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On March 13 2015 08:59 jellyjello wrote:
SC2 has hit the ceiling for its growth in terms of a spectator sport. We can point out many reasons for it, but essentially what we are seeing today with the viewership numbers is the direct result of the biggest flaw in SC2: the game just does not have the charm to attract many casual players to keep playing the game.
The launching of LoTV will regain the viewership numbers by the virtue of it being a brand new game. However, unless the game's core issues are addressed - elements which attract casual players, we are going to have this same discussion again in 2-3 years.
I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player.
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On March 14 2015 03:35 gruff wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2015 08:59 jellyjello wrote:
SC2 has hit the ceiling for its growth in terms of a spectator sport. We can point out many reasons for it, but essentially what we are seeing today with the viewership numbers is the direct result of the biggest flaw in SC2: the game just does not have the charm to attract many casual players to keep playing the game.
The launching of LoTV will regain the viewership numbers by the virtue of it being a brand new game. However, unless the game's core issues are addressed - elements which attract casual players, we are going to have this same discussion again in 2-3 years. I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player.
Exactly. The ESL csgo stream at the moment of writing this has 300k viewers, and the arena is stacked with people chanting for the teams. The reasons for this kind of popularity have nothing to do with small things like balance, builds or other in game nuances, and more to do with the fact the game is dominated by westerners, played by teams instead of individuals, easy to start to play as a casual and as an e-sport very action packed and easy to follow.
Unless lotv changes the fact that sc2 is a base building rts then the status quo won't change.
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I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player.
counterexample: wc3 in china
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Canada11355 Posts
On March 13 2015 22:15 Tchado wrote:Drop sc2 but bring back HoN......kinda weird , at least with DreamHoN back I have a reason to watch dreamhack 
YO DREAMHON? I am also going to be watching HoN this is huge!
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On March 14 2015 07:06 OblivionMage wrote:Show nested quote +I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player. counterexample: wc3 in china
Counter example: YYF's and Burning's dota 2 streams on that 'chinese twitch' site have regularly about a million viewers on them. Now that's 'china popular' for you.
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I can't say I'm surprised. Watching StarCraft2 has become completely boring to me. The only reason I still watch sometimes is to hear Tasteless/Artosis banter
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On March 14 2015 07:06 OblivionMage wrote:Show nested quote +I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player. counterexample: wc3 in china
Are you sure high numbers relating to this isn't directly because there are so many viewers in China? Do the numbers for wc3 compete with the numbers for other popular games, like the poster above me just brought up?
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I am of the opinion, that it's not the game itself, but the players that play it. Sorry to say this, but the game had plenty of views when we had more non-koreans doing well. The fact is, I am not going to watch a tournament full of robot no personality koreans, I just have no interest in that. There is no storyline for me to invest in.
I haven't watched IEM Katowice at all, and why would I? Who should I cheer for? Where are Snute, Stephano, Naniwa? I don't care about Zest and Dark crushing everyone. If I wanted to watch the GSL, I would have watched, but I don't.
When they make tournaments worth watching, with players that we can care for, then they can expect high views.
Sorry for all the Korean fans here, but that's just me. I was watching the most SC2 when Stephano was active and beasting, then when he quit I tried focusing on others, but little by little all non koreans started vanishing from tournaments. And today we have a tournament like IEM Katowice, hosted in Europe with all Korean lineup. Good luck making people watch that instead of CS:GO. Why would they?
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On March 15 2015 19:35 Kaewins wrote:
I am of the opinion, that it's not the game itself, but the players that play it. Sorry to say this, but the game had plenty of views when we had more non-koreans doing well. The fact is, I am not going to watch a tournament full of robot no personality koreans, I just have no interest in that. There is no storyline for me to invest in.
I haven't watched IEM Katowice at all, and why would I? Who should I cheer for? Where are Snute, Stephano, Naniwa? I don't care about Zest and Dark crushing everyone. If I wanted to watch the GSL, I would have watched, but I don't.
When they make tournaments worth watching, with players that we can care for, then they can expect high views.
Sorry for all the Korean fans here, but that's just me. I was watching the most SC2 when Stephano was active and beasting, then when he quit I tried focusing on others, but little by little all non koreans started vanishing from tournaments. And today we have a tournament like IEM Katowice, hosted in Europe with all Korean lineup. Good luck making people watch that instead of CS:GO. Why would they?
