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Alarm bells were ringing ever since i heard of the announcement of the announcement.
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Mexico2170 Posts
On May 23 2014 11:40 lolmlg wrote:Show nested quote +On May 23 2014 06:47 nkr wrote:
it's all in that big truck!
Also it's easy for everyone to be all hindsighthero, but the fact is when nasl was announced in the end of 2010 or early 2011, an investment like this didn't make people go "what are they doing?". People thought sc2 was the next big thing, but it ended up being LoL and Dota2 instead. Shit happens. I'm going to be real with you. Are you ready? Nobody with any intelligence thought that. SC2 was a disaster waiting to happen. Blizzard mishandled every aspect of their attempts to strong-arm the professional scene. They alienated the Brood War fanbase and meddled so thoroughly in the dynamics of Korean e-sports that they basically guaranteed that there couldn't be the kind of independent grassroots support that gave Brood War longevity. On top of this they simply designed an inferior game that inspired far more apologetics than devotion. In the end, the only source of strength for SC2 was Blizzard and everyone recognized it. It was what Blizzard wanted all along and they paid for it. While Brood War enjoyed the support of large sponsors, SC2 would collapse as soon as Blizzard lost interest. The volatility of the scene undermined it on a continual basis. Edit: And while it's obvious that DotA2 is enjoying success at the moment, a statement like "the next big thing was LoL and DotA2" is just a mix of wishful thinking and hubris.
And do you think LoL would be this big without Riot pushing the game? You think LoL would be this big thanks to the community?
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On May 23 2014 13:38 [SXG]Phantom wrote:Show nested quote +On May 23 2014 11:40 lolmlg wrote:On May 23 2014 06:47 nkr wrote:
it's all in that big truck!
Also it's easy for everyone to be all hindsighthero, but the fact is when nasl was announced in the end of 2010 or early 2011, an investment like this didn't make people go "what are they doing?". People thought sc2 was the next big thing, but it ended up being LoL and Dota2 instead. Shit happens. I'm going to be real with you. Are you ready? Nobody with any intelligence thought that. SC2 was a disaster waiting to happen. Blizzard mishandled every aspect of their attempts to strong-arm the professional scene. They alienated the Brood War fanbase and meddled so thoroughly in the dynamics of Korean e-sports that they basically guaranteed that there couldn't be the kind of independent grassroots support that gave Brood War longevity. On top of this they simply designed an inferior game that inspired far more apologetics than devotion. In the end, the only source of strength for SC2 was Blizzard and everyone recognized it. It was what Blizzard wanted all along and they paid for it. While Brood War enjoyed the support of large sponsors, SC2 would collapse as soon as Blizzard lost interest. The volatility of the scene undermined it on a continual basis. Edit: And while it's obvious that DotA2 is enjoying success at the moment, a statement like "the next big thing was LoL and DotA2" is just a mix of wishful thinking and hubris. And do you think LoL would be this big without Riot pushing the game? You think LoL would be this big thanks to the community?
Not exactly.
Kespa BW was under heavily scrutiny from matchfixing and being labeled as "illegal tournaments" from Blizzard.
But company still wants to take advantage from the rise of professional gaming in Korea. BW is no good for PR, barely anybody plays SC2 in Korea, and this new game called LoL is slowly gaining momentum with tons of potential. Logically, the companies shifted to LoL sponsorship. Riot game saw that opportunities and decide to bring LCS into the table to push the game even further. LoL had a sense of "grassroot movement" at its inception.
So its a combination of both.
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On May 23 2014 13:45 Xiphos wrote:Show nested quote +On May 23 2014 13:38 [SXG]Phantom wrote:On May 23 2014 11:40 lolmlg wrote:On May 23 2014 06:47 nkr wrote:
it's all in that big truck!
Also it's easy for everyone to be all hindsighthero, but the fact is when nasl was announced in the end of 2010 or early 2011, an investment like this didn't make people go "what are they doing?". People thought sc2 was the next big thing, but it ended up being LoL and Dota2 instead. Shit happens. I'm going to be real with you. Are you ready? Nobody with any intelligence thought that. SC2 was a disaster waiting to happen. Blizzard mishandled every aspect of their attempts to strong-arm the professional scene. They alienated the Brood War fanbase and meddled so thoroughly in the dynamics of Korean e-sports that they basically guaranteed that there couldn't be the kind of independent grassroots support that gave Brood War longevity. On top of this they simply designed an inferior game that inspired far more apologetics than devotion. In the end, the only source of strength for SC2 was Blizzard and everyone recognized it. It was what Blizzard wanted all along and they paid for it. While Brood War enjoyed the support of large sponsors, SC2 would collapse as soon as Blizzard lost interest. The volatility of the scene undermined it on a continual basis. Edit: And while it's obvious that DotA2 is enjoying success at the moment, a statement like "the next big thing was LoL and DotA2" is just a mix of wishful thinking and hubris. And do you think LoL would be this big without Riot pushing the game? You think LoL would be this big thanks to the community? Not exactly. Kespa BW was under heavily scrutiny from matchfixing and being labeled as "illegal tournaments" from Blizzard. But company still wants to take advantage from the rise of professional gaming in Korea. BW is no good for PR, barely anybody plays SC2 in Korea, and this new game called LoL is slowly gaining momentum with tons of potential. Logically, the companies shifted to LoL sponsorship. Riot game saw that opportunities and decide to bring LCS into the table to push the game even further. LoL had a sense of "grassroot movement" at its inception. So its a combination of both.
