EPTAre we killing esports? [part 1] - Page 11
| Forum Index > Closed |
|
windsupernova
Mexico5280 Posts
| ||
|
Azarkon
United States21060 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:49 Eee wrote: The Swedish National Championship (Known as e-sports SM in Sweden), if you look at the players 80% of them are teamless. And the only real progamer that has been able to qualify is Sjow, even though sponsored players like Merz, Bischu, HayprO, ThorZaIN and Lalush have participated, non of them qualified. So why hasn't even a lesser team signed these players? France has just like Sweden their own local scene, these tournaments that are arranged by Llewellys, I bet it's the same situation there. Probably lots of young talented players that are teamless. If that's the case then yeah, foreign teams have failed in their talent searching, and that this is perhaps one reason why foreign eSports can never seem to compete. Korean teams are constantly on the look-out for up and rising talent, and it is through this search that players like Leenock and DRG were given the opportunities they needed to become pro-gamers. If foreign teams aren't doing the same for their own scenes it's no wonder they're perennially stuck having to recruit Koreans. That said, when ogsVines tops the NA ladder, that does throw a wrench into searching for homegrown talent. But maybe it's different on the EU. | ||
|
Full.tilt
United Kingdom1709 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:32 jmbthirteen wrote: Those people that watch those lower leagues, the vast majority of them also watch the big leagues. I don't know anyone that watches just minor league baseball, yet I know hundreds of people that watch major league baseball. Why? The play is of a higher caliber. And its not even elitism, its competition. Foreign players are getting supported and supported very well right now. Hell teams signing Koreans makes them better. Being able to practice with the best players in the world is only good. I agree right now it is great for foreigners, there's is still quite a large number who can remain competitive with the top Koreans, they may lose more than they win but a lot of the time the games are pretty close. My thoughts are mainly based on if the trend continues and SC2 becomes like BW. Which a lot of people still enjoy of course and is great. I started watching BW and Korean only competition like a lot of other people and couldn't see the point of foreign tournaments because the play was so far off what I had already seen in the Korean tournaments. I just don't think that situation is best for the growth or even maintaining the current foreigner interest in SC2, with regards to new players coming to the scene or getting new viewers. Of course there could be a lot of new viewers who only want to see the best of the best, I just think relatively there could be more who take a more general view and whose priorities maybe different. | ||
|
Bagration
United States18282 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:53 hrvoje07 wrote: Yea, because a lot of teamless and talented players were allowed to play in INVITE qualifiers for MLG arena. Fact that a league is promoting an invite qualifier is just enough for me to not support it. The MLG Arenas are a step in the right direction, since they divide qualifiers by regions. Now they need to open the qualifiers to more people and rising stars. They also cover the costs for the players as well, which is great. | ||
|
NexUmbra
Scotland3776 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:28 Shelke14 wrote: You know what this ties into? MLG Hopefully everyone agreeing that the western scene needs more support, jumps on the MLG bandwagon and buys all their PPV. This is exactly what sundance is trying to push, a league where if you're teamless and talented, being a western will give you the chance to be 'all payed' for expense to MLG tournments. Yeah but how many 'teamless and talented' players are going to be able to beat players like Sjow, Thorzain, Ret, Sheth or SaSe? | ||
|
Eee
Sweden2712 Posts
On March 04 2012 05:07 NexUmbra wrote: Yeah but how many 'teamless and talented' players are going to be able to beat players like Sjow, Thorzain, Ret, Sheth or SaSe? Well ThorZaIN couldnt even qualify to the qualifier of the swedish nationals (Yes the qualifier of the quailifer). So I think there's plenty of them, especially if the chance were to be given to them.  | ||
|
willoc
Canada1530 Posts
One reason is this whole "forced national hero" through acquisition doesn't work. A player isn't going to get good just because he/she managed to get picked up by a team. White-Ra, Naniwa, Stephano didn't require this. Another is that we don't need national heroes. I live in Canada. My favorite players are Koreans and White-Ra. I used to like Huk but not so much anymore (probably because of the switch to EG which seemed to have changed his priorities). It wasn't because he was Canadian, it was because he had originality, discipline, passion and skill. Some of those seem to have declined now. I'm sure that a number of people will only root for their national hero but that seems rather strange due to the relatively small size of the scene compared to sports like soccer where there are numerous players per nation (and they don't necessarily hail from that nation either). Maybe national heroes would be a good idea to promote at a later stage? I dunno. Regardless, I would rather have my teams stick to picking up players with skill/attitude/passion rather than focusing on "player from non-Korean place". Are some teams doing stupid things (unrealistic salaries)? Yes. This will always happen. Those teams will fail in the future where popularity isn't a deciding factor anymore. | ||
|
