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Friends, there is some sad news.
Sonic's Announcement in Korean
Here's a *very* quick and dirty translation.
Hello, this is BJ Sonic.
I regret to bring you some bad news.
My current business venture and related work has left me not much time to sleep.
New issues related to the recent sponsorship deal with Manchester United, the expansion of the business, product improvements, product diversification, and entry into foreign markets are increasing requiring that the full efforts and capital of myself, the company, and my employees, who are like members of my family, be focused on the business.
Running the StarLeague requires the expenditure of several 100 million KRW and this has become too much of a burden at a time when I must focus everything on my business. This means that it is unclear whether the next season of StarLeague will take place.
Personally, I have tried to continue the StarLeague in any form by contacting people I know in various businesses to propose sponsorship deals but all companies I contacted have expressed reluctance.
More specifically, the core personnel at my company, the CEOs and professionals at the companies I contacted about sponsorship have all could not understand why I wanted to run the StarLeague in the first place let alone express any interest in sponsorship.
The gap in our understanding was too far to be overcome with any amount of convincing.
I will continue to seek out other channels...but I cannot promise you anything about the next season.
Nevertheless, I see that Kongdoo and many great BJs on Afreeca are continuing to host great StarLeagues, so perhaps we can hope that another great sponsor will pop up to save the day and host an even better league in the future.
I will try to return as soon as there is some time/money (T/N it's unclear which) to spare.
Please enjoy the upcoming holidays. Best wishes.
Original:
+ Show Spoiler +안녕하세요 BJ소닉입니다.
오늘은 다소 아쉬운 소식을 전해드려야 하겠습니다.
제가 현재 진행하고 있는 사업과 그와 관련된 일로 인해 최근에 정말
눈코뜰 새 없이 바쁜 하루하루를 보내고 있습니다.
최근에 맨유와의 스폰서쉽 체결을 포함하여 제가 진행하고 있는 사업의 확장과
제품의 품질개선이나 상품의 다양화 및 해외시장 등 새로운 사업적인 이슈가
늘어가면서 저와 회사 그리고 가족같은 직원들의 역량과 자본이 더더욱
사업 연관된 일에 집중되어 가야할 필요성이 점차 대두되고 있는 상황입니다.
실제 스타리그 진행을 위해서는 수억원에 해당되는 금액이 지출되어야 하고
회사의 역량과 자본을 현재 확장되어가고 있는 사업에 집중해야 할 시기에
스타리그를 지속적으로 진행하기에는 부담이 되고 차기 스타리그의 진행여부에
대해 불투명하다는 말씀을 드릴 수 밖에 없는 상황이 되었습니다.
개인적으로는 어떤 형태로든 스타리그를 진행하고자 지인, 지인의 지인을 통해
여러 업체 관계자 분들에게 스타리그 스폰서 쉽을 제안해 왔습니다.
그러나 현재 컨텍해본 모든 업체가 난색을 표하고 있는 상황입니다.
더 구체적으로 말씀드리면 현재 제 회사의 핵심인력도 그리고 스폰서쉽을
제안했던 업체의 대표, 핵심 실무자들도 제가 스타리그에 스폰서쉽을
제안하는데 대해 아니 스타리그 진행하는 것 조차 이해하기 힘들다는
반응이 대부분이었습니다.
그런 상황에서 제가 그들을 설득하기에는 너무 버거운 일이더군요
앞으로도 꾸준히 이런저런 채널을 통해 알아보겠지만.. 안타깝게도
차기 스타리그에 대한 약속을 드릴수가 없겠습니다.
한편으로는 제가 리그를 하지 않아도 콩두컴퍼니나 기타 아프리카에 훌륭한
BJ분들의 스타리그가 꾸준히 진행되고 있으니 조만간 또 다시 다른 훌륭한
스폰서가 나타나 보다 더 화려하고 알찬 리그가 탄생하지 않을까
기대해 봅니다.
언젠가 여유가 되는 상황이 오면 다시 돌아오겠습니다.
곧 다가오는 추석연휴 알차게 보내시고, 항상 건강한 하루 되시길 바랍니다.
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United States2948 Posts
Thanks for translating.
Very disappointing indeed, particularly when we see SBENU expending even greater resources for LoL and SC2 events. I wonder if they are also at risk, or if any of these league sponsorships have added to SBENU's bottom line?
Maybe the compromise is to step back a bit and hold such major leagues online rather than offline/televised on OGN, as glorious as it has been. Since Sonic/SBENU and Kongdoo have aligned themselves, the Afreeca option may make more sense...Even if it is offline, just use the Sonic TV studio rather than something extravagant?
Knowing how brutal K-netizens can be, I'd surmise some unkind remarks about Sonic buying one less Lamborghini to enable a few more SSLs...
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TLADT24920 Posts
oh wow, this is pretty big sad news!  Hopefully, we hear some good news in the near future. Whatever the end outcome is, Sonic has kept the scene alive and given a lot to BW and for that, he is commended. I only hope that Korean netizens take it easy on him.
prech, I also wonder just how much his other sponsors have affected his finances. I mean, sponsoring LoL and SCII on top of BW must be difficult and financially-draining. There's also no guarantee that it'll help his bottom line which I feel is what Sonic is counting on (different age groups for the games).
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ALLEYCAT BLUES50586 Posts
its ok, we waited for a long time between SSL seasons before, I don't doubt that Sonic will come strong when he is able to, in the mean time kongdoo will do their best to keep up with our demands, I wish him success in his business because it translates to better rewards for us too.
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United States33492 Posts
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble?
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Katowice25012 Posts
It sort of reads that way from this translation. SSL is the only of those leagues I follow so this is pretty sad.
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wait what, since when did sbenu have a sponsorship deal with manchester united?
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United States11393 Posts
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Johto4954 Posts
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Aww, very sad news. I've always had the impression that Broodwar isn't very profitable to sponsor even going back to the Kespa days, and companies mostly did it without a profit return in mind. I'd guess that if Broodwar continues to be competitive the money will have to come in from the fans.
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On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble?
I doubt it. Just that they have been using funds elsewhere. They sponsor 1 SC2 league, 1 SC2 Team, have a deal with Manchester United (a huge football team). And that has all come about recently. I'm sure they have plenty of other ventures as well.
Doesn't sound like a company with financial trouble.
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Too bad I was hoping for BW growing strong in korea again. It looked so promising until now
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Right, so: When it was first announced that Sonic was going to sponsor SC2, I wrote how disappointing I thought it was, and was bashed by other users for being needlessly alarmist. Is it okay to talk about "Sonic moving on" now?
Actually, I'm not that disappointed by this news. The BW scene can not be one man's burden, and Sonic has already done more for us than most people would've thought possible. Given that Sonic himself can't find any other sponsor, him leaving only means that he won't be able to keep up the illusion, for our sake, that things are better than they actually are.
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It's sad :/ the guy looked so passionate, hopefully even without sponsoring we can have him doing his crazy stuff.
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ALLEYCAT BLUES50586 Posts
On September 22 2015 18:31 GeLaar wrote:
Right, so: When it was first announced that Sonic was going to sponsor SC2, I wrote how disappointing I thought it was, and was bashed by other users for being needlessly alarmist. Is it okay to talk about "Sonic moving on" now?
Actually, I'm not that disappointed by this news. The BW scene can not be one man's burden, and Sonic has already done more for us than most people would've thought possible. Given that Sonic himself can't find any other sponsor, him leaving only means that he won't be able to keep up the illusion, for our sake, that things are better than they actually are.
its easy to interpret it as him moving on as it is of him focusing on his business for now, he did this before between SSL9 and SSL10, he barely held any events between them and boom we got SSL10 on OGN, please read it as what it is, A CEO of a company who needs to focus more on his company during this period of rapid expansion and isn't capable of supporting the BW scene at the moment.
A more successful/stable SBENU = more BW. I don't think that this has changed.
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Sonic cares about money, not about sc :D who thought about it.
User was warned for this post
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On September 22 2015 19:17 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Sonic cares about money, not about sc :D who thought about it.
He's running a business, of course he cares about money.
