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+ Show Spoiler +On August 26 2010 00:48 retro-noob wrote:
It seems like Korea, Canada, Ukraine, Sweden, and Germany are out in front right now if you look at countries that have produced multiple elite players, especially relative to their population.
The US has a lot of good players, but I feel like other than, Idra, they aren't considered top players. Also, the US is the most populous country on the scene BY FAR, so I'd expect even more from there.
I may be wrong on any or all of this, btw; I'm just basing it off some quick research and my memory.
Are these countries culturally more into games or RTS or StarCraft than others? Am I just imagining that those countries have a higher number of the top players right now?
I'd expect the US, France, Russia, the UK, Italy, Japan, Australia, China (though I don't know what rules there are in China around these games), Brazil, Spain, etc. to be putting equal numbers of people into the conversation for "best SC2 player."
Sweden is especially surprising just based on the population difference between them and these other countries. Why Sweden and not Austria, Switzerland, or Israel?
If I'm not wrong, what is it about those countries that have them producing so many good players per capita right now?
EDIT: Obviously, Korea is a special case, and I understand that one.
Americans have never been that awesome in computer/videogames tbh. No idea why that is (even thou i have my own hints to why that is)
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On August 26 2010 03:07 LittleeD wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2010 01:43 Scope wrote:
As a Swede, I have a few theories as to why we have the most top players per capita (except for Korea I suppose). I think the same factors have a hand in Sweden's dominant position in the music industry.
Weather is crap 8 months out of the year. People stay indoors.
For the 3-4 months the weather is passable, there are summer vacations and school holds up.
We have the largest percentage of single households in the world, because of a number of cultural factors. Being alone isn't stigmatized in Sweden like it is in most places.
It is way way easier to be poor in Sweden, than in countries such as the US. Medical care is largely free. Public transportation is better, and in the cities there really is no reason to own a car. Even daycare is almost free, if you happen to reproduce.
Our internet connectivity has been very good for a long time.
Work days are shorter, tax breaks for people with low income are extensive, vacation time is far greater than in the US.
Some more tenuous theories: The parents of the generation of Swedes born in the eighties had the largest amount of divorces in Swedish history at least. One-parent households mean kids need to entertain themselves more, and guilty parents buy more expensive gifts such as computers.
Swedish culture is somewhat socially inhibited, compared to most of Europe. We are the koreans of Europe, I guess you could say. Nerdery comes naturally.
Sports and competitive play is and has always been a big deal here. Scrawny and fat kids want to compete as well.
That's my 2 cents. Nailed right on One thing I dont understand though is that Norway is just about the same but we've always been quite unheard of in the e-sport scenes. Cant think of anything that seperets us that hugely.
IQ level >
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alot of it comes down to climate I think, the most populated states in america are texas and california, which have a lot of sun, so staying in to play games becomes an active choice (rather than being in the sun), this culture probably spreads to the rest of america since california produces most of the entertainment media in america; also traditional hollywood archetype of the 'nerd' is something negative whereas in europe that image doesn't exist as much.
in sweden and canada it's also cold and being inside is the default position many months of the year, and if you are inside anyway why not spend your time enjoying some computer games online with your classmates? it becomes a social thing (and pretty quickly overtakes real life social interaction I might add lol)
have no explanation why you don't see as many norwegians or finns though, they have similar internet connections and climate.
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On August 26 2010 01:31 Xeris wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2010 00:48 retro-noob wrote:
It seems like Korea, Canada, Ukraine, Sweden, and Germany are out in front right now if you look at countries that have produced multiple elite players, especially relative to their population.
The US has a lot of good players, but I feel like other than, Idra, they aren't considered top players. Also, the US is the most populous country on the scene BY FAR, so I'd expect even more from there.
I may be wrong on any or all of this, btw; I'm just basing it off some quick research and my memory.
Are these countries culturally more into games or RTS or StarCraft than others? Am I just imagining that those countries have a higher number of the top players right now?
I'd expect the US, France, Russia, the UK, Italy, Japan, Australia, China (though I don't know what rules there are in China around these games), Brazil, Spain, etc. to be putting equal numbers of people into the conversation for "best SC2 player."
Sweden is especially surprising just based on the population difference between them and these other countries. Why Sweden and not Austria, Switzerland, or Israel?
If I'm not wrong, what is it about those countries that have them producing so many good players per capita right now?
EDIT: Obviously, Korea is a special case, and I understand that one. Uh, why did you list Canada as 2nd? What Canadian has won anything besides HuK, Drewbie, and TT1? Slush and KiwiKaki haven't won a single thing since beta, and there are no other good Canadians really. Also, Germany? TLO and Socke are the only good Germans that have won anything. USA has IdrA, iNkA, Select, KawaiiRice, Machine, PainUser, and a bunch of other strong players. I think outside of Asia - Ukraine and Sweden are definitely the top nations, followed by USA.
key part of that is relative to population. You listed 3-5 canadians, and 2 Germans, and 6 Americans. You should be able to list 30-50 Americans if you want the same ratio of players to population.
