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Maybe it's just me but lately for every decently ran SC2 tournament/event, there are 4 events not functioning properly. By that I mean, the live stream almost always lag at some point during the event, there are major delay times, bad audio etc.
I think the last event I actually enjoyed watching without problem was DreamHack Summer 2013, since then I've experienced lags with any other event.
For example, going on right now, there was a one hour delay for the ROG final (on top of the original 90 minutes delay they informed us about), and now the stream lags and the audio is out of sync.
At IEM Shanghai there was almost a 5 hours delay at one of the final days of the tournament.
DreamHack Valencia suffered from major lags for some time during the last couple of series before the finals.
That being said the WCS streams seem to be running smoothly in terms of the stream, but then the players or actual observers drop or lag.
Oh, also! there was one tournament, I don't remember which one it was, where everybody constantly dropped, I think Apollo was casting it with someone, and on a separate stream Nathanias tried to cast some game for about an hour but couldn't and they ended up not casting a lot of the more supposedly exciting matches.
Anyway my point is, this situation, on top of being a complete nuisance to me, really hurts SC2 as an eSport. It is unprofessional, I have a feeling it doesn't help with the sponsors, it is bad for the players, the audience and the community.
I don't know what the situation is with other esports (the moba scene), but what I do know is that it didn't use to be this way. Sure there were a few mishaps, but I don't remember them ever happening at this density, I don't remember the problems being so many and so big.
What happened? Did they switch organizers and the new ones are bad? Do they get less budget so they can't raise the events successfully? And more importantly, what can be done to fix it? Maybe the community can somehow let the people in charge know that they need to find a way to make the events a bit more professional? I mean, raising a live stream event at 2013 by a major company should NOT be this problematic (come on ASUS! if you want people to buy your products, you should show us that you can raise such an event, referring to the latest ROG).
Please share your opinions, and this is mainly a thread to see what we as a community do to improve this situation, and less about pure ranting (even though it is kind of a rant because it IS personally annoying that this happens so frequently).
Thanks a million :-)
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juicyjames
United States3815 Posts
On August 04 2013 06:34 FuxFux wrote:
Oh, also! there was one tournament, I don't remember which one it was, where everybody constantly dropped, I think Apollo was casting it with someone, and on a separate stream Nathanias tried to cast some game for about an hour but couldn't and they ended up not casting a lot of the more supposedly exciting matches.
IEM Shanghai last weekend? Apollo/ToD/Maynarde/Kaeleris were on the main stream, and Nathanias was doing the community stream.
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I think that the reason that tournaments like IEM and ASUS ROG have more production errors than other tournaments is that they run less tournaments than say Dreamhack and MLG. So they have less experience in running these types of events. Also, running events is extremely hard, so it should be understandable if someone makes a couple of mistakes.
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On August 04 2013 07:10 JacobNX01a wrote:
I think that the reason that tournaments like IEM and ASUS ROG have more production errors than other tournaments is that they run less tournaments than say Dreamhack and MLG. So they have less experience in running these types of events. Also, running events is extremely hard, so it should be understandable if someone makes a couple of mistakes.
Isn't IEM run by the same organization which does WCS? They should have more than enough experience.
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I meant IEM has less experience doing LANs when compared to something like DH that has like 4-5 LAN events a year.
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juicyjames
United States3815 Posts
On August 04 2013 07:13 JustPassingBy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 07:10 JacobNX01a wrote:
I think that the reason that tournaments like IEM and ASUS ROG have more production errors than other tournaments is that they run less tournaments than say Dreamhack and MLG. So they have less experience in running these types of events. Also, running events is extremely hard, so it should be understandable if someone makes a couple of mistakes. Isn't IEM run by the same organization which does WCS? They should have more than enough experience.
Yes, ESL runs both IEM and WCS EU. I'm not sure if they use the exact same team for both, but I'm guessing there's probably a decent amount of overlap.
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I thought MLG Anaheim and MLG dallas were really fun to watch :D I so far havent really enjoyed ASUS ROG. Does anyone think that there is a little too much starcraft going on?
