Why MSL Group Selection cancelled?

On November 05 2009 03:25 p4NDemik wrote:
Fomos removed it from their schedule a couple of days ago. Apparently there are rumors that MBC is having difficulty with their sponsor/having trouble finding one.

On November 06 2009 04:56 Papperskorg wrote:
wow, that sucks, and no teams wanted to go at Gom who had sponsors and everything lol

On November 06 2009 05:07 El.Divino wrote:
I'm feeling a Red Bull MSL.

On November 06 2009 06:03 darktreb wrote:
People who can read Korean - is this a sign of serious trouble? Or is it the same old MSL having trouble finding sponsors (which has been the situation for quite awhile now). Not saying that the MSL won't happen, but it is pretty discouraging that it seems to be getting harder and harder for them to find a sponsor.

I can't remember it taking them so long that they had to postpone the group selection.

On November 06 2009 06:26 Bifur wrote:
This is the beginning of the end of progaming

On November 06 2009 06:25 DoctorHelvetica wrote:
Any koreans here wanna shed some light on this?

BroodWar seems to have a bigger fanbase then it did in 2002-2003, why are big companies dropping out? Won't they just make more money?

On November 06 2009 06:43 gchan wrote:


It's called a recession.

On November 06 2009 06:57 dukethegold wrote:
Has this ever happened before? O.o

Also, can any Koreans here shred some light upon the situation?

On November 06 2009 07:24 OreoBoi wrote:
What would happen if Blizzard sponsored the MSL?

On November 06 2009 07:02 l10f wrote:


There's no light to shed, they just don't have a sponsor yet.

Also note the last 3 (Clubday, Lost Saga, Avalon) went down after sponsoring MSL. Clubday closed their service, Lost Saga is about to, and Avalon isn't doing that well either.

On November 06 2009 07:29 Zinbiel wrote:

Kespa would kill itself and the universe would implode, according to my calculations at least.

On November 06 2009 07:47 StorkHwaiting wrote:
I hope MSL does not happen. There are too many leagues already in Starcraft. The quality of the games is going down for the most part. Way too much just spammage of games and conventional play. I'm tired of it and the progamers are too. There is nothing fun about playing SC like a machine. Like Nal-Ra said, there would be a lot more creativity if they weren't playing 3 games a week.

There should be one individual leage and one PL. That is PLENTY! I'd rather watch 1 good game than 5 mediocre ones.

On November 06 2009 08:01 On_Slaught wrote:
I'll prob get some slack for this...

But who said that the OSL wasn't "bigger" and more prestigous than the MSL? Hmmm.

On November 06 2009 08:13 p4NDemik wrote:

Dude can you teach me your ESP methods? I really want to know about the personal wishes of every single progamer. I'm sure there's plenty to be made in this line of psychic tutelage. PM ME IMMEDIATELY.

On November 06 2009 08:19 heyoka wrote:
MSL was the one that changed the rules to some super screwy bo3/bo5 system last spring right? The one where even bo3s were played out over 2 weeks? Or was that both individual leagues?

On November 06 2009 07:30 XsebT wrote:
Welcome to the real world kespa. - I see this as good news, as kespa is in a position so commanding that it is only bad for the game and its' players.
- Kespa is made for money, not for quality.

On November 06 2009 08:28 p4NDemik wrote:

Paraphrasing one commentator's words counts as the collective opinion of hundreds of progamers?

Obviously not.

Therefore, he must be psychic.

On November 06 2009 07:47 StorkHwaiting wrote:
I hope MSL does not happen. There are too many leagues already in Starcraft. The quality of the games is going down for the most part. Way too much just spammage of games and conventional play. I'm tired of it and the progamers are too. There is nothing fun about playing SC like a machine. Like Nal-Ra said, there would be a lot more creativity if they weren't playing 3 games a week.

There should be one individual leage and one PL. That is PLENTY! I'd rather watch 1 good game than 5 mediocre ones.

On November 06 2009 09:08 nayumi wrote:
Team Liquid MSL anyone?

Go make a donation thread to raise $10 million dollars and we are set.

