EPT
Well as some of you might have heard over the last few days, i have officially quit eNature Top Team, and Progaming altogether.
It was definitely not an easy decision for me to come to, but its something i have been thinking about for a long time (about 2 months) and i've mentioned it a few times before.
There are a lot of things contributing to it, the main one was that i no longer found fun in the game that has given me so much joy over the years. I always said in interviews that i would stay until i nolonger enjoyed playing the game, always thinking that, that would never be the real reason for quiting, funny how fate can work.
Whether it was because i was annoyed with my manager for his mistake with the times with my disqualification from the MML match (where i gave myself a 80% chance to win vs Yooi on that map, i'd put a lot of practice in and was really confident), or maybe i just missed my family i've been gone for a long time now, my brother is getting married and i've never even met his fiance. Maybe it was seeing Lord Rekrul, making his millions through poker while i saw myself standing still. Whether these counted or not, it made no difference, i no longer enjoyed what i was doing, and for the last 2 months i guess, i've just been waiting for my way out.
That came early on in my dilema, in two forms. First of all the foreigners were in trouble with immigration, with potential to be banned from korea and a fine to go with it(can't talk much about this as the result is still pending, and i dont want to say anything that may curtail the process for Brian). The immigration issue definately made me begin to explore other alternatives and without the drive for gaming returning, the alternatives became more of a reality.
*******Make sure to read the part underneath this paragraph as i found out this isn't true******
Following this came our teams incredibly horrible performance in the Pro League, that also combined with my manager not selecting me to play for any of the early matches (mainly because i think he saw my lack of interest) definately didn't help me want to play. My next chance for a tv match came, when eNature took on Kor, i think the only reason i even had this chance, was my manager was out of the country on his honeymoon (over in guam) so he didn't decide on the lineup, so i was quite happy to jump in and play. I played vs Cloud and ended up winning (what would end up being my last televised game) i guess you could look at it , that at least i've gone out on a high since i won my final match but it definately doesn't feel like that. (fyi, you may call me a cynic but the reason i think that i only played because my manager was not deciding, was because of his lack of interest in sending my out in any of the first 5-6??-7? matches) I dont blame him though, if i managed a team i wouldn't want a player under me to play a match when he wasn't putting in 100% effort.
*********OKAY********
I found out that this last paragraph is totally incorrect, apparently my manager felt that i didn't want to play as i never volunteered for the spot thus he never selected me earlier. Also for my match vs KOR my manager Daniel, asked for me to play that week. NOW, I would delete the previous paragraph but EVEN THOUGH THE PREVIOUS PARAGRAPH IS NOT FACTUAL i feel its important for me to state how i was feeling and what i perceived during this time, even if it was incorrect.
Anyway in the end i've had an enourmous amount of fun during my time over here. I've met a lot of friends, who hopefully i'll remain in contact with over the years to come. I've lived happily in another country for a long time, been immersed in a small amount of their culture (i say small because most of the time i was stuck in my little gaming shell)
I've been fairly fortunate i guess, i've always had gaming to relate too, so was never really homesick, in the 2+ years i've spent in this country i've never been seriously ill which could have cause a lot of troubles. On top of that i've always had someone to look after me, first off my friend from Aus, Minsoo who helped me a lot in the early days.
At this point i was still an amateur, but that soon changed with my only real claim to fame in the early days was when i had fought my way through to the final 8 out of a 512 player tournament to gain my semi pro license.
It was at this point (and during this tournament) that the managers and especially aficianado/bejjang (as you all know him) of POS took notice of me and i soon made my transition over to the POS team which is where i really began my progaming career. The guys at POS were great, and i have a lot of fond memories of my days there, all of them really made my life easy and i'll be glad to call them all friends for the rest of my life. They are doing really well recently and i wish them all the best.
I had quite a bit of success with them, my all kill of the toona team would be one of them, the other notable one was when July and Myself played pretty much every week in the ITV team league and we helped get the team all the way to the finals before finally sucumbing to the power of GO(i think thats right - at one point i think i was 5 or 6-0 in wins).
Unfortunately after this point due to circumstances beyond either of our control i had to part ways with the team and although i missed them it was where i made my final real transition in my progaming career.
Hexatron/eNature was a bit different, elky and giyom were part of the team! foreigners were ALMOST a majority! They along with the rest of the team made us welcome. I definately have to thank all of the players at eNature and especially our manager Daniel Lee. Without him i probably would have retired quite a while ago so i have to thank him for the effort and faith he had in me. I may not have made it into a starleague but i feel i did enough to help promote the team, and did well enough in gaming to warrant his investment in me and i hope he feels the same way. I think in the end it was a pretty mutual relationship and went well.
So yeah this is much larger then i was intended, but i definately had to thank the people involved in those 3 main steps in my life in korea. Once again, thanks.
I have some regrets, my 4 biggest is not making it into a starleague, being disqualifed from 2 different leagues, not defeating the 4 pillars in televised games (4 top terran players, damn i had nada beat! argh! i sure did mess that game up) - though i did kill 2 of them so i'll have to be happy with that! And finally i guess, letting the fans i've got in korea down by not doing as well as some of them would have liked, or maybe quiting (what would seem to them, quite suddenly) when they were talking about how far i might go.
I'd like to thank all of my fans for their support, all of the korean gamers, the POS/eNature teams, their managers, all of my friends, you know who you are.
I've had an incredible experience that would be almost impossible to have elsewhere, and i throughly enjoyed my time here, thanks to all the korean ppl for being so nice and friendly to a guy from downunder!
Our team may have done poorly in the last proleague, but i think they have a lot of potential and if they practice hard i think they could do very well. Dongjin hyunjin yongsung and brian are all really good players, so i wish them all the best in the future.
As for my future? well i've got real life to get back to i guess, the dream is over and what a dream it was! I have 1 year (with 3 completed) for a Bachelor of Information Technology to complete, with a dble major in Computer Science and Software Engineering. I've got all my old friends and family i have to meet and make up for being gone for so long. Dont really have too many plans beyond that, though i hope to oneday return to korea and experience a lot more that i never was able to see, i especailly would like to spend some time down on Jeju! (i've only been there once and that was for a tournament so i didn't get to see much.) I would also like to go and visit N Korea some time. I dont think i'll be playing so much starcraft, maybe i'll play in WCG Australia though i wont practice much for it, and i will try out for the odd tournament here and there but all in all, i have no set plans, and i'll take the future as it comes.
For now, thanks to everyone, i hope you all understand my decision and that you can accept it. Earlier when i was reading my daum cafe, i saw all of your messages of support and you asking me not to retire, it was very touching and made me feel so sad to leave you all. I apolgize to everyone who i have disappointed but i've had a great time and maybe we will meet again some time in the future.
For now good bye and good luck!~ I hope you all have as much fun with the game as i've had over the years.
난 너흴 모두 사랑해!~~~
Thanks for showing Korea how to really use the reaver.
thx for the games/giving us the inside scoop on everything 
