as a domain of scientific inquiry.

Arena Research Cluster: Reasons to join

Access to latest reserach

on esports through a vetted interdisciplinary research literature database that is continually updated by the ARC community.

Contact information

People and company directories

Knowledge exchange

Platform of knowledge exchange and dissemination, through the ARC website and newsletter

News dissemination

Quarterly research digest newsletters, providing an overview of the latest research in esports, and disseminating news and white papers from the ARC community

Research highlights

Research spotlights and whitepapers

Collaborative events

Joint planning and execution of conferences and workshops

More information about our Team and Esports at the University of York

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