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On August 26 2010 00:48 retro-noob wrote:
I'd expect the US, France, Russia, the UK, Italy, Japan, Australia, China (though I don't know what rules there are in China around these games), Brazil, Spain, etc. to be putting equal numbers of people into the conversation for "best SC2 player."
Eh I don't think italy will be putting people for the "best sc2 player" just for some things you can notice if you're italian:
1)Most italian players have fewer free hours to dedicate to the game, because italy has bigger problems at the moment to think of.
2)Italian gamers tend to be all-around-bad.Our attitude usually is bad, we aren't liked in any internet community usually as far as I know.Maybe this won't be the case for sc2 but I dare you play in an italian community and get away without getting mad.(I'm looking at you WoW crushridge server.)
3)Our internet infrastructur is heavily lacking so we tend to have less gamers---> less chances to get good sc2 players, plus italian gamers tend to prefer other games.
4)We have a laughably institution that is trying to promote e-sports but failing really hard at doing that, so again, less people to come by and try.
5)Some of our "pro" teams are quite arrogant so they tend to drive people away, it's just a flamefest all around.
6)there are really no incentives on start doing this, even our laws are troublesome on this regard, and as said, bad internet lines, not enough practice times, bad attitude(now you know where I have taken my nickname) just all around I think italy isn't made for this.
I put myself in first line for all this problems, I'm probably one of the worse examples of this, also it's easy to check this if you have any italian knowledge and can check around forums, it's pretty bad.
I know this might seem silly or atleast strange to say, but I really don't like my fellow italian community as you can see.I've had so many bad experiences(and still having them) so I don't trust this works for us.
Other than this I think most of euro countries will be putting more players since now the e-sports are growing a bit better, not like in korea or US/canada but still, as you can see we have a good number of north european pro gamers that are really putting out some good things.I hope we'll see more and more players because more competition is always better!Just don't count on us I'd say.
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as long as the country doesn't provide an enviroment to train these people and send them to tournaments, you can forget about any sort of "Top countries at SC2" list, it's unfair for the players and takes away their credit
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On September 25 2010 13:00 Bad_Attitude wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2010 00:48 retro-noob wrote:
I'd expect the US, France, Russia, the UK, Italy, Japan, Australia, China (though I don't know what rules there are in China around these games), Brazil, Spain, etc. to be putting equal numbers of people into the conversation for "best SC2 player." Eh I don't think italy will be putting people for the "best sc2 player" just for some things you can notice if you're italian: 1)Most italian players have fewer free hours to dedicate to the game, because italy has bigger problems at the moment to think of. 2)Italian gamers tend to be all-around-bad.Our attitude usually is bad, we aren't liked in any internet community usually as far as I know.Maybe this won't be the case for sc2 but I dare you play in an italian community and get away without getting mad.(I'm looking at you WoW crushridge server.) 3)Our internet infrastructur is heavily lacking so we tend to have less gamers---> less chances to get good sc2 players, plus italian gamers tend to prefer other games. 4)We have a laughably institution that is trying to promote e-sports but failing really hard at doing that, so again, less people to come by and try. 5)Some of our "pro" teams are quite arrogant so they tend to drive people away, it's just a flamefest all around. 6)there are really no incentives on start doing this, even our laws are troublesome on this regard, and as said, bad internet lines, not enough practice times, bad attitude(now you know where I have taken my nickname) just all around I think italy isn't made for this. I put myself in first line for all this problems, I'm probably one of the worse examples of this, also it's easy to check this if you have any italian knowledge and can check around forums, it's pretty bad. I know this might seem silly or atleast strange to say, but I really don't like my fellow italian community as you can see.I've had so many bad experiences(and still having them) so I don't trust this works for us. Other than this I think most of euro countries will be putting more players since now the e-sports are growing a bit better, not like in korea or US/canada but still, as you can see we have a good number of north european pro gamers that are really putting out some good things.I hope we'll see more and more players because more competition is always better!Just don't count on us I'd say.
Partially agree with this, i ended up playing only 1vs1 ladder games because the community isn't that good to begin with.
I don't think italians have less time, it's more of a cultural problem that considers soccer serious business and computer games just a game for kids (when critically the opposite is true), and basically playing computer games a waste of time.
I don't think we have "Pro Teams", never heard of any, just some pro gamers.
Our internet is lagging behind, but in maior cities it seems to be fine.
Agreed on the italian forums, i stopped posting about sc2 on any italian forum a while ago, i'm not banned from any of those forums, it just makes no sense posting. I only read them like once a month and find nothing has changed.The discussion level was really low to begin with, so not a huge loss.
