My Thanks - 1000th post rant

G'day folks,

I'm actually not really one for romanticising "great numbers" or anything like that, but I believe I haven't actually taken the time to thank everyone who has been involved in my SC2 commentating to some degree, and perhaps my 1000th post on TL is time to do that.

I'm probably going to go on various tangents while writing this, because someone is distracting me and I'm also watching the awesome Babyknight streaming (as you should too, fellow Brotoss) - so please bear with me and I'll try to stick to topic as much as possible. I thought I'd go over my short and relatively unknown history of casting games and get to the "thank you's" where applicable. I'll do my best to include everyone I can, however please understand there are a lot of people over the last couple of years, and if I don't mention you then my bad TT. Some people listed might not be directly influential on it either, however they have meant something to me in some respect.

Enough rambling; let’s get to the realtalk.

Back in the day...

I'd started watching SCBW back in the earlier days of 2006/2007, entranced by the amazing Korean casters, not only because of the incredible amount of energy they bring to a cast - but for the simple fact - I couldn't understand a word, but I still loved it. How is that even possible? I truly recognised this yesterday when I was watching Breaking Bad, and there was a section in season 3 where there are entire scenes in Spanish, and through some weird error I had, I wasn't getting any subtitles.

This was incredibly frustrating for me, mainly because I couldn't catch what was going on in the story - then it occurred to me - I never understood what the Korean commentators were saying back then... and still loved it. It's incredible to think about. Obviously the visual aspect of watching Starcraft helps quite a lot when you understand what the units do, what buildings produce and function as; but still, I think that even if I didn't have as much game knowledge then, I'd still have had fun watching. There is so much energy and power that a commentator brings to the game - or any sport for that matter. Try watching a football game without the sound on, see how long it'll hold your attention before your eyes flick around the room watching a dust-bunny whisp by. Unless you're a devout fan, I doubt it'll hold for long.

But as I said, the casters are amazing and I really respected them - even at one point wishing that I could send some communication to them to say "thank you" to them, but during those days I was still at school and got distracted even easier than I do now, so that never came to fruition. Apart from the odd Korean cast on MBC/OGN that I'd catch, I didn't know much else of the world of competitive Starcraft, nor the larger community and the other commentators that existed. That soon changed.

Suddenly: An influential figure!

In the late summer (Australian summer!) of 2008, the GOM Star Invitational began on Jan 27th, hosting an event that included an English stream and a personality that the Korean's thought strong enough to commentate! I had to tune in. My best friend and I both watched the Star Invitational religiously, watching the likes of (a very young) Flash, Stork, GGplay, Boxer, and others battle it out - this time with a play-by-play and partly analytical commentary from the one and only; Nick "Tasteless" Plott.

A handsome 12 year old Tasteless. Or maybe a little older!

While obviously behind the scenes there were deeper things going on regarding KeSPA and GOM (which I didn’t know about at the time), it was a new way to watch the game for myself and a few people I knew, also sparking a thought in the back of my mind regarding commentating. "This is so cool and seems really fun to do!" I thought - listening to Tasteless describing styles and methods players used - who was soon joined by SuperDanielMan, adding an interesting element to the casting (Monkey milk anyone?) with his background in managing/coaching SCBW. SDM and Tasteless did a great job, it's a while back but if I remember correctly they had some nice back and forth, along with decent play-by-play and analytical commentary separation, which made the casts even better at that point. Not long after, lilsusie was also part of the crew, helping out with player interviews, and also filling the casting role too!

A bit of a more 'fun' style casting, these two did a good job

So it occurred to me - this seems like fun, why don't I give it a shot? I was never a fantastic SCBW player (Got to C on iccup as my highest rank

), so I clearly didn't have the depth of knowledge that Tasteless brought to his casting. But this was 2008 - almost a year after the announcement from Blizzard. on May 19th 2007, that SC2 was in development (and had apparently been so for almost 4 years...). I figured I'd let that thought go for now, and come back to it once SC2 was out - I'd have a new start; I could bring some of my minor SCBW knowledge over as building blocks, then try and flesh out that knowledge with SC2 content and see if I could do casting from then on. At least that was the plan!

In the end I didn't actually get any casting going until after the game was released - starting out with a tournament that was setup by deL and our little team from "SCOceania" (which unfortunately failed miserably) - a SEA based 2v2 tournament. Remember - at this point I believe that SEA players still only had access to the SEA server, no NA at all. It wasn't until a little after that which we got access to NA - but I digress.

