Set 1: coL.Minigun v. M±DieStar

Complexity's new recruit manages to take his spot in IPL2 from the last qualifier, a distinct difference to Diestar who had sat in comfortably ever since qualifier #1. While Minigun has not grabbed a recent tournament win, a strong showing for his team during EG's Master's Cup V included wins over Sen, IdrA, HasuObs, and SjoW. Diestar is extremely active in participating in weekly European cups, snatching up 3 golds and 2 silvers from the 6 weeks leading into July. His recent win over Puzzle in the TL Open #18 demonstrated his grasp on TvP, and Minigun will be on the back foot this time around, as their last meeting ended in Diestar's favor.

Set 2: FXO.mOoNan v. FuRy

mOoNan's TvT stands as his best match-up statistically, but his last 3 tournament TvTs have all ended in losses. Granted it was against the likes of MMA, Hack, and KawaiiRice, but it won't stop Fury on capitalizing on that. On the flip side of things, mOoNan's recent move to Korea can only be beneficially for his already outstanding play, and Fury's last 10 has gone 0-10, losing all but 1 game at Dreamhack Summer 2011. Our only mirror of the day, TvT always has the chance to deliver a long macro game filled with every possible Terran unit.

Set 3: sixJax.ViBE v. M±Tarson

Vibe bursted onto the scene early April with his run at MLG Dallas, and continues to pursue a place among side top NA Zergs. The Polish Terran recently traded series with IdrA at Homestory Cup, with a side of DIMAGA bo3. Neither player post resounding statistics on their particular matchup, but VIBE's recent quality of opponents simply cannot compare to those were present at Takesen's apartment. With both sides having fantastic practice teammates, it would definitely be the headline TvZ for any matchday, but sadly, not today.



It was expected that IdrA would start off IPL2, having the champ defend his throne. The undisputed best NA Zerg has had a short run in multiple tournaments as summer began, but coming in as the winner can have a positive effect on his mentality. The two quick games against Tarson at Homestory Cup can be a reoccuring nightmare for any Zergs, however. Let's hope he can think past that and remember all the other EU T he demolished this past month: Kas, Naama, Cloud, merz...The last Zerg drewbie played in a tournament was IdrA over a month ago. He lost. He'll need to find a reason to convince his new team to continue supporting his cause, and sending IdrA to the losers bracket is a mouth-watering treat. Oh yeah, and who can forget this game.

We sat down with the head of IGN eSports division/VP of engineering David Ting to talk about his vision of the IPL franchise. (Note: interviews were conducted weeks earlier.)

At this stage, how is IPL2 looking? Is everything on schedule? Did everything turn out the way you had planned it to be?

Absolutely. I think that by looking at the overall big picture, I am an engineer by trade, so when I enter these initiatives, I don’t look to optimize simply the short term, but to value the input/output in engineering terms. Looking at the input, we had over 500 players that signed up and over half the grandmasters. We’re happy to be able to bring the prize pool to the player, facilitating and building an economy for passionate gamers (like myself) and fueling their career. We’re also ramping up an internal production team and from what I’ve seen thus far, it has been amazing and we’re looking forward to the community feedback to build our product better.

Going a little deeper into the prize pool aspect of things, the first season had a prize pool of $5,000, and quickly multiplied tenfold. Is this an indicator of your success, or was it already on your checklist when you started?

I had planned this all along. The experimental IPL1 gave us data points that gave the green light to proceed. We actually could go higher than $50,000, and I would not be surprised if IGN pays out more than $1,000,000 in prize money within the next 12 months.

In season 1, we mainly saw North American invitees, and season 2 included qualifying players from Europe. Are Asian invites on the way for season 3?

Definitely. Season 3, I want to do it gradually. Even though I am American patriot, I do realize the possible skill gap between Americans/Europeans/Koreans players. What I want to do is to tilt the balance a little bit, and have American players earn more time not having to worry about their living and spend that time practicing and up their game. In IPL3, we will definitely invite a small pool of Asian players, and try our best to avoid a sweep.

As of right now, IPL is strictly an online tournament. Are plans underway to make future IPLs a live event?

Yes. We are working really hard right now to accommodate the financial needs to create a physical event. My philosophy (going back to the engineering aspect of things) has always been one where I would always like to do things in a way where we limit our liability, and at the same time, not build something that’s subpar in excellence, since it undermines the IGN reputation. We will take a cautious approach towards the matter, and hopefully it will come to fruition sometime this year.

On the spectrum of things, MLG has triumphed over its competitors in North America in the live event field, and IPL as hail as the king of online production. With NASL a compromise between the two, where do you think the sweet spot is? Would creating a live event hurt IPL instead?

Thus far, we have not been able to collect the necessary data points to find out where the optimal operating point is. My intent is to test the entire range, and observe the scene’s reaction. On the business level, I believe what GOM does can be surpassed. Looking at NASL and MLG would not be the right way to calibrate the target for this organization. An ESPORTS aspiration has always been a comparison to a league similar to the NFL, and mine lies somewhere in between those two organizations.

Branching off from IPL, would you consider a similar venture for another franchise (game)?

Yup. I’m working on the second one right now. Right now, it’s not a good idea to distract our team until we can do Starcraft right. So until I am completely convinced, it won’t be published anytime soon. Being an enthusiast myself, I would also hope for game publishers to actively participate and help push ESPORTS in the right direction.

Thank you for your time!

Thank you very much!

After David, we had the men behind IPL share with us some tidbits behind their incredible project: Alex Conn, Taylor "Painuser" Parsons, Alex "HDStarcraft" Do, Kevin "CatsPajamas" Knocke, Josh "AskJoshy" Sutherland joins us for some Q&A.