I really like how Sweden is doing in online videogames overall, which also reflects in sc2. I would expect more from the US, there should be more US pro gamers IMO, given the population, internet infrastructure and wealth of the country. I'm sure there will be an increase of US pro gamers in the near future.
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On August 26 2010 03:07 LittleeD wrote:
Nailed right on
One thing I dont understand though is that Norway is just about the same but we've always been quite unheard of in the e-sport scenes. Cant think of anything that seperets us that hugely.
Well, when talking about Norway's esport scene, eoLithic, elemeNt, XeqtR come to mind (getting kind of oldschool though).
Generally speaking, Nordic countries have been ridiculously dominant (especially true for the FPS scene) over the years compared to other european countries, and I believe Starcraft 2 will be no exception if the game keeps growing like this.
Strong players from Norway will eventually emerge.
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well UK has only one player that is among the "top" being Demuslim, followed by "decent players" like Ourk and afew others.. must be some way of finding a percentage of players from each country somewhere i guess.
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UK --> Xbox, and call of duty and full of ragers.]
im the only person i know IRL that plays sc
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Remeber the epic Clan 9(swe) vs DeathRow(us) series back in 98. Atleast for me, that proved Swedes are somehow really good gamers.
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The UK has a welfare state and pretty good internet much like sweden or germany, but it also has a culture which says: 'if you play videogames on a computer as opposed to a console, let alone playing an RTS game, you're a loser and must be killed.' It's just regarded as very anti-social, which, maybe it is.
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On September 25 2010 18:51 Panoptic wrote:
The UK has a welfare state and pretty good internet much like sweden or germany, but it also has a culture which says: 'if you play videogames on a computer as opposed to a console, let alone playing an RTS game, you're a loser and must be killed.' It's just regarded as very anti-social, which, maybe it is.
What? You mean RTS games could cause anti-social behavior? Nooooo... this can't be true... haha
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Germany and Sweden has a strong PC gaming culture, America has a huge population etc. Many people playing -> good players
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On August 26 2010 00:56 Full wrote:
and to be honest, asians are most probably just smarter than other races. Seems that way to me anyway.
Do you have any idea how racist that is?
It has nothing to do with anything like that. In some places gaming has just gotten big for diffrent reasons. Sweden for example because its rainy and cold as fuck most of the year. There are very good articles written about why and how it got big in korea. Usa and germany etc are just so big they are gonna have anything because of that alone.
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On August 26 2010 22:18 iD.NicKy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2010 01:33 Xeris wrote:On August 26 2010 01:06 iD.NicKy wrote:On August 26 2010 01:02 retro-noob wrote:On August 26 2010 01:01 iD.NicKy wrote:
sweden because of their internet connection back then.
germany because germans are always good at any sport.
korea for the obvious reason
Ukrainian have some top top players but not a lot of good players.
Canada no idea why, maybe because they were french at first 8) What's it like in France, Spain, and the UK? France, Spain, Uk has a lot of good players but only few top players let's say demuslim/dapollo for UK, Lucifron for spain, sarens/moman for france How can you call dapollo good when he's literally played in 0 tournaments? Just because he lives in Korea and gets interviewed by Artosis doesn't make him good. Also MoMaN isn't good , just because he bashes on newb French players and has a bunch of random french-only events added to his GG.net acc to get to 1100 points doesn't make him good. Check out his match list and see how many other European players he beats (basically 0). I just love the kid (dapollo), don't hate me :D.
So you didn't have to bitchslap him for making fun of your accent yet? ;p
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On September 25 2010 19:05 Illva wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2010 00:56 Full wrote:
and to be honest, asians are most probably just smarter than other races. Seems that way to me anyway.
Do you have any idea how racist that is? It has nothing to do with anything like that. In some places gaming has just gotten big for diffrent reasons. Sweden for example because its rainy and cold as fuck most of the year. There are very good articles written about why and how it got big in korea. Usa and germany etc are just so big they are gonna have anything because of that alone.
They tend to have book smarts, yet not a whole lot of common sense--hence their lack of influence on the world stage. Southeast Asian's influence stretches as far as Southeast Asia. Western society stretches from Australia to Europe, yet Asians are smarter than other people? LOL Rethink that please.
He clearly doesn't know very many Asian people.
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Back when I was in highschool in 2003 roughly half of the guys in the class played starcraft, people played starcraft at lans at my college and now many I know play starcraft 2. When I did military duty we used to play computer games at the evenings etc. In Sweden it is fully socially acceptable to play video games today even for normal people. I haven't met a guy ever in Sweden who I know didn't play videogames. Even most of the girls play video games...
10 years ago we had these doomsayers talking how video games destroyed the youth, but they are all but gone by now and people have realized that it is a much better pasttime than watching random TV shows.
