Recently TL.net participated in the Sandlot Tournament hosted by Blizzard. Apart from being a fun tourny, it also provided the opportunity for the heads of the major starcraft sites to get together and talk shop. Today I want to introduce one of the sites which took part in the tournament, and in many ways, is the Korean brother to TeamLiquid.
PgR is a progaming fansite in Korea that features an active forum, game reports, and rankings, not unlike TL. Hangzri is one of the main administrators at PgR21.com, and recently we talked about some of the interesting things happening at the site, some of which affect the BW world outside Korea.
We started out with some basic information on the site itself...
Manifesto7: So how old is PgR, and how long have you run it? Hangzri PgR is the site master, and he started it in 2001. He is very busy these days though. I joined in Fall 2001. Now we have five admins, and some weird rules.
Manifesto7: Oh yeah? Give me some examples. Hangzri Posts in the forums should be over 15 lines, to prevent trash posts. We are also strict about spelling, and emoticons. They are rarely allowed.
Manifesto7: Ahh, and you hae to be a member for a long time before you can post right? Hangzri Yes...
Manifesto7: have* (spelling TT) Manifesto7: emoticons TTTT Hangzri haha. Yes, you need to be a member for two months and reach level nine to write.
Manifesto7: Wow. Maybe TL can learn some lessons from this. So what is the specialty of the site? Why is it different or special? Hangzri Well, most online communities are focused on Liberty rather than Order. But we think being polite to others is just like offline. Communicating carefully with each other is the most important thing because we cannot see faces or emotions. Misleading and misunderstandings are so prevailing online.
Manifesto7: I agree with that. Hangzri We don't want a jewel in the chaos, we want a small, sound cafe with some manners. (Actually we are big now;; too big.)
Manifesto7: How many members do you have? Hangzri More than 20,000. We are the biggest SC community in Korea.
One of the reasons we did this interview, was because of some developments that have been happening on the PGR21 boards. Recently, they have opened a translation board where articles produced by their members are translated into English for the foreign community to read. It is their hope that the relationship can work both ways, and that some of the best articles produced by the foreign community can be translated to Korean....
Manifesto7: Very nice work on that article. Hangzri Thanks, we are still aggregating that post. [note: it is finished now. Click on the thread by Forgotten_]
Manifesto7: So why did you decide to do this? Hangzri We wanted to communicate with SC fans outside Korea
Manifesto7: Do you want English speakers to make accounts on PGR? Hangzri This is our goal, but we have some technical problems to work out first.
Manifesto7: What kind of material are you going to translate? Hangzri We will translate some statistical analysis of Mania, opinions of fans, and some professionals in the industry.
Manifesto7: How many of your forum members can speak English do you think? Hangzri Maybe many of our members can read English (regardless of speed), but writing in English is so much more difficult.
Manifesto7: Do you think the people on your forums have much interest in BW outside Korea? How about foreign tournaments? Hangzri Sure. If there is enough explination in Korean and replays, I think many people would be excited.
Manifesto7: Well, I will try to find someone on TL who can be a bridge between our site and yours, and hopefully suggest some TL threads to translate. Hangzri Sure go ahead, as long as that person is a pretty girl.
Manifesto7: haha. Hangzri
As if the translation board was not enough, PGR21 is set to announce that they are hosting a tournament featuring the players of the Sandlot. This will be a large tournament, and I am really looking forward to it...
Manifesto7: So this is a tournament featuring the players from the Sandlot tournament teams? What is the format like? Hangzri Yes, we are looking for all the mannered players from the Sandlot. It will be a single elimination tournament, with best 2 of 3 for the last 16 (maybe).
Manifesto7: What maps will you use? Hangzri The map choice policy will be thumbs down and randomly picked. [Note: I gather this to mean out of the pool, both players can refuse one map, and then it will be randomly chosen from the remaining ones.] The map pool will be discussed on our site with the fans.
Manifesto7: How about the prizes? Hangzri First prize will be about $2,000. The total prize pool will be about $3,000.
