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On April 10 2011 17:52 Deadlyfish wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2011 17:43 EnderCraft wrote:On April 10 2011 17:25 Deadlyfish wrote:I agree with Catz. Koreans should be able to participate in the NASL. But they shouldnt be able to do it just by spending a few hours a week playing their games. Yes i realize that they are doing the same thing that NA's are doing, and it's not like i have a logical argument against this. But having someone like MC just spend a few hours and then winning the whole tournament, just seems, idk, anticlimactic? It obviously shouldnt be a LAN event from the start either, nobody wants that. But if the tournament is just dominated by Koreans it just isnt as exciting, you might aswell just watch the GSL then. On April 10 2011 16:46 EnderCraft wrote:
Wow... I disagree so whole heartedly with CatZ. If your scared of the Koreans taking away potential prize money, do something about it. Koreans are human being's just like everyone else.
IMO in order for E-Sports to be a western phenomenon, westerners must be able to compete at the same level as Koreans. Why reward players for incompetence, as strong as a word as that may be. The only skill gap here is between the players themselves, not nationality.
Starcraft 2 is a global competition just like any other forms of competition that take place around the world. Are you going to exclude a Russian hockey player from entering the National Hockey League because he's going to dominate? No. They deserve to compete just like everyone else. They are made up of the same chemistry as every human being on this Earth.
Starcraft 2 should be global, and not segregated like Starcraft 1 was. In fact, that is definitely part of the reason why it failed in the west in first place i'm sorry to say. To continue that practice would spell nothing but disaster, and only damage the credibility of SC2 as an E-Sport in the west...
I say no to truncating the competition. It only favors incompetence, and caters to a delusional idea that just because you hail from a certain country, your automatically the better person, which is definitely NOT the case. Uh, well if he wanted to participate in the NHL then he would have to move to America. Imagine if he could do it from Russia... You cant even compare hockey to this. It's not about skill levels, it's that someone can play in the NASL without committing to anything. If you want to play in the GSL then you have to go to Korea. Yes the NA players dont have to commit to anything either but that's why it's called the NASL, right? MLG, GSL, ESL (EPS), these are local tournaments, and if you just have 1 guy dominating everything, whether he is NA, EU or KR, it just makes it boring. Every sport in the world has local leagues. They arent as prestigious, but they dont need to be. If this was called the "World Championship Of the Best Players in the World at Starcraft" then yea, you should invite everyone, but it isnt. You mean the NorthAmerica Amateur Starcraft League? However I agree, it does suck to have to go all the way to Korea and live there to actually compete. But to deny willing Koreans to participate outright is just plane wrong. It honestly just makes it easier on the (western) players, and lowers the skill ceiling for the overall tournament. When frankly, any good PROFESSIONAL competition should have the best of the best. To not have the best of the best lowers the professional credibility of any tournament. Your always going to have the Pro's, and the amateurs. Not everyone is going to be the best of the best. And if the NASL is a so called possessional Starcraft tournament, then amateurs do not belong. I don't care if oGsMC wins the NASL 20 times. Western players have been playing SC2 professorially just as long as he has, there is absolutely no excuse for incompetence. The only thing that is hurting the western progamers is themselves. I admit, the NHL analogy was kind of bad. My point is that truncating the competition of any possessional competition will always lower its credibility overall. Koreans are obviously allowed to participate, but i just dont think that they should be able to do it from Korea just spending a few hours a week playing a few games. It just all depends on how you view the NASL. I think it should be the North American league, where we see the best of the best of the North Americans. Just like GSL is the best Koreans, and EPS is the German league. Anyone can compete in the EPS, but they have to move to germany, like a few players already did. Do you think EPS should allow top Koreans to participate from Korea? My favorite players are NA players, i don't really care as much about Koreans, Africans or Australian players. I guess some people would rather want an international league, which is fine, i'd love seeing that as well.
I will say this. NA should have its own "EPS". However, compared to a global entity such as the NASL, the level of competition will always be less than the NASL. There is no beating around the bush. Personally, I think SC2 has become more of a global phenomenon, rather than the home grown entity that emerged in South Korea during SC1's conception.