On September 03 2010 05:42 SuperGnu wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On August 26 2010 00:48 retro-noob wrote:
It seems like Korea, Canada, Ukraine, Sweden, and Germany are out in front right now if you look at countries that have produced multiple elite players, especially relative to their population.
The US has a lot of good players, but I feel like other than, Idra, they aren't considered top players. Also, the US is the most populous country on the scene BY FAR, so I'd expect even more from there.
I may be wrong on any or all of this, btw; I'm just basing it off some quick research and my memory.
Are these countries culturally more into games or RTS or StarCraft than others? Am I just imagining that those countries have a higher number of the top players right now?
I'd expect the US, France, Russia, the UK, Italy, Japan, Australia, China (though I don't know what rules there are in China around these games), Brazil, Spain, etc. to be putting equal numbers of people into the conversation for "best SC2 player."
Sweden is especially surprising just based on the population difference between them and these other countries. Why Sweden and not Austria, Switzerland, or Israel?
If I'm not wrong, what is it about those countries that have them producing so many good players per capita right now?
EDIT: Obviously, Korea is a special case, and I understand that one. Americans have never been that awesome in computer/videogames tbh. No idea why that is (even thou i have my own hints to why that is)
I'd say that it is mostly because their culture is really conservative so they shun things that breaks their normal sports culture making gaming really stigmatized. Sweden on the other hand is a country which loves to break old trends and do new things instead, our culture isn't strong at all but it adapts to everything.
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On September 25 2010 19:20 chimthegrim wrote:Show nested quote +On September 25 2010 19:05 Illva wrote:On August 26 2010 00:56 Full wrote:
and to be honest, asians are most probably just smarter than other races. Seems that way to me anyway.
Do you have any idea how racist that is? It has nothing to do with anything like that. In some places gaming has just gotten big for diffrent reasons. Sweden for example because its rainy and cold as fuck most of the year. There are very good articles written about why and how it got big in korea. Usa and germany etc are just so big they are gonna have anything because of that alone. They tend to have book smarts, yet not a whole lot of common sense--hence their lack of influence on the world stage. Southeast Asian's influence stretches as far as Southeast Asia. Western society stretches from Australia to Europe, yet Asians are smarter than other people? LOL Rethink that please. He clearly doesn't know very many Asian people.
He's just quoting from the stereotype.
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On September 25 2010 19:21 Klockan3 wrote:Back when I was in highschool in 2003 roughly half of the guys in the class played starcraft, people played starcraft at lans at my college and now many I know play starcraft 2. When I did military duty we used to play computer games at the evenings etc. In Sweden it is fully socially acceptable to play video games today even for normal people. I haven't met a guy ever in Sweden who I know didn't play videogames. Even most of the girls play video games... 10 years ago we had these doomsayers talking how video games destroyed the youth, but they are all but gone by now and people have realized that it is a much better pasttime than watching random TV shows. Show nested quote +On September 03 2010 05:42 SuperGnu wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On August 26 2010 00:48 retro-noob wrote:
It seems like Korea, Canada, Ukraine, Sweden, and Germany are out in front right now if you look at countries that have produced multiple elite players, especially relative to their population.
The US has a lot of good players, but I feel like other than, Idra, they aren't considered top players. Also, the US is the most populous country on the scene BY FAR, so I'd expect even more from there.
I may be wrong on any or all of this, btw; I'm just basing it off some quick research and my memory.
Are these countries culturally more into games or RTS or StarCraft than others? Am I just imagining that those countries have a higher number of the top players right now?
I'd expect the US, France, Russia, the UK, Italy, Japan, Australia, China (though I don't know what rules there are in China around these games), Brazil, Spain, etc. to be putting equal numbers of people into the conversation for "best SC2 player."
Sweden is especially surprising just based on the population difference between them and these other countries. Why Sweden and not Austria, Switzerland, or Israel?
If I'm not wrong, what is it about those countries that have them producing so many good players per capita right now?
EDIT: Obviously, Korea is a special case, and I understand that one. Americans have never been that awesome in computer/videogames tbh. No idea why that is (even thou i have my own hints to why that is) I'd say that it is mostly because their culture is really conservative so they shun things that breaks their normal sports culture making gaming really stigmatized. Sweden on the other hand is a country which loves to break old trends and do new things instead, our culture isn't strong at all but it adapts to everything.
I find what you're saying to be partially true, but also I find the discussion to be a little off. There are a lot of Americans that are amazing at video games. Trust me, they are freaking awesome. They just play Call of Duty Modern Warfare or other games rather than Starcraft or something along those lines.
The sports culture idea, I do think has some merit. We do sort of look down on people who are anti-social because of video games. It is something that I admit I kind of do a little bit myself because I strongly believe you should have a balance in your life of some physical activity and other activities (like gaming).
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EPT