Manifesto7: Wow, good money. I am Liquid`Nazgul, sign me up. I beat In_Dove. Hangzri Naz you there now? How?
Manifesto7: No, I just want to play myself so I'll take his ID. Hangzri Haha, the replays will reveal it, don't take that chance.
Manifesto7: I think the game play would reveal it first...
Looks like PGR is a busy place, and I hope that TL can be more connected with the site as time goes on. Time to wrap up with a few final questions...
Manifesto7: Ok, a few more questions. Who do you think will win the proleague, SKT1 or MBC? Hangzri Heh, I haven't thought of it, but I will say MBC this time.
Manifesto7: What will the score be? Hangzri 4:3 I hope!
Manifesto7: Ok. If you could have one player in the world play a game to save your life, who would it be? Hangzri Hahaha, that was a dino-Old question to SC fans!
Manifesto7: :p Hangzri My answer was TheMarine that time... (in BW.com). This time it will be SaviOr.
Manifesto7: Good choice. I think you live Hangzri haha GOOD!
Manifesto7: Thanks a lot for your time, and I hope we can work together and keep the translations active. Good luck with the tourny too. Hangzri Thank you, next time I will interview you with your pics.
Manifesto7: Haha, ok I will find some handsome pictures. Hangzri Of Midian?
Manifesto7: Haha, I think all of PGR is in love with Midian. [He was on their Sandlot team, and kicked ass as always with manner and skill.] Hangzri Haha, yes.
Manifesto7: Thanks again. Hangzri Bye.
So, big news indeed. I hope that everybody will bookmark the PGR translation section and take a moment to read. The articles produced there really put ours to shame sometimes, and I think they are a great example of what could be accomplished here too. Our forums share so much in common, that I hope we can become closer and work together. Here is a quick summary of what to look out for in the near future:
Haha, handsome pics of midian. Nice interview Mani.
It's really cool that pgr is looking at doing translational work between the kor/foreign communities. We all love that type of material, and I think we have something to share with the koreans as well.
Wow, this really sounds like it could lead to a prolific cooperation between the Korean and the Foreign community, being represented by pgr21.com and tl.net. I am looking forward to it. And this Hangzri admin sounds like a nice guy, get him to post here
Very nice interview, Mani. Fun to see that the Koreans actually are interested in the non-korean scene as well. Hope this cooperation will work out well.
Yes, we are looking for all the mannered players from the Sandlot. It will be a single elimination tournament, with best 2 of 3 for the last 16 (maybe).
On January 10 2007 00:43 ToT)Testie( wrote: Yes, we are looking for all the mannered players from the Sandlot. It will be a single elimination tournament, with best 2 of 3 for the last 16 (maybe).
Ahem! Excuse me, sir. I say sir!
!!!
JK
---- Anyway, I hope this works out well. Unfortunately I don't speak Korean, but I hope someone who does will volunteer from TL (uh oh, neither 15 lines, nor a lack of emoticons in my post T_T)
On January 10 2007 02:01 SISKH wrote: --- Nuked ---
Dropped like it's hot.
Nice to see them turned some attention outwards and making a real effort of making it work. I hope we can make a few steps towards them and their goal to close the gap they are trying to bridge.
He also seems a very nice and mannered person with good english. Seems you guys had a nice and enjoyable talk.
Thanks for the stuff Mani as always! Hope to see this tree bear some fruit in the future.
- the brigde has been build - a huge step forward for bw comunity thank you (if you take sugestions - from time to time if you (pgr21.com) can transtale a first person vod it would be awsome . i dont understand korean and i really want to know how they analyse a game )
This is absolutely awesome. A stronger connection between the two communities could help us so much, and to see them take the initiative is extremely cool.
it's a korean/english dictionary of starcraft terms and player names, even using our english slang. S2. i think it could be useful for us for english -> korean too.
Very nice work Mani. Western fans like you are what keeps the Starcraft scene thriving over here and the bridge between Koreans and us clean. Also for your pictures, might I suggest the picture of you that you used against FakeSteve in that liquimatch? Aka, the wrestling one.
Thanks Forgotten_ (forgotten_zone)! (first translation in the translation forum)
Nice interview & more important great initiative!