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It's possible that the last two seasons were the peak of post-kespa BW. We'll have to see but if noone else steps up after KSL2 and if Sonic isn't back then we'll probably see a lot of the top tier players leaving for military and the scene shrinking beyond repair.
On the amateur and semi-pro levels, I think there's still going to be content for at least a few years to come regardless. And I'm sure we'd see some ex-pros taking part in those leagues and streaming, so it's not the end of the world. (It's still much better than foreign BW, in terms of sustainability.)
Imagine going to Korea in five years to watch the finals of a super underground league played in a PC bang where you know most of the other players. Fishiking vs Olympus Bo5 for 10 pizzas. I'm already excited
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1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
It doesn't sound like financial trouble at all, it sounds like he's worked and stressed the fuck out and someone has to share the burden. Expecting him to do everything (financially, logistically, etc) is crazy.
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this isnt good news but in a way im actually glad sonic has made this announcement. sbenu has been doing so much lately i was beginning to wonder how the business and sonic is managing to cope through all this. theres no way someone can do all this on his own given his business' current circumstances and it was crucial he came to realise this quickly. now that he has hopefully we can start thinking about the future of bw outside sonic, and see if the scene really is sustainable after all.
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I wouldn't worry about it too much (for the reasons mentioned by BLinD-RawR & Bohemond).
It feels like a shame that it can't be the SC2 or LoL tournaments (wait is it a tournie or a team he has in LoL?) put on hold, but on the other hand, if they make some profit for him and the BW tournament does not, then it's not surprising.
I don't expect this is the end of Sonic's involvement in BW. I believe he's just being very sensibly conservative about what promises he makes (or doesn't make), trying to be honest and make sure people's expectations are if anything lower than they should be, rather than higher.
Lovetv Starleague 3 not happening was a let-down that no one wants to mimic.
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ALLEYCAT BLUES50586 Posts
On September 22 2015 20:01 Stratos wrote:It's possible that the last two seasons were the peak of post-kespa BW. We'll have to see but if noone else steps up after KSL2 and if Sonic isn't back then we'll probably see a lot of the top tier players leaving for military and the scene shrinking beyond repair. On the amateur and semi-pro levels, I think there's still going to be content for at least a few years to come regardless. And I'm sure we'd see some ex-pros taking part in those leagues and streaming, so it's not the end of the world. (It's still much better than foreign BW, in terms of sustainability.) Imagine going to Korea in five years to watch the finals of a super underground league played in a PC bang where you know most of the other players. Fishiking vs Olympus Bo5 for 10 pizzas. I'm already excited
the real winner there is obesity/diabetes.
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Australia1191 Posts
It kind of sounds like hes lost the controlling vote in these types of Ventures for SBENU and that the board/CEO see Profit in working with KeSPA and Manchester, but do not see where SBENU gets profit or gains in running a BW tournament.
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On September 22 2015 20:30 ZodaSoda wrote:
It kind of sounds like hes lost the controlling vote in these types of Ventures for SBENU and that the board/CEO see Profit in working with KeSPA and Manchester, but do not see where SBENU gets profit or gains in running a BW tournament.
I feel like this is the case too, business seems to be doing well but the board/higher ups/whatever see 0 profit in running bw tournament. in the end its about the money. seeing as though sonic says hes tried contacting other businesses regarding sponsoring and came up short im thinking maybe combination of BW not being very marketable and all this OGN high production quality shit must take shit load more money than the ghetto afreeca run SSL from before.
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Boo
Here's to hoping Sonic can work through this and have another great SSL.
He should just focus on BW and LoL >_<
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ALLEYCAT BLUES50586 Posts
I don't think sonic has a personal hand in the running of the SC2 and LoL teams.
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On September 22 2015 20:50 jinyung2 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 22 2015 20:30 ZodaSoda wrote:
It kind of sounds like hes lost the controlling vote in these types of Ventures for SBENU and that the board/CEO see Profit in working with KeSPA and Manchester, but do not see where SBENU gets profit or gains in running a BW tournament. I feel like this is the case too, business seems to be doing well but the board/higher ups/whatever see 0 profit in running bw tournament. in the end its about the money. seeing as though sonic says hes tried contacting other businesses regarding sponsoring and came up short im thinking maybe combination of BW not being very marketable and all this OGN high production quality shit must take shit load more money than the ghetto afreeca run SSL from before.
Wait... Is SBENU not privately owned by Sonic? If it is, why would there be a board? That isn't usually how private companies are run. Also, why does Sonic say he would have to be doing all the work? I assume this means OGN has opted not to continue running BW Starleagues with Sonic next year?
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I think the reason for the this is due to the lack of funds after investing so much into various aspects of the companies (expanding, foreign market, sponsorship, etc), not because the company is doing badly.
Hopefully if Sbenu becomes even more successful they will be able to host another SSL agian.
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On September 22 2015 21:44 purakushi wrote:Boo Here's to hoping Sonic can work through this and have another great SSL. He should just focus on BW and LoL >_<
blizzard still significantly helping out with the bills for sc2 (unlike BW which is mostly SBENU sponsored). plus sc2 has sizable foreigner viewership,the broadcast adverts will help with his forays into foreign markets.
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Bisutopia19299 Posts
This is what happens when Bisu loses a finals.
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On September 22 2015 22:06 Estancia wrote:
I think the reason for the this is due to the lack of funds after investing so much into various aspects of the companies (expanding, foreign market, sponsorship, etc), not because the company is doing badly.
Hopefully if Sbenu becomes even more successful they will be able to host another SSL agian.
what makes me worry is that if really big BW takes a hiatus of even as little as a year it may shrink to unrecoverable positions, especially with players like Bisu leaving for the military. The top1 priority for BW scene is to be compelling to younger guys imo and while something like Mong Starleague or Terror Starleague are fine for established BW lovers, they fail to fulfil that purpose.
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On September 22 2015 22:06 looknohands119 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 22 2015 20:50 jinyung2 wrote:On September 22 2015 20:30 ZodaSoda wrote:
It kind of sounds like hes lost the controlling vote in these types of Ventures for SBENU and that the board/CEO see Profit in working with KeSPA and Manchester, but do not see where SBENU gets profit or gains in running a BW tournament. I feel like this is the case too, business seems to be doing well but the board/higher ups/whatever see 0 profit in running bw tournament. in the end its about the money. seeing as though sonic says hes tried contacting other businesses regarding sponsoring and came up short im thinking maybe combination of BW not being very marketable and all this OGN high production quality shit must take shit load more money than the ghetto afreeca run SSL from before. Wait... Is SBENU not privately owned by Sonic? If it is, why would there be a board? That isn't usually how private companies are run. Also, why does Sonic say he would have to be doing all the work? I assume this means OGN has opted not to continue running BW Starleagues with Sonic next year?
no clue man I pretty much know nothing about business, also I guess saying "board" was kinda incorrect its more like just important people in his company (and other staff/representatives from companies he presented sponsorship opportunity to) advising against it? would suck if sonic was calling all the shots and some people advising against it was enough to deter him from running SSL12. RIP sonic's passion I guess he's lost interest lol
no i dont think ogn is cutting ties or anything, but it seems sponsors pay up not only for prize pool but for many other things. at least thats the logical assumption, looking at ssl11's prizepool it was only around ~50 million won, but sonic states here that it costs several 100 million won, so obviously there is A LOT of money going into it that isn't prize pool.
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I'm a lot more optimistic than I should be about this. I think there'll be a turnaround
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Isnt there a broader Korean audience for BW than for SC2? Since his brand is based in korea isnt more logical to then take the sponsorship away from sc2 to BW?
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I can totally understand that Sonic has to focus on other things atm and thus cannot plan the next SSL, but i didn't think that no other sponsor wants to step in tbh.
I thought the last two SSLs were a success in korea?
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United States10239 Posts
Let the man take a break. He has been doing so fucking much to carry BW right now. Plus, if there are other interested BW people who want to make a tournament, then this will be their chance to shine. I will remain optimistic about BW until then.
BW HWAITING!