On November 06 2009 09:14 xMiragex wrote:


all joking aside, i wonder how much money TL can raise for a huge event or something O.o

On November 06 2009 09:18 Frits wrote:


probably about 20 to 50 k

On November 06 2009 09:29 Holgerius wrote:

How much would be needed in order to sponsor MSL? :D

On November 06 2009 08:28 p4NDemik wrote:

Paraphrasing one commentator's words counts as the collective opinion of hundreds of progamers?

Obviously not.

Therefore, he must be psychic.

On November 06 2009 09:17 iLoveKT wrote:
Bisu is screwed lol.

On November 06 2009 09:30 Frits wrote:


Probably about 70k? i honestly dont have the slightest clue but its not like TL will ever consider this anyway. TL is not a company nor does it need publicity in Korea.

That and Im pretty sure MSL will be able to find a sponsor.

On November 06 2009 09:36 konadora wrote:

Heroes of Newearth MSL

On November 06 2009 09:36 konadora wrote:

Heroes of Newearth MSL

On November 06 2009 09:44 dukethegold wrote:


Blizzard can bypass the Kespa ban on it by creating a separate and independent subsidiary.

WoW MSL

It is destiny, and Stork is the main character.

On November 06 2009 09:40 nadafanboy42 wrote:
I always feel that these people calling for less leagues are being extremely selfish and short-sighted. Starcraft growing smaller and stagnating remaining a tiny niche-club may be good for your own ability to watch the games, but it is not good for the players. Maybe the games were better in the old days, but it was not better for the players (remember Silent Control fainting? Or just try to find an interview with the OZ guys about their PLUS days). If anything what Starcraft needs imo is more leagues. The problem right now is that there is nothing in between amateur tournaments and the top s-class leagues, all pro players compete in all tournaments. There should be a minor league where the b-teamers can participate and get used to being on tv, so that the S-class players can cherry-pick the important tournaments and focus on those. More concretely, instead of lessening the number of proleague matches, keep the current number, but force teams to set up two rosters an A-team and a B-team, and split the matches between A-team and B-team matches.

On November 06 2009 09:19 konadora wrote:
Look at their recent sponsors... Club Day Online, Avalon Online, Lost Saga...

On November 06 2009 09:18 p4NDemik wrote:

The issues regarding the players you mentioned being overworked are first and foremost the biproduct of the insane amount of Proleague games. Despite their remarks that they didn't have much time to prepare, etc. it's still quite a stretch to think that they'd rather not have that league around to play in.

In almost every tournament you have just as many players who have only that opportunity to prove themselves (outside of a spare few PL games at most) as you do overworked aces like Flash and Jaedong. To cite the exceptional cases of these elite few players and say that the whole of progamers would be better off without the MSL because their teams overplay their aces during Proleague is preposterous. They'd be cutting off their nose to spite their face.

On November 06 2009 09:58 d_so wrote:
i like how pandemik's getting crushed on by a sub 50 poster

On November 06 2009 05:34 GTR wrote:
Coke already sponsored an OSL.
+ Show Spoiler +

On November 06 2009 05:04 StorrZerg wrote:


that suckksssss TT

Blizzard should sponsor it LOL

On November 06 2009 09:57 StorkHwaiting wrote:


What company in their right mind would want to purchase advertising time on a TV show that broadcasted games like Juni versus Spear. And what actual viewership would sit around and want to watch that?

There is nothing keeping Starcraft from booming and getting bigger except the fact that the Korean audience only has a set amount of people that want to watch. Korea's population is only so big. You can't justify paying millions of dollars on buying ads and sponsorships if the viewership is only 20-30K ppl. (I don't know the actual viewership but it's never going to be American Idol level simply because there aren't that many Koreans).

What your proposing would take a LOT MORE MONEY. The business fundamentals of what you're talking about do not exist. You can't wish these things into being. Minor leagues like in baseball don't work in Starcraft. Baseball has MUCH more money coming in. They can afford to set up an entire league that nobody watches just for the profitability of scouting a star from there. That's how big money is in the sport. Starcraft doesn't have that kind of buying power.