At this stage, how is IPL2 looking? Is everything on schedule? Did everything turn out the way you had planned it to be?

Alex Conn: Yeah, everything is looking very good so far, all the players have been really responsive to us. Everyone is really excited about the tournament and we’re working really close to a lot of the team management to bring you a fantastic tournament.

CatsPajamas: We broke 10k viewers for one of our qualifiers and and overall it’s a positive response.

PainUser: I got some of the pro players giving me positive feedback about the casters as well!

Did any of the qualifiers stand out for you guys? Any surprises or household names that fell through?

A: Well, that’s always the interesting thing about qualifiers. The number one surprise to me was definitely vileState, who to me, is a really really underrated player. You might doubt whether he had an easy qualifying bracket or not, but he blew through his seeding matches and it was ridiculous. He’s young so I think he’s a force to be reckoned with in the future.

C: There were some heartbreaks as well, I remember Socke on the verge of qualifiying three times, and finally (phew) qualifying on the last round.

A: Same with Cloud, actually.

PU: Oh yeah. *laughs* What a nail biter.

You guys went through a lot of casters who are not part of your main roster during the qualifiers. Any plans to incorporate them into the main event?

A: It was always broadcasted to them as being strictly qualifier casters. Basically, what we wanted to do was reach out to the lesser-known casters, and give them a chance to promote themselves because they truly deserve the recognition for their work in the community. So in exchange for helping them getting their names out there, we were assured quality casts, and I would say that is definitely a fair trade.

PainUser, ever since your commentating career has taken off, it has come as a detriment to your progaming aspirations. Do you think at some point you will be able to turn it around?

PU: It really depends on the way the scene goes. My “progaming career” was basically me living off of my team salary which isn’t highly sustainable, and tournament winnings were scarce. At this point, I would only really consider a few players in NA that are actual progamers based on their income from playing. As far as what IGN offered me, it was a huge opportunity that I just couldn’t pass up. I miss playing a lot, but as of right now, IPL is my main thing. I guess playing vicariously through casting would be sufficient for now, plus it’s a lot less pressure just casting *laughs*.

HDStarcraft, you were always regarded as the pioneer for SC2 shoutcasting, are your ventures with IPL propelling that or are you taking your career in a different direction?

HD: I feel that my casting career can be further propelled on a platform such as IGN. While there are a few familiar faces within the Korean scene that everyone grown to love, I feel that the North American scene regarding casters can still be grown and foster and I want to be on that ship when it takes off.

PU: To touch on that, I feel that Korea is dominated in a way by their own casters, and Tastosis is the face of the GSL. No matter where they go or what other tournaments they promote, everyone will see them and brand them as the leading casters for GSL. Here at IPL, we three are given a rare opportunity to build our own brand along with IPL, and I think it gives us a slight advantage in terms of promotion.

Cats, what are some of the factors that have helped you along the way from becoming your average commentator to a household name?

Well, I definitely have had some help along the way. I will give a shoutout to TotalBiscuit, though. I first started posting stuff on Reddit, and one of the first replies came from him. It basically said, “Wow, you have an amazing voice and a horrible microphone”. After that, he helped me acquire some new equipment and carry out promotional endeavors. Aside from that, I really attribute everything to my drive to succeed. Putting in 80 hours a week, casting for 5-10 people for period of 3-4 months eventually paid off.

Josh, now that you're a full-timer at IGN, how will that affect your projects with complexity? What marketing methods will you be employing to help IPL reach new audiences?

J: I hope not! I hope that I will be able to stay on with complexity and do everything like I used to. Granted that my time is now limited, but when I am able to, I will still continue to cast and such now as more of a hobby. I definitely look forward to traveling to live events now that they've acquired some new players. In regards to marketing, we're working on new content to appease a wider variety of gamers. Aside from the large SC2 communities, there are various other websites that have potential SC2 interest that we can reach out to, and I find that the most difficult challenge lies between satisfying hardcore fans who often have low tolerance, and being considerate of the novice players as well.

In IPL1, you guys opted for a comic book artist portrayal of the players instead of the traditional camera time. What made you decide to do that? Were you inspired by EVER OSL 2007?

A: It’s funny that you mentioned that, because we looked over at old BW Korean intros, and that one is one that definitely stands out. Props to Wellplayed for helping us make that fantastic. For season 2, we won’t be keeping that same theme for every tournament, we want to keep it new and fresh.

With all the pairs of casters, is there a reason why DJWheat was chosen to solo cast?

A: Our original goal for IPL2 was always dual-cast. The problem is that we feel the replay desyncing issue was not acceptable for a high quality production setting, so everyone that is dual-casting are casting side-by-side behing a monitor. Unfortunately, there was no other caster near DJWheat, but we cannot not include the godfather of ESPORTS. So while we could not find another caster for Wheat to cast alongside with, having Wheat’s presence on the team is a unanimous decision within the team.

Looking at the finalized bracket right now, do you have any favorites in mind?

Cats: I’ve been a White-Ra fanboy for a while so I’m definitely pulling for him!

HD: I like White-ra as well, he is looking extremely strong right now.

PU: IdrA. I have no love for the Zerg nor the Protoss *laughs*, but IdrA is our season one champ, did great at the last MLG, and been switching up his playstyle. BratOK is also someone I’m cheering on, he has such crisp and precise build orders.

Cats: He has such ridiculous transitions.

PU: Yup, so clean.

Alex: I’m not allowed to have favorites . But, I’ll always be cheering for my old ROOT guys!

Well, that’s all the questions I have for today, thank you for your time and I hope IPL2 is a great success!

All: *synchronously* Thanks!