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Regardless of the situation, we will still action upon "dead game" comments. As this is a sensitive issue for SC2 fans, please do not come into this thread and talk about SC2 players switching over to BW. This thread is also not about bashing Blizzard, David Kim, or the WCS system. |
On October 19 2016 13:09 -NegativeZero- wrote:
yep this is a pervasive problem with esports. you make a casual yet still competitive game that appeals to a huge amount of people (see: mobas, hearthstone)? great, you've got a good, successful game with a big player base, so now people want to play it competitively... except the pros are still playing a casual game with a comparatively low skill ceiling. some people are ok with this, but i just can't get into these pro scenes, not after i've seen what pro starcraft players are capable of.
the "hardcore" games with a higher skill cap that allow for extremely high level competitive play (see: rts, arena fps, etc)? well they're hard as shit, nobody wants to play them, so there's no player base and no investment into the pro scene, even though they might make for objectively "better" esports.
brood war solved this problem with the UMS mode, where the casuals were literally playing a completely different game than the pros. but imo even if sc2 hadn't fucked up the custom game section at the beginning, the desire for these types of minigames just isn't as high as it used to.
It is viewer base, not player base, that matters. Surely the player base is important, but it's not the deciding factor. Sports like F1 car race are popular not because there is a big player base but because it is entertaining/exciting to watch. Many elder people who watch soccer or football probably do not play the games for years. They simply love to watch. And that's the key to the commercial success of those games.
The fact that sc2 is not fun/exciting to watch anymore is the real driving factor behind the scene. Who/what is responsible to this? The designer, period.
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On October 19 2016 14:06 bearhug wrote:Show nested quote +On October 19 2016 13:09 -NegativeZero- wrote:
yep this is a pervasive problem with esports. you make a casual yet still competitive game that appeals to a huge amount of people (see: mobas, hearthstone)? great, you've got a good, successful game with a big player base, so now people want to play it competitively... except the pros are still playing a casual game with a comparatively low skill ceiling. some people are ok with this, but i just can't get into these pro scenes, not after i've seen what pro starcraft players are capable of.
the "hardcore" games with a higher skill cap that allow for extremely high level competitive play (see: rts, arena fps, etc)? well they're hard as shit, nobody wants to play them, so there's no player base and no investment into the pro scene, even though they might make for objectively "better" esports.
brood war solved this problem with the UMS mode, where the casuals were literally playing a completely different game than the pros. but imo even if sc2 hadn't fucked up the custom game section at the beginning, the desire for these types of minigames just isn't as high as it used to. It is viewer base, not player base, that matters. Surely the player base is important, but it's not the deciding factor. Sports like F1 car race are popular not because there is a big player base but because it is entertaining/exciting to watch. Many elder people who watch soccer or football probably do not play the games for years. They simply love to watch. And that's the key to the commercial success of those games. The fact that sc2 is not fun/exciting to watch anymore is the real driving factor behind the scene. Who/what is responsible to this? The designer, period.
fyi F1 is in a big decline - also it is not entertaining to watch 
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On October 19 2016 14:15 sharkie wrote:Show nested quote +On October 19 2016 14:06 bearhug wrote:On October 19 2016 13:09 -NegativeZero- wrote:
yep this is a pervasive problem with esports. you make a casual yet still competitive game that appeals to a huge amount of people (see: mobas, hearthstone)? great, you've got a good, successful game with a big player base, so now people want to play it competitively... except the pros are still playing a casual game with a comparatively low skill ceiling. some people are ok with this, but i just can't get into these pro scenes, not after i've seen what pro starcraft players are capable of.
the "hardcore" games with a higher skill cap that allow for extremely high level competitive play (see: rts, arena fps, etc)? well they're hard as shit, nobody wants to play them, so there's no player base and no investment into the pro scene, even though they might make for objectively "better" esports.
