Filipino gamers have seen Bam Aquino swarm their news feed about his recent endorsing of professional Filipino Dota 2 team that is Rave. But how did he even get hooked into all this esports talk when it has not yet reached mainstream status in the country?

Mineski.net managed to speak to Senator Bam Aquino himself and let him tell the story.

From GDAP to esports
Senator Bam first remarked that his office is the first one from the government to deal with the rising IT industry in the Philippines such as video game development. Bam claims that giving support to industries such as this gives more career opportunities for the citizens, "We've been dealing with the Game Developers Association of the Philippines (GDAP). We've been helping them trying to get more leads and bring in more companies here in the Philippines like Sony, Microsoft, and Ubisoft because we believe that there's a lot of talent and a lot of competency in the Philippines to develop video games."

[Group photo]
(From left) France Embassy to the Philippines Audiovisual Attaché Martin Macalintal, Senator Bam Aquino, Board of Investment (BOI) Director Angelica Cayas, GDAP Pres. Alvin Juban, and BOI Division Chief Lanie Dormiendo during the annual Philippine Game Festival​ last 2014.
Grabbed from investphilippines.go.ph

Bam's story on his involvement with GDAP then connects to how he came to know about esports, "We've been talking to all these guys to setup studios here. Hopefully there will be good news in the next couple of months and then through that effort we learned about the esports industry players. That's when they came to us and asked for our help for Team Rave."

Being proud of Rave
Bam has shown his exhilirating support for the team through social media and through assisting them with visa applications. "We're proud of this team (Rave), they're number one in Southeast Asia, they're the underdogs, they beat really huge teams from really huge countries (Russia, China, and South Korea). As you can see, esports here in our country isn't as strong compared to those countries and they're already able to place."

[Missing photo]
Team Rave winning the Mineski Pro Gaming League Season 6 Southeast Asia Grand Final at SM Skydome last November 2014
(From left) Manager Pyung Kwon, Ryo Hasegawa, Mark 'Cast' Pilar, Michael 'NB' Ross, Djardel 'Chrissy' Mampusti, Jio 'Jeyo' Madayag

"So we're hoping that with more support from Pinoys and from different institutions that they can really bring home the gold then take the largest prize money. So we're quite proud of them and we hope they have even more continued successes as they continue they journey," the senator adds.

PH has one of the worst internet connections

[Average ASEAN Internet Speed infographic]
Grabbed from Rappler.com

During our conversation with Senator Bam, the issue of slow internet connection was inevitably brought up, "We have one of the worst internet (connections) in the ASEAN. Actually it's one of our main advocacies to really improve the internet infrastructure here in the Philippines. Hopefully if we're able to improve that, we'll be able to develop our esports industry even more and be able to support our cyberathletes."

Esports Association of the Philippines
The upcoming Esports Association of the Philippines was also brought up. Bam enthusiastically replies, "I think it would be great if an association for esports would be created. Earlier we talked about possibly talking to the Philippine Sports Commission to see any way for cyberathletes to be recognized officially by the government. But a private body I think would even be better. We're willing to support in any way we can."

[Individual photos]
Two proponents of the Esports Association of the Philippines
Eric Redulfin of TNC (left) and Ronald Robins of Mineski (right)
Photo of Eric grabbed from TNC Gaming

The Esports Association of the Philippines has been brought up by two different key figures: TheNetCom CEO Eric Redulfin, and Mineski Corporation CEO Ronald "Rhom" Robins. In both instances, the association seeks the middle ground between game publishers, event organizers, team managers, and professional gamers in order to place a proper regulation and provide necessary benefits to participants of the esports industry.

Editor's note: After our talk with the Senator, I kept thinking that the future looks good for Philippine esports and we are finally somewhere on their radar. But as we all know, drastic changes does not simply happen overnight and I honestly believe that we should not put everything on the shoulders of the government. It's actually up to all of us, members of the esports community, to work together if we are to desire of something to materialize.