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I think shows like IEM, ASUS ROG, Red bull you should not be too hard on them they are just supporting gamers advertising their products this isnt their core business, but WCS/dream hack/MLG shouldnt have these issues and besides WCS I dont think they do.
Now why WCS is run so badly thats too many things to list, but mlg/dream hack in general I think are pretty good mostly
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On August 04 2013 07:13 JustPassingBy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 07:10 JacobNX01a wrote:
I think that the reason that tournaments like IEM and ASUS ROG have more production errors than other tournaments is that they run less tournaments than say Dreamhack and MLG. So they have less experience in running these types of events. Also, running events is extremely hard, so it should be understandable if someone makes a couple of mistakes. Isn't IEM run by the same organization which does WCS? They should have more than enough experience.
Yes, IEM is run by ESL and nobody has more experience running tournaments than ESL, outside of korea at least.
It's just that they are choosing the hard way, bringing events to locations as China and South America, where it's just not that easy.
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Blame Twitch for lag. I wasn't beliving when I was watching Proleague finals(I could watch 480p at twitch without major lag) that I could watch it live 1080p in youtube NO LAG! I always knew that Twitch is so shitty crap but after that I was just "Im never gonna use twitch again" I realy REALY hope that tournaments stop using Twitch...please make it happen!
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On August 04 2013 07:50 TheBloodyDwarf wrote:
Blame Twitch for lag. I wasn't beliving when I was watching Proleague finals(I could watch 480p at twitch without major lag) that I could watch it live 1080p in youtube NO LAG! I always knew that Twitch is so shitty crap but after that I was just "Im never gonna use twitch again" I realy REALY hope that tournaments stop using Twitch...please make it happen!
Hope you know it wasn't twitch causing problems for the proleague finals.
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What I don't get is why there aren't any in game tournaments like they did for Warcraft 3.
You played for portraits. It was kinda neat. They held a different tournament(1v1/2v2/3v3/4v4) something like every other week.
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On August 04 2013 07:51 Disengaged wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 07:50 TheBloodyDwarf wrote:
Blame Twitch for lag. I wasn't beliving when I was watching Proleague finals(I could watch 480p at twitch without major lag) that I could watch it live 1080p in youtube NO LAG! I always knew that Twitch is so shitty crap but after that I was just "Im never gonna use twitch again" I realy REALY hope that tournaments stop using Twitch...please make it happen! Hope you know it wasn't twitch causing problems for the proleague finals.
Yeah, it's broadcaster fold? ASUS ROG had same problem...DreamHack have same problem...Twitch just lags so fucking much that I cannot even belive..
Who it is then causing problems if its not twitch? twitch just dont work in europe at all.
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This is a Twitch/cable provider problem, not a tournament problem. The current issues affecting YouTube and Netflix also affect SC2 tournaments. Until providers stop being shitheads and actually allow decent peering arrangements, there's going to be lag with streaming media.
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The major issue with ASUS was the venue. It's held at a large lan / demo scene event called Assembly. The main stage is shared all day and the 90 min delay was because of other events delaying the setup time. The sound issue was quickly solved (at least it went away for me after they reset the stream) and the lag issues you've described have been a major twitch issue for a significant time period now.
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You make a valid point....these issues may also explain why dota/lol had nearly 400,000 viewers when a mere 30,000 of us were watching an awesome grand final...
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On August 04 2013 08:11 Chinnro wrote:
You make a valid point....these issues may also explain why dota/lol had nearly 400,000 viewers when a mere 30,000 of us were watching an awesome grand final...
Well at least everyone came back then.
Yeah its weird, SC2 has always been really crazy touchy, the worst moments I have seen have almost all been in SC2.
MLG Dallas, MLG Anaheim 2, Shoutcraft all the ones in the OP.
DoTA2 did have a couple issues though, one where servers went down delaying everything by 10 minutes OMGONOES, but one so serious that they had to delay the soloist tournament until Monday which was kind of a bummer.
Its just a flipping joke that SC2 is so unstable, at this point what I really hope for is Starcraft 2 for Xbox announced. No offense to PC users but God, you know if they made a console version there would be no problems. Did Evo go down ever no. Does CoD or Halo go down ever, no. SC2 on console with special keyboard and mouse controller do it now! 
