Apparently there was a second tournament this weekend and Xenocider took it, beating players like Ret and Welmu along the way. For his efforts, he was awarded with a big $10,000 check. I caught up with him in a casual interview the night he got back from Korea.
Gogo interview Xenocider: gogo?
Are you back in the us? Yeah just got b
So you're free now for like an hour? ya, video interview or text
Text unless you want me to go to florida. You can afford my ticket now, right? LOL
Btw the interview has started already. Can you tell me what happened last weekend? Me and the rest of the world was focused on iem Government shutdown, corrupt republicans and democrats are taking over the US and screwing us out of food stamps and also i won ief.
So you're non-partisan. Also, what's ief? IEF is a korean government run tournament that fliss in people across the world and lets in some korean amateurs.
How did you even qualify for this? They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Wowowow, was there a reason suppy went to iem and you went to ief and not the other way around? I'm not really sure but I went to iEF because I'm confident I can beat any non-terran outside of Top Koreans so I was sure I was going to win. Also because I love dirty money maybe Suppy has integrity.
Speaking of dirty money, do you realize the last time we did one of these interviews you got on EG a few days later? Coincidence or? And also what's going to happen after this interview? Well I'm not really sure about the first one, I think EG was planning on picking me up ever since my conception so I doubt it. After this interview I'll probably be receiving my monthly 100,000$ raise just like my fellow team mates. We've been cutting back since SC2 is dead but a mans gotta eat amirite?
So do you want to become an honorary member of TL's SC2 coverage team? I'm sure none of us watched this tournament this weekend. Can you recap it for us? I can only really speak for my self I didn't watch the other matches, I beat a Korean Protoss 2-0 in the first round, Ret 2-0 in the second round, I was nervous against Ret because before the matches he 3-0'd Ryung but I think my TvZ is a little better than Ryung's so I was able to edge out a win there. Then in the finals I knew Welmu knew that I scv pulled every game and that I cc firsted on Akilon, so instead I just played standard and went reaper on Akilon which worked out in my favor both games. Honestly I was only extremely concerned about Ret because he had recently 5 killed CoL + Major, he was very good.
Oh, i think i'm obliged to ask this. If xenocider wins a tournament in the woods, does it make a sound? Indeed
So i heard you had some trouble with school and you almost didn't go to the tournament. what happened with that? I had to miss 3 days of school in order to go to the event in the first place, in these 3 days of school there are 5 exams, I will have to make them up as soon as I return to school.
How much more popular will you be when you return to school tomorrow and people find out you won $10,000? I'm sure that all of my fellow class mates viewed me as the adonis of the Class of 2015 already. Maybe this will help. I highly doubt it.
You won the wcg usa qualifiers too. Any reason you think you're especially on a roll now? Probably because I didn't hit any Terrans in any of those tournaments, my TvT winrate on ladder is in the 30's and my TvP/TvZ recently probably in the 70's. The only matchup where I cant abuse my race. sigh
So you're like the Innovation of the United States? Actually the reason why I can't win TvT is because I only copy Innovation's play, I'm being 100% serious.
Why don't you copy someone else in TvT since Innovation does so badly in TvT? It's more a matter of in TvZ and TvP you can do 1-2 builds with the same premise and win. In TvT no matter how good my mechanics not only are there 10+ builds that are all relevant but also 2 entire compositions that are good on specific maps. It's very hard for a player like me to figure out
What about you makes it hard for you to figure out? is it that you're more of a mechanical rather than an on-the-fly and adaptive player? I've never really thought about making builds my self, I am a mechanical player so usually once I have a baseline build. I can do all the time I can build off of that and figure out all the in-game info, that build hasn't struck me yet though.
So you're basically living the dream right now, that of every aspiring american player. Do you ever think about how lucky you are or do you not attribute luck to your success? I don't think success can ever come solely from luck, of course it is very important but based on my general positive mentality and practice regimen I feel as if my ranking is deserved
So WCG is mostly Protoss. Think you can take that? (Xenocider is silent for half an hour, then responds)
Sorry got pulled away by my parents zz. I think so I'm so confident in my TvP right now, if I don't win then atleast someone will show me what I can lose to
Speaking of your parents, what do your parents think about your whole progaming thing, especially with you coming home with a $10,000 check? Btw, they did give you a big check, right? Yeah they did . Big Check I think they are a bit more supportive but still pretty generic asian about it
Oh, she's cute. Did she come with the check? They* There's a line of them on the side. Also I'm not a she. But thanks, i dont roll that way.