The only real 'creative' work I'd done in relation to videos were a couple odd DoTA compilation videos I'd made - and looking back they were fun to make, but still obviously quite amateur to look at

.

The real action begins

We started up the SCOceania 2v2 Tournament with a bit of a bang - including some great local talent that was budding in our area, along with an old face - Legionnaire! The tournament was fun - of course I'd need to give thanks to deL for putting the whole thing together, he did a really great job with our rag-tag group and making sure things ran smoothly, one of his greater talents.

The first cast went up on August 24, a match between team Power 9 against Team Solid. These were fun teams and fun games, nothing truly amazing (especially given the crappy map pool at the time*) but it was still very cool for me to give casting a shot - attempting to emulate Tasteless and his ilk that made watching Starcraft a blast.

Needless to say, there were issues. As you can see below, the technology "just wasn't there yet" to close the replay time index, nor put a flashy picture over the top of it - vertical bars on the side also made it look quite rudimentary - and I was terrible at putting the unit counting station up back in those days.

Attempting to be Tasteless is a useful skill to have

Another huge issue I had, which many of the "long-time" viewers will remember, are graphical glitches and blackouts. They were incredibly difficult to deal with. It was actually the most frustrating part of my commentating - there were very odd bars and colours that came up on the VoD from time to time, which really hurt the viewing pleasure of the casts. Needless to say, I searched high and low for a possible solution, and it wasn't until 6 months later, a whole new PC (I thought it was a pc hardware issue), and a dear friend that I found out: it was my router. I have NO clue how this is possible - but the router was... somehow screwing up the upload to Youtube. When I asked my dear friend Nixiecon to upload a cast herself (I sent a short one to her through dropbox) - it worked fine. Cue the most frustrating moment in my life, to which a router may or may not have met its demise to a pickaxe in my backyard.

It wasn't the fact that it cost me time and money to fix - it was the fact that I'd let down so many viewers with the graphical issues, and probably cost myself a lot of subscribers early on in my tenure. Given that the issue was fixed, I started getting back into casting a lot more, considering I was on the verge of giving up at that point. Somehow, one way or another, I was led to this particular site below, which spawned a new era of my casting.

Learning from the best

A scary place to look at for someone with no Korean knowledge...

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However I didn't care!

Playxp is a site that I started going to, as there were 'pro replays' a-plenty. So many in fact that I actually ignored quite a lot of them - this particular section is where a lot of the masters level players that are "unknown" post their replays against pros and talk about it. It was a fun place, I learnt a lot from watching the replays myself, but it also gave me some great content to work with - leading to one of my first VoD's with a decent amount of views, "ManOfOneWay" (SlayerS_BoxeR) vs Acupuncture.

One name can bring a lot of views

Things rolled along nicely from there, fixing up graphical things (getting help from all sorts of people in that regard was a huge boost for me). It helped me keep things on track, and some of the various fans who watch my VoDs have also brought me a lot of happiness. I started connecting with various people through Twitter - who knew much more technical things than I and were able to help, along with creative people like Brandon Casteel who was able to help me out with some sweet graphics that I've been using all this time. Not to mention high level players (both Koreans and foreigners) that I have been able to get some very cool casts of up on the channel - all while keeping a full time job IRL that I love doing.

That's one thing that I think has separated me a little from some other commentators - I am not aiming to be the next Husky, and/or part of the live 'top tier' casters for that matter. I like my job IRL, and I really just enjoy casting great games and sharing them with you all. I've kept a great balance between work and casting, and that's one thing I'd like to keep intact. So I know there are a lot of people who mention to me "you do great casting, you should go to MLG!" - I definitely appreciate the compliments and such - however I'm happy with things the way they are... for the moment. If I decided to get into it a bit more (which of course I'd never rule out), I'll look into it and see what comes of it.

Newer influences

Not going to rant on about this one for too long, because I'm sure I've lost some of you already and others are getting bored - but I wanted to mention a couple of my favourite 'top tier' community members that I enjoy listening to.

DJWheat

As we all know Wheat has been around since before the dawn of time, and may have been responsible for the big bang - but since his move over to SC2 he has been a great inspiration for me. Somewhat similar to the way I cast, he provides a great mix of play-by-play and analytical content (when alone) and when paired up he has some fantastic play-by-play and have great "questioning" to the analytical commentator - which is something that I think is sorely missed in some casting duos.