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I also have the feeling that there are a lot of issues with current tournaments and streams. I had bad experience with Twitch, but I dont know enough about these things to say 100% it's their fault.
I love watching SC and atm it feels that it was less trouble, watching BW over DAUM or Afreeca back in the days. Once you got your Korean only programs running, you had no trouble watching the games at all.
Ofc, I dont want to say it was comfortable in any way back then, but it seems to me that it is not that enjoyable with all the issues.
Today I got up early to watch PL Finals and the deciding game was unwatchable on Twitch. Sadly I live in Germany and cannot watch the stream via youtube... I guess that many people ask themseves if it is worth getting up early or staying up late to watch something with isues like the ones described in this thread.
I hope, there will be some kind of progress and a soulution to the Twitch related problems, since most streams run via Twitch. And I also hope that SC2 gets more viewers so that it is more lucrative for companies to invest into all this.
GomTV however seems to be very great with their stream. While many people were compaining about issues with the Twitch stream during the semis of WCS KR, the actual GOMTV stream ran smoothly and without problems
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IEM Shanghai, Proleague finals and the official ROG stream today were all unmitigated disasters and the problems originated with the organisers and/or twitch tv as I could open 10+ YouTube/porn/whatever streams without any issues at the same time, so I am pretty damn confident my ISP has nothing to do with it.
In the end the buck stops with Blizzard, and if they are serious about their e-sports commitment regarding SC2, they will need to provide a means of high-quality broadcast preferably utilizing the game client or by setting minimum standards for external partners. That said, I am aware that the tournament audience is a small percentage of all SC2 buyers and the people annoyed about stream quality issues most likely a small percentage of the tournament audience. Still they took quite a bit of money in their hands when creating the WCS series and they can't be happy when quite a few alternative tournaments using and promoting their product look as inept as the tournaments mentioned.
ps. I had not a single issue watching several OGN broadcasts during the last few months, they are using twitch as well unless I am mistaken. Their overall production quality is outstanding, so maybe other tournaments can watch and learn?
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On August 04 2013 07:53 Iodem wrote:
What I don't get is why there aren't any in game tournaments like they did for Warcraft 3.
You played for portraits. It was kinda neat. They held a different tournament(1v1/2v2/3v3/4v4) something like every other week.
We just don't have the technology anymore.
+ Show Spoiler +
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On August 04 2013 07:14 JacobNX01a wrote:
I meant IEM has less experience doing LANs when compared to something like DH that has like 4-5 LAN events a year.
ESL have been putting together LAN tournaments for way longer than SC2's existence, bub.  And for the past few years they have had 4-5 (even 6) LAN events a year.
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Russian Federation325 Posts
I follow sc2 all major tournaments closely, and I saw 0 games from IEM Shanghai, because stream was down each time I checked.
Asus ROG had ugly audio desync in the finals, not to mention 1 hour delay. Maybe we need PPV tournaments. Personally I happily buy GOM tickets just to watch few Code S games I didn't catch online. I think SC2 audience is relatively mature and there are thousands of people who can pay 5-10$ to watch at least Code A level tournament.
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I hate how I can't follow anything anymore. Just make a system like golf.
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juicyjames
United States3815 Posts
On August 04 2013 07:53 Iodem wrote:
What I don't get is why there aren't any in game tournaments like they did for Warcraft 3.
You played for portraits. It was kinda neat. They held a different tournament(1v1/2v2/3v3/4v4) something like every other week.
+ Show Spoiler [On In-Game Tournaments and Clan Wars] +(Dec 8, 2012) Husky Interview with Dustin Browder. Relevant portion starts @ 05m21s
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United States33600 Posts
your complaints would be more valid if you didn't recklessly exaggerate the times
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The technology isn't there yet.
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On August 04 2013 07:50 TheBloodyDwarf wrote:
Blame Twitch for lag. I wasn't beliving when I was watching Proleague finals(I could watch 480p at twitch without major lag) that I could watch it live 1080p in youtube NO LAG! I always knew that Twitch is so shitty crap but after that I was just "Im never gonna use twitch again" I realy REALY hope that tournaments stop using Twitch...please make it happen!