Why would you care so match about the nationality of who is playing? If the games are entertaining to you, then you watch it, otherwise you don't. During tournaments, you get to have players interacting only 10% of the time anyway, 3 questions interviews to the winner and that's about it.
You can't say that since in 2012 there were more viewers and there were more foreigners, then the fact that there were more foreigners implies that there were more viewers.
Just look at when Naniwa played his WCS group. It was the best foreigner storyline in a long time, the former foreign hope who comes back after almost a year to claim back his throne in an offline event, and how were viewer numbers? They went from 35k to 45k. Sure, it's an increase, but it's still insignificant compared to games like CS:GO or LoL.
I don't know how you are so convinced that everyone thinks the same as you do. Sorry to say it, this doesn't have anything to do with sc2's declining viewer numbers.
But yeah, we should probably kill all the koreans or give them an handicap in-game, maybe this would solve all SC2's problems.
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On March 15 2015 19:35 Kaewins wrote:
I am of the opinion, that it's not the game itself, but the players that play it. Sorry to say this, but the game had plenty of views when we had more non-koreans doing well. The fact is, I am not going to watch a tournament full of robot no personality koreans, I just have no interest in that. There is no storyline for me to invest in.
I haven't watched IEM Katowice at all, and why would I? Who should I cheer for? Where are Snute, Stephano, Naniwa? I don't care about Zest and Dark crushing everyone. If I wanted to watch the GSL, I would have watched, but I don't.
When they make tournaments worth watching, with players that we can care for, then they can expect high views.
Sorry for all the Korean fans here, but that's just me. I was watching the most SC2 when Stephano was active and beasting, then when he quit I tried focusing on others, but little by little all non koreans started vanishing from tournaments. And today we have a tournament like IEM Katowice, hosted in Europe with all Korean lineup. Good luck making people watch that instead of CS:GO. Why would they?
Yet all foreigner only tournaments get less views than ones with Korean's in it.
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On March 14 2015 06:45 xyzz wrote:Show nested quote +On March 14 2015 03:35 gruff wrote:On March 13 2015 08:59 jellyjello wrote:
SC2 has hit the ceiling for its growth in terms of a spectator sport. We can point out many reasons for it, but essentially what we are seeing today with the viewership numbers is the direct result of the biggest flaw in SC2: the game just does not have the charm to attract many casual players to keep playing the game.
The launching of LoTV will regain the viewership numbers by the virtue of it being a brand new game. However, unless the game's core issues are addressed - elements which attract casual players, we are going to have this same discussion again in 2-3 years. I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player. Exactly. The ESL csgo stream at the moment of writing this has 300k viewers, and the arena is stacked with people chanting for the teams. The reasons for this kind of popularity have nothing to do with small things like balance, builds or other in game nuances, and more to do with the fact the game is dominated by westerners, played by teams instead of individuals, easy to start to play as a casual and as an e-sport very action packed and easy to follow. Unless lotv changes the fact that sc2 is a base building rts then the status quo won't change.
Basically CS is a simple, easy to understand game with a high skillcap that offers a social experience and is fun for casuals and hardcore gamers. Not surprising that its an esport success. You don't even need to really "understand" the game to be entertained. I can look at the score and see who is winning and when someone is able to 1v3'ing the enemy team, I get super excited as well.
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SC2 being dropped from Dreamhack is one thing, which i can fully understand due to its limited appeal these days, but to be replaced by Minecraft ....yikes !!!!. i got to say that's a new low
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On March 15 2015 19:56 KingAlphard wrote:Show nested quote +On March 15 2015 19:35 Kaewins wrote:
I am of the opinion, that it's not the game itself, but the players that play it. Sorry to say this, but the game had plenty of views when we had more non-koreans doing well. The fact is, I am not going to watch a tournament full of robot no personality koreans, I just have no interest in that. There is no storyline for me to invest in.
I haven't watched IEM Katowice at all, and why would I? Who should I cheer for? Where are Snute, Stephano, Naniwa? I don't care about Zest and Dark crushing everyone. If I wanted to watch the GSL, I would have watched, but I don't.
When they make tournaments worth watching, with players that we can care for, then they can expect high views.
