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Several problems for SC2 and e-sports in general:
1) The problem with these things is that most people who are interested in SC2 (tier 1 level) are gamers. They may be interested in a game, but majority will grow tired of it after a while and go to another game (as a lot of casual gamers do). With all the new competition cropping up everyday, it will be hard to keep the number going in the long run
2) Furthermore, it is not like a sport with so much history and legends. There are a few to be sure, most of which are from BW, but really, how many of these SC2 fans were able to watch players like BoxeR in their prime? I watched BW for 2 years before SC2 was released and still do now and I barely saw BoxeR play anymore then.
3) High degree of understanding required and requires people to keep up with current builds/strategies. This really is part of the game and nothing can be done about this but it also doesn't help in the growth of SC2, whether we choose to acknowledge it or not.
So I would say that SC2, like BW, will be a game for enthusiasts and not for the masses. It's not like more traditional sports like basketball where the tier 1 fans at least grasp to win, you have to put the ball in the basket more than your opponent. SC2 just has way too many intricacies to make the casual fan, who may not even play the game, interested in it.
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Husky introduced me to Starcraft2, but I skipped straight to GSL because I felt like watching KR progamers play would make me improve.
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Day9 daily is for players interested in becoming more competetive. It's not supposed to have a million views. It's not for the mainstream fanbase.
GomTV however is and the only reason they are not accessible is that there are no free vods. Been saying for a while now that is is detrimental to esports to not have even very low quality free vods but most tournaments seem to follow that model for some reason. I know its economical to some extent but GSL tickets can't bring in anywhere near enough to finance the league or anything substantial for that matter. There are however points to be made about the fact that releasing LQ free vods would probably increase ticket sales in the long run.
I understand that GSL went for the ticket system int he beginning to get started but they really jneed to get free vods. It's basic logic that they wont get almost any new viewers when they only have free live and that is at very bad times for anyone outside of korea.
Just look at MLG. They provide free vods and I believe it's one of the reasons that sc2 boomed during the last MLG season. You can link your friends actual games so they don't ahve to pay money to even have a taste of the scene.
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Psy starcraft has almost triple the subs that lagtv has.. so i think u should consider changing the order of T1 youtubers. Especially considering it looks like you put them in between HD and husky.
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On August 25 2011 00:23 noemercy wrote:
Psy starcraft has almost triple the subs that lagtv has.. so i think u should consider changing the order of T1 youtubers. Especially considering it looks like you put them in between HD and husky.
Psy has lost the majority of his active subscribers while lagtv now uploads more and conistently gets more views but ur right I should change the order
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I think the OP should redo his post and use actual facts, statistics, etc. to back up his analysis. I don't think you can accurately diagnose this sort of issue based off generalities and common conceptions.
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I started by watching Husky, subscribing to force, psy, then started watching day9 and from then on, came to TL. I don't have a rts background. I don't think its a big problem. The esports scene is growing. Just a few days ago, i heard my schoolmates talking about playing scbw at a lan shop. which stunned me actually.
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On August 25 2011 00:31 Rubber wrote:
I think the OP should redo his post and use actual facts, statistics, etc. to back up his analysis. I don't think you can accurately diagnose this sort of issue based off generalities and common conceptions.
He cannot. Because there are no facts, stats and so on that are available to your average TL user. This thread is a simple exercise in futility and borderline trolling.
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On August 24 2011 22:30 firehand101 wrote:
I just cant understand why everyone wants this to be so big so fast. Let it mature and prosper in its own, there is only so much we can do as a community. Most gaming events are struggling to fit people in as it is. Just let it catch on, it will do fine
Yeah, i feel that people are just trying to unaturally force SC2 stuff so fast. Lets be patient let things develop.
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Need stats/numbers. Otherwise just some guy drawing wild conclusions from his opinions.
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This thread can basically be summed up with:
1. No statistics
2. Who says that unrestrained growth for something like SC2 is going to make it better anyway?
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I found Starcraft 2 in a very roundabout way. I got in to a Minecraft Let's Play series by YouTuber "davidr64yt". He then started playing SC2 and made a promo video for DiggitySC. That was how I found the world of Starcraft 2 casts, and it is definitely the reason both my brother got into this game. From there I found the other casters (HD, Psy, Husky) and finally worked my way up to TL and Day[9] stuff.
Just saying my story supports the OP's point.
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On August 24 2011 15:22 DivinitySC2 wrote:
As you can see from the diagram, when a typical person discovers this game and its community, they typically enter through the most visible way. Husky/HD/ or Lagtv (guys who do those cheese fail vids). Someone with zero knowledge of the game will not watch a day9 daily or Gomtv and understand what th the exception of destiny.
