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On September 30 2008 18:16 ret wrote: I really wanna be a commentator as well. But I can't get past the technical aspect of adding sound to videos. Bummer.
if you had read tasteless' post... its only for good players.. i dont think we are waiting for another D- guy to cast >_<;
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Well u should talk to someone that is already an commentator :o gl in being 1
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Have you considered getting a color commentator? Someone to turn to when you're not sure what to say? Specifically someone who has a really good understanding of the game?
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On September 30 2008 19:41 Kaolla wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2008 18:16 ret wrote: I really wanna be a commentator as well. But I can't get past the technical aspect of adding sound to videos. Bummer. if you had read tasteless' post... its only for good players.. i dont think we are waiting for another D- guy to cast >_<;
lol
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On September 30 2008 07:58 VorcePA wrote: Of course, I found gg.net before I found TL or SC2GG, so I'm kind of set with them, actually.
uh oh. UH OH. you know what people will do to you now?! lynch and maybe eat your babies. gg.net vs tl this sunday!
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On September 30 2008 19:41 Kaolla wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2008 18:16 ret wrote: I really wanna be a commentator as well. But I can't get past the technical aspect of adding sound to videos. Bummer. if you had read tasteless' post... its only for good players.. i dont think we are waiting for another D- guy to cast >_<; thereisalwaysplaceforcombatexhiguys.
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On September 30 2008 17:31 MyLostTemple wrote: There was once a TvT i casted where i had both players names swaped for about 20 minutes. i felt like shit when i realized i had made a mistake like that, but i had to focus and continue to cast since we were only half way done that day.
DAAAAH I remember that game! I watched you cast it live. I thought it was hilarious. But here's the thing: I forgave you. I didn't hold it against you, nor did I think you were a bad caster because of it. Yeah, if you constantly made mistakes like that I'd think twice about your abilities to cast, but one mistake every now and again like that isn't going to kill you. Actually, what drives me nuts about watching you is that you get building and unit names mixed up a lot. You *obviously* know more about this game than I do, so it's ok that you make tiny mistakes like that; we all know what you're trying to say. If that weren't enough, I know you have to talk fast, and think even faster, so I (and I think most of us) don't hold it against you.
I wish I had discovered the pro-gaming scene 6 years ago, rather than 6 months ago. I would be a radically different player.
And in regards to your second post: I'm not saying I'm going to be a good caster tomorrow, a great caster next week, and a prodigy in 3 months and lo and behold I'm in Korea. That's stupid. The *best* I can ever hope for is being one of the first on scene for Starcraft 2, and with any luck it will be as popular as its predecessor. Someone mentioned that I shouldn't try to set my goal so high as following in your footsteps. Where you are today is an unattainable goal in the near future, and the odds favor that I will never reach it. But starting out by posting videos on youtube is, well, a place to start.
edit: my comments about your commentating are not meant to patronize you. Nobody is perfect. And even if you do take it offensively coming from a newb like me, just remember: you set the example for all of us.
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On September 30 2008 17:31 MyLostTemple wrote: if you are not good at starcraft you shouldn't be a caster.
Tasteless, I have a ton of respect for you and realize you are a pioneer, but this is where I disagree with you. Yes you need to have solid fundamental knowledge and be an intense student of the game, but there's a point where it splits. In commentating you only need to know it, where as in a game situation you need to be able to execute it. I'm a hobbyist for commentary. I'm not looking to get a paycheck out of it. I really won't say how good or bad I am, I don't enjoy making judgments of myself. I can't play a game of SC to save my life. I'll admit it. It's not because I don't know what to do or have no clue what's going on, it's execution. At that point where you need to do every thing simultaneously and pull of all the micro-management, my mind overloads and I shut down. I forget things. My economy goes to the shitter, my macro comes screeching to a halt, and I forget to continue scouting. I look like a blubbering idiot. Yet when I watch a pro game, I have a sound knowledge of what's going on. Yeah there's still the occasional "WTF just happened" moment, but you learn as you study.
I'm not trying to promote or deter anyone from commentating. In my opinion, if you like it, do it. I know, however that I watched an entire season of proleague an MSL, an OSL and two leagues sponsored by GOM before I even strapped on the headset and recorded. I think that even if you are forever bound to D-, you can still learn the game solid from other commentators and just watching games en masse.