That's why the salaries suck ass. That's why the players have no bargaining power. That's why there are NOT that many players and teams period! If the sport drew a lot more money then there would be a lot more teams and there would be a lot more players. Aces wouldn't be so overworked because there would be 30-40 man rosters to choose from.

Then again Starcraft will never play like a baseball/football/basketball. You don't have Kobe Bryant playing individual leagues while he's trying to take his team to the playoffs. Starcraft is different.

And the reality is the GOOD players right now are being overworked.

On November 06 2009 06:21 Nevuk wrote:
If GOM got canceled because of Kespa and the msl winds up not happening, I will be annoyed.

On November 06 2009 10:53 p4NDemik wrote:
Agreed Stylish. The OSL/PL would have to become massively popular to conteract a major player in the BW scene just dropping of the scene.

At this stage none of this banter we're having really matters - the fate of StarCraft in Korea will lie with SC2 anyways. If it succeeds then there will be continued expansion/growth, and if it doesn't then the industry will become a smaller and smaller niche.

On November 06 2009 10:14 dukethegold wrote:
You know. I still don't know what EVER sells...

On November 06 2009 10:57 MuffinDude wrote:
Aww don't fail on me now msl. This is the only league that jangbi does well in. =( and if you go away, stork can't get his double gold.

Starcraft community isn't getting smaller so thats good. There are more and more progamers around. I predict that sc2 will be just another game. They might have separate leagues for it, but it won't go mainstream. Thats only my speculation, so yea.

What e-sports could do in order to grow is by trying to reach out to the fans a bit more. From what I have seen, e-sport does not hold many events that are strictly for the benefits of the fans.

That's why makers of the games need to be involved, as they are most likely interested in making their own games bigger, reach wider audience and increase their reputation. That's why competition is necessary, in order to bring about changes.

GOM did not have to go away at all.

On November 06 2009 10:19 p4NDemik wrote:

If you eliminate more and more opportunities there is less and less interest for the mid-level players to work hard to continue pursuing what is already an incredibly difficult career path. You can't neglect 75% of the players to accomodate the talented few. You need those less talented individuals to compose the teams, to serve as practice players, to push those ahead of them.

You're thinking purely from the point of view of maximizing the potential viewership for a short period of time. With only one major Starleague for players to practice for and literally no hope for most new players to reach A-team status without giving up years of their lives with literally nothing substantial gained the motivating factors to keep kids interested in becoming progamers would begin to evaporate. Sure, the OSL's/PL's ratings would skyrocket if the MSL became no more, but the overall interest would not increase, and it would merely be the first step towards a failing industry.

You need to keep the players at least moderately happy to sustain any league. The fact that salaries for Korean progamers are so low highlights how good the Starleagues work as motivators to keep these kids interested in pursuing such a profession. With a shrinking pool of leagues, and little to no real income gained, how many of them could justify giving up years when they could be in school to continue playing a computer game?

On November 06 2009 13:13 OreoBoi wrote:
Macdonald's MSL?
Kimchi MSL?
If Blizzard sponsored an MSL, they should call it the "Starcraft 2" MSL.

Oh well, if theres no MSL, maybe Flash won't have to work as hard and he'll win an OSL title ^_^

On November 06 2009 09:17 iLoveKT wrote:
Bisu is screwed lol.

On November 06 2009 12:18 d_so wrote:
blizzard is great at making games but they have had no idea how to market it to nongamers

On November 06 2009 10:29 justiceknight wrote:
I really dont see how do you compare a good sponsor and a bad sponsor,what difference would it make?

On November 09 2009 15:27 FieryBalrog wrote:
This is really sad.

Anyway, I feel that the SC pro-scene has been gradually dwindling in Korea over the past year or so. Not enough interesting characters to follow in the narratives of the leagues.

On November 10 2009 08:47 sky_slasher wrote:
This appears to be MBC responding to an user's question about whether the Group Selection will occur:

http://www.mbcgame.co.kr/client/VI_Board_View.asp?Top_CD=G_VI&Sub_Title=BBS&Sub_sTitle=bbs&page=1&itemid=23359&txt_Search=&txt_Key

There's gonna be Group Selection on the 19th, this post by MBC Game said.