Every aspiring progamer hit the ground running when SC2 hit beta. This means that unlike Soccer in the US, which saw little attention, western progamers have been giving the same amount of attention to SC2 as the Koreans have. Thus making it a more level playing field in terms of skill. Far unlike SC1 where the Koreans were paying much more attention to SC1 before the western world; automatically putting foreigners at a disadvantage. However in SC2, this is no longer the case.
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i think people are over-estimating the koreans. if foreigners are willing to put in the effort to prepare for the matches properly theres no reason that they shouldn't win, we have a lot of advantages over the koreans.
1) we have access to vods of every tournament match they've ever played, and they won't have any clue on how to find vods of any foreigners.
2) they won't be taking these tournaments as seriously as gsl and also they are pretty arrogant towards foreigners and will underestimate us
3) the lag is really really bad from Korea to US , I have tried playing on the Korea server and it really sucks.
Any foreigner that puts in the time, watches some matches of their opponent and practices vs that race and puts in the time should win, the skill gap is marginal IMO
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I think people are nitpicking CatZ using NASL as an example. He EXPLICITLY says he's not trying to pick on NASL.
There is room for international competition. We have GSL World Champion, WCG, IEM World Championship, Blizzcon. But each region needs their own leagues. Or you can do like Blizzcon or IEM where you have regionals and then winners of those goes to a world finals. I mean anything anyone can bring up CatZ addresses in the interview. -.-
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On April 10 2011 18:32 drewbie.root wrote:
Any foreigner that puts in the time, watches some matches of their opponent and practices vs that race and puts in the time should win, the skill gap is marginal IMO
The question is can foreigners get the chance to put in similar effort if they are not making money out of it. If all NA-EU based online tournaments get dominated by players from Korean clans don't you feel you risk stunting the growth of the more 'homegrown' NA-EU gaming organizations? Teams like Liquid have invested huge amounts of money into Korean Esports; but how many Korean teams have invested into Western Esports? Other than occasionally taking some prize money.
The relationship just feels one sided at the moment.
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On April 10 2011 18:42 Ownos wrote:
I think people are nitpicking CatZ using NASL as an example. He EXPLICITLY says he's not trying to pick on NASL.
There is room for international competition. We have GSL World Champion, WCG, IEM World Championship, Blizzcon. But each region needs their own leagues. Or you can do like Blizzcon or IEM where you have regionals and then winners of those goes to a world finals. I mean anything anyone can bring up CatZ addresses in the interview. -.-
As one of those people, I'll admit that this is true. I'm still a big CatZ fan for sure, and he's definitely right that regional leagues and tournies help out the regional players. But that's not what NASL is, and he admits that himself towards the end of that section of the interview. It seems like alot of the people trashing NASL based on what CatZ is saying aren't so balanced minded however.
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On April 10 2011 18:47 kataa wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2011 18:32 drewbie.root wrote:
Any foreigner that puts in the time, watches some matches of their opponent and practices vs that race and puts in the time should win, the skill gap is marginal IMO The question is can foreigners get the chance to put in similar effort if they are not making money out of it. If all NA-EU based online tournaments get dominated by players from Korean clans don't you feel you risk stunting the growth of the more 'homegrown' NA-EU gaming organizations? Teams like Liquid have invested huge amounts of money into Korean Esports; but how many Korean teams have invested into Western Esports? Other than occasionally taking some prize money. The relationship just feels one sided at the moment.
I don't want to be offensive. But as a person, we should not always demand the community to help you out. You need to grow your own legs and work hard to show that you deserve the community to support you. This is how broodwar grew in Korean. Nobody supported them when it started, they invested their time and money into it, even when it is not profitable. Seriously, there is already more than enough support for SC2 compared to broodwar. Stop whining about how Koreans have all the required facilities, they work hard and they deserve what they have now.