Good luck to anyone who pursues this.
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Hahaha that article title is so great.
God I should print out copies and hand them out when necessary.
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I guess I will chime in.
Instead of tasteless' advice of "if you are not good at starcraft you shouldn't be a caster", I would say If you dont like casting itself don't do it. But if you are passionate about the game and casting just do it and don't look back.
Though I have to say I totally understand where Tasteless is coming from. He has been to events where the caster hasn't even played through the broodwar campaign. From what I have seen its just in the nature of esports casting.
Starcraft casting is a lot different than other esports just due to the game itself. Starcraft is crazy in depth. I am constantly learning new things which is part of why I enjoy doing it so much. If you enjoy the feeling of discovery and sharing that with people then I would say stick to it.
I am a bad player. I will probably never appeal to anyone who is C or above. (Though there are exceptions of course.) However I have noticed that there are very few seriously players above C level that enjoy any type of commentary. The simple reason is I am aiming for the casual spectator not the hardcore gamer. My commentating doesn't appeal to hardcore gamers.
From what I have seen, hardcore gamers prefer Tasteless' commentaries, particularly those in which he mentions various tips and tricks which they can employ to improve their play. Artosis obviously falls into this category as well due to his depth of knowledge. Rarely can I provide that to a C/B player. Part of the rub with a lot people is that I simply don't care.
I'm not trying to please the hardcore gamer nor am I trying to teach people to become gosu starcraft players. I am trying to draw people into the game itself. Esports is dead in the water when only the most elite players can watch, enjoy and understand a commentary. In my opinion this is one of the key problems with counter-strike and other FPS.
Starcraft is unique because there are various levels of understanding. And in that framework there can be spectators, gamers and professionals.
I will always encourage people to try commentary and to stick with it for awhile. Partially because I derive a lot of pleasure from it and I would never want to deny anyone that. But mostly because there are guys like Vaul and Cholera out there who are fantastic casters who probably wouldn't have started without some encouragement or a place to start.
Even recently Cholera involved Louder who did a fantastic job his first time out and he might turn out to be the best commentator of all time, you never know.
But first I would suggest looking for some way that you can help out the community at large, basically where there is a gap or a hole.
The problem you are going to run into is you are entering territory that is very well trodden. When Moletrap and I started Klazart was on hiatus and there was zero english starcraft for OSL MSL and proleague. Now there are over a dozen youtube commentators and more testing their metal every day. So I only suggest doing it if you really are dedicated.
Beyond that I can guarantee no matter how entertaining or insightful your commentary is someone will hate it. Welcome to the internet. Try to differential those who are truly concerned with helping you out and those who have their own issues you can do nothing about. Real advice is rare and valuable.
Also listen to other commentators to understand how they are unique in what they offer and how you yourself can offer something unique. Tasteless and Artosis are great commentators beyond just their stellar game knowledge.
Feel free to tap me at sc2gg, I am always open to give technical tips among other things.
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Tasteless, I have massive respect for your commentaries and I think you do an amazing job over at korea. I don't know if this was what you always wanted to do, but good on you for taking the risk, and landing it big time.
However, I do disagree with your statement that you can only be a good commentator if you were a good player. eg. There are plenty of sports commentators that give pretty good insight into their respective sporting matches without actually playing the sport themselves.
This is similar to coaches of sports teams. *most* of them have been ex players, but there are tons of world class coaches who have a deep understanding of the sport, but haven't really excelled as a player.
Anyway, I look forward to tuning in live for your casting of boxer. Hope it'll turn out to be an epic.