This is my experience as well.
I discovered the YouTube stream of Proleague a couple of months ago, switched over and never went back.
The quality of the stream is night and day. Same tournament, Twitch is laggy even at low res. YouTube handles HD of the same exact tourney with zero hiccups or lag.
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On August 04 2013 09:13 shin_toss wrote:
The technology isn't there yet.
See my post directly above.
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On August 04 2013 07:16 FeUerFlieGe wrote:
SC2 dying
My thoughts exactly.
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On August 04 2013 09:44 Von wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 07:50 TheBloodyDwarf wrote:
Blame Twitch for lag. I wasn't beliving when I was watching Proleague finals(I could watch 480p at twitch without major lag) that I could watch it live 1080p in youtube NO LAG! I always knew that Twitch is so shitty crap but after that I was just "Im never gonna use twitch again" I realy REALY hope that tournaments stop using Twitch...please make it happen! This is my experience as well. I discovered the YouTube stream of Proleague a couple of months ago, switched over and never went back. The quality of the stream is night and day. Same tournament, Twitch is laggy even at low res. YouTube handles HD of the same exact tourney with zero hiccups or lag.
usually 720p works perfectly on twitch since most either use maximum quality or go down to 480 if it lags, because they think lower quality means less lag.
Youtubes advantage is the low viewer numbers, if everyone would jump onto youtube their servers would probably burn more then the twitch ones.
At the end it is always a search for what quality doesn't lag  .
As for offline tournaments, it is often a problem with the venue and thats nothing you can safely predict. Atleast if you try to go all over the world and work with venue staff and equipment that you aren't experienced with. Of course twitch adds another layer of problems to this that might occur and the always online as well (though it is better for online viewers as the tournament can't go on without internet )
So nothing special really happened just the normal stuff if you use a venue you are not experienced with. And a few tournaments that did this in a row.
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On August 04 2013 07:16 FeUerFlieGe wrote:
SC2 dying
We haven't left the hospital yet, but our condition's stabilized. :D
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that's what happens when you rent a venue you've never used or use at best once a year. you're gonna have issues because you're not familiar with the infrastructure.
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On August 04 2013 08:19 DeathProfessor wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 08:11 Chinnro wrote:
You make a valid point....these issues may also explain why dota/lol had nearly 400,000 viewers when a mere 30,000 of us were watching an awesome grand final... Well at least everyone came back then. Yeah its weird, SC2 has always been really crazy touchy, the worst moments I have seen have almost all been in SC2. MLG Dallas, MLG Anaheim 2, Shoutcraft all the ones in the OP. DoTA2 did have a couple issues though, one where servers went down delaying everything by 10 minutes OMGONOES, but one so serious that they had to delay the soloist tournament until Monday which was kind of a bummer. Its just a flipping joke that SC2 is so unstable, at this point what I really hope for is Starcraft 2 for Xbox announced. No offense to PC users but God, you know if they made a console version there would be no problems. Did Evo go down ever no. Does CoD or Halo go down ever, no. SC2 on console with special keyboard and mouse controller do it now!
The very fact that you're suggesting Blizzard release a console version of SC2 to fix problems would suggest that really you shouldn't be recommending that Blizzard do anything.
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It MOST definitely is twitch, i've been watcing BW proleague/starleague finals for a long time and everything was excellent, then along came twitch for sc2 and everything is shot to crap.
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On August 04 2013 11:27 shadymmj wrote:
It MOST definitely is twitch, i've been watcing BW proleague/starleague finals for a long time and everything was excellent, then along came twitch for sc2 and everything is shot to crap.
It can also be your internet provider. Mine likes to freak out when my girlfriend and I watch a lot of twitch/netflix during the week. I am sure there is a cap where they start to get grumpy at us.
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On August 04 2013 12:21 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 11:27 shadymmj wrote:
It MOST definitely is twitch, i've been watcing BW proleague/starleague finals for a long time and everything was excellent, then along came twitch for sc2 and everything is shot to crap. It can also be your internet provider. Mine likes to freak out when my girlfriend and I watch a lot of twitch/netflix during the week. I am sure there is a cap where they start to get grumpy at us.