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On September 22 2015 22:37 Mirabel_ wrote:
I'm a lot more optimistic than I should be about this. I think there'll be a turnaround
Sonic has done this before. Telling everyone it's the end of the world and then 'magically' delivering anyhow. He seems very scared of disappointing his fans. He has been very positive lately before these news arrived, what with his own team and plans for a new proleague, surely this cant be it.
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Come on sonic, you were the chosen one !
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Australia1191 Posts
On September 22 2015 22:06 looknohands119 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 22 2015 20:50 jinyung2 wrote:On September 22 2015 20:30 ZodaSoda wrote:
It kind of sounds like hes lost the controlling vote in these types of Ventures for SBENU and that the board/CEO see Profit in working with KeSPA and Manchester, but do not see where SBENU gets profit or gains in running a BW tournament. I feel like this is the case too, business seems to be doing well but the board/higher ups/whatever see 0 profit in running bw tournament. in the end its about the money. seeing as though sonic says hes tried contacting other businesses regarding sponsoring and came up short im thinking maybe combination of BW not being very marketable and all this OGN high production quality shit must take shit load more money than the ghetto afreeca run SSL from before. Wait... Is SBENU not privately owned by Sonic? If it is, why would there be a board? That isn't usually how private companies are run. Also, why does Sonic say he would have to be doing all the work? I assume this means OGN has opted not to continue running BW Starleagues with Sonic next year?
Its an educated assumption honestly, Starting a Business and being successful within your local city is quite easy, But no matter how much money you have once you wish to expand you usually need to attract investors to pay for an increase in output of goods and input of materials to service a larger consumer base, then unless you already have distribution connections you attempt to attract investors who have these and are interested in distributing your product more widely, Eventually the business becomes such a large scale you need to appoint a CEO and a CFO and even sonic would be overwhelmed attempting to fufill both rolls, and the reason im explaining all this is usually once Investors and a CEO/CFO are involved, you have them requiring shares in the company as assurance they wont be screwed by the owner, and a Board is naturally formed from there, Obviously what ends up happening to the business savy is they tend to dive shares but always hold 51% for majority vote, but many many people in the 50s to now still make the mistake of going down to 40 or 45 and can then be out voted.
Obviously this is all assumptions it could just be his CEO/CFO and Investors just dont think he should spend money on BW and he doesn't wanna force the issue with his power and piss them off.
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GRAND OLD AMERICA16375 Posts
i agree with zoda on this, it's a nature of a company that is rapidly expanding and growing. Sonic gets tied to his company and can't do things a freely as he used to.
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A good move for Sonic's business.A bad move for bw players/fans.
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konadora
Singapore66357 Posts
im guessing the biggest problem is
1) he's mentally burdened
2) sponsors maybe dont see any good returns in sponsoring a 17 year old game
3) investors/sponsors probably want him to focus on selling more shoes, not hosting a brood war tournament
so he probably just needs someone else to take the helm and organise the SSL
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It's fine, Sonic has shown time and again that his passion for BW shall never fade. Once his business stabilises in new regions, he will be able to kick back and run the show once more.
On September 22 2015 22:14 BisuDagger wrote:
This is what happens when Bisu loses a finals.
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Terrible news. Regardless, much props to Sonic for his effort.
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Booh, those "CEOs and professionals" have no true love in their heart.
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Knowing how brutal K-netizens can be, I'd surmise some unkind remarks about Sonic buying one less Lamborghini to enable a few more SSLs...
let the man buy his lamborghini, he's not working for the sake of working
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let's hope this isn't really it. sonic has pulled this kind of speech before this and always came back. I respect him for caring about his business first but it would leave a bad taste if SBENU continued to support their respective interests in Sc2 and Lol but give up on Broodwar. If sponsoring a BW Starleague is not interesting enough anymore to Sbenu, i doubt someone else will (on a mjaor scale, we might still see evebts like the VANT Starleague aka KSL2, but it's considerably smaller.
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Croatia9522 Posts
Does anyone know anything about the upcoming/rumored proleague, or is that canceled as well? Also, how does this news affect Sonic's BBARAS team?
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Bear in mind also that 100m KRW is about $85k USD, so several 100million would be (assuming the translation is reasonable) $300k+ (as you wouldn't say several for 2 in English) and while it may potentially not be a burden overall, if they are investing lots in order to develop, such as with the Manchester United deal, it may be that they are tight for cashflows and needing to manage everything carefully.
Businesses of all sizes need to manage their cash, even if they have lots of profit.
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On September 23 2015 03:08 Lonyo wrote:
Bear in mind also that 100m KRW is about $85k USD, so several 100million would be (assuming the translation is reasonable) $300k+ (as you wouldn't say several for 2 in English) and while it may potentially not be a burden overall, if they are investing lots in order to develop, such as with the Manchester United deal, it may be that they are tight for cashflows and needing to manage everything carefully.
Businesses of all sizes need to manage their cash, even if they have lots of profit.
this.
hopefully it's just a temporary short term cashflow thing
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On September 23 2015 03:08 Lonyo wrote:
Bear in mind also that 100m KRW is about $85k USD, so several 100million would be (assuming the translation is reasonable) $300k+ (as you wouldn't say several for 2 in English) and while it may potentially not be a burden overall, if they are investing lots in order to develop, such as with the Manchester United deal, it may be that they are tight for cashflows and needing to manage everything carefully.
Businesses of all sizes need to manage their cash, even if they have lots of profit.
I read somewhere here that the osl's back in the kespa days costed about 250k to host, so sounds about right.
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Oh, sad news.
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For what it's worth... here are some stream-of-consciousness-level thoughts.
1) I bet sponsorship of SC2 will not continue either. There's even a joke that only the people who watch SC2 in Korea are degenerate gamblers ("토쟁이"). If I had to guess I would bet that the SC2 sponsorship was just a way to keep Blizzard happy while bringing BW back to TV. They say that SC2 Proleague has seen improvements in viewership, but they also say that a dwarf whose height has doubled is still a dwarf.
2) LoL sponsorship is likely to continue. LoL continues to make more TV money than BW in its heyday.
3) Despite appearances, Sbenu has yet to make a profit. Their sales growth has been great but not enough to cover the fixed costs of exponential expansion rates and super aggressive marketing (unrelated to gaming). Of course, all of these expenditures are leveraged through loans. Sonic/Sbenu is likely strapped for cash for the foreseeable short-term.
4) No matter how much some trolls on the Korean webs shout otherwise, Sbenu has not benefited from SSL. 95% of BW viewers on Afreeca are male. The Starcraft audience in general is overwhelmingly male even if the cameras focus on fangirls and give the false impression that they make up a significant proportion. Sbenu's core customers are women and mothers buying for their children. You can see some of this in how color has been an important part of Sbenu marketing. The celebrities who have appeared on Sbenu ads during SSL are part of much bigger ad campaigns for Sbenu. If anything, Sbenu probably has suffered a little bit from crazy Afreeca TV viewers who go around posting false rumors about their products. A large portion of anti-Sbenu posts on the web originate from Starcraft-related communities. Fortunately, Sbenu's core customer's don't read those sites so it probably wasn't too damaging.
5) I remember after FIX SSL9 and Gabangpop Proleague (when the Afreeca BW scene was arguably at its peak), Zeus once said something (many months ago) on stream about how pro gamers had missed a huge opportunity to revive the scene in a more sustainable way because of their shortsightedness about the importance of big leagues. More can be said about this in a systematic way, but I will leave it at that. I agree with his argument that some of this falls on the pro gamers...although I don't think that I can truly blame them because most of them don't have the level of education and life experience to see these things.
6) About Man U deal, Sbenu probably has to pay big licensing fees to sell Man U branded Sbenu shoes. This is something that will hopefully bring them closer to profitability but that sponsorship is a legitimate business gamble and not because Sonic wants to show off how much he likes Man U.
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Is there support that Sbenu isn't profitable?
Not that I doubt it couldn't be, considering it's growing and probably requiring significant up front investment especially if they are sorting out designs and production, plus lots of marketing, just wondering where the information comes from and whether there are any available figures to show the position.
Most licensing agreements also will have a combination of up front costs and per item costs, or one or the other, depending on how it's worked out.