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Chill&Artosis dream casting team
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MyLostTemple
United States2921 Posts
i'm not saying people shouldn't experiment with casting for fun. the way i read the OP i assumed he wanted to go professional with casting. frankly i think you should do whatever you want, regardless of what people say. i was told by countless people in the esports scene that SC was a dieing game (obviously untrue) and that a career as a starcraft caster would be impossible. i'm happy to say those people were dead wrong. however, to become professional at this i think it's so critical that you have an arsenal of competitive experience.
getting a high rank on iccup is a hell of a lot more than having good mechanics. this seems to be a big delusion amongst D- to D+ ranked players; that if they were just playing more they would be able to climb the ranks easily. Even when reaching the C level, you can still tell a lot of people play like robots who can be duped into doing the wrong move without too much trouble. There's a lot of psychology that takes place with scouting in early to midgame that, as far as i can tell, you only start to truly catch on to if your playing a ton of starcraft games and have a vast experience with different build orders.
as far as i know all sports casters have deep experience with the game. if they don't and they're simply professional MCs then they have a color commentator who makes up for everything they don't have.
The direction i was trying to point the OP in was that he should start playing as much as possible and get some in game experience, this will give you more to talk about and you'll be able to cast more comfortably.
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Since this is actually a serious discussion on Starcraft commentary, I'll unstop my lurkers and throw in my 2 spines.
I've been doing commentaries of Korean pro-games for about 6 months now. At first, when I started off, I was much less fluent in either casting or game analysis that I am now, and when I posted some links up at Teamliquid, I felt pretty much blown off. So I haven't really posted here since then, even though I think I've improved to the point where my technical analysis and obsessive knowledge of the pro-gamers would make even some the biggest skeptics here accept my videos. I don't claim to catch all the nuances and details, and many times, even when I do see them, there's simply not enough screen time to mention them. In the interest of full disclosure, I play very often since I've started commentating, but not competitively since the old days of Battle.net ladder and PGT before 2002. I do try to make sure I play every new map that comes out several times, though, before I cast games on them.
One of my "serious gamer" viewers, Louder, who's going to the WCG USA, actually did some dual casts with me on the recent MSL Ro32 Group B, with Flash/Jangbi/Bul_T/Yellow[arnc]. I decided to do the play-by-play and give background knowledge on the players while asking Louder what he would do in certain situations, what his predictions on tech choices would be, etc. The end result has received some of the best reviews of any of my videos, and I really hope some of the head Teamliquid members could take a look. Here is the first game, you can find the rest as video responses: + Show Spoiler +
I've also tried to consciously improve the technical level of analysis in my commentary. Here's a solo attempt that cuts out most of my color commentary and focuses on just the TvT action in a Proleague All-Stars game between Flash and Fantasy: + Show Spoiler + And finally, here's an example of what I think of what I think is my "usual" style, with the excellent Stork v ForGG games in the WCG Korea qualifiers a month ago: + Show Spoiler +
Anyway, my point is this: I would not mind more involved in Teamliquid, and I have tried a few times from the start, but I feel that I wouldn't be given a fair chance at here of getting viewers or just some constructive feedback. I feel that my posting here (or Diggity, Klazart, and Moletrap doing so) would most likely result in an a scoff-fest at my playing skills, with many of the responders not even watching my videos before judging. Sure, there's mistakes. But us four have been providing consistent, comprehensive English casting of the OSL, MSL, and Proleague for several seasons now. That's hundreds of games that are no where else cast in a language that most foreign viewers can understand. We have received hundreds, if not thousands, of messages saying that they wouldn't have watched those games if not for our commentaries, of which I usually receive 3000 - 4000 viewers, and Klazart can receive up to 10,000+. These viewers add to eSports publicity in general, which benefits Teamliquid, Tasteless, the chances of eSports being broadcast in the US, and all other good things. So I do hope that the members here would at least give my videos another shot - take a look at the ones I posted, for example - and reconsider their views of my work. I would love to contribute more to your site if you let me without being pre-judged.
By the way, I love your casting, Tasteless! I have literally seen every game you have casted - from the old WCG casts with DJ Wheat, to the WWI games with Bunny, to every single GomTV Invitation/Classic game on the list. I appreciate very much that you have paved the way for later enthusiasts like us, and I hope we can meet sometime at WCG Cologne, to which I'll most likely go also.
Cheers - Cholera
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Calgary25980 Posts
Wow okay so this is an sc2gg thread now I guess...
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United States13896 Posts
sigh ... let the flaming begin ...
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
I recorded some commentaries once. Then i realized i was terrible at starcraft and shouldn't be doing them. Its like this, a commentator's job is to bring insight to the game - anyone and his mother can say "oh there go the zerglings, oh he's sieging his tanks". You have to be able to present something that makes the audience go "ah!".