Sorry for all the Korean fans here, but that's just me. I was watching the most SC2 when Stephano was active and beasting, then when he quit I tried focusing on others, but little by little all non koreans started vanishing from tournaments. And today we have a tournament like IEM Katowice, hosted in Europe with all Korean lineup. Good luck making people watch that instead of CS:GO. Why would they? Why would you care so match about the nationality of who is playing? If the games are entertaining to you, then you watch it, otherwise you don't. During tournaments, you get to have players interacting only 10% of the time anyway, 3 questions interviews to the winner and that's about it. You can't say that since in 2012 there were more viewers and there were more foreigners, then the fact that there were more foreigners implies that there were more viewers. Just look at when Naniwa played his WCS group. It was the best foreigner storyline in a long time, the former foreign hope who comes back after almost a year to claim back his throne in an offline event, and how were viewer numbers? They went from 35k to 45k. Sure, it's an increase, but it's still insignificant compared to games like CS:GO or LoL. I don't know how you are so convinced that everyone thinks the same as you do. Sorry to say it, this doesn't have anything to do with sc2's declining viewer numbers. But yeah, we should probably kill all the koreans or give them an handicap in-game, maybe this would solve all SC2's problems.
I am not exactly convinced, but I think it's a big part of the reason. I don't care if the game is fun to watch, I can have fun in other ways. This is an eSport and I need someone to cheer for, and Koreans ain't those people.
Do you think I'd watch the CS:GO finals if it weren't Fnatic vs NiP? I don't care how good the teams are, I watch the teams I like and respect. Now switching to SC2, I have less and less reason to watch. The last tourneys I enjoyed were the ones where Snute and Scarlett had a deep run with chances of winning, everything else has been Korean dominated and completely unwatchable as I don't care about those players. It doesn't matter to me if Dark or Zest wins, it's just another Korean to me. And many people I know of, have a hard time watching SC2, not because the game is so complicated, but because all they see is Koreans. Even LoL, that is so severely dominated by Koreans, isn't that void of foreign competition.
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On March 14 2015 03:35 gruff wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2015 08:59 jellyjello wrote:
SC2 has hit the ceiling for its growth in terms of a spectator sport. We can point out many reasons for it, but essentially what we are seeing today with the viewership numbers is the direct result of the biggest flaw in SC2: the game just does not have the charm to attract many casual players to keep playing the game.
The launching of LoTV will regain the viewership numbers by the virtue of it being a brand new game. However, unless the game's core issues are addressed - elements which attract casual players, we are going to have this same discussion again in 2-3 years. I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player.
You don't try to compete with other games for viewership. We are not comparing game A vs game B; that is not the point here. What we all need to understand is that for SC2 to take the next step in popularity and viewership numbers, the game _has_to_be played by casual players more often, period.
The core design problems with the game makes it too difficult for new people to jump in and start playing the game right away. There is the element of steep learning curve, too complicated strategies, and lack of adequate social environment...etc. The game relies too much on the concept of rock paper scissors, while the battles doesn't last long enough for casual players to be drawn in. Think about it: would someone who is curious about SC2 but has zero knowledge about RTS find this game fun to play after trying it out a few times? A few may, but chances are that the majority would not, as proven since the launching of the SC2: Wings of Liberty.
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Sadly SC2 viewership as you mention isn't even in the same ballpark. CS:GO just got 600k viewers on twitch and 1million+ total. It doesn't mean SC2 isn't a good game, or that CS:GO is a better game, but it does mean it's a different game with a much wider appeal and is better suited for e-sports.
But I do agree with one of the previous posters that the fact that if you're not korean you will never win a major event in SC2 has a huge effect. It's demoralizing, and all the deniers are simply flat out wrong. The same thing applies to traditional sports too. When your country beats all odds and does well at some international event there's a huge surge of popularity in the sport in that country and new people start playing it. They realise they have a chance, and they identify with their compatriots. Robot asians who don't even speak english are impossible to identify with as a westerner. It becomes their game, not ours.
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On March 16 2015 00:37 xyzz wrote:
Sadly SC2 viewership as you mention isn't even in the same ballpark. CS:GO just got 600k viewers on twitch and 1million+ total. It doesn't mean SC2 isn't a good game, or that CS:GO is a better game, but it does mean it's a different game with a much wider appeal and is better suited for e-sports.
But I do agree with one of the previous posters that the fact that if you're not korean you will never win a major event in SC2 has a huge effect. It's demoralizing, and all the deniers are simply flat out wrong. The same thing applies to traditional sports too. When your country beats all odds and does well at some international event there's a huge surge of popularity in the sport in that country and new people start playing it. They realise they have a chance, and they identify with their compatriots. Robot asians who don't even speak english are impossible to identify with as a westerner. It becomes their game, not ours.