For Man U I would assume they would set an up front licensing fee to guarantee them some money, and then also a per item fee, so that would probably make them take a reasonable hit as well like you say, and on an up front basis as well.
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I've always said and felt that the scene isn't stable until we have multiple consistent sponsors. Whatever the result of this turn of events, news like this is inevitable, rather than sad and unexpected.
What worries me more is the fact that the other partners don't want to step up to help. That hurts more than Sonic being either unavailable or having money troubles.
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On September 23 2015 03:59 Lonyo wrote:
Is there support that Sbenu isn't profitable?
Not that I doubt it couldn't be, considering it's growing and probably requiring significant up front investment especially if they are sorting out designs and production, plus lots of marketing, just wondering where the information comes from and whether there are any available figures to show the position.
Most licensing agreements also will have a combination of up front costs and per item costs, or one or the other, depending on how it's worked out.
For Man U I would assume they would set an up front licensing fee to guarantee them some money, and then also a per item fee, so that would probably make them take a reasonable hit as well like you say, and on an up front basis as well.
A sum of $100k is tough for them. I think that is a sign of trouble, at the very least.
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a solution would be to switch to a DOTA2 TI sponsorship model. Considering what people give to streamers, funding SSL12 through crowdfunding would be quite feasible
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Sad,
but it sounds like he still loves BW and wants to do more in the future? I would be shocked if he didn't. But well, the new KSL might be good
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Quite a setback in BW's revival.
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On September 23 2015 03:59 Lonyo wrote:
Is there support that Sbenu isn't profitable?
Not that I doubt it couldn't be, considering it's growing and probably requiring significant up front investment especially if they are sorting out designs and production, plus lots of marketing, just wondering where the information comes from and whether there are any available figures to show the position.
Most licensing agreements also will have a combination of up front costs and per item costs, or one or the other, depending on how it's worked out.
For Man U I would assume they would set an up front licensing fee to guarantee them some money, and then also a per item fee, so that would probably make them take a reasonable hit as well like you say, and on an up front basis as well.
Here's a figure that made the rounds on the web some time ago. It says that Sbenu had operating losses around $170,000 USD in 2014. The losses are before paying taxes or interest on loans. Since Sbenu was made into a separate entity in Fall 2014, you can extrapolate (if naively, then 4x for annual figures) a bit given that it continued to expand even more aggressively this year. So SSL likely has had a nontrivial effect on the bottom line.
+ Show Spoiler +
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On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble?
Could just be pressure from his business partners to be more responsible. I can't imagine financial trouble when he's expanding globally and striking big deals. I guess it's not unthinkable he could have spread himself too thin.
To me it sounds like he's spending every dime trying to make his company as big as possible. He could return to BW at a later date when he gets returns on all his expansion. Real properly produced Starleague isn't cheap to run, very different from the old Sonic days when he barely had to pay anyone. So it's easy to see how working it into the budget is difficult, especially if it affects the trust of his business partners who want him to care about their bottom lines.
I wasn't expecting it, but I'm not really shocked either. The level of production quality vs the quality of the games was way out of sync. Kongdoo is a good middle step if BW is going to keep fighting.
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On September 23 2015 09:11 Chef wrote:Show nested quote +On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble? Could just be pressure from his business partners to be more responsible. I can't imagine financial trouble when he's expanding globally and striking big deals. I guess it's not unthinkable he could have spread himself too thin. To me it sounds like he's spending every dime trying to make his company as big as possible. He could return to BW at a later date when he gets returns on all his expansion. Real properly produced Starleague isn't cheap to run, very different from the old Sonic days when he barely had to pay anyone. So it's easy to see how working it into the budget is difficult, especially if it affects the trust of his business partners who want him to care about their bottom lines. I wasn't expecting it, but I'm not really shocked either. The level of production quality vs the quality of the games was way out of sync. Kongdoo is a good middle step if BW is going to keep fighting.
i think the quality of play was good. Granted this time Bisu/hero wasn't picture perfect, but overall i was pretty satisfied. Perhaps you're a bit nostalgic and don't recall all the mediocre games the OSL and MSL even gave us way back then? xD
Coz i recall some.
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success comes with own burdens
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Japan11286 Posts
Well, nobody said it was going to be easy right?
It seems to me all this investing into esports + Manchester U beginning to bite. It's natural because he's spending and it's not like return will be instant.
On September 23 2015 03:43 lemmata wrote:
For what it's worth... here are some stream-of-consciousness-level thoughts.
5) I remember after FIX SSL9 and Gabangpop Proleague (when the Afreeca BW scene was arguably at its peak), Zeus once said something (many months ago) on stream about how pro gamers had missed a huge opportunity to revive the scene in a more sustainable way because of their shortsightedness about the importance of big leagues. More can be said about this in a systematic way, but I will leave it at that. I agree with his argument that some of this falls on the pro gamers...although I don't think that I can truly blame them because most of them don't have the level of education and life experience to see these things.
Can you elaborate? I was away during this time so I can't understand well. ^_^
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awww... sad news indeed. if only i have extra money, i would be willing to chip in.
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I was a bit blindsided by this piece of bad news. Maybe the hero who gave us so much BW to watch will fall in the end?
Expanding and the new deals must have been huge investments for his company, and that usually requires loans. I really hope his investments pay off in the mid/long term, and they can survive this rough patch without going under.
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Hopefully this means SBENU will start releasing my size shoe.
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I wonder if OGN would help with it... They seemed interested enough to talk about future english casters for the next seasons...
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On September 23 2015 09:50 Cele wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2015 09:11 Chef wrote:On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble? Could just be pressure from his business partners to be more responsible. I can't imagine financial trouble when he's expanding globally and striking big deals. I guess it's not unthinkable he could have spread himself too thin. To me it sounds like he's spending every dime trying to make his company as big as possible. He could return to BW at a later date when he gets returns on all his expansion. Real properly produced Starleague isn't cheap to run, very different from the old Sonic days when he barely had to pay anyone. So it's easy to see how working it into the budget is difficult, especially if it affects the trust of his business partners who want him to care about their bottom lines. I wasn't expecting it, but I'm not really shocked either. The level of production quality vs the quality of the games was way out of sync. Kongdoo is a good middle step if BW is going to keep fighting. i think the quality of play was good. Granted this time Bisu/hero wasn't picture perfect, but overall i was pretty satisfied. Perhaps you're a bit nostalgic and don't recall all the mediocre games the OSL and MSL even gave us way back then? xD Coz i recall some.
I don't think so, it's not even close. Might depend on what you're watching for though.
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Croatia9522 Posts
On September 23 2015 20:53 Chef wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2015 09:50 Cele wrote:On September 23 2015 09:11 Chef wrote:On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble? Could just be pressure from his business partners to be more responsible. I can't imagine financial trouble when he's expanding globally and striking big deals. I guess it's not unthinkable he could have spread himself too thin. To me it sounds like he's spending every dime trying to make his company as big as possible. He could return to BW at a later date when he gets returns on all his expansion. Real properly produced Starleague isn't cheap to run, very different from the old Sonic days when he barely had to pay anyone. So it's easy to see how working it into the budget is difficult, especially if it affects the trust of his business partners who want him to care about their bottom lines. I wasn't expecting it, but I'm not really shocked either. The level of production quality vs the quality of the games was way out of sync. Kongdoo is a good middle step if BW is going to keep fighting. i think the quality of play was good. Granted this time Bisu/hero wasn't picture perfect, but overall i was pretty satisfied. Perhaps you're a bit nostalgic and don't recall all the mediocre games the OSL and MSL even gave us way back then? xD Coz i recall some. I don't think so, it's not even close. Might depend on what you're watching for though.
Not even close? Are you basing this argument on the actual games you've watched or on a feeling you have that games can't possibly be on the same level due to a different way of practice nowadays?
While it's very hard to compare, in any meaningful way, the quality of games nowadays to the KeSPA days, I think Cele is right and there's definitely certain amount of nostalgia involved in your opinion.
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On September 23 2015 18:43 WrathSCII wrote:
I wonder if OGN would help with it... They seemed interested enough to talk about future english casters for the next seasons...
No.