Funkydonky
950 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:55 jmbthirteen wrote: i'm pretty sure Axslav is happy MLG paid his way since Reign collapsed. Also MLG has stated multiple times the qualifiers will be open for future Arenas. They just wanted to control the first Arena as much as possible since it was a test. I don't get what Axslav has anything to do with my post. He was a known player thats why he was invited to qualifiers. I don't want to comment on what they will do in the future, i will when i see it. Mlg has stated a lot of things in the past that they haven't delivered on. | ||
|
jmbthirteen
United States10734 Posts
On March 04 2012 05:15 hrvoje07 wrote: I don't get what Axslav has anything to do with my post. He was a known player thats why he was invited to qualifiers. I don't want to comment on what they will do in the future, i will when i see it. Mlg has stated a lot of things in the past that they haven't delivered on. He's a teamless and talented played that benefited from MLG. And what hasn't MLG delivered on. | ||
|
tripper688
United States569 Posts
On March 04 2012 03:57 marcesr wrote: I agree with big parts of the artice. I really do think that most teams and tournaments underestimate how big of a problem the 'Korean invasion' is. The best example is the Home Story Cup 4. A guy called Sound who noone has ever heard of before comes to the tournament, gets up to the finals beating a lot of foreign stars like Stephano and then?...then what?! No one has ever seen anything again from Sound since then. If you want to keep people interested into the competition you need stars who they can identify with. Most people wont keep watching just because they see good starcraft. So if their favourite non Korean star just gets owned by a random Korean they have never heard of before they lose interest. Koreans who prove themselves in the GSL and who are supported by their own teams can fly to international tournaments, but western tournaments and teams shouldnt pay for 'random' Koreans to come over because you drastically reduce the entertainment value. You mean like MLG flying people over and such? While I kind of agree, it's not the teams flying them over and when they are, they're not random koreans. They're members of the team or their affiliate in Korea. If Sundance or Carmac want to fly a random Korean out to the Americas or EU, it's well within their right to. As for HSC4, the problem isn't inviting Koreans, the problem is the fact that the best foreigners only compete consistently at B/A levels of play. On March 04 2012 04:16 jj33 wrote: I swear you people who make threads about how you care so much about the growth of "e-sports" are so immature. What are you people suggesting? Segregation? Ban koreans from foreign tournaments and limit them to joining foreign teams? If anything that'll kill esports. NObody would take tournaments seriously. You guys remind me of America back decades ago when Black people just started to play in the NFL/NBA etc and how the majority was against it and wanted segregation. If Koreans are the best at sc2, which they are, then they reap the benefits. simple as that. I don't think anyone wants to start segregating out of spite (They're taking our money and killing esports!! FUFUFFUFUU BAN THEM!!), but honestly I agree. The problem isn't the lack of tournaments or the invites. The problem is the player base being GENERALLY less into what they do. Which is all fine and good from a long term perspective (at least they have something to fall back on) but you can't say hey, I'm going to put in half the effort of my Korean counterparts so I can get my education and have something of a life and then at the same time gripe about how much better they are and how you're getting shafted by your own teams. UOTE]On March 04 2012 04:21 Bagration wrote: On March 04 2012 04:16 jj33 wrote: I swear you people who make threads about how you care so much about the growth of "e-sports" are so immature. What are you people suggesting? Segregation? Ban koreans from foreign tournaments and limit them to joining foreign teams? If anything that'll kill esports. NObody would take tournaments seriously. You guys remind me of America back decades ago when Black people just started to play in the NFL/NBA etc and how the majority was against it and wanted segregation. If Koreans are the best at sc2, which they are, then they reap the benefits. simple as that. I don't think anyone is even considering any type of segregation or banning Koreans. All that we ask is for organizations to invest a bit more in foreigner talent. Very different. Let the Koreans come, but give foreign pros the resources so that they can compete.[/QUOTE] ...That's what's already happening though? Unless you don't want them to sign Koreans to foreign teams..? You can focus all you want on the resource aspect of it but the underlying issue is that the Koreans are BETTER. They take the game more seriously. They want to win more. They're willing to bet their futures on it. If you're the coach or manager of a team, do you take a code A/B Korean that could very well win MLG or do you take an up and coming foreigner who would get stomped by said Korean and asking for equal or more money? Think about it for a second. When you buy household goods, do you buy "Made in USA (or w-e country you're from)" only in order to support the local economy? When you buy fruits and vegetables do you buy things that are only locally produced? When you start talking of hosting NA or EU only tournies and such...that's basically segregation. And yea you might produce some home grown heroes but guess what? They're eventually going to have to play against some Koreans and they're gonna get beat too. On March 04 2012 04:34 playa