The best sports commentators of all time have ALWAYS come directly from the field they are casting - usually as a player then to a coach then to commentator. There is always years of experience and credibility behind what they are talking about no matter who is watching. When you watch a sports commentary the lead announcer isn't necessarily an ex pro/coach. Often he is a news anchor or hired by the network for his casting ability.
DJWheat is a perfect example - he doesn't know much about starcraft (he knows a shit load about shooters specifically quake as he was ex progamer) but he has years of casting experience. By himself he is no different than a youtube caster. BUT, djwheat always has someone like Tasteless to provide that knowledge and can feed of what tasteless is saying to present a smooth and enjoyable cast.
The reason SC2GG commentators get such bad feedback is because yes, they know more than the audience they are presenting to (randoms on youtube), but there is no depth of knowledge to back up what they are presenting. Put Tasteless or Artosis or Nony with diggity and you could broadcast it on NBC. Yes you can learn starcraft from watching vods and replays. I really don't believe that you can be among the top in your field unless you have the experience or have a partner with the experience to back you up.
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My post has nothing to do with SC2GG.com, nor do I claim to represent them, or ask anyone here to to like them more, etc. All I'm talking about is new commentators and reactions to them here. Let's try to keep it on topic, and change the thread title back to what it was.
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Belgium9947 Posts
On October 01 2008 14:25 WorldCommunist8 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 30 2008 17:31 MyLostTemple wrote: if you are not good at starcraft you shouldn't be a caster. Tasteless, I have a ton of respect for you and realize you are a pioneer, but this is where I disagree with you. Yes you need to have solid fundamental knowledge and be an intense student of the game, but there's a point where it splits. In commentating you only need to know it, where as in a game situation you need to be able to execute it. I'm a hobbyist for commentary. I'm not looking to get a paycheck out of it. I really won't say how good or bad I am, I don't enjoy making judgments of myself. I can't play a game of SC to save my life. I'll admit it. It's not because I don't know what to do or have no clue what's going on, it's execution. At that point where you need to do every thing simultaneously and pull of all the micro-management, my mind overloads and I shut down. I forget things. My economy goes to the shitter, my macro comes screeching to a halt, and I forget to continue scouting. I look like a blubbering idiot. Yet when I watch a pro game, I have a sound knowledge of what's going on. Yeah there's still the occasional "WTF just happened" moment, but you learn as you study. I'm not trying to promote or deter anyone from commentating. In my opinion, if you like it, do it. I know, however that I watched an entire season of proleague an MSL, an OSL and two leagues sponsored by GOM before I even strapped on the headset and recorded. I think that even if you are forever bound to D-, you can still learn the game solid from other commentators and just watching games en masse. Good luck to anyone who pursues this.
Well this is where you are wrong. And this is what any good brood war player will tell you:
Eventhough you learn a lot by watching high-level StarCraft, you will never really understand it unless you played at a decent level.
You think the difference is small, but the difference is huge. HUGE. You've probably seen the standard TvZ a million times: 1 Rax FE vs 3hatch muta. You can probably 'predict' (yes quotation marks because its not through reasoning but through personal viewing experience) what's gonna happen next. But you know nothing of how the game evolved to that point, why that build is more suited to one map than to the other, how it affects your gameplan when you lose 4 scvs or 9scvs during mutaharass. Things like that really matter.. and you'll never know even half of what a decent player would know about it.
You guys have been improving, props to that, but you'll never become good casters. Solely for the fact that you learned StarCraft from watching StarCraft. You can't introduce new facts to people that just watch StarCraft regularily. You can't provide them with analysis. You're just like them. A viewer.
I'm not saying casting is easy, not at all. I've done some casting myself and I'm fucking terrible. But I still think it'd take a fluent speaking top player not even a week of practice to catch up with 99% of the SC2GG commentators in skill, eventhough you've been doing this for ages. And every week after that he'll double his outperforming you.
Hey, you guys cater to a different audience, I'm aware of that. But in my opinion the decent starcraft players aren't gonna make the switch over to watching you guys anytime soon.
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