The other thing I love about Wheat? He's not GM. He's not the best player in the world - but he's fine with that, and he owns that. There are so many people who will question a commentator and say "WELL ARE YOU TOP 10 MASTERS? IF NOT GTFO" which to me is a stupid position to take. Don't get me wrong - obviously you need solid game knowledge to bring a good solo (or even duo) cast to the table - but this mantra of "be top 3 control or you're shit" really irks me. (end rage rant)

Artosis
One of the pillars of the community, known for his own ability to rant and rave while streaming (much like myself) - Artosis brings so much knowledge to casting, it's invaluable. I sincerely wish I had his knowledge depth for my own casting - but that won't ever happen due to my own circumstances, and I'm ok with that.

Doa
Doa is an interesting commentator to me - he seems to bring a very calm style that (by some wizard magic) still has its own pulse; its own energy. I really like it, and the recent pairing with KevinCatsPajamasKnocke (make sure you say it in 1 second like he does) is a great combination that does really well for the IGN team.

Grubby

A little more recent phenomenon - I thought I'd include Grubby in here, because listening to his commentary (as I'm sure the majority of you would agree) is awe-inspiring. An unfathomable depth of knowledge from his 900 years of playing, combined with some incredibly descriptive elucidation, makes Grubby a fantastic addition to any casting team, and I really hope that he continues to fill this role even after he finishes playing.

The main event

Finally after all that, I guess it's time to thank everyone - I'll try and "group" these up relating to their influence on me or the "genre" they fill in my eyes, and include Twitter if I remember it. If you feel like you were grouped incorrectly, please fill out a form and send it to me through the internets via Australia's primary internet method:

THANK YOU TO:

General:

Ares[Effort](@areseffort) and the TL replay pack crew - the TL replay packs have always been a great source of content for me, and with the primary assistance of Ares I've had a great time producing content from the players that are part of my favourite high level team.
Junkka(Junkka83) - Junkka is one of the funniest people I've met, and even helped me out quite a while back with recognising some players in the replays I picked up, such a humble dude.
Nicole(@nixiecon) - One of my most devoted fans, and one of the most helpful ones. Your support over time meant so much to me - along with finding out that my early graphical error was the GOD DAMN ROUTER went a long way.
Logan(@lastkarrde) - My kiwi bru who helped me with my personal blog that I always forget about, and one of the original SCOceania crew. Top bloke, and I hope you stay healthy man.
Taliana(@taliana aka @sc2trans) - ever funny and helpful, always willing to give me assistance with all things Korean - along with updating the @SC2Trans Twitter account keeping everyone in the community apprised of what the Korean players are saying!
@deodorantLEE - Another translation buddy who helped me out HEAPS with finding out the names of players in the Korean reps I grab off playxp
@scientistsMJ - Same as above, I hope school went well!
Ziggy!(@ziggyDStarcraft) - Setup the Learning SC site, and supportive all the way!
Pete T - My IRL buddy who has been a bro since the old days when I played Dota, great to talk to and a true GM level friend,
Bobby(@ironhammers) - showed that I was an idiot because I wasn't capturing video in the correct resolution (which led to me fixing the vertical bars on my casts)
Josh(@Clutch08) - Helped us organise all of those awesome MLG community casts that are up on the MLG site, great guy
Stephen(@MLGStephen) and Lee(@MLGLee) - MLG dudes who brought the MLG community casting into existence and gave me a chance of doing it - thank you guys heaps <3
Marc(@marconofrio) - aka FXOFrequency - helped me out with some local aussie reps that were great fun to cast!
Brendan(FXOdeL) - another initiate in SCOceania, thanks for sticking with it for the short time it was around... but also of course for your local contributions
Zoe(@zozorenee) - my dearest friend Zoe! Supporting me IRL and perhaps even diving into the SC2 community soon once she has a new PC - everyone tweet her and tell her to play SC2!
Matt(@deebs1986) - one of my other best friends IRL who has put up with my shit for so long, I'm even playing on his graphics card because I'm so lazy I haven't bought a new one yet haha. Top bloke
Henrik(@henrikammer) - made the extremely sexy splash screen that I use on my stream <3
The Australian Proleague Crew You all know who you are, thank you for letting me be a part of the APL, really hope we have another one soon!
Mary(@ninehourfilms) - being a great listener when I needed to rage about casting stuff and helping me out on occasion with a few things - also creating the awesome GGMovie about Evil Geniuses! Check it out! :D
Lamonte(@G4MR) - great help with replays and finding new talent, thank you so much!
Andrew(@WPSeaGnome) - Agrees with me that Glee is shit (Oh I guess he cuts VODs for Twitch which is kinda awesome too)
Edwin(@riseofr1ce) and Scotty(sawedust) - The most incredibly helpful dudes on Twitter that I know of, almost any stupid technical question I've had they've been able to help or point me in the direction.
Steven(@projekt21) - The maaaaaaaan. Fixed up my live stream so it's at least partially watchable! That was one of the coolest moments of all time!
Gimble(@GimbleB) - The greatest Scottish Terran player that will ever exist, great assistance and hosts a really cool show that you should watch!
Tumba(tumbasc) - great all round dude, helping with MLG and providing me with a laugh all the time - also was for some reason willing to cast this ridiculously hilarious game I played on the Korean server which made me feel famous.
Josh(@prodigSC) - Badass map maker who has helped me out in various ways, including recognising some of the RANDOM maps that the Koreans play on
Giannii(@giannii) - great assistance in setting up freaking wordpress on my site! :D