wrote: I haven't read all the posts, but what Wegandi said resonated with me. It makes next to no sense to put in the required time to become good enough to be on a top team, to then find out whether the job provides suitable pay or not. Plus, if pro teams are going to be logical, in that they want to maximize winning, it would seem to come down to the "survival of the fittest." Well, if you want to draw on history, for whatever reason, if given enough time, it seems that Koreans would be better than almost all non Koreans, if not all. Thus, there's just too many question marks for many non Koreans to pursue this as a job. Until people can really explain why Koreans are better than non Koreans at a new game, when it hasn't even really caught on in Korea, I'm not sure how we can magically make up the skill gap. Plus, one must worry that there is something to South Korea being the most intelligent country; if that is a large part of why they own most players, what happens if more and more players from Korea start to play? Until players start to talk segregation (not that I don't think that's a bitches way) or people seriously try to dissect why Koreans are better than us and what we can do to match their level -- without playing 14 hours a day and basically living to play -- this OP seems to be very relevant. If anything, it's way past due. Anytime the best players end up on teams, "killing e-sports" might be a misnomer, as I'm sure in Starcraft most players would rather watch the best players in the world (koreans), rather than non Korean matches. But, the viability of being a pro player for a non Korean seems to be diminishing or could be in jeopardy. How big would pro sports be if they never found their way onto television? Whether SC is formatted/made for it or not, it seems like it might be necessary. You hit the nail on the head though. The difference in average national IQ between Korea, China, and Japan is within margin of error. You don't see China and Japan producing GSL winners. Even between the Eastern Asian countries and the first world Western nations, the national average IQ is within 5-10 points. The very fact that you want to ignore the amount of work and practice put in by the average Koreans is kind of ridiculous. "They're better than us but it can't be because they practice twice as much, it has to be because of some unknown factor that we cannot quantify." Really? You really think setting up team houses, having dedicated coaches, and grueling practice does not contribute more than a 5 point difference in IQ? If I'm a professional pianist and only practice 4 hours a day, while my peers are practicing almost twice that and studying theory on top of it, do I have any right to complain that they're better? I'm not calling foreigners lazy. I'm not calling them dumb (far from it, I think they have a much healthier approach to gaming than the Koreans). I am calling bullshit on the fact that there is some intrinsic, unknown, and uquantifiable factor in Korean success when you yourself already state that you don't want to practice as hard as they do. On March 04 2012 04:44 Blennd wrote: Wanting to enjoy a sport without being shunned by the mainstream of your society is racist? Wanting the thing you enjoy to also be enjoyed by at least some of the people who are culturally, geographically, and linguistically close to you is racist? Is going to a barcraft racist? So sick of the attitude that equates wanting the foreign scene to grow with hating koreans. Off topic but that made me chuckle. Koreans love to drink and hang out too you know... *edit spelling* | ||
|
emc
United States3088 Posts
It's only inevitable that soon the only teams that exist will have korean super stars because those players win and earn the money needed for their team. Owning a team is a business, like baseball or soccer, you want the best player on your team to promote your team. Is it killing esports? probably? but it's an inevitable reality and we'll just have to see where it takes us. Yeah I love seeing americans in GSL but why do I watch GSL? It's for the high level play. I'd like to compare college level football (American Football) as the foreigner scene and NFL as the korean scene. I actually only follow the NFL because I haven't been to a college that has a good football program. If I did, then I might watch college football just for that team. But since I don't, I only really watch NFL because that's where the best players compete. In SC2, I follow IdrA and HuK (my hypothetical college team) at all of their tournaments but a player like Darkforce or Merz (my hypothetical college team I didn't go to) who I don't really care about? I just skip them and watch the koreans instead. So with that in mind, the tip top teams (NFL league) will always have their eye on the tip top players (NFL players) and that's just the nature of the game. It might be up to the community to keep the foreign interest alive so that players like Idra/HuK don't eventually get completely replaced by koreans (not saying that will happen). | ||
|
HaNaRi
Korea (South)50 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:34 Eee wrote: Very interesting post, may i quote you in OP? You are absolutely right, this can only strengthen the scene. Hopefully the world is ready for this kind of system so it can be maintained. sure go ahead On March 04 2012 03:43 Arceus wrote: well one of the factors that ruined wc3 scene back then is that it's full of empty promises and broken dreams. People thinks doing esport is easy, organizations after organizations come and go. Even giant ones failed. Hope thats not the case for sc2. And the info that hanari dude posted above doesnt fully reflect on the salary when wc3 was doing good aka 06-08. Iirc topnotch stars like Moon, Lyn, Lucifer got 5K-$10K per month, real good Koreans like some of the SK players got like 2k-4K. In total there were like 20+ Koreans that were kinda wellpaid, not to mention a special Chinese project called BET which was believed to pay way more. Whats more ? Imbalance race, 8 years old mappool, sc2 surfacing etc. aka not something that is likely to happen to sc2. So, I think the analogy drawn by OP is kinda bad. As long as the Korean scene lives, more orgs like TL, EG (not Reign lol), the sc2 scene will thrive Arceus we're talking about the decline of eSports. 06-08 was doing good, but not good as it could've been if leagues such as MBC was still involved. | ||
