I've always loved computer/video games. And I probably always will. But lately I've been noticing a trend in E-sports that's made me more weary. Before I get in to it, I would like to say that I am not trying to bash any games, or say that any game is inherently "better" than any other games. But I am going to make statements such as game A is more difficult than game B.
I feel like E-sports in general is moving towards making games more "noob friendly". And I'm not just talking about SC2 vs BW stuff, though that is included. I was a big fan of WC3, as well as DOTA. But for a while I've been playing LoL. I've always loved Counter Strike:1.6 but that game as well, moved over the CS:Source. Every game is becoming more and more "noobfriendly". And it makes sense that these games (and especially E-sports) are going in that direction. Since it's easier for the new players to pick it up, you get more people involved in the game, more viewers, more buyers, more money. And, just because a game is more noob friendly does not necessarily make it have a lower skill ceiling. But what it does cause (more often than not) is it lets people of less skill to beat the people of higher skills more often. It leads to a more "snowballing" effects within the game. Snowballing as in, once a player takes a small advantage, it quickly goes out of control, because it's easier to just "not make mistakes" and have that lead to a win. In BW, even if you are somehow able to get an advantage against Flash, or Jaedong, you often find them coming back inch by inch and winning. (Best examples: Flash V Reach in SPL, super storms, comeback win, or Flash V Kal, i don't remember where, but reavers did amazing dmg, flash cameback anyways. Jaedong's ZvZ where he'd lose the BO battle but somehow still win 90% of his games lololol). But imagine the same situations in SC2, the chances of a comeback are slim to none. I'm not saying there aren't comebacks in SC2, sure there are, probably a lot more than in BW, but those comebacks aren't someone clawing their way back to victory step by step showing how they're the better player. It usually seems it's either the people in advantage makes a mistake, or the one counter "all in" works (All ins are pretty strong in SC2 it seems >.>).
This isn't a "bad" trend, nor is it a "Good" trend, it's just a trend i've noticed, and a trend that i personally do not like... I would much rather see Moon's amazing archer micro V Sky, or Bisu's perfectly timed harasses and multi task, than see 5 secs of amazing flashes, shiny things that decimiate an army, putting the other person in a way bigger advantage. I compare a lot of this to football. American and European football. American football, you know when things are going to happen, you don't really need the patience to watch it, cause you know when you can go grab a snack, you know when things will happen. Yes, sometimes they're amazing things, but they time that they're going to happen is predictable. While european football, you never know where and when something fantastic is going to happen. You need a lot more patience and you need to sit down, and watch the whole thing. SC2 seems more like american football. Flashyness for a short duration, within moments there are forcefields, storms, emps, fungals, blinks. While even in WC3, where it did have glmipses of that, because the units were a bit more durable, it lead to some unbeleiveable micro by players, or in BW, there were battles that lasted for litterally minuites.
I wish the best for E-sports, and if this more noob friendly way is going to get more money/attention/players in to this, then I'm not going to complain. I just wish games which weren't so noobfriendly could be popular in the west, as BW was in Korea. (not every one of those fangirls play BW, but they can still watch and enjoy it. Cause a difficult game, once learned, can sometimes be even more beautiful than a simple game)
I don't see it as "noob friendly" at all. It depends on the perspective you look at it from. You're saying that less skilled players are beating players of more skill when they shouldn't, but it's somewhat biased from what you expect from top tier players. You use the "comeback" statement, but in SC2 if you slip up in the beginning - it's less forgiving. I'm not sure how that equates to less skill, but more so fine tuned timings and punishing the other player.
If you make a dire mistake in a battle or in the early game, why should someone be able to come back from that? If you want to see good micro play, there is quite a bit with marine splits against banelings. (Kas versus Idra Game 2 DreamHack 2011) or WhiteRa's warp prism play to save collosi or his storm drops this past weekend.
Either way, not a bad read. Personally I'd like to see more baneling mines ;D
i dont understand your argument. are you saying brood war was too flashy? or was bw too noob friendly? I just don't see what you're trying to say because you contradict yourself so much.
On November 26 2011 07:29 Roe wrote: protoss was extremely noob friendly in bw.
i dont understand your argument. are you saying brood war was too flashy? or was bw too noob friendly? I just don't see what you're trying to say because you contradict yourself so much.
Pretty sure he's saying the exact opposite. And the most noob friendly race in bw is still much less noob friendly than any sc2 race.