In other news, people have to realize that SBENU was not only trying to sponsor BW but other leagues in Korea (Spotv Starleague, LoL Champions) as well as trying to expand his company with clothing line instead of just shoes. And if some people are yelling at him to drop BW, then it makes sense.
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On September 23 2015 07:31 lemmata wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2015 03:59 Lonyo wrote:
Is there support that Sbenu isn't profitable?
Not that I doubt it couldn't be, considering it's growing and probably requiring significant up front investment especially if they are sorting out designs and production, plus lots of marketing, just wondering where the information comes from and whether there are any available figures to show the position.
Most licensing agreements also will have a combination of up front costs and per item costs, or one or the other, depending on how it's worked out.
For Man U I would assume they would set an up front licensing fee to guarantee them some money, and then also a per item fee, so that would probably make them take a reasonable hit as well like you say, and on an up front basis as well. Here's a figure that made the rounds on the web some time ago. It says that Sbenu had operating losses around $170,000 USD in 2014. The losses are before paying taxes or interest on loans. Since Sbenu was made into a separate entity in Fall 2014, you can extrapolate (if naively, then 4x for annual figures) a bit given that it continued to expand even more aggressively this year. So SSL likely has had a nontrivial effect on the bottom line. + Show Spoiler +
Thanks. I wasn't sure if there would be any actual financial data available (or how I would go about finding it).
The credit rating doesn't look too great either, which could mean getting loans/etc would be more difficult which squeezes cashflows as well.
If it was their first period they might have had some one off setup expenses like legal costs/etc, so that figure might be a bit high to annualise, potentially as well. But the main thing would be cashflows, since any business can easily run at a loss for a while, as long as they have some cash.
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If they had to spend several hundred million KRW within a period of one year, it's safe to say that these sponsorships put them in the red and that without them they would be substantially better off financially.
It takes a large, stable business to be able to keep up a sponsorship like this. It's sort of sad, but money was always an issue with BW.
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Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
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Bisutopia19299 Posts
On September 24 2015 08:56 DarkNetHunter wrote:
Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
Let's not forget what TL.net's creators have done for foreign BW or 2pac's contributions!
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On September 24 2015 09:03 BisuDagger wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2015 08:56 DarkNetHunter wrote:
Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
Let's not forget what TL.net's creators have done for foreign BW or 2pac's contributions!
or everybody else's. Since foreign BW =/= only TL. But i think weighing contributions is pretty vain and naturally we all lack the oversight to make such statements. For instance, i know a guy who ran of the biggest and prestigious foreign Clan league - the BWCL for three years alone. Is he a big time contributor? Yes. Does anybody remember m4nu for what he did for us?i doubt many do. So let's stop making comparisons about contributions. Truth is, Sonic is a hero and in my mind, so are:
2pac
Nazgul
General_Mengsk
Zerush
Moon
Yoda
Largo
Gecko
Dingdang
and a couple dozen others. i could add a hundred more names without even thinking too hard. What's even the point of comparing them?
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On September 24 2015 09:58 Cele wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2015 09:03 BisuDagger wrote:On September 24 2015 08:56 DarkNetHunter wrote:
Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
Let's not forget what TL.net's creators have done for foreign BW or 2pac's contributions! or everybody else's. Since foreign BW =/= only TL. But i think weighing contributions is pretty vain and naturally we all lack the oversight to make such statements. For instance, i know a guy who ran of the biggest and prestigious foreign Clan league - the BWCL for three years alone. Is he a big time contributor? Yes. Does anybody remember m4nu for what he did for us?i doubt many do. So let's stop making comparisons about contributions. Truth is, Sonic is a hero and in my mind, so are: 2pac Nazgul General_Mengsk Zerush Moon Yoda Largo Gecko Dingdang and a couple dozen others. i could add a hundred more names without even thinking too hard. What's even the point of comparing them?
Sorry I did not mean time invested in our scene, for that we definitely have a huge number of fantastic contributors. However financially Sonic has provided more than all the above mentioned to the BW scene.
In any case it was not meant to start a comparison of contributions, just to give some perspective to those people complaining that he's not investing every penny he owns in BW or why he shouldn't have a nice car.
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On September 24 2015 09:58 Cele wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2015 09:03 BisuDagger wrote:On September 24 2015 08:56 DarkNetHunter wrote:
Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
Let's not forget what TL.net's creators have done for foreign BW or 2pac's contributions! or everybody else's. Since foreign BW =/= only TL. But i think weighing contributions is pretty vain and naturally we all lack the oversight to make such statements. For instance, i know a guy who ran of the biggest and prestigious foreign Clan league - the BWCL for three years alone. Is he a big time contributor? Yes. Does anybody remember m4nu for what he did for us?i doubt many do. So let's stop making comparisons about contributions. Truth is, Sonic is a hero and in my mind, so are: 2pac Nazgul General_Mengsk Zerush Moon Yoda Largo Gecko Dingdang and a couple dozen others. i could add a hundred more names without even thinking too hard. What's even the point of comparing them?
can I be a hero too ?
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illuminatti signs started to appear in sbenu commersials and suddenly ssl is in doubt. I sense conspiracy.
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On September 24 2015 21:11 _Animus_ wrote:
illuminatti signs started to appear in sbenu commersials and suddenly ssl is in doubt. I sense conspiracy.
it all makes sense now !
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On September 24 2015 18:34 oGoZenob wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2015 09:58 Cele wrote:On September 24 2015 09:03 BisuDagger wrote:On September 24 2015 08:56 DarkNetHunter wrote:
Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
Let's not forget what TL.net's creators have done for foreign BW or 2pac's contributions! or everybody else's. Since foreign BW =/= only TL. But i think weighing contributions is pretty vain and naturally we all lack the oversight to make such statements. For instance, i know a guy who ran of the biggest and prestigious foreign Clan league - the BWCL for three years alone. Is he a big time contributor? Yes. Does anybody remember m4nu for what he did for us?i doubt many do. So let's stop making comparisons about contributions. Truth is, Sonic is a hero and in my mind, so are: 2pac Nazgul General_Mengsk Zerush Moon Yoda Largo Gecko Dingdang and a couple dozen others. i could add a hundred more names without even thinking too hard. What's even the point of comparing them? can I be a hero too ?
approved (;
@Darknethunter: sure, i get where you're coming from. I was just in the mood to point out less known people and reminiscence a bit ^^
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Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind?
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Bisutopia19299 Posts
On September 24 2015 22:13 Cele wrote:Show nested quote +On September 24 2015 18:34 oGoZenob wrote:On September 24 2015 09:58 Cele wrote:On September 24 2015 09:03 BisuDagger wrote:On September 24 2015 08:56 DarkNetHunter wrote:
Nothing terribly surprising, also nothing to worry about a lot.
His business is bound to require a huge amount of cash at the moment before their expansion can provide profits. This means they can't be throwing spare cash out to sponsor things for 'passion' when there is no benefit to their bottom line besides a vague marketing bonus to a non-target audience. There is no way Sonic could justify these costs to investors or business partners.
Anyone doubting Sonics passion just needs to remember what he's done for BW the last years, investing more than the entire foreign community in its complete existence has.
Let's not forget what TL.net's creators have done for foreign BW or 2pac's contributions! or everybody else's. Since foreign BW =/= only TL. But i think weighing contributions is pretty vain and naturally we all lack the oversight to make such statements. For instance, i know a guy who ran of the biggest and prestigious foreign Clan league - the BWCL for three years alone. Is he a big time contributor? Yes. Does anybody remember m4nu for what he did for us?i doubt many do. So let's stop making comparisons about contributions. Truth is, Sonic is a hero and in my mind, so are: 2pac Nazgul General_Mengsk Zerush Moon Yoda Largo Gecko Dingdang and a couple dozen others. i could add a hundred more names without even thinking too hard. What's even the point of comparing them? can I be a hero too ? approved (; @Darknethunter: sure, i get where you're coming from. I was just in the mood to point out less known people and reminiscence a bit ^^
I was just shamelessly giving 2pac a shout out because he can never have enough.
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On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind?
of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it.
