TV Asahi’s information program “Yoko Oshita Wide! Scramble” featured the “Exhibition Match with Para Esports Players” initiative, in which ePARA provided operational support and ePARA employees Jeni and NAOYA appeared.
In the program, the “Exhibition Match with Para Esports Players,” held at Tokyo Big Sight as part of Tokyo eSports Festa 2026, showed many people taking on esports regardless of age or disability and vividly conveyed people with and without disabilities competing on the same stage.
Along with that excitement, the program also focused on Jeni’s activities, introducing Jeni as a player who continues to take on esports while living with an intractable disease. It touched not only on Jeni competing as a player, but also on Jeni’s work as a producer at ePARA and involvement in planning and operating barrier-free esports events.
It also introduced how esports can be more than just a place for enjoyment and can serve as a means of expanding possibilities for employment and social participation, as well as the role ePARA plays in that.
In the studio after the broadcast, the program’s cast members offered warm comments about Jeni’s approach to esports and ePARA’s activities. Below is a comment from journalist Akira Ikegami.
Comment from Akira Ikegami:
When I first learned about “esports,” to be honest, there were times when I wondered, “Is this really a sport?”
But when you actually watch it, you feel, “Ah, this is a sport too.” On the screen, everyone can compete as equals. Seeing that, I felt, “This truly is a sport.”
And I think that showing, in this way, that “you do what you want to do” and “you really can do what you want to do” may itself encourage people facing similar struggles.
Through words like these, we are very pleased that ePARA’s long-cherished belief in “a society where people can take on what they want to do even if they have disabilities or illnesses” reached many people through the program. As part of ePARA × Saudi Vision 2030, ePARA will continue promoting activities aimed at spreading barrier-free esports across borders. Encouraged by this broadcast, ePARA will continue creating places where everyone can stand side by side as challengers.