Also, I completely agree with the OP. It's hard to get behind games like LoL or CoD when it comes to esports. Some people don't care cause they just like the idea of legitimizing esports but imo games should have to earn it. I think sc2 is a lot better than most games tho and blizzard had esports in mind when designing it. Anything compared to bw seems easy so its kind of an unfair comparison but compared with the current market of modern games i think sc2 is one of the best candidates for esports.
This blog sums up what I think about SC2 at the moment.
You will often times know the winner of the game within the first five minutes, and then it just becomes a case of "Wait for big shiny things to kill less upgraded shiny things due to previous advantage". Watching BW is so tense, you never know who will win. Jangbi vs Fantasy in the most recent OSL comes to mind.
On November 26 2011 07:29 Roe wrote: protoss was extremely noob friendly in bw.
i dont understand your argument. are you saying brood war was too flashy? or was bw too noob friendly? I just don't see what you're trying to say because you contradict yourself so much.
Pretty sure he's saying the exact opposite. And the most noob friendly race in bw is still much less noob friendly than any sc2 race.
Well it's just he complains about shiny things decimating an army and then supports things like reavers and storms. (both much more powerful than sc2 counterparts). Also the skill ceiling is impossible to reach in sc2, as it probably is in bw. We constantly see players making such basic mistakes that you would attribute, in bw, to skill. We do in fact see a lot of turn around simply because of skill (harass, flanking, spellcasting). Not only that but the mechanics make it impossible to reach. The whole "you never know what's going to happen" in brood war is way overblown. Most of brood war is incredibly limited and uncreative, and the thought only occurs because of the primitive UI. Will he go wraiths in this TvP? Nope, they suck. Will he go bio? No..Etc.The match ups revolved around basically 2-3 units with a couple of spellcasters. Don't point to deep six builds, because that was another all in that you complain about in sc2, and it almost never happened to be considered seriously. The same goes for the other builds that usually get brought up to support some kind of "creativity" in bw. I'll agree with you though, that the poor balance of brood war was what made it good. That's more about luck in my opinion though.
When you say the game is easy, then your only back-up argument is that the game is about luck (you should be winning tournaments shouldn't you?). But I think that will be disproved with time.
What is mind boggling is that some game developers aren't even trying to hide the fact that they are making their games, which are played for at international tournaments for tens of thousands of dollars (or any other currency for that matter), more noob friendly. And what exaclty qualifies as being noob friendly? Simplicity? Ease of mechanics?
Although the way I see it, simplicity does not equate "noob friendliness". I mean, look at Chess. Or even Go. The premise of those games are fairly simple, but both are the world's most complex strategy board games. In fact, Go can be said to be more "noob friendly" cuz all you do is put down black or white stones. yet the game is mind boggling complex. I think we just need to give SC2 more time to develop. Remember that the game is only a year old, there are 2 expansions left, and the rate at which players are discovering (or rediscovering from bw) strategies is pretty quick. I think we just need to let the game evolve and see where it takes us. IMO its too early for a judgement call.
On November 26 2011 07:29 Roe wrote: protoss was extremely noob friendly in bw.
i dont understand your argument. are you saying brood war was too flashy? or was bw too noob friendly? I just don't see what you're trying to say because you contradict yourself so much.
Pretty sure he's saying the exact opposite. And the most noob friendly race in bw is still much less noob friendly than any sc2 race.
Well it's just he complains about shiny things decimating an army and then supports things like reavers and storms. (both much more powerful than sc2 counterparts). Also the skill ceiling is impossible to reach in sc2, as it probably is in bw. We constantly see players making such basic mistakes that you would attribute, in bw, to skill. We do in fact see a lot of turn around simply because of skill (harass, flanking, spellcasting). Not only that but the mechanics make it impossible to reach. The whole "you never know what's going to happen" in brood war is way overblown. Most of brood war is incredibly limited and uncreative, and the thought only occurs because of the primitive UI. Will he go wraiths in this TvP? Nope, they suck. Will he go bio? No..Etc.The match ups revolved around basically 2-3 units with a couple of spellcasters. Don't point to deep six builds, because that was another all in that you complain about in sc2, and it almost never happened to be considered seriously. The same goes for the other builds that usually get brought up to support some kind of "creativity" in bw. I'll agree with you though, that the poor balance of brood war was what made it good. That's more about luck in my opinion though.