You are full of it. There was no grassroots anything with LoL tourneys. There were basically no tournaments for a long time, and what was there was really, really poorly run. Then Riot got bought out for like $500 mil and threw money at the problem till it was fixed. What they did correctly was market the shit out of LCS in game, which blizz didn't do for SC2 for a long, long time.
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I'm not really sure why anyone would be surprised by this, especially after Season 1. They promised a lot and delivered some. I liked IPL Fight Club a lot more than NASL. NASL's format was convoluted much like the WCS system was originally. For a while, I also couldn't tell if they wanted to make this a regional thing like ESL or open it up. Opening up to the world made it seem like they were trying to compete with the GSL in a way. It was just weird to me. I personally think the death knell was the WCS itself. When they basically forced every decent player, team and tournament organizer to play its system the entire year, they screwed a lot of TOs (NASL the hardest). On top of that, I don't care what anyone else says, SC2 as an esport feels like it's in a serious decline so I would expect less popular/sustainable TOs to fold up shop. Just check viewer numbers on events that post them or the players who still stream (if you can even find some).
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On May 23 2014 14:03 Rho_ wrote:Show nested quote +On May 23 2014 13:45 Xiphos wrote:On May 23 2014 13:38 [SXG]Phantom wrote:On May 23 2014 11:40 lolmlg wrote:On May 23 2014 06:47 nkr wrote:
it's all in that big truck!
Also it's easy for everyone to be all hindsighthero, but the fact is when nasl was announced in the end of 2010 or early 2011, an investment like this didn't make people go "what are they doing?". People thought sc2 was the next big thing, but it ended up being LoL and Dota2 instead. Shit happens. I'm going to be real with you. Are you ready? Nobody with any intelligence thought that. SC2 was a disaster waiting to happen. Blizzard mishandled every aspect of their attempts to strong-arm the professional scene. They alienated the Brood War fanbase and meddled so thoroughly in the dynamics of Korean e-sports that they basically guaranteed that there couldn't be the kind of independent grassroots support that gave Brood War longevity. On top of this they simply designed an inferior game that inspired far more apologetics than devotion. In the end, the only source of strength for SC2 was Blizzard and everyone recognized it. It was what Blizzard wanted all along and they paid for it. While Brood War enjoyed the support of large sponsors, SC2 would collapse as soon as Blizzard lost interest. The volatility of the scene undermined it on a continual basis. Edit: And while it's obvious that DotA2 is enjoying success at the moment, a statement like "the next big thing was LoL and DotA2" is just a mix of wishful thinking and hubris. And do you think LoL would be this big without Riot pushing the game? You think LoL would be this big thanks to the community? Not exactly. Kespa BW was under heavily scrutiny from matchfixing and being labeled as "illegal tournaments" from Blizzard. But company still wants to take advantage from the rise of professional gaming in Korea. BW is no good for PR, barely anybody plays SC2 in Korea, and this new game called LoL is slowly gaining momentum with tons of potential. Logically, the companies shifted to LoL sponsorship. Riot game saw that opportunities and decide to bring LCS into the table to push the game even further. LoL had a sense of "grassroot movement" at its inception. So its a combination of both. You are full of it. There was no grassroots anything with LoL tourneys. There were basically no tournaments for a long time, and what was there was really, really poorly run. Then Riot got bought out for like $500 mil and threw money at the problem till it was fixed. What they did correctly was market the shit out of LCS in game, which blizz didn't do for SC2 for a long, long time.
A splash screen that came up during week one and the finals?
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Considering how much money MLG has burned through, I wouldn't be surprised if NASL was running on the basis that someone would fund them with a few million to keep going, and it fell through.
Since they seem to have purchased most of their production infrastructure, seems like maybe they didn't have enough money at the start and thought they had something lined up to fund them that fell through or pulled out.
Since they say they've paid all salaries, and prize money wouldn't be that much, I wonder who hasn't been paid/how they spent $1.6m without someone asking for cash up front for whatever they were buying, unless it's all their assets which one might assume would be security for the individual debt amounts if they were bought on credit...
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That explains why they closed the doors as a league. 1.6 million debt for such a small company is far worse than what people in this thread seems to believe.
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Sad to admit but it seems they bet on the wrong horse, SC2 was never as big as people expected it to be in 2011.
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Somebody had quite the wishful thinking to get the total up to that amount. They should have closed up shop a lot sooner.