Let me give you my perspective. I was introduced to SC2 at release via HD/Husky. I was a 100% spectator, 0% player. I went on to discover TL, Day9, and GSL and got really into the scene. I came to SC2 because of HD and Husky. I stayed because of Day9 and Artosis.
I didn't play a single game until a few months ago. I didn't have the time to learn to master the game, but I did have time to watch it (its more entertaining to me than most TV nowadays)
Now that I have some more time on my hands I've started playing. But I'm still much more of a spectator than a player.
Here was my path:
1. Shoutcasters: HD, Husky, Joshy, Total Biscuit
2. TL.net, r/starcraft
3. Professional casters: Day9, Artosis, PainUser, djWheat
4. Podcasts about the pro scene like SotG and OneMoreGame.tv
5. Analytical casters: Psy, Adebisi, Trump
6. Pro streamers: TLO, Huk, Idra
7. Actually playing the game myself
Notice that I put professional casters above analytical ones. You need to understand the game really well in order to enjoy someone like Psy/Adebisi/Trump or a pro streamer. And you need to understand at least the basics in order to enjoy Day9/Artosis/PainUser.
But shoutcasters are easy to enjoy even if you know nothing about the game. I know TL.net tends to hate on shoutcasters because this community is very elitist, but shoutcasters are a vital gateway drug into Starcraft.
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Frankly, I hate Husky, and anyone I know who is interested in getting into SC2 I point towards much less annoying casters (like Day9), you don't have to get someone into D9D's right away, that would be overkill, but what about watching some MLG vods.
If SC2 is to be more popular and wide-spread (which I don't really think is completely necessary) more people need to watch top tier casters, not these shitty ass mom&pop casters who know jack shit about the game. Artosis said it himself, "Everyone and their mother is casting, and if SC2 and eSports is to get big in the West, we need better casters."
The issue is with these 'tier1' casters that you speak of. They suck, and they make people less interested in SC2 because they can't explain the finer and more interesting points of the game. Think about it, in American Football or any other professionally commentated sport there are at least two casters, one doing the Play-by-Play which everyone can understand. Then there is the color commentator, who takes the Play-by-Play and makes it more lively and funny/interesting. Then USUALLY there is the Stats Man, the guy who spits out the pure-nerdy jargon which then gets translated through the other two. THIS GUY is the most important member of the team. This caster is what brings people deeper into the game, this caster makes people WANT to know more about the game, WANT to understand at a higher level. Not just to stay Bronze For Life like Husky.
TL;DR - "Tier1" casters need to not be shitty in order for SC2 to grow.
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ITT: An incredible amount of people thinking that by saying "No numbers", the entire point is moot.
Thank you, because the 75 other people who did the same thing weren't enough to hammer that point in.
The general premise of this, I believe, is true. However, it is at the same time inevitable, because the biggest bottleneck for competitive Starcraft is not the Youtube views, Google searches, or stumblings upon Teamliquid; it's the fact that not everybody games like we do. We can't just ignore that fact. Without converting people into gamers, there's nothing we can do beyond telling other gamers (who are most likely a part of other communities) to join the Starcraft ranks. I'm not talking about casual "Oh, yeah, I like to play CoD a bunch with my friends on my 360" people, either; people who enjoy gaming to the point where they see a true competitive aspect beyond their little LAN party with a few friends are a necessity for any game to grow.
So we're pretty much screwed unless more people enjoy gaming.
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I would like to see several of the popular sites sites/casters in this thread have a poll on there various sites asking how players were introduced to the game. Currently we have no real data on how people were brought in, and I would think that if anything a ton of people in the past few months that have joined the scene do so because they hear the stories of 50k/90k tournies going on every month, sometimes multiple times a month.
I think the game isn't stagnating at all, every MLG event has had more and more viewers, nearly all of them coming purely from sc2. Gaming in general has grown massively this year. I wouldn't be surprised if the 8(ish) million dollars that the various moba games just announced for tournament prize pools brings tons of people into sc2 just from it being around the same venues/mentioned on streams of those games. I would be interested to see where people actually come from, as long as it was polled from many different sources, not just team liquid.
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I don't think the OP is entirely right, that a stagnating pool of tier one youtube producers will lead to an eventual decline of the popularity of Starcraft 2. From a modeling standpoint, there is a finite pool of players who, given sufficient exposure to suitable content, would become 'fans' and move up the pecking order of consumption outlined above. This is a stock variable, a set capacity of individuals whose interests even remotely align with esports. The OP however, I feel mistakenly treats this quantity as a flow variable. An increase tier 1 youtube production would yield an increased rate of induction into fandom from this initial pool, but would do little to evangelize, so to speak. The reason for stagnating viewership growth across all levels of consumption is is that this initial pool, like a pocket of oil under the desert, has been sufficiently mined. (Edit: On a side note, this is also a very different thing than actual viewership stagnating. Merely growth is slowing as we reach all the easily accessible viewers.)