Today was exceptionally bad for twitch though
Particularly when they had almost 400k watching LCS and TI3 concurrently.
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Threads like these are killing Esports. I thought ROG was a very well done event, Semmler did great with the interviews. And though there were some weak games, a lot of them were awesome and extremely entertaining.
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On August 04 2013 13:46 bjornkavist wrote:
Threads like these are killing Esports. I thought ROG was a very well done event, Semmler did great with the interviews. And though there were some weak games, a lot of them were awesome and extremely entertaining.
ROG was cool as hell, but Semmler doing great? That last interview was so derpy. "How do you do it, how do you win?". 2G can you please bust Semmlers balls for this. <3
Really didn't want to bump this thread(Because it serves no purpose), but I could not stand idle and let Semmler get complimented on those interviews.
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On August 04 2013 13:46 bjornkavist wrote:
Threads like these are killing Esports. I thought ROG was a very well done event, Semmler did great with the interviews. And though there were some weak games, a lot of them were awesome and extremely entertaining.
hahahaha. That's one of the most ludicrous sentences people throw out casually. And don't say Esports, just say SC2 as they are, in fact, not synonymous.
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twitch hasn't really upped their game. but i guess they pay. that always help for the other casters.
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With some of the first streaming providers it was possible to reduce lag if you cut off the stream chat. Does Twitch actually have a "block chat" button?
Turning on slow mode for chat or disabling it completely could help if a tournament knows there are lag issues.
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In Asus ROG for example they wanted to reserve the main stage for finals which they had to set up after the last event on main stage which didn't end same time as semi-finals. This wasn't done last year for example.
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On August 04 2013 07:16 FeUerFlieGe wrote:
SC2 dying
sc2 dead
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On August 04 2013 11:27 shadymmj wrote:
It MOST definitely is twitch, i've been watcing BW proleague/starleague finals for a long time and everything was excellent, then along came twitch for sc2 and everything is shot to crap.
I watched the Proleague finals on twitch, which died then went to YouTube, YouTube had all the same image glitches and screen blackouts, so all that part of the problem was on the video feed.
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On August 04 2013 16:22 BathTubNZ wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 11:27 shadymmj wrote:
It MOST definitely is twitch, i've been watcing BW proleague/starleague finals for a long time and everything was excellent, then along came twitch for sc2 and everything is shot to crap. I watched the Proleague finals on twitch, which died then went to YouTube, YouTube had all the same image glitches and screen blackouts, so all that part of the problem was on the video feed.
I never had image glitches or screen blackouts..I watched first game on twitch 480 without major lag and then changed to youtube and 1080 and it didnt lagged once or gave image glitches or blackouts. But maybe its regional question. I have heard that twitch works fine for americans but it just dont work for europeans..
And I have heard that australians have bad internet but I dont know about NZ
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On August 04 2013 15:51 F.O.A.D. wrote:sc2 dead
Everyone is switching to DOTA2 next week. Except Blizzard, whos running like 3 tournaments against it, lol.
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On August 04 2013 17:25 TheBloodyDwarf wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2013 16:22 BathTubNZ wrote:On August 04 2013 11:27 shadymmj wrote:
It MOST definitely is twitch, i've been watcing BW proleague/starleague finals for a long time and everything was excellent, then along came twitch for sc2 and everything is shot to crap. I watched the Proleague finals on twitch, which died then went to YouTube, YouTube had all the same image glitches and screen blackouts, so all that part of the problem was on the video feed. I never had image glitches or screen blackouts..I watched first game on twitch 480 without major lag and then changed to youtube and 1080 and it didnt lagged once or gave image glitches or blackouts. But maybe its regional question. I have heard that twitch works fine for americans but it just dont work for europeans.. And I have heard that australians have bad internet but I dont know about NZ
This was production issues with the video feed plenty of people mentioned it here and on reddit. Not lag or bad internet on my part.
http://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/comments/1jogu3/you_now_only_need_100_subscribers_to_stream_over/cbgrnmt
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EPT