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Denmark10305 Posts
Thank god for ESL, Dreamhack and GomTv/KESPA etc. who knows how run shit and doesn't just collapse because they overextend. "Go big or go home" is the recipe for disaster when it comes to stuff like this
also this has nothing to do with the state of SC2. It's just simple because they didn't knew what they were doing.
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This doesn't even have to be that bad, there is no specification of the type of debt. If I recall in their first season NASL started out with roughly that amount in prizepool? I vaguely remember someone invested into them. This could simply be the 1,6 million mentioned in debt.
If someone invests in a company, that money is often loaned subordinately under a certain interest rate%, but if that person also aqquired a large stock% by investing it can be seen as loaning the money to 'yourself'. In either case its not as easy as people make it out to be to have 1.6million in direct (non subordinated) debt. I'm guessing a huge % of this is subordinated debt owed to either a big initial investor or simply to the majority stock holder (could be same person).
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SC2 is just not profitable enough.
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NASL paid my The Gauntlet earning few month before closing, much respect for giving me the money while so much in debts.
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On May 23 2014 17:45 SmoKim wrote:
Thank god for ESL, Dreamhack and GomTv/KESPA etc. who knows how run shit and doesn't just collapse because they overextend. "Go big or go home" is the recipe for disaster when it comes to stuff like this
also this has nothing to do with the state of SC2. It's just simple because they didn't knew what they were doing.
You're very harsh - the difference between success and failure often boils down to luck.
NASL should be applauded for trying to achieve something. They failed, but that's part of life.
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Up shot, if you live in Rancho Cucamunga keep an eye out for that public auction and their PCs.
On May 23 2014 19:09 TaShadan wrote:
SC2 is just not profitable enough.
NASL was really lacking operationally as well, it wasn't simply that SC2 wasn't profitable though that was undoubtedly a factor.
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Russian Federation798 Posts
On May 23 2014 14:30 miicah wrote:Show nested quote +On May 23 2014 14:03 Rho_ wrote:On May 23 2014 13:45 Xiphos wrote:On May 23 2014 13:38 [SXG]Phantom wrote:On May 23 2014 11:40 lolmlg wrote:On May 23 2014 06:47 nkr wrote:
it's all in that big truck!
Also it's easy for everyone to be all hindsighthero, but the fact is when nasl was announced in the end of 2010 or early 2011, an investment like this didn't make people go "what are they doing?". People thought sc2 was the next big thing, but it ended up being LoL and Dota2 instead. Shit happens. I'm going to be real with you. Are you ready? Nobody with any intelligence thought that. SC2 was a disaster waiting to happen. Blizzard mishandled every aspect of their attempts to strong-arm the professional scene. They alienated the Brood War fanbase and meddled so thoroughly in the dynamics of Korean e-sports that they basically guaranteed that there couldn't be the kind of independent grassroots support that gave Brood War longevity. On top of this they simply designed an inferior game that inspired far more apologetics than devotion. In the end, the only source of strength for SC2 was Blizzard and everyone recognized it. It was what Blizzard wanted all along and they paid for it. While Brood War enjoyed the support of large sponsors, SC2 would collapse as soon as Blizzard lost interest. The volatility of the scene undermined it on a continual basis. Edit: And while it's obvious that DotA2 is enjoying success at the moment, a statement like "the next big thing was LoL and DotA2" is just a mix of wishful thinking and hubris. And do you think LoL would be this big without Riot pushing the game? You think LoL would be this big thanks to the community? Not exactly. Kespa BW was under heavily scrutiny from matchfixing and being labeled as "illegal tournaments" from Blizzard. But company still wants to take advantage from the rise of professional gaming in Korea. BW is no good for PR, barely anybody plays SC2 in Korea, and this new game called LoL is slowly gaining momentum with tons of potential. Logically, the companies shifted to LoL sponsorship. Riot game saw that opportunities and decide to bring LCS into the table to push the game even further. LoL had a sense of "grassroot movement" at its inception. So its a combination of both. You are full of it. There was no grassroots anything with LoL tourneys. There were basically no tournaments for a long time, and what was there was really, really poorly run. Then Riot got bought out for like $500 mil and threw money at the problem till it was fixed. What they did correctly was market the shit out of LCS in game, which blizz didn't do for SC2 for a long, long time. A splash screen that came up during week one and the finals?
It was simple but very effective.
They would have had half the number of viewers if the screen wasn't there.
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Blizzard announces $1.6 million tournament season prize pool...
some months later NASL goes under with more than $1.6 million in debt?
Mere Coincidence you say? Where is Jesse Ventura when u need him ?
all joking aside,
regarding employees getting burned by NASL's demise:
smart employees usually see many signs a company is in trouble without ever directly being told "this place is doomed because it has a giant debt". its up to them to find another job and GTFO
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when things get real and business comes first...:x. I wonder how it got up to 1 million before they realized something was up?
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On May 24 2014 00:55 fireforce7 wrote:
when things get real and business comes first...:x. I wonder how it got up to 1 million before they realized something was up?
maybe we'll learn more about this developing story 
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EPT
