[1] The World Cyber Games, created by International Cyber Marketing CEO Yoosup Oh and backed financially by Samsung, was considered the e-sports Olympics;[2][3] events included an official opening ceremony, and players from various countries competing for gold, silver and bronze medals.

It brought together teams from 17 countries to compete against each other in PC games including Quake III Arena, FIFA 2000, Age of Empires II, and StarCraft: Brood War.

In 2001, the World Cyber Games held their first main event, hosted in Seoul, Korea, with a prize pool of $300,000 USD.

In addition, all games played at the tournament would be based exclusively on Windows PC's or the Xbox console.

[citation needed] In 2007, the event was hosted in Seattle, Washington, United States, with a total prize pool of US$4,000,000.

[15] The tournament was also coincided to run alongside the World Cyber Games debut reality television show, WCG Ultimate Gamer.

Plans to develop the WCG "into the world's top digital entertainment festival in the future".