I fail to understand why it's a bad thing
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Bisutopia19299 Posts
On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing
It's the same situation for tasteless and artosis. They want to be casters and started by casting starcraft. They became very successful and extend their careers by casting across multiple games. It's a difficult career decision for them because they lose loyalty points to their original scene. Ultimately, they are doing what's best for them and I think that's just fine.
You are allowed to feel a little hurt that Sonic has spread his money across a span of games because you want what's best for you and the game you love. Ultimately, we just have to suck it up and be happy with where he has gotten us thus far and hope that he or someone else can pick up the torch.
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On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing
problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all
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Japan11286 Posts
Sonic allowed guys like me to experience something that I thought I'd never be able to experience following the events back in 2012. Even if it was only the Challenge Day, it was still a dream come true to watch a live BW match in Yongsan. For someone to pull off a miracle like that, you can't deny the man's passion. If it was all about money, he would've never cared so much for BW as to try to revive it not only in the short term but also in the long term. You can feel disappointed/frustrated whichever it is but you can't deny his passion.
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Sonic's passion is beyond doubt to me. Running the early SSL's wasn't about money as he didnt net any plus in them, all that dedication in the early SSL's can't be denied. Then again it's sad he (seems to) leave Broodwar for now but it makes sense business wise. In contrary to Tastosis, i won't bear any ill feelings.
I dislike Tastosis nowadays not becasue they started casting other games, but because they claimed for all of them " to be their most favorite *genre* game ever" Who is going to believe Tasteless claiming first that a) Sc2 is the best RTS ever and b) see him stream BW under the description "passion realized" or something? It might make sense to do so, but as a viewer i feel cheated upon.
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TLADT24920 Posts
On September 25 2015 01:32 mca64Launcher_ wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all
No, that wasn't the case. As mentioned, he invested a lot of money into it and also highlights his products at the same time. Sonic has been having SSLs for years before professional BW finished and has done it out of passion despite all the negativity, matchfixing stuff that came out back during SSL7 times etc...
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On September 25 2015 01:32 mca64Launcher_ wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all
He invested hundreds of thousands of dollars into a game that was never likely to give him a good roi. There's no way he did this for the money. "No good deed goes unpunished."
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Cele u are not allowed to forget RUS_Brain in your list ^^ he sponsorized iccup ladder event, TLC, many russian lan, and so on =)
Dem i forgot other names, i feel like shit =/ Gecko come here explain to Cele what a real list is !
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On September 25 2015 20:06 Myujinsan wrote:
Cele u are not allowed to forget RUS_Brain in your list ^^ he sponsorized iccup ladder event, TLC, many russian lan, and so on =)
Dem i forgot other names, i feel like shit =/ Gecko come here explain to Cele what a real list is !
hehe i forgot the man of the hour, Rus_brain and his love for oldschool maps :>
So many people...
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This is heartbreaking news.. But it was very predictable that sonic would leave tournament hosting after his company would grow big enough. Sad
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On September 25 2015 01:32 mca64Launcher_ wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all
That's incredibly ignorant. He never needed SC, and he spent countless hours maintaining the scene long before his league was on OGN. It's not even like he threw money at SC, he spent his own time off to manage 10+ seasons of the league. He put more than his fair share in.
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On September 23 2015 21:20 2Pacalypse- wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2015 20:53 Chef wrote:On September 23 2015 09:50 Cele wrote:On September 23 2015 09:11 Chef wrote:On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble? Could just be pressure from his business partners to be more responsible. I can't imagine financial trouble when he's expanding globally and striking big deals. I guess it's not unthinkable he could have spread himself too thin. To me it sounds like he's spending every dime trying to make his company as big as possible. He could return to BW at a later date when he gets returns on all his expansion. Real properly produced Starleague isn't cheap to run, very different from the old Sonic days when he barely had to pay anyone. So it's easy to see how working it into the budget is difficult, especially if it affects the trust of his business partners who want him to care about their bottom lines. I wasn't expecting it, but I'm not really shocked either. The level of production quality vs the quality of the games was way out of sync. Kongdoo is a good middle step if BW is going to keep fighting. i think the quality of play was good. Granted this time Bisu/hero wasn't picture perfect, but overall i was pretty satisfied. Perhaps you're a bit nostalgic and don't recall all the mediocre games the OSL and MSL even gave us way back then? xD Coz i recall some. I don't think so, it's not even close. Might depend on what you're watching for though. Not even close? Are you basing this argument on the actual games you've watched or on a feeling you have that games can't possibly be on the same level due to a different way of practice nowadays? While it's very hard to compare, in any meaningful way, the quality of games nowadays to the KeSPA days, I think Cele is right and there's definitely certain amount of nostalgia involved in your opinion.
It's based on watching the games. Execution and strategy are poor in comparison. I've been watching the hybrid league recently, since I did not want to watch them when they were relevant. I think even at that point, the players in their current state could not take 1 game in 10 against the players in the hybrid league. Those games themselves were largely disappointing in their time.
In Chess you know a player is out of his preparation when his or her clock starts running down. In StarCraft you know it when they start making weird mistakes, or they begin the one track tug of war and forget about the overall game plan. The professional games before took quite awhile before you noticed they were out of prep. The games today they are out of prep after taking their first or second expansion (depending on the race).
Strategic ideas and insight are lacking in the games I've watched over the last two years. Once in awhile I see a game with a flicker of the imagination the game was once played with, but by and large the games are amateur and don't have a lot of fight in them. I kinda liked it better when larva just saved up gas for bullshit egg tactics.
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On September 25 2015 01:32 mca64Launcher_ wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all
Yes, like he needed SC before, right?
You're absolutely correct though: this has all been a scam perpetrated by Sonic because he's a moneygrubbing capitalist hell-bent on those BW-dollars. Sonic is an evil and immoral criminal mastermind who's success is all predicated on his devotion to Brood War. He spent god-knows-how-much money, his time, his sweat, and his devotion to a game everyone else seemingly abandoned and declared "dead", for eleven consecutive seasons (each time bigger than the last) in a huge bid to swindle everyone of their money (except nobody else put money in?) because it's all about the money for him, right? Now he decides to go run and hide with his untold BW-dollars (seriously, tell me how much you think this guy made off of sponsoring Brood War, even indirectly) and he's apparently too busy with his other businesses and low-on-cash to try to cobble together another season of SSL, except he's really not, because his entire business model and the key to his success was sponsoring a game he (and we) clearly loves. Or does he? No, it was all so the crafty businessman could plug his wares to an audience that would likely not buy them. So he's going to simply abandon the game and everyone else (even though in the first post, assuming the translation is correct, and it seems to be, he says this is a setback). It's a huge conspiracy. It was always about money for Sonic (that evil, evil businessman) and not SC (even though it actually seems antithetical to keep pouring money into what many, many people would consider "obsolete"). We've all been conned (how, I'm not even sure). He was just using SC, guys. WAKE UP.
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On September 26 2015 18:12 feckless wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2015 01:32 mca64Launcher_ wrote:On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all Yes, like he needed SC before, right? You're absolutely correct though: this has all been a scam perpetrated by Sonic because he's a moneygrubbing capitalist hell-bent on those BW-dollars. Sonic is an evil and immoral criminal mastermind who's success is all predicated on his devotion to Brood War. He spent god-knows-how-much money, his time, his sweat, and his devotion to a game everyone else seemingly abandoned and declared "dead", for eleven consecutive seasons (each time bigger than the last) in a huge bid to swindle everyone of their money (except nobody else put money in?) because it's all about the money for him, right? Now he decides to go run and hide with his untold BW-dollars (seriously, tell me how much you think this guy made off of sponsoring Brood War, even indirectly) and he's apparently too busy with his other businesses and low-on-cash to try to cobble together another season of SSL, except he's really not, because his entire business model and the key to his success was sponsoring a game he (and we) clearly loves. So he's going to simply abandon the game and everyone else (even though in the first post, assuming the translation is correct, and it seems to be, he says this is a setback). It's a huge conspiracy. It was always about money for Sonic (that evil, evil businessman) and not SC (even though it actually seems antithetical to keep pouring money into what many, many people would consider "obsolete"). We've all been conned (how, I'm not even sure). He was just using SC, guys. WAKE UP.
sonic is doing the best for his brand,some months ago almost every game competition had sbene as sponsor,this is a very smart move from him,the youth is moving around here where sbene is popular at.also must be more economic too.
