Hot 6ix GSL Season 1
Code S

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Life and soO advance to the semifinals

by Christelle

Hope dwindled for fans of mankind around the world as JinAir_Maru – the sole remaining Terran in Code S – failed to keep up with a spirited performance from ST_Life in the Round of 8.

Life's play might have been called cheesy if executed by any other player, but in his hands we could only call it the prodigy playing at his best. More often than not he simply outplayed Maru with his stellar ability to control speedlings in the early game, and he showed the ability to go for clever tech switches and off-beat "all-in" timings to catch Maru off guard.

But that’s not to say that Maru played poorly. The Marine Prince had shining moments of impeccable micro in spite of the disastrous situations he often played from, and he made Life fight hard for his victory. At the end of the five game series, even the normally stoic Life seemed overjoyed and a little surprised to have advanced to the semifinals.


The other side of the bracket was a tale of two teammates. SKT_PartinG, the once WCS world champion and far more acclaimed player, could not seem to find his footing against the skilled but unassuming SKT_soO. The series began poorly with for PartinG as his unconvincing zealot-phoenix attack backfired completely, leading to a quick 0-1 deficit.

Despite tying up the series with an expertly executed immortal all-in game two, PartinG failed to find his bearings in longer games. In two consecutive games PartinG found himself futility using phoenixes to fight corruptors, which were followed by either a deadly flock of mutalisks in the sky or pack of hydralisks down on the ground. soO was able to easily brush aside his teammate's weak defensive efforts to take a 3-1 win.

This speaks of course of the ability of soO, whose climb to the semifinals is somehow both extraordinary and expected. He's not the biggest star on an SKT team that is as stacked as ever, but he is showing the class of a player who reached the GSL finals last season.

Notes and Observations

• What do we make of Parting's peculiar attempt at walling in his enemy? Perhaps it was custom tailored for his teammate and practice partner. While it had the potential to be the coolest manuver of the week, quick cancellations by PartinG mean we'll never know.
  
  
• Maru showed great resilience in games where he was playing from a disadvantage. His parade pushes looked very strong, and he showed that he is very capable of winning games by other means than his usual aggressive drop-play (which still earned him a victory).
  
  
• Maru tinkered around with some bio-mech compositions in two games but lost both of them. Emulating Fantasy must be harder than it looks.
  
  
• Life accidentally blew up his banelings again, though this time it was harder to say it directly lost him a game. With Life insisting that his hotkey settings are perfectly fine, one has to wonder whether his fingers are slipping or if his keyboard is malfunctioning.
  
  
• It is now confirmed that the GSL Finals will be Protoss vs. Zerg. Sorry Terrans. You came so far!
  

Writers: Christelle
Graphics and images: GomTV
Editor: Waxangel