Special thanks to:

Galen(@MLG_Omerta) and Dave(@MLG_Wiggin) - 2 great dudes that have helped me out both in my own gameplay - but also as co-hosts of our fun show "Late Night IMBA discussions!" which is an absolute blast!
Lastlie(Lastlie2) and Papa Boesthius(boesthius) - keeping me entrenched in the SCBW scene at least to some degree, you guys are hilarious :D

Huge thanks to some of my really vocal and helpful fans:

Gollum(@gollum80), Synizta, Cryteek, Henrikammer(@henrikammer), Luis(@drums2k9) and Alice(@alice_bee) - who watch me stream for some unknown reason despite my rage, stupid risky eco builds and sometimes weird music - you guys rock

I suppose I should also thank players too! Though obviously I can't thank them all... But mainly:

Tt_Pig(@ttpig_sc2) - Aussie Zerg baws, make sure you watch his stream!
Rossi(NvRossi) - Aussie Terran who has educated me on some of the local players in the SC2 scene which was incredibly useful!
OneStar(@OneStar1006) - One of my favourite Korean Terran players - onestar has sent me a plethora of replays ranging from extreme to very simple but effective - expect to see him on the big stage soon
Mechanical Duck! (@mechanic_ori) - Another Duck! But this one is actually good at mech play, does it almost all the time! Think of... a Korean GoodY!
Sanha(@dtGSickness) - One of my favourite Korean Protoss, even one of my favourite overall Protoss - perhaps favourite player ever? This guy is funny and does some amazing shit with warp prisms.
The entire TeamLiquid team (@teamliquidpro) - I love you guys, keep fighting the good fight
My own team, Dream Team Gaming(@alldaydreamteam) - thank you for supporting me and letting me be part of the team, hwaiting!

Along with all those random Korean's I did casts of from playxp replays... you guys are awesome but will probably never see this anyway, but still. Makes me feel good. Also huge shoutout and thanks to some of the high level players I get to speak to who provide me with reps and listen to me rant about random things: Seed(@IM_Seed), Sage(@NSHSSage), Hongun(@hongun87), Babyk(@The_13abyKnight), Styx(now Gemini from ePi - @epiGemini), alejandrisha(@alejP15), Ognis (@QuanticTheOgnis) and Flo(@QuanticFlo). You guys are all amazing and I wish I had the skills you guys do

And thank you to every person who has gone on my channel and watched a game or two, provided feedback or sent in replays. Every one of you helps make it all worth it.

<3

Very special thanks to my gorgeous Ashley who edited this because she's incredibly awesome at English - the one class at school I hated and wanted to ragequit. <3

What's next?

I'm certainly going to continue casting, providing as much content to you all as I can - that's not going to fade away at all. However it may slow down because of a certain something coming up... Something that... I might starting doing casts of (once the PVP element comes around that is...)

Thoughts on Diablo3 casting? I dunno, it could be fun. We'll find out eventually.

So for those who read through this whole damn thing - I salute you. For those who skipped through to find their name and what I said about them: you're so generic - read the whole thing damnit

You can find me:
www.youtube.com/duckvillelol - My channel!
www.duckvillelol.com - Blog that I have trouble updating because I'm lazy
www.facebook.com/duckvillelolsc2 - Facebewk, hit that like button!
www.twitter.com/DUCKVILLELOL - on Twitter

Cheers.

My Thanks - 1000th post rant

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