|
Blennd
United States266 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:46 jj33 wrote: Oh please. flip the situation, if Koreans were struggling and people made threads saying "let's help koreans" I bet you'd be in there laughing at them. Oh please. If people started rounding up Jews in your hometown and gassing them to death, I'd bet you'd be right there applauding them. See what I did there? Generally in an argument if you are going to assume completely asinine things based on absolutely nothing, it's better to have them be something nice about a person instead of something mean. | ||
|
RageBot
Israel1530 Posts
On March 04 2012 03:57 bOneSeven wrote: People who disagree here are not really taking their time to think this trough. Excuse me, how many views had the SPL last time I saw it ? And yes, bw players are perhaps even better than sc2 ( they obviously have better mechanics and better training system ) so you would think ... Host an MLG with top20 koreans ( constantly, after 3-4 editions ) and see how many viewers you get, most of the viewers will watch it because Husky is casting or because Day9 is casting or because Tastossis will be there, but in no way because they want to see the koreans play. I really enjoy bw ( haven't spent that much time looking at it, perhaps 3-4 games/week ) and I was a subscriber to GOMTV "back in the day". So the guys who will be watching MLG with top 20 koreans will mereley be hardcore fans. Can you hold a HomestoryCUP if only koreans atend ? No. What teams need to do is get prohouses in SEA/NA/EU with 8-15 players and really start practicing. Milenium kinda did that with Stephano/Bling/Adelscot/Tarson and it seems to me that Stephano and Bling actually improved in this time ( and that with only 4 players, imagine with 8+ ). The problem is ( don't really know the financial issues ) that you'd probably need more money to invest in all the stuff...+ prohouse in korea exist also because all events are in korea so they wouldn't need to worry about travling for 1k$+ for each player and so and so...anyways... Edit: Wow, i've told myself i'll never reply to a post without reading it thoroughly, my bad, you are absolutley right. | ||
|
Alacast
United States205 Posts
| ||
|
Eee
Sweden2712 Posts
| ||
|
Belha
Italy2850 Posts
Is pretty pretty obvious for any cold logical minded person that not banning the koreans in all the foreign scene is bad for the future of e-sports outside korea. Korean e-sport teams (players + organization) take their time to evolve, from 2000 to present. +10 years. 2011: Now with a big scene (sc2) outside korea, we are just paying the evolved, stronger beings to take the tourneys, the money, and the foreign chance/hope to balance the gap. Foreigns-only teams eventualy will fall aganist this most developed rivals, so their only chance is to hire those koreans players or disband. But this is just strengthen the circle: more koreans crushing the chance of foreigns to evolve. (evolve, aka develop the methods and organizations/teams that after a decade allow the koreans to dominate the game) Eventualy the scene will indeed be "depleted". I blame the tourney organizators that started this "circle", like mlg, who in seek of more income, start to invite koreans. However, can we blame them? Is people that in forums and in polls cried out for more koreans. So at the end, imho, yes, we all are killing esports. | ||
|
illsick
United States1770 Posts
There are definitely a lot of foreigner players on a good team and some of them not any better than code "B" Koreans. So there are investments and support for foreigners. Complexity, EG, Mouz, Liquid, etc all have players that are potentials or just not top tiered even for a foreigner. The rosters of SC2 teams are pretty big and they are still sinking money in developing their lower tiered players. In sports, teams pick up players that play the respective sport to the best of their abilities; race shouldn't be a factor. As for the downfall of WC3, who is to say that WC3 wouldn't have ended the same way regardless of what the OP stated. | ||
|
babylon
8765 Posts
On March 04 2012 04:44 Blennd wrote: Wanting to enjoy a sport without being shunned by the mainstream of your society is racist? Wanting the thing you enjoy to also be enjoyed by at least some of the people who are culturally, geographically, and linguistically close to you is racist? Is going to a barcraft racist? So sick of the attitude that equates wanting the foreign scene to grow with hating koreans. Hmmm. I don't think mainstream society actually "shuns" people who enjoy SC2 or eSports because they enjoy SC2/eSports. They may think you're a little strange and roll their eyes at you, but that's a far cry from shunning, imo. | ||
|
Nouar
France3270 Posts
We used to have 2/3 LANs each weekend in France at that time, the best players were not ALL present at each and every one and it put on the (small) spotlight other players and allowed them to grow. Now, there is... ladder and online tourneys. it's not *bad* but... just not enough. (playhem, <3 <3 <3) | ||
| ||