To prolong the growth of viewership, we need to follow the day[9] advice, which is evangelize starcraft to people who otherwise wouldn't be interested. No matter how much material is available for their consumption, they won't take advantage of it out without being brought over, converted so to speak, first. That's where the longterm growth and success of esports lies. Rather than a call for more production of introductory materials, our priority should be to bring that friend to barcraft, or raise awareness of things like the After Hours Gaming League that work to legitimize starcraft to a larger demographic. We just made the Wall Street Journal with barcraft, we're doing great. But there's always more to do.
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I asked myself how the GSL is hard to find until I realized you're polling.. well I didn't see any references to where you got this information but I'm assuming you are going by NA.
GSL isn't that hard to find >.<
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If you haven't discovered SC2 by now your damn l8 xd.
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I came to TL first when i played BW for a short time. Still i wouldn't have bought SC2 if there weren't Caster on Youtube that really enjoyed the game which made me enjoy the game too. So yeah, i started with the Youtube-Husky-HD-Psy-route into MLG/GSL/NASL. Of course i got told to go watch Day9 time and time again but i stopped watching it.
If you want a detailed explanation in form of an example, the spoiler is your friend. I tried hard to keep it as objectively as possible^^
+ Show Spoiler +Link to the Episode: http://vodpod.com/watch/10666993-day9-daily-313-rootslush-larvae-management?u=day9tv&c=day9tvMy problem starts at minute 23. Pause the game, count the drones on each base. Guess what? Slush has completely saturated BOTH bases. There is no third, he is not building a third base. He would need an army to break down at least one rock to further expand. His gameplan seems to clearly be Muta/Ling on 2 bases, at least for mid-game (since he would need units to break down the rocks anyway, plus he got +1 melee upgrade). Day9 talks exactly 5 minutes trying to figure out why exactly you would make units in that situation. He checks for new scouting information, harassment by the opponent, maybe to break down the rocks or something similar. Then he checks his opponents base and after not really seeing much of a thread there too he claims that it most possibly is a general push coming out at that time so Slush must have remembered the timing of the push that most Terrans must be doing at the time. Sure he also considers that zerg might need units to get a third base. But does not figure that there never was a decision to make in the first place. So I have had problems with Day9 not seeing the forest because he was so fascinated by a few trees that he thought was cool information. I gave his stream multiple chances to convince me that it would really make me a better gamer. But, in fact, after a couple of episodes it turned out each time like the last one i just described in detail.
I agree that there are different layers of exitement in watching the game. One could be your personal surrounding (since someone not interested in the game mights still have fun watching it with his/her friends as a group activity). Then there is the excitement the caster brings to the viewer. Basically, the caster ist not only there to show you the game and to state the obvious (as in what x player is doing), but also to be a substitution for the personal surrounding and to entertain you (for example giving you funny information about the player/a background story, speculate reasonably about strategies/what is going on in the players head etc). I think, if there wasn't a person necessary to move the screen to show you the game (everyone had observer mode) and all would be familiar with the game itself (units/abilities), you still would have a ton of fun watching the game together and maybe pointing out to your friends what you expect to happen, what funny thing you just noticed etc (btw we need multiplayer replay mode :D). And third, there is the excitement about the skill of the game. You don't need to fully understand all the skill you see (or don't see^^), it often is enough that you KNOW that there is a heckload of skill involved and that you can be amazed by it (and dream of yourself being that good). So GSL is still interesting for newbies ( i know a few ppl who know nothing about SC2 except that they watch GSL from time to time, mostly for this reason). The only difference that makes the youtubers so appealing is that there is a large amount of ppl surfing youtube and stumbling across it. It is so much harder to just google random stuff (not even game-related) and get to a SC2 community side, let alone find those tournament streams when you know nothing about them (and don't search for them specifically). Also usually youtube is the place to take a peak at things you don't know yet. And i would never classify those youtubers lower than the other parts of SC2, in fact they seem to be the only ones putting that much effort into picking up the youtubers, the only ones that care about it. So your pyramid might reflect your own vision of the scene, but for example for me Day9 would be really low there and Husky bottom and top at the same time, whereas GSL is everywhere and outshines most things (they have the exciting commentators and the pro games  ). Also, there naturally is a limit to the youtube-surfing ppl joining the SC2-youtubers since the number of youtube-surfing ppl is limited as well. Still, it is not the only source of influx (especially if the grand tournaments finally do advertising in common media, for example a small trailer on tv for MLG or similar things). So, the world has not ended yet.
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EPT