I don't think it would be much better regardless of nationality if it's one country that dominates completely.
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On March 16 2015 00:39 gruff wrote:Show nested quote +On March 16 2015 00:37 xyzz wrote:
Sadly SC2 viewership as you mention isn't even in the same ballpark. CS:GO just got 600k viewers on twitch and 1million+ total. It doesn't mean SC2 isn't a good game, or that CS:GO is a better game, but it does mean it's a different game with a much wider appeal and is better suited for e-sports.
But I do agree with one of the previous posters that the fact that if you're not korean you will never win a major event in SC2 has a huge effect. It's demoralizing, and all the deniers are simply flat out wrong. The same thing applies to traditional sports too. When your country beats all odds and does well at some international event there's a huge surge of popularity in the sport in that country and new people start playing it. They realise they have a chance, and they identify with their compatriots. Robot asians who don't even speak english are impossible to identify with as a westerner. It becomes their game, not ours. I don't think it would be much better regardless of nationality if it's one country that dominates completely.
It's not so much nationality but culture & race. CS:GO is dominated by Europeans and Americans, so it appeals to Europeans and Americans, and not to Koreans. The only major e-sport game that has a split 'domination' at the moment is Dota 2, considering the Chinese and Western teams pretty much split the major trophies. That's of course the ideal situation, but if it comes to 'asian domination' or 'western domination' the westerners will always choose the latter, and the asians the former, and that's evidenced by the popularity of the games in those regions.
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On March 16 2015 00:30 jellyjello wrote:Show nested quote +On March 14 2015 03:35 gruff wrote:On March 13 2015 08:59 jellyjello wrote:
SC2 has hit the ceiling for its growth in terms of a spectator sport. We can point out many reasons for it, but essentially what we are seeing today with the viewership numbers is the direct result of the biggest flaw in SC2: the game just does not have the charm to attract many casual players to keep playing the game.
The launching of LoTV will regain the viewership numbers by the virtue of it being a brand new game. However, unless the game's core issues are addressed - elements which attract casual players, we are going to have this same discussion again in 2-3 years. I feel that have less to do with the flaws of the game and more about the lower appeal of the type of game it is. I don't believe any base building rts will manage to fulfill those criteria's unless they completely compromise what makes them fun to play for a competitive player. You don't try to compete with other games for viewership. We are not comparing game A vs game B; that is not the point here. What we all need to understand is that for SC2 to take the next step in popularity and viewership numbers, the game _has_to_be played by casual players more often, period. The core design problems with the game makes it too difficult for new people to jump in and start playing the game right away. There is the element of steep learning curve, too complicated strategies, and lack of adequate social environment...etc. The game relies too much on the concept of rock paper scissors, while the battles doesn't last long enough for casual players to be drawn in. Think about it: would someone who is curious about SC2 but has zero knowledge about RTS find this game fun to play after trying it out a few times? A few may, but chances are that the majority would not, as proven since the launching of the SC2: Wings of Liberty.
My point was that I don't think that's possible. As for the bolder part, yes a lot would, it's called playing the campaign. Casuals will never be appealed by this kind of game in multiplayer unless you redesign the whole game into something else (mobas and such). Sure SC2 isn't a perfect game but you just have to accept that casuals just like to watch mulitplayer more than they like to play it.
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CS:Go numbers 300k+ on Twitch, 900k+ in GOTV
No wonder why they kick SC2 out of many Dreamhacks. Blizzard is really making me sad. So many wasted opportunities to make SC2 a big eSports game.
Just look at all the Features GOTV has, take a look at the Dota Spectator and in game features and compare it to SC2. I don't remember it correctly but didn't it take like 3-4 years to develop an overlay? The overlay was even mostly developed by a non employee which Blizzard later hired.
The future doesn't look good, but I hope for the best.
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On March 16 2015 00:52 TurboMaN wrote:
CS:Go numbers 300k+ on Twitch, 900k+ in GOTV
No wonder why they kick SC2 out of many Dreamhacks. Blizzard is really making me sad. So many wasted opportunities to make SC2 a big eSports game.
Just look at all the Features GOTV has, take a look at the Dota Spectator and in game features and compare it to SC2. I don't remember it correctly but didn't it take like 3-4 years to develop an overlay? The overlay was even mostly developed by a non employee which Blizzard later hired.
The future doesn't look good, but I hope for the best.
hltv.org numbers were different, it was 950k from all streams from twtich. Main stream was close to 600k alone
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EPT