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On April 10 2011 19:16 Zaurus wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2011 18:47 kataa wrote:On April 10 2011 18:32 drewbie.root wrote:
Any foreigner that puts in the time, watches some matches of their opponent and practices vs that race and puts in the time should win, the skill gap is marginal IMO The question is can foreigners get the chance to put in similar effort if they are not making money out of it. If all NA-EU based online tournaments get dominated by players from Korean clans don't you feel you risk stunting the growth of the more 'homegrown' NA-EU gaming organizations? Teams like Liquid have invested huge amounts of money into Korean Esports; but how many Korean teams have invested into Western Esports? Other than occasionally taking some prize money. The relationship just feels one sided at the moment. I don't want to be offensive. But as a person, we should not always demand the community to help you out. You need to grow your own legs and work hard to show that you deserve the community to support you. This is how broodwar grew in Korean. Nobody supported them when it started, they invested their time and money into it, even when it is not profitable. Seriously, there is already more than enough support for SC2 compared to broodwar. Stop whining about how Koreans have all the required facilities, they work hard and they deserve what they have now.
Agreed, but people will never see it that way so unfortunately your valid points will go unnoticed.
Furthermore, people saying having Koreans will cause foreign players to not attend the tournament and just give up is a really poor excuse. If someone is going to give up that easily, then they are just weak willed and don't deserve to win in the first place. This is a competition, not a free hand out. To take out the strongest opponents from a tournament will just make people care less about NASL. It's like what JP said on SoTG, with all the Starcraft 2 tournament etc., it is going to reach a point where people only have so many hours in a day. You remove the best players in the world from it, and they will just watch GSL instead or some other tournament featuring Korean players (like TSL).
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On April 10 2011 18:32 drewbie.root wrote:
i think people are over-estimating the koreans. if foreigners are willing to put in the effort to prepare for the matches properly theres no reason that they shouldn't win, we have a lot of advantages over the koreans.
1) we have access to vods of every tournament match they've ever played, and they won't have any clue on how to find vods of any foreigners.
2) they won't be taking these tournaments as seriously as gsl and also they are pretty arrogant towards foreigners and will underestimate us
3) the lag is really really bad from Korea to US , I have tried playing on the Korea server and it really sucks.
Any foreigner that puts in the time, watches some matches of their opponent and practices vs that race and puts in the time should win, the skill gap is marginal IMO
1) You really think they won't have "any clue" on how to find vods? You really think Koreans are that clueless at using the internet? That they won't know YOUTUBE? You really think for people from oGs (if they care enough), will not have help from HuK or Jinro to find Vods of you guys? I think this time you SERIOUSLY underestimate Korean internet use and simply googling people.
2) I think after playing White-Ra etc., MC for one learned not to underestimate foreigners.
3.) Yes I agree, they will lag.
Skill gap is far from marginal, GSL World Champs MONEY TOURNEY (Read: NOT SHOWMATCHES) showed that it is quite large given how a lot of the match ups were one-sided. Korean best of the best, are still quite a ways ahead, but you are right, with Point 3. With lag, I guess it will lessen the skill gap to make it easier to compete against Koreans.
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All I hear from the people that wanna limit the number of Koreans in the NASL is:
"THEY TOOK OUR JEERBS!"
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CatZ addressed the inevitable "I'm afraid of competition" argument. I'll just say, watch the video again. Really I think people just want to focus on what little bits suits their argument and not looking at the whole of what he's trying to say.
Korea started with local competitions and grew from there. I think he's onto to something.
On April 10 2011 15:28 alexhard wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2011 15:08 fams wrote:
Koreans have the local sponsors who have been involved in competitive gaming before, they also have the GSL offering a lot of prize money.
This has been addressed above in the thread, but I guess you ignored it. Major Korean teams do not have sponsors, and do not have salaries. All the major western teams do have those things. Korea only has GSL. The international scene has dozens of tournaments, also with very high prizes and many more opportunities to earn that money for the players.
Could've sworn that was a Razer logo on that SlayerS jacket.
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I agree on catz point that to have growth in the west we need to focus on players in the west which in turn means a certain amount of exclusivity and his analogy with soccer is pretty much spot on.
On the other hand I dont agree with him on the NASL although he correts himself and says it's not really about that league in particular but more about how it generally works and what needs to happen for esports in the west to grow(just like soccer has).
Personally I think NASL are handling it just the right way to attract viewers but also getting in the right players and living up to their name with 4-5 players in every division being people from NA.