brood war solved this problem with the UMS mode, where the casuals were literally playing a completely different game than the pros. but imo even if sc2 hadn't fucked up the custom game section at the beginning, the desire for these types of minigames just isn't as high as it used to. It is viewer base, not player base, that matters. Surely the player base is important, but it's not the deciding factor. Sports like F1 car race are popular not because there is a big player base but because it is entertaining/exciting to watch. Many elder people who watch soccer or football probably do not play the games for years. They simply love to watch. And that's the key to the commercial success of those games. The fact that sc2 is not fun/exciting to watch anymore is the real driving factor behind the scene. Who/what is responsible to this? The designer, period. fyi F1 is in a big decline - also it is not entertaining to watch
I used to love watching F1 when I was younger, would get up at terrible hours to watch it. Good god it's boring now 
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On October 19 2016 12:35 Apoteosis wrote:
well, the best moments of this game were without kespa and his proleague, so I guess it's a good change.
besides, I think that the famous kespa regime was like slavery. those kids now are on their own, without studies, or any other skill that grants them a future in their lives. that's why almost all ex-pros now play poker. (there are notable exceptions, like polt, but he was never in a kespa team)
at least, western players go to the college.
That's definitely an interesting way to look at it. I always loved the Esports Federation-era anyway.
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On October 19 2016 03:56 Majick wrote:On a different note, if I had to blame someone, I would pick the first 3 guys from the list below + Show Spoiler +
Why Nerchio? I can understand why Neeb and ByuN might be blame 
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soO finally free of oov. Time to win something.
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oh no...gg wp
I hope there would be more opportunities to watch the korean players' matches.
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On October 19 2016 12:51 RevTiberius wrote:
I'm gonna say something really deep now... The time of RTS is over... the genre was at it's peak - together with turn-based strategy games like Civilization - in the early 1990s when computers didn't have the processing power to make games like Counter Strike / Doom / Halo possible...
Were you trying for sarcasm? Because Half-Life was realeased same year as Starcraft, Doom was realeased 4-5 years before starcraft, and Halo is only 3 years younger than Starcraft. Heck even Quake & sequel was out when Starcraft launched.
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On October 19 2016 09:04 Spyridon wrote:Show nested quote +On October 19 2016 07:14 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
no doubt, match fixing issues hastened its demise. however, the entire RTS genre is not aging well. a great many genres do not age well. None of that has to do with Blizzard. Consumer tastes are shifting away from RTS. RTS still has some life in it... but the glory days are over. This same tired argument again... Disregarding that BW is still doing better than SC2, which shoots down that whole claim/argument that RTS is dead. The biggest damage to RTS games was done by Blizzard themselves. SC2 suffered because of Blizzards decisions, and on top of that, BW suffered because Blizzard intentionally harmed BW to make way for SC2. TBH, the damage to RTS, SC2, and BW, was primarily done by Blizzard. They brought the genre to where they are, but their questionable decisions also brought it down. Would BW have ever stopped being #1 RTS if their own developer didnt force it out of the way...? Some people rightfully enjoy SC2. Other rightfully are upset with what Blizzard has done.
I mean, I LOVED SC2 from like 2010-2012 ish. I watched countless hours, HuskySC, every major tournament, grinded up to T8 Diamond. I started fading during senior year of high school and into college because I felt the game took more "energy" and the right mindset to really enjoy. CSGO's warmup, on the other hand, is basically just mechanical until you feel ready to play a game. I know it's individual, but the solo aspect of SC2 eventually wore me down, especially without dedicated practice partners. I much prefer team based games.
As a nostalgic fan, I do think part of the issue is the RTS genre is in decline. If you haven't seen it, check out Thorin's video about why Quake more or less died and why it would never be the #1 game today, even with impeccable design. I think this is relevant to SC2, to a lesser extent. Times change, consumer tastes DO change. Quake used to be THE esport and now-- no 15-16 year old aspiring pro gamer even knows the game tbh. I remember knowing like 60 pro gamers back in 2010-2011, and I really feel like the bottom fell out and the retirees never really got "replaced" so to speak.
It's interesting to me though, because I've often felt SC2 is so easy to watch compared to CSGO (another game I love), because you can see the whole picture. Half the time in CSGO, 70% of the kills happen off camera. This is a sad day for SC2, but I hope it doesn't die.