Sonic started promoting sinbal farm on afreeca doing bw events,thats how all this started.
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also the bw sonic team bbaras or wathever is it called is a limited project and is very clear the players that are in this team right now lack basics and are perfoming really bad,even larva with offraces won them...like seriously,there are many good flish players much better than them.the only one that really made a huge surprised was olympus but even so i dont think he is that good.
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On September 26 2015 18:23 [sc1f]eonzerg wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2015 18:12 feckless wrote:On September 25 2015 01:32 mca64Launcher_ wrote:On September 25 2015 01:07 oGoZenob wrote:On September 25 2015 00:26 mca64Launcher_ wrote:
Cant believe what i read and even i got warned for tellin what i think. For sonic its all about money, not about sc. tell me one thing where he didnt promote own stuff. His every tour had some kind of promotion and it wasnt for free. Are you so naive and blind? of course he's promoting his stuff, he invests a lot of money in this, and if he can gain any attention to his product I really don't know why he shouldnt. it's a win-win, he's offering a show we want to see, in return he wants us to know his brand exists, and maybe if you're interested you'll consider buying it. I fail to understand why it's a bad thing problem is he desnt offering a show anymore :D cause he doesnt need anymore sc. My point was he used sc thats all Yes, like he needed SC before, right? You're absolutely correct though: this has all been a scam perpetrated by Sonic because he's a moneygrubbing capitalist hell-bent on those BW-dollars. Sonic is an evil and immoral criminal mastermind who's success is all predicated on his devotion to Brood War. He spent god-knows-how-much money, his time, his sweat, and his devotion to a game everyone else seemingly abandoned and declared "dead", for eleven consecutive seasons (each time bigger than the last) in a huge bid to swindle everyone of their money (except nobody else put money in?) because it's all about the money for him, right? Now he decides to go run and hide with his untold BW-dollars (seriously, tell me how much you think this guy made off of sponsoring Brood War, even indirectly) and he's apparently too busy with his other businesses and low-on-cash to try to cobble together another season of SSL, except he's really not, because his entire business model and the key to his success was sponsoring a game he (and we) clearly loves. So he's going to simply abandon the game and everyone else (even though in the first post, assuming the translation is correct, and it seems to be, he says this is a setback). It's a huge conspiracy. It was always about money for Sonic (that evil, evil businessman) and not SC (even though it actually seems antithetical to keep pouring money into what many, many people would consider "obsolete"). We've all been conned (how, I'm not even sure). He was just using SC, guys. WAKE UP. sonic is doing the best for his brand,some months ago almost every game competition had sbene as sponsor,this is a very smart move from him,the youth is moving around here where sbene is popular at.also must be more economic too. Sonic started promoting sinbal farm on afreeca doing bw events,thats how all this started.
I get what you are saying, I really do. Sonic seems to be an intelligent fellow. I also have nothing against putting your time and money into something expecting some sort of return (Sonic is also a businessman, so I'm sure he understands this quite well). But you can't honestly sit there and tell me (or imply to me) that the guy is evil (which is the tone I'm getting from some people here) because he poured effort into something that had been abandoned to obsolescence, and then plugged his own brand and expected something out of it. No matter what happens from here on, you can't sit there and argue to me that he hasn't done his part to try to keep the scene alive. SBENU sponsors esports, I get that, but how much of a return do you really think he got on his investment on solely BW? Even if he started out that way, why continue? Maybe I'm thick-headed and missing something here. It's really questionable to me that an astute businessman is going to spend this much on something that other people (as the first post indicates) are not willing to go near, even if it is a niche market, unless it's some kind of devotion, hobby, or pet project. Furthermore, if the money really has gone to Sonic's head (okay, let's confirm this one more time: he's a businessman) and he's decided sponsoring BW is more costly than it is worth, how can I sit here and say he's a user? He's given more than his fair share, and expecting something out of it isn't that far-fetched to me. That doesn't mean he is a user (or "used SC"). I might have put a lot of time into playing and following this game, but I have never organized anything on the scope Sonic has, so to sit there with a straight face and claim that he "used SC" (when he gave so much) is a bit of a stretch for me.
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who ever uses term of evil he doesnt know what it means ^^. i didnt pointed he started everything with bw and afreeca etc as a bad thing,what i mean is is just amazing everything he made from almost nothing ? maybe bw is not marketeable as others games but just makes Sonic a very respectful guy with passion.and this is very good for his public image
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On September 22 2015 17:50 nbaker wrote:
Aww, very sad news. I've always had the impression that Broodwar isn't very profitable to sponsor even going back to the Kespa days, and companies mostly did it without a profit return in mind. I'd guess that if Broodwar continues to be competitive the money will have to come in from the fans.
It's probably harder to gauge in terms of "direct" profitability. But considering what a powerhouse of popularity Brood War was five, ten years ago, it's not hard to imagine multiple sponsors coughing up a few thousand USD each to sponsor an OSL, or a big one fronting the whole thing (or a majority of it). There was a lot of viewership. Now, BW is considered "obsolete" by so many and a shadow of its glory days. I'm not surprised (still disheartened) that companies that Sonic communicated with have expressed reluctance to sponsor another SSL, and even confusion as to why Sonic even wants to host another.
Side note: curious as to how many people tuned into the SSL finals? TL showed the numbers of viewers of the stream, but I can't remember.
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On September 26 2015 09:33 Chef wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2015 21:20 2Pacalypse- wrote:On September 23 2015 20:53 Chef wrote:On September 23 2015 09:50 Cele wrote:On September 23 2015 09:11 Chef wrote:On September 22 2015 17:22 Waxangel wrote:
I wonder if this means that SBENU is in financial trouble? Could just be pressure from his business partners to be more responsible. I can't imagine financial trouble when he's expanding globally and striking big deals. I guess it's not unthinkable he could have spread himself too thin. To me it sounds like he's spending every dime trying to make his company as big as possible. He could return to BW at a later date when he gets returns on all his expansion. Real properly produced Starleague isn't cheap to run, very different from the old Sonic days when he barely had to pay anyone. So it's easy to see how working it into the budget is difficult, especially if it affects the trust of his business partners who want him to care about their bottom lines. I wasn't expecting it, but I'm not really shocked either. The level of production quality vs the quality of the games was way out of sync. Kongdoo is a good middle step if BW is going to keep fighting. i think the quality of play was good. Granted this time Bisu/hero wasn't picture perfect, but overall i was pretty satisfied. Perhaps you're a bit nostalgic and don't recall all the mediocre games the OSL and MSL even gave us way back then? xD Coz i recall some. I don't think so, it's not even close. Might depend on what you're watching for though. Not even close? Are you basing this argument on the actual games you've watched or on a feeling you have that games can't possibly be on the same level due to a different way of practice nowadays? While it's very hard to compare, in any meaningful way, the quality of games nowadays to the KeSPA days, I think Cele is right and there's definitely certain amount of nostalgia involved in your opinion. It's based on watching the games. Execution and strategy are poor in comparison. I've been watching the hybrid league recently, since I did not want to watch them when they were relevant. I think even at that point, the players in their current state could not take 1 game in 10 against the players in the hybrid league. Those games themselves were largely disappointing in their time. In Chess you know a player is out of his preparation when his or her clock starts running down. In StarCraft you know it when they start making weird mistakes, or they begin the one track tug of war and forget about the overall game plan. The professional games before took quite awhile before you noticed they were out of prep. The games today they are out of prep after taking their first or second expansion (depending on the race). Strategic ideas and insight are lacking in the games I've watched over the last two years. Once in awhile I see a game with a flicker of the imagination the game was once played with, but by and large the games are amateur and don't have a lot of fight in them. I kinda liked it better when larva just saved up gas for bullshit egg tactics.
Yes, this is true. I've said it occasionally and thought it very frequently, the players just don't have the kind of refinement that they did in the progamer house days. People tend to be very slow to admit that any player, or even more so the entire playerbase, is playing far from his/its true potential. Very understandable because the signs are very subtle and may sometimes just be a one-off case, but nonetheless in this case it is true that the quality of play is not where it used to be.