All in all a nice but somewhat disorganized interview, if you really wanna call it that  , but towards the end it sort of comes together. Ty Josh!
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Honestly ull have IGN league to get ur own local NA heroes, NASL will be bigger than GSL in my opinion and not having the best players(not having Koreans) would damage NASL and make it nothing more than some tournament like MLG or IEM. Sure it would still be big, but it wouldnt be the biggest, the best tournament out there.
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On April 10 2011 20:44 FarbrorAbavna wrote:
I agree on catz point that to have growth in the west we need to focus on players in the west which in turn means a certain amount of exclusivity and his analogy with soccer is pretty much spot on.
It's not about exclusivity... it's about risk vs. reward. Koreans risk NOTHING to compete in NASL, foreigners risk EVERYTHING to compete in GSL. There is a very obvious gap there and Catz is pointing it out, and he is absolutely right. If all the top Koreans want to compete that's fine, but they need to come here first. Even if they sweep the tournament: 1) the games will be better with less lag issues, and 2) people won't complain when conditions are equal.
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On April 10 2011 09:09 Liquid`Nazgul wrote:
In general it is hard to outright disagree with what Catz is saying because at the basis of his argument is the fact that local stars need to rise up in order for this sport to grow. This is true no matter what way we will use to arrive at that point. It also is easier to create American stars in the US than it is to create Korean stars in the US. People like their national heroes.
However I think a lot of the arguments he builds on after this fact aren't that strong. I don't think the national league argument holds up as well in individual sports as he makes it seem.
The reason why he is only able to point at examples with team sports getting huge national leagues up is because often times teams get supported by people from a certain region within the nation and thus there is a lot of emotion attached to supporting them. Through that emotion you can fill up stadiums up to 100k people. You can see this in soccer, NBA, NHL etc.
In individual sports like tennis, bicycle racing, MMA, and StarCraft; people tend to attach themselves much more so to the individual itself and/or his nationality. You won't be able to fill up stadiums with supporters from the exact region Roger Federer is from. That attachment to regional teams in team sports, and that attachment to national players in individual sports, they are very important to the scene, but it is important that we do not mix them up and most importantly don't expect a national league for an individual sport being able to draw upon too much emotional support for their regional heroes.
A national league for an individual sport would mostly draw upon the viewers individual like or dislike for a player. Whether it is based on race or personality. If this argument is true then it makes the argument for national leagues much weaker because it would mean that people are able to start to like an individual player even if he is not from their nation. I believe this can be seen in Korean esports, TSL, IEM, MLG and basically any league that is going on right now.
National interest in an individual is still huge. Regional interest much less so.
Another argument would be that knowing how little the non-Koreans practice compared to their Korean counterparts, it kind of bugs me to see the need to ask for exclusive tournaments. The infrastructure may not be as good as in Korea with the teamhouses but it sure is a lot better than what the players are doing with it. Basically you shouldn't ask for easier leagues if you are not making the most out of your opportunities.
The biggest difference between the scenes is teamhouses and a cultural difference in attitude. Besides that though I Catz overrates the SC2 scene in Korea in terms of development and infrastructure. Very few players in Korea get the salaries the western progamers get, and the list of foreign pros on a salary is much larger than it is for Korea (the difference is enormous). The salary is a lot better outside of Korea than it is inside. Looking at what a noname Korean is putting into this game while he sleeps in bunkbeds and barely has money to do anything besides eating and sleeping, why exactly are we discussing how we can make things harder for Koreans?
I am again quoting Nazgul.
His post is based on solid background information.
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Perfect example of someone that has no idea what hes talking about...
To get the viewers, you need the Korean's, to get it out there u need Korean's. Saying that they should move to US to play in a tournament that NO MATTER What gets played on the inett makes no sense, thats like saying, everyone that play's in the tournament including people from NA should move to LA to play in it. and from what iv heard the people that get to the finals are coming to the US to play their games LIVE!.
I like the first post of iNcontrol, obviously they/we should try to keep a decent balance between Korean's/EU/NA, but saying that just because their better then most of us, they shouldn't compete is fucking ridiculous, more people will watch MC vs Naniwa then people will watch Naniwa vs any root member or EG member or whatever, because of the hype thats been building up for so long "Korea VS Foreigners".