On November 10 2009 09:58 DoctorHelvetica wrote:
Maple Story MSL

On November 09 2009 15:27 FieryBalrog wrote:
This is really sad.

Anyway, I feel that the SC pro-scene has been gradually dwindling in Korea over the past year or so. Not enough interesting characters to follow in the narratives of the leagues.

On November 10 2009 10:03 konadora wrote:

holy fuck

On November 06 2009 11:57 d_so wrote:


you guys are talking about a nation that still uses internet explorer 6.0 and windows xp.

this is a stereotype but there is truth it: koreans stick to what they know and what they feel they have a connection or 정 with. they won't move over to sc2 even if it's better. maybe after a year or two some people will start to switch over, but i'm willing to bet that sc2 won't replace starcraft, it'll just compete with it.

simply put, MSL having a late sponsor is nothing new and is not a sign of diminishing demand for BW.

On November 09 2009 06:45 Jayson X wrote:
Late sponsor is nothing new.
The problem lies within how this sport is being looked at. It's a team sport that is played in 1vs1s.
On one side you have the tennis like Grand Slam's, lots of prestige for a player, big hype and prices and on the other side this heavy focus on a team league. The problem is that both is played at the same time, all the time.

Imagine Federer to play Wimbledon on Saturday and then Davis Cup on Sunday. That would be physicaly counter productiv like hell. But since broodwar players are that much more tied to their team and korean work ethic is kinda insane good players squeeze themselves out to the maximum. Until they loose focus and crash. Tell me, why does a team like SKT1 need more than 20 players? Just imagine how many hours upon hours most of these players do nothing else but practice. They don't play in any individual league, they dont play in proleague and suprisingly, online events barely exist. Shure there are bench-players in all sports but give me a break.

There is something fundamentaly wrong in how this sport is "played out" in that we want both at the same time all the time. Just try transfer the system to any other sport on this planet, it's a totaly insane and fragile composition. And not just for the players, but the teams and sponsors too.

Is a player to blame for playing so much? Is a coach to blame for sending out his ace so much? No! But at some point they should decide what this sport is. Either we focus on individual leagues, treat it like tennis, lots of grand slams and trow in the occasional "cup" OR go down the team road, tone down individual leagues and build up on the winners league <-> normal system thing.

We simply can't have both. And if kespa wasnt that greedy they would realise that!
Yes this game is great, yes i love it as a fan, so STOP fucking it up, give these players some space, make it worthwhile for the sponsors to stick around and start using your fucking brains to make it a better expirience for the fans!

On November 10 2009 10:29 FConnectionUK wrote:


Korea is one of the fastest trend changing country in the world. If you buy a phone today in Korea, by tomorrow, your phone's outdated. Your phone has to be changed daily if you want to keep up.

Microsoft always release its new patch in Korea first. Windows ME, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7? First stop? Korea. Korea will never ever delay upgrading its patch, even if they dont know if there are any risks or not. Trend is what's more important, not what's best. Nobody wants to be outdated. If its the hot stuff, Korean has to update it.

But yes, Korean culture value its 정 or connection alot more. But that doesn't mean they will always stay the same. I believe SC2 will have a huge impact on starcraft.

Lineage 1 was suppose to be the best mmorph game at the time in Korea. Lineage 2 came out, everyone complained how it did not live up to its reputation. Still, how many players do you see playing lineage 1 still? Not many.

On November 09 2009 05:26 Doso wrote:
KeSpa IS the teams...

On November 10 2009 11:46 3 Lions wrote:

Runescape MSL ftw

On November 10 2009 12:00 QuickStriker wrote:


oh god......

On November 10 2009 20:49 heyoka wrote:
whats the story behind nate osl?

On November 10 2009 21:45 Roffles wrote:

Sync won Nate OSL, but no one really cared because back in 2002, South Korea made a deep run in the World Cup. It also didn't help that all the favorites like Boxer/Yellow were knocked out really early. Ended up being Sync vs Hot in the finals that no one really cared about.

On November 11 2009 01:05 Ilikestarcraft wrote:

wasnt casy vs chojja also in the world cup. I think people cared then. Or maybe that was because they made the games start so late so that after the osl final ended world cup was just about to start. And then they lost 2-0