When you say the game is easy, then your only back-up argument is that the game is about luck (you should be winning tournaments shouldn't you?). But I think that will be disproved with time.
On November 26 2011 07:37 Jedclark wrote: This blog sums up what I think about SC2 at the moment.
You will often times know the winner of the game within the first five minutes, and then it just becomes a case of "Wait for big shiny things to kill less upgraded shiny things due to previous advantage". Watching BW is so tense, you never know who will win. Jangbi vs Fantasy in the most recent OSL comes to mind.
Storms and Reavers were very, very micro intensive. So micro intensive that even if you got your scarab off it could be a dud due to your opponents reaction speed or no reason at all.
Good storms were also a skill in itself. Just ask Jangbi.
Yes, the developers are leaning towards a more casual audience, but let us remember there are still a ton of people who love to watch it and many might not even play it.
Games can definitely become a spectator sport without having to make so many sacrifices in the game-play.
I agree for the most part with this blog. To me noob-friendliness is a measurement of how easy/probable it is for lower skill players to beat higher skill. Even though I still play sc2, I find the noob-friendliness high.
This post seems to be contradictory. Firstly, you want an easier turn-around with super storms and epic micro. But then you think the flashy explosions and 5 seconds for victory are a negative for SC2.
^ theres a difference because in SC2 anyone can make super storms and epic micro because the game has easier controls like autocasting and autosurround (lol), but in BW its an epic feat to pull off good storms and micro making it much more entertaining.
On November 26 2011 07:29 Roe wrote: protoss was extremely noob friendly in bw.
i dont understand your argument. are you saying brood war was too flashy? or was bw too noob friendly? I just don't see what you're trying to say because you contradict yourself so much.
Pretty sure he's saying the exact opposite. And the most noob friendly race in bw is still much less noob friendly than any sc2 race.
Well it's just he complains about shiny things decimating an army and then supports things like reavers and storms. (both much more powerful than sc2 counterparts). Also the skill ceiling is impossible to reach in sc2, as it probably is in bw. We constantly see players making such basic mistakes that you would attribute, in bw, to skill. We do in fact see a lot of turn around simply because of skill (harass, flanking, spellcasting). Not only that but the mechanics make it impossible to reach.
I disagree. I feel that the mechanics in SC2 have been dumbed down to the point where in the long run, it will be impossible to differentiate professional players from each other in terms of mechanics. Time will tell though.
On November 26 2011 07:49 Roe wrote: The whole "you never know what's going to happen" in brood war is way overblown. Most of brood war is incredibly limited and uncreative, and the thought only occurs because of the primitive UI. Will he go wraiths in this TvP? Nope, they suck. Will he go bio? No..Etc.The match ups revolved around basically 2-3 units with a couple of spellcasters. Don't point to deep six builds, because that was another all in that you complain about in sc2, and it almost never happened to be considered seriously. The same goes for the other builds that usually get brought up to support some kind of "creativity" in bw.
There is creativity and there are new builds; just because the unit composition doesn't change doesn't mean the game is limited. I suggest looking beneath the surface instead of just going OMG HE'S GOING TANKS AND VULTURES AGAIN IN TVP THIS GAME IS BORING.
On November 26 2011 07:49 Roe wrote: The match ups revolved around basically 2-3 units with a couple of spellcasters.
Even though matchups revolve around relatively few units, they are still very dynamic and exciting because of the insane amount of micromanagement required. In fact SC2 is much worse in this regard because of the comparative lack of micro.
On November 26 2011 07:49 Roe wrote: I'll agree with you though, that the poor balance of brood war was what made it good.
lmao
On November 26 2011 07:49 Roe wrote: When you say the game is easy, then your only back-up argument is that the game is about luck (you should be winning tournaments shouldn't you?). But I think that will be disproved with time.
Wow good job blowing his argument way out of proportion. No one is arguing that random amateur ladder players will be able to beat professional players. What the OP is worried about is skill difference AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL, and he has a good reason to be worried.
This has been discussed before, Dustin Browder said it himself that this isn't Starcraft Brood War. I personally enjoy LoL, it's heavily team oriented and there is still skill involved. In the end each game comes down to decision making, mechanics get in the way of that be it APM or something else. A good example would between playing a guitar and a piano, each has their own distinct mechanics one must learn but it doesn't matter which you play the end product will be music.
EPT