Seriously catz sometimes it sounds like you just pull shit out of your ass, and in this interview u had no idea wtf u were talking about, scrambling for words ect.
Compareing E-sports to the most established sport in the world is ...........................
EDIT: the Korean's have already made their sacrifice if they are better then u, why shouldn't you make that sacrifice as well and get just as good as them? <-- Because u said "they should make a sacrifice/take a risk"
+ Show Spoiler +His arrogance and attitude in this interview pissed me off. sorry about bad grammer/bad mouthing someone "respected" by alot of people in the community
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Completely disagree.
It's the same socialistic mentality as always: Please impose barriers to foreigns as we need our own industry to grow !
There are two problems with this:
- The moral one. By doing so, you are limiting people freedom. I believe in freedom. Catz, you or your family are from Peru.... would you agree to the US kicking every foreign on the basis of the jobs market slump?
- The practical one. At first, it may seem than the US scene may benefit from this. But, in the long run, it won't be so. The spectators will get a suboptimal product. The players won't be as good as the may be if they had to compete with foreigns. Finally, other countries will implement the same restrictive approach, leading to less of a global scene, meaning, a lot of sub-scenes of less quality.
I'm not inventing anything, this happens already in all kinds of industries: automotive, aeronautics.... You got the opportunity to make it right for eSports. Socialism ruins it all!
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Won't this argument basically be solved in 2 weeks when NASL, GSL and IGN Pro-league are airing at the same time? Unless you don't have work/school it will be tough to watch all 3 so as Day9 says eyeballs will vote, all Korean, 1/5 or all NA.
Just wait for the viewing results from that week and you won't need a debate, although I think maybe IGN being devoid of even Europeans is a little bit of a handicap. If you watch the video though Catz's arguments seem to be NA centric, so there is no real need to debate this here when you can simply vote with your eyes in 2 weeks.
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Koreans draw in fans who already watch SC2.
Local Heroes draw in fans that DO NOT ALREADY WATCH SC2.
Koreans = maintain status quo
Local Heroes = grows e-sports
Koreans = good for us who already watch SC2
Local Heroes = good for sponsors
We have to stop looking at what is best for us and look at what is best for e-sports...
The only way this will take off is if we can cater to the lowest common denominator, we need to be able to get your aging parents, you grandparents, your uncles, aunts, and 10 year old siblings watching SC2 who currently thing SC2 is just a game and not interesting.
A business will not care if YOU tune into their event, since you already watch SC2 so you are already part of the market.
To grow e-sports you need to turn the red area into the blue area... the blue area is already doing what we want and as such catering to them will not help grow the blue area it will simply help keep the blue area the exact same size...
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On April 10 2011 15:28 alexhard wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2011 15:08 fams wrote:
Koreans have the local sponsors who have been involved in competitive gaming before, they also have the GSL offering a lot of prize money.
This has been addressed above in the thread, but I guess you ignored it. Major Korean teams do not have sponsors, and do not have salaries. All the major western teams do have those things. Korea only has GSL. The international scene has dozens of tournaments, also with very high prizes and many more opportunities to earn that money for the players.
shhh don't burst that bubble, right now its the foundation for the argument of why North American teams are so behind in skill versus the Koreans, at least that was ROOT's argument.
On a more serious note, CatZ here is my question to you:
You mentioned in your video that "you might be trying your hardest but its discouraging when you see the likes of MC being invited to the same tournament as you." If you already have a practice house, have the sponsors, and are trying your best to practice as much as possible, and are still unable to beat players like MC or MVP. Is it not possible that they just might be more talented than you? Regardless of nationality, they could just be a better player skill-wise than you. It's just like the NBA, you have players that practice a lot, but will never be a Lebron James or a Kobe Bryant, maybe it's something you have to accept.
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All I hear from CatZ is I don't want to practice as much as the koreans but I still want the same / more money then they get. Its not like Koreans are super human at SC, they practice a lot harder and at greater lengths. Assuming same talent levels and race balance if you practice just as hard you will be just as good and no need to fear the Koreans.
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