SC2 hwaiting
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Canada8991 Posts
Yey not that bad, I am looking forward to see them stream.
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I dont think proleague is going back to bw, the big name pros are making way too much money from streaming. I doubt they'd want to rejoin proteams again and live in a team house environment (with strict rules and all).
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I dunno if they're making that much money. And remember PL was an advantage for those that wouldn't be getting mad streamer dosh.
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Ares[Effort]
DEMACIA6550 Posts
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Yeah but BeSt and FlaSh are pretty damn notable players.
Rather than the top players, I think the middle of the road players - the very same ones the loss of ProLeague in SC2 will hurt, will earn dramatically less through streaming.
Whether the very top players want to participate is an interesting question. But the players that simply won't make that much? They'd benefit massively.
Edit: I was mistaking BeSt for another player. I'll settle for an ambiguous "many".
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On October 19 2016 15:58 TT1 wrote:
I dont think proleague is going back to bw, the big name pros are making way too much money from streaming. I doubt they'd want to rejoin proteams again and live in a team house environment (with strict rules and all).
not sure where the viewers will come from if there is no public events for the audience.
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On October 19 2016 14:34 GamerLife wrote:Show nested quote +On October 19 2016 12:51 RevTiberius wrote:
I'm gonna say something really deep now... The time of RTS is over... the genre was at it's peak - together with turn-based strategy games like Civilization - in the early 1990s when computers didn't have the processing power to make games like Counter Strike / Doom / Halo possible... Were you trying for sarcasm? Because Half-Life was realeased same year as Starcraft, Doom was realeased 4-5 years before starcraft, and Halo is only 3 years younger than Starcraft. Heck even Quake & sequel was out when Starcraft launched.
and civ 6 is coming out soon looking quite popular and good :O
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This really sucks, I haven't been watching SC2 religiously the way I did until the end of HOTS but I always made time to watch Proleague. Glad to see JinAir will continue to support their team and hopefully a new league will rise to take Proleague's place. Kespa did well in some regards and horribly in others in managing the league. LOTV is partially to blame, the swarmhost started making SC2 less fun to watch and then the fixes they put in place to get rid of the swarmhost and later the LOTV units have just made the game slightly less fun to watch than it used to be. Honestly, if they tweaked balance a bit i'd happily return to watching WOL if there were major tournaments. The match fixing wasn't the thing that killed SC2, although it certainly didn't help (and I still think it was far more widespread in PL than the players who were convicted at the time, after the scandal broke the fixing seemed to stop), at the end of the day it was LOTV failing to make the game better and more watchable.
I'm also somewhat surprised by how cheap it was to subscribe to Proleague, I don't know what percentage of their revenue came from subscription as opposed to advertising but the $4.99 per month I was paying felt far too low when I was getting multiple nights of entertainment per week, especially during the HOTS seasons when I think it was at its peak (I think Code S was at its peak earlier around the end of WOL). That said maybe less people would have subbed if it was something like $9.99 a month, but I don't think it would have halved.
SC1 is still the greatest game of all time, but SC2 at its peak was amazing as well, and it still is my favourite esport to watch by far. I hope the foreign scene continues to get support and who knows maybe there's a billionaire fan out there that will come through and save the day.
I hope Blizzard start working on Starcraft 3 (or another RTS game) and that financial concerns don't prevent them from continuing their RTS legacy.
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On October 18 2016 12:23 ihatevideogames wrote:
So, who are we supossed to blame for this?
And don't tell me 'it's dem casual MOBAtrash killing our rtsers!', that ain't true, most people who wanted to move to mobas already did so a long time ago.
In my opinion, the drop in viewrship directly correlates with how fun the actual game is to play.
I could never seem to get bored of hots games and even old wol games (started sc2 late due to bad bnet 2.0). But lotv is overall so boring and has so many bad/boring units. My favorite new unit is probably the disruptor, and it has multiple issues...
In 2014/2015 and even early 2016 id often probably watch about 15-30 hours a week of hots, now I don't even watch close to 15 hours per month of lotv... In fact this month I have definitely watched more war3 and even broodwar than lotv.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/4Ui70sx.png)
