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A non-players view of Starcraft 2

Blogs > Enzyme
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Enzyme
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
Australia183 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-06-17 23:40:26
June 17 2011 23:33 GMT
#1
The Starcraft 2 community is growing fast, and with it there are a number of people that do not even play video games that just enjoy watching and enjoying the experience. To me, Starcraft 2 is my sport. I do not need to play it in order to obsessively watch games, to read about tactics and strategies, or to enjoy many of the aspects the community and game provides. I could write pages on why I find Starcraft 2 more enjoyable than any "real sport", however I won't bore you with that.

I believe the influx of people like me is what is causing many of the problems in the Starcraft 2 community, and in our defense, I think we are needed as much as everyone else.

Famous comments by IdrA have expressed concerns that casters and players with personality (He mentioned Destiny at this point I believe) have more fans than the actual players themselves. I believe this is merely a result of many people not being able to appreciate the game at a level that IdrA does. Unless he expects every fan to spend 8+ hours a day practicing like he used to in Korea, the average fan will generally be entirely ignorant about the game.

Watching Destiny's stream when he is teaching students, even players in Platinum/Diamond/Low Masters, seem to have very little true game understanding. I believe DJ Wheet said something to the effect that he realized that the reason he had hit a skill cap was merely due to the fact he doesn't think like the progamers do. As more people enter the community, the average skill level is dropping, and expecting the fans to appreciate the game based on pure skill is unrealistic.

I bring this back to why I appreciate who is casting more than the players at times. This is because the casters are my gateway to Starcraft 2. They feed me insight into the game, they help me to understand and appreciate the players. If I just watched replays by myself of Losira or Nestea I wouldn't understand what makes them so good. It is the casters that not only bring energy and enthusiasm to the game, adding hype, but they inform and educate which lets me enjoy my sport even more.

This also ties into player personalities. When a player is entertaining off stage as well as when they are playing, it humanizes them and makes them someone you can connect with. Nestea vs SC would not have been nearly amazing to me if I had never seen Nestea or SC play even if I had the same level of SC2 awareness. It was my fan spirit for Nestea that had me on the edge of my seat during that last game, and I will never forget it. I appreciate Nestea for his skill, but I also like other players just because they are people. I want to see people like Destiny and Incontrol win because they interact with the community, they are people to me, there is a bond that forms between them outside of the realm of their gaming skill.

Non-players are swayed by more than just good game play, but this is exactly what is required to lift Starcraft 2 into being a true sport for spectators. Imagine football if only people that played football could consider themselves "true fans". Imagine if only pro-football players could argue about what players are good. I hope perhaps that non-player communities develop where I can argue with others about games and players from a purely fan point of view, like in any other sport. There is a level of ignorance that comes with not playing at the highest level and you cannot really expect fans to actually have much depth in their knowledge in something with so much finesse and nuance as Starcraft 2. I am sure every sports star in the world hates the fact their fans have no real appreciation of how hard what they do is, but this appreciation gap is what separates the pros from the fans.

To close off and summarize, non-players are going to become a bigger and bigger portion of the esports viewership if there is any hope that the scene grows to the size everyone wants it to. With this, game "ignorance" is a fact of life, and players and the community need to understand this. I think there is also an important pressure on non-players to not get carried away when arguing with people that clearly have a better understanding of the game from a personal level. I hope that Stracraft 2 only gets more popular, and that there is plenty more amazing content for me to enjoy.

***
DyEnasTy
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United States3720 Posts
June 18 2011 00:00 GMT
#2
4/5 good read
Much better to die an awesome Terran than to live as a magic wielding fairy or a mindless sac of biological goop. -Manifesto7
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