We have always wanted better integration between Korea and the rest of the StarCraft world even despite the language barrier we have strive to reach the other side. It has very seldomly taken root in a reciprocal manner. This really is a nice initiative.
The shrinking popularity of StarCraft worldwide does have its benefits. It becomes a force that supports and fosters coalescence of the remaining communities or its members. The "one community" dream will be a reality one day even if we do nothing todwards it, on this basis alone. However even small initiatives, by very a few individuals, can bring about cooperation that benifits us all and brings new life to our game, now rather than later.
That is of course, if Blizzard does not open the pandora box. Sometimes I miss the chaos of the myriad of a zillion StarCraft sites back in the golden years!
Well sounds like this could lead to some really good stuff, both ways of course Kind of strict over there and maybe we could learn a bit from them. But you know TL has it´s beauty to so don´t get to non-emotional guys ^^
Great interview, and I'm going to check out their English section right after this. Two things though:
They have roughly 20,000 members as opposed to 25,000 members here on TL.net. Yay for us? Although I know only a fraction of our total members are actually active posters ><
And I don't really agree with that rule about posts being at least 15 lines. Thats just too long in my opinion, and will probably dissuade some people from posting. Maybe a more reasonable limit like 5-7 lines would have been more appropriate. I mean, if I were there, this totally awesome post by me would be rejected
fifteen lines is pretty long. ten is reasonable IMO. I mean, so many one-liners results in 23 page threads that really only have maybe 200 lines of content actually worth reading.
exception maybe is livereports. but recently I've decided one line livereports can be misleading and look stupid, so I do a report every two or three minutes of the game. slightly delayed, yes, but more readable and accurate.
I DO think that we can learn some things from pgr21 - they're a lot more manner than fighterforum which is like pure emote and really messy forums ;o
fifteen lines is pretty long. ten is reasonable IMO. I mean, so many one-liners results in 23 page threads that really only have maybe 200 lines of content actually worth reading.
exception maybe is livereports. but recently I've decided one line livereports can be misleading and look stupid, so I do a report every two or three minutes of the game. slightly delayed, yes, but more readable and accurate.
I DO think that we can learn some things from pgr21 - they're a lot more manner than fighterforum which is like pure emote and really messy forums ;o
Wow, that was a great interview Manifesto . And thanks to Hangzri for accepting the interview. I think it will be great to see the Korean and non-Korean SC communities working together and helping one another.
Also, many thanks to the people who do the translations .
On January 10 2007 12:06 Bill307 wrote: Wow, that was a great interview Manifesto . And thanks to Hangzri for accepting the interview. I think it will be great to see the Korean and non-Korean SC communities working together and helping one another.
Also, many thanks to the people who do the translations .
Couldn't agree more. Many many thanks to Mani. Many many thanks to Hangzri. It would not only be really awesome to see the best English speaking and Korean speaking SC communities to work together, it would also be freaking sexy.
I've read articles on PGR before (the recommended section; similar to our featured threads) and the quality is simply superb. All the replies are mature, no flaming, no stupid posts. Good stuff
#6 T vs P In fact, the most problem when it come to balance in Hitchhiker is P vs T. The defeat of Anytime[gm] has given Protoss users frustration and anger. If you search for “Hitchhiker” in certain communities, you will find out how much the sentiments are.
Ah good it's not just me
but anyway this news is very cool to hear, both more reading material thanks to translations and a new pgr sponsored Sandlot tourney coming up. it's great that koreans are working to help foreigners get involved in the scene. i can't wait to see further bridges between the communities
I read the article posted on PgR21.com about the creation of the maps... That was really interesting and insightful. Anyone with access to their forums should thank them for us.
Very good news, and the "Sandlot v.2" tourney sounds like it would be fun to keep up with and produce some good replays. Maybe this will also open the door for more friendly tourneys and competitions between the sites in the future. (I really miss the Liquibitions, TLT's, and even the old ToT vs Korean clans from awile back).
EPT
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/Manifesto7/ScreenHunter_9.jpg)