Alright, isn't it past your bedtime? And don't you have to take like 5 tests tomorrow? Jetlag, ggwp. I can take exams in my sleep One of my teachers was extremely pissed that I skipped her exam actually, I heard she's making an extra hard test just for me.
What's it on? AP Psychology
Do you agree more with the behaviorism or cognitive school of psychological thought? Hm, I haven't gone into depth about either, right now we're focusing on the biology/ where things take place but I believe both can co-exist and I think i'd probably agree more with behaviorism
That was quite an unexpected answer. Do you have any other surprises for me? Korean people are very attractive
Alright, sponsor plug time? And also be honest, did you have to look them up? I would like to thank my sponsors monster kingston hyperx razer astro xmg zam jinx need for seat. I would never have to look them up as I love them all so much and their products are so great that I have internalized each of them into my core. Without my sponsors I would literally be disintegrated,
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
They have been doing this since the Broodwar days, it's nothing new. As in, this tournament and format.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
The primary goal of the tournament was to stimulate the Korean amateur scene. Not saying that the people send there weren't top players, but you might not want the very best of the best there to have more interesting games and a small chance for your local amateurs.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
The primary goal of the tournament was to stimulate the Korean amateur scene. Not saying that the people send there weren't top players, but you might not want the very best of the best there to have more interesting games and a small chance for your local amateurs.
There were more foreigners than koreans(3) ... so.... I don't really think thats what they wanted to do.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
The primary goal of the tournament was to stimulate the Korean amateur scene. Not saying that the people send there weren't top players, but you might not want the very best of the best there to have more interesting games and a small chance for your local amateurs.
There were more foreigners than koreans(3) ... so.... I don't really think thats what they wanted to do.
I still don't understand why people get so weird-ed out or mad about a mid-tier tournament having any substantial amount of money. People freak out about all the players retiring, but a lot retire because they don't feel they make enough money. But whenever any tournament injects money into the scene that's not at the absolute top, they get shit for it. So fans get mad that players retire, but they also get mad when they get money? I saw a lot of this in the thread that announced Xeno's win but I still don't follow the train of logic in this. Why can't people just be happy that Xeno won and that there is still good prize pools to be won by non-super-s-class-top-tier Koreans. It's good for the scene. In what way is anything that this tournament doing bad?
Their train of thought is that this money could have gone to a "much more deserving" or "better" player. But guess what? If this tournament didn't exist, it doesn't directly correlate to mean that all of this money would have gone to something like the Code S prize pool. More likely the money would have not gone into E-Sports at all. It's a logic fallacy to think that this tournament not existing equals more money for top tier players. It just doesn't. That's not how business, money or sponsorship works.
Congratulate Xeno and don't give him shit about winning a tournament like it's a bad thing.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
Money distribution has been incredibly unfair since end of 2010 anyway, who cares.
They sent an invite for 1 American 4 Europeans and 4 Chinese, essentially, i got EG swagged in.
Am i the only one who find this increadibly bad? With a $10k first prize there should atleast be some top tier players in that tournament. There are players who could beat some of the competition at this tournament in their sleep but still earn less prizemoney than this in a year due to getting knocked out of WCS Kr.
Between this and companies starting to sponsor casters and other non-competitive figures in the scene i can understand why there has been so many awesome players quitting as of late, and why players like NaNiwa are not sure if they will be playing next year.
Korea supports the foreign scene more than foreigners do apparently.
On October 15 2013 15:52 kisoso wrote: 2013 maybe? It's great to finally see a foreign EG do well, it's been a while.
Huk won two events and placed second in the last like 3 months.
I'd hold off the kool aid. By the same token you could say JD won the HyperX 8-Man Invitational in Vegas. I have a hard time calling these anything more than handouts or community pleasers. The reason they're here is to generate content and promote the sponsors. That is their primary purpose. A company like Red Bull could definitely do a lot more. Red Bull Battlegrounds is just to get their feet wet and test out the waters.
LMFAO this kid will grow up to have a bright future. his interview on text is extremely witty to the point where you wouldn't think it's said by a 15 year old kid from china. i definitely see a little bit of myself in him, character-wise, and definitely see him doing well in the future. my favorite quote from this whole interview would probably be, "I'm sure that all of my fellow class mates viewed me as the adonis of the Class of 2015 already".
On October 15 2013 13:32 monk wrote: Speaking of your parents, what do your parents think about your whole progaming thing, especially with you coming home with a $10,000 check? Btw, they did give you a big check, right? Yeah they did . Big Check I think they are a bit more supportive but still pretty generic asian about it
Oh, she's cute. Did she come with the check? They* There's a line of them on the side. Also I'm not a she. But thanks, i dont roll that way.
EPT
congrats on being killer at starcraft as well!
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