Add the Washington Post to the list of mainstream publications that have noticed the power of eSports business.

The Post notes the multi-billion dollar purchases that have driven many of the recent headlines: “Gaming inspired three of the biggest deals in business this year: Microsoft’s $2.5 billion deal for the “Minecraft” game studio, Mojang; Amazon’s $1 billion acquisition of the game-streaming social network Twitch; and Facebook’s $2 billion acquisition of the virtual reality gaming firm Oculus VR.”

In fact, the piece points out the gap between gaming revenues and other entertainment forms: “Last year, the movie industry pulled in $10.9 billion at the U.S. box office. The music industry reported $7 billion in sales. Game sales tallied more than both, combined, at $21 billion.”

Another sign of the times — eSports viewing numbers get compared to the World Series : “ESPN is even getting into the action. The network’s streaming arm, ESPN3, aired its first esports coverage this year of a tournament at Seattle’s Key Arena. As exciting as playing the big stadiums is, the audience is even bigger online. Some tournaments have logged up to 23 million concurrent viewers. That’s roughly the same number of people that tuned in to watch the Game 7 of this year’s World Series.”