On September 26 2015 19:59 feckless wrote:
Side note: curious as to how many people tuned into the SSL finals? TL showed the numbers of viewers of the stream, but I can't remember.
5-7k is standard. Look in the LR thread if you want, people usually like to post that number.
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it's ok brood war is time proof.
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If only wishful thinking really made it so...
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Fine, I'm gonna make my own starleague! With blackjack...and hookers... In fact, forget the starleague.
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I think the last hurrah of Brood War could only come if Jaedong or Flash decided to quit and come back to BW. That's the only scenario where I could see a bump in financial interests considering investing in another Starleague.
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United States337 Posts
On September 28 2015 04:31 MountainDewJunkie wrote:
I think the last hurrah of Brood War could only come if Jaedong or Flash decided to quit and come back to BW. That's the only scenario where I could see a bump in financial interests considering investing in another Starleague.
JD has already strongly considered the switch, but there may be another league coming up at the end of Oct / beginning of Nov.
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This is a pretty standard dilemma for a business person who has a passion for something / wants to do something for the world. I think we all know Sonic's heart has always been in BW. He doesn't want to give it up, but if he neglects his business for it, he might end up losing both. So he's almost definitely making the right choice. Give it some time. If it weren't for him, we just wouldn't have pro BW anymore.
And if nothing else, he kickstarted the scene. SSL may not be happening but the demand for BW has definitely gone up in the past few years, and it won't be going down. BW IS FOREVER
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On September 28 2015 04:31 MountainDewJunkie wrote:
I think the last hurrah of Brood War could only come if Jaedong or Flash decided to quit and come back to BW.
That's the only scenario where I could see a bump in financial interests considering investing in another Starleague.
Or maybe if Bliz ever decided to update the game (modern resolutions, Bnet 2.0, works with modern OSes, etc).
Which the odds are against. And even if they did, they wouldn't do it 'til well after LotV came out.
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they will never. theyre not gonna throw million dollars worth of development and time down the drain to revive a 'dead game'. they should have done it before they even made wings of liberty. now its just too late because if bw was ever revived with modern graphics etc we all know sc2 would die instantly
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On September 30 2015 13:32 evilfatsh1t wrote:
if bw was ever revived with modern graphics etc we all know sc2 would die instantly
I'm really not sure of that. The game that sells nowaday are fast rewarding with little to no effort. Even sc2 is considered way too complicated. I can't imagine broodwar selling well in this conditions
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On September 28 2015 04:38 afreecaTV.Char wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2015 04:31 MountainDewJunkie wrote:
I think the last hurrah of Brood War could only come if Jaedong or Flash decided to quit and come back to BW. That's the only scenario where I could see a bump in financial interests considering investing in another Starleague. JD has already strongly considered the switch, but there may be another league coming up at the end of Oct / beginning of Nov.
Source? I'm all for him switching back to BW over this pathetic play in WCS...
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On September 30 2015 18:23 oGoZenob wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2015 13:32 evilfatsh1t wrote:
if bw was ever revived with modern graphics etc we all know sc2 would die instantly I'm really not sure of that. The game that sells nowaday are fast rewarding with little to no effort. Even sc2 is considered way too complicated. I can't imagine broodwar selling well in this conditions
when all the progamers, casters, leagues, sponsors and spectators all move back to bw, sc2 will have nothing left. whats the point of buying a game then where no one is left playing besides b-teamers who know they dont have a future back in bw anyway.
people would eventually buy bw regardless of simplicity because it would be the new 'it' game again
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In all honesty, neither Brood War nor SC2 are really that big in the grand scheme of things. The sponsors of BW wanted to move on to something more popular after BW hit hard times, but that turned out to be CSGO/DOTA2/LoL, not SC2. We RTS fans are really kind of a niche group now.
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On September 30 2015 13:32 evilfatsh1t wrote:
they will never. theyre not gonna throw million dollars worth of development and time down the drain to revive a 'dead game'. they should have done it before they even made wings of liberty. now its just too late because if bw was ever revived with modern graphics etc we all know sc2 would die instantly
I don't think it would be unprofitable. Many franchises see reviving an old, but beloved game as a good way to get quick cash. From Blizzards point of view: 'we already have bnet2, just have to do minor integration work' 'we already have the game designed' 'we have a very strong idea of the art direction' 'most of the code is probably reusable from the original game.'
Basically they would just have to pay artists for new assets, and a small (for Blizzard) team of people to bring things up to speed and integrate. Plus testing. Not super cheap, but compared to making a whole new game, very affordable. The whole business model of GoG is basically just taking the work out of making things run on recent operating systems.
The thing that makes it unlikely is just that Blizzard has never shown interest in that kind of business model, and if tweets are anything to be believed, SC1 is a bit of a sore spot for some of the current big players. That and everything Blizzard is doing right now is working really well for them.
It's fun to imagine a world where SC1 gets a makeover though. Lots of controversial changes to be considered.
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@chef other companies do that but that is NOT blizzard way
blizzard have an emphasis on quality and premium feel on any of their new releases, if they want to delegate resources and effort, they would use that on a new sequel than ruin their legacy with a cheapo HD remake (that recent wc3 news is restricted to china and not operated by blizz so it doesnt count)
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On September 30 2015 23:14 Chef wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2015 13:32 evilfatsh1t wrote:
they will never. theyre not gonna throw million dollars worth of development and time down the drain to revive a 'dead game'. they should have done it before they even made wings of liberty. now its just too late because if bw was ever revived with modern graphics etc we all know sc2 would die instantly I don't think it would be unprofitable. Many franchises see reviving an old, but beloved game as a good way to get quick cash. From Blizzards point of view: 'we already have bnet2, just have to do minor integration work' 'we already have the game designed' 'we have a very strong idea of the art direction' ' most of the code is probably reusable from the original game.
Considering the quality standard of code back then, and the fact that both games run on completely diffrent enginges, I highly doubt, my 2 cents of a programmer.
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Fans could ported Quake to Delphi using C++ source code.. Should be easy and not expensive for Blizzard to release refreshed sc;bw
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On September 27 2015 00:23 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On September 26 2015 19:59 feckless wrote:
Side note: curious as to how many people tuned into the SSL finals? TL showed the numbers of viewers of the stream, but I can't remember. 5-7k is standard. Look in the LR thread if you want, people usually like to post that number.
I think that 5-7k number was from the people who attended the finals, not people who tuned in. I dont think anyone has said what OGN reported, or if OGN reported viewership numbers at all.
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On September 30 2015 23:14 Chef wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2015 13:32 evilfatsh1t wrote:
they will never. theyre not gonna throw million dollars worth of development and time down the drain to revive a 'dead game'. they should have done it before they even made wings of liberty. now its just too late because if bw was ever revived with modern graphics etc we all know sc2 would die instantly I don't think it would be unprofitable. Many franchises see reviving an old, but beloved game as a good way to get quick cash. From Blizzards point of view: 'we already have bnet2, just have to do minor integration work' 'we already have the game designed' 'we have a very strong idea of the art direction' 'most of the code is probably reusable from the original game.' Basically they would just have to pay artists for new assets, and a small (for Blizzard) team of people to bring things up to speed and integrate. Plus testing. Not super cheap, but compared to making a whole new game, very affordable. The whole business model of GoG is basically just taking the work out of making things run on recent operating systems. The thing that makes it unlikely is just that Blizzard has never shown interest in that kind of business model, and if tweets are anything to be believed, SC1 is a bit of a sore spot for some of the current big players. That and everything Blizzard is doing right now is working really well for them. It's fun to imagine a world where SC1 gets a makeover though. Lots of controversial changes to be considered.
the million dollars i mentioned was a reference to the amount spent on sc2 already. im no expert but my guess is that reviving bw with a makeover would be peanuts compared to what they spent on sc2, but the money has already been spent. theyre not going to throw sc2 away now to revive an old legend
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I want SSL12 I need my BW fix!
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EPT
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/GEzEpU7.png)
