I don't know how many out there have been watching the MLG SC2 tournament in Raleigh at the moment or got a chance to catch a few games but for those of you who did (and I guess those of you who did not as well) I just want the point out the difference between the two casting teams. The casters are of course Day9 with JP an Husky with HD.
I have to admit that in the early stages of beta I was an HD/Husky fan. The game was new and they were able to put up a ton of replays early on as well as organize the HDH tournament which was a blast to follow and they did a wonderful job showcasing the game before I got hold of a beta key and I know that many people can appreciate their early coverage of them game because they certainly did a good job. However, as the game has progressed I feel that they have failed to keep up with their quality of commentary when compared to the rest of the communities commentators despite their huge following on youtube and this tournament has further reinforced my current feelings toward them that they are undeserving of the attention. While I do like them as people and personality wise and am grateful that they gave a nice jump-start in the beginning I do not believe that they are (or have been the last month or so) living up to the name that they have in the community. Day9 is an amazing caster. He has awesome knowledge of the game and is also very entertaining and knows very well how to provide great commentary and I would say that he is definitely one of my more favorite commentators. He has done a lot of work recently from the SoCal Lan 5 (which I got to see in person :D), the Razer King of the Beta Tournament and launch party, Intel Extreme Masters tournament in Germany, and of course his Day9 Daily and he has been doing a wonderful job at all these events. He has been doing excellent work and deserves much respect and is probably one of the best english speaking commentators out there for SC2 at the moment. That being said while Husky and HD are being compared to one the best casters in the community it just goes to show how poor of commentaries they are providing. They make very few interesting points due to what seems to be a lacking of knowledge, make quite a few errors, and overall put together poor commentaries in my opinion which lack much color.
While this thread is pointing some negative attention towards HD and Husky I just want to say that so far the tournament has been going very well and everyone involved have been doing a great job. That includes the commentary provided by HD and Husky, the point I am trying to make is that the level of Day9 and JP's commentary is much higher than theirs (and I believe that there are many commentators out there who I would say would be doing a better job in their place).
That all is of course just my opinion. What do you think?
HD is awful. He has a good quality stream but with MLG that is null. He doesn't know what is going on, can't predict the games, can't predict strategy, doesn't understand matchups very much, and misses everything that is important
Husky is better, but lets HD spout his nonsense and it makes him seem worse. Husky also misses important things that are going on, but knows more.
But yes, HD is just....oh god. At least he doesn't talk about "chrono boosting his probes for the economy" as if its revolutionary anymore. Like, really, chrono boosting probes for economy? I thought it was for a fucking probe rush, chrono is such a proskill and you never see it
but on the other hand Husky and HD have been really busy since the beta ended. They are not as good as Day9 but other than Tastless who really is. Who doesnt love Day's voice on air lol. Also its their first lan event, they are probably fighting the nerves and what not.. i know if i was casting matches in the same event as day9 i would shat my pants.
Husky and HD just need more time and practice under their belt. Pointing out some of their faults along with pointing out some good parts is healthly also in my opinion.
With time if they keep at it im sure they will mature into really great casters. You gotta love the passion and heart they put into it aswell. And that can be said for alot of people in the community. Is it always going to be top notch like the Plott brothers.. no.. but give it time and great things will continue to happen.
SC community is pretty much the greatest group of people... ever.
Im a big fan of all 4 of them, but lately HD hasnt been impressing me, in his videos i find he says the same thing over and over and just tries to use large vocabulary, and sometimes doesnt even make sense, im finding it kinda annoying. Husky i love to watch just for his humourous commentaries, and when i want to watch a good casted game i just watch day9.
that being said i still think they all do a great job, day9 is just naturally leagues ahead, but i mean... its day9..c'mon. i think husky is doing just fine but i honestly think HD needs to pick up his game a little bit and stop using his analogies (he once recently referred to a ZvP as the cold war i think), and large vocabularies that sometimes dont make sense in context, and stop repeating himself. (eg. and the red zerg spawning here under the player name dimaga, gonna spawning here, as the red zerg.) - that sounds a bit exagerated but he really does often do that lol.
It's their 1st LAN event and they need to set up a flow between each other. At the beginning of the event they were pretty bad but they clicked right at the end at the cast were really good.
MLG took HD and Husky for their fanbase. I followed pro broodwar for a year or two before SC2 came out and I was a fan of some of the commentators from the violetak account like Diggity, Rise, Cholera (that's it) who were a lot easier to listen to I think than HD and Husky. HD and Husky are relatively new but when they came on the scene they just poured out tons and tons of commentaries, and around this same time is when there was a drought and also a higher demand.
The commentators I mentioned above lost the wind from their sails or something. I remember they asked for donations to keep commentating, and that's when their commentating stopped. It was the worst timing probably, because that's where interest in commentated games rocketted up and HD and Husky started becoming popular. It's too bad the other commentators took a break right at that timing and haven't been as big on SC2, we could have been listening to better quality commentators on MLG. I know diggity has done stuff since, and rise has been around, but their drought was at bad timing like I said, it's too bad.
At least day9 has improved a lot as a commentator. That chill vs combat ex grudge match commentary he did was a little too angsty for me lol. Husky and HD did seem to get a lot more comfortable tonight as time went on so gonna give props to them for that. Early on Husky's voice was annoyingly anxious but it got a little easier to listen to as he calmed down. For real though, HD forces awkard wording, and mixes up unit names in the worst way, and Husky's excitement level goes to the extreme and he gets all shrill haha. They should really work on that if they want to appeal to a wider audience. Any potential fans looking over at this new SC2 tab on MLG would be like "... nerds" just sayin.
HD and Husky are AWFUL commentators, they miss soooo much (for instance, a Mothership). They demonstrate little insightful knowledge of the game seem to just say whatever comes to the top of their heads at any given moment. They seem to be able to hype up action moments (big battles) very well and Husky has an incredible ability to talk at 9342587 words per minute. That's their only strength, though.
Day9 and JP, on the other hand, are literally flawless. They have an amazing rapport, fantastic insight and playbyplay and never miss a thing. Furthermore, their on camera behavior is absolutely amazing. Day9 acts as if he's been on camera his entire life, casually telling jokes and keeping the conversation going well after lesser men would have wilted. He'd be an amazing news anchor and an even better talkshow host in another life, I just wish they'd give him more time at this event.
I've always been a large fan of Huskies because of the humor he infuses. Even tonight had me laugh a few times. HD on the other hand is a good caster, but I think he needs more experience with the different MU's. Sometimes I just facepalm at a predicted tech-path when one is way more obvious. That's about my only gripe, however. As far as missing things I think everyone can improve there--I mean it is really difficult to truly see and especially commentate on everything that is going on.
Also as well I feel like trying to explain some reasons why someone lost just didn't make sense. Like the gretorp vs silver game 1. I didn't agree with his assessment that the hellions were the cause, it was definitely the banshee and lack of viking micro easily. Still I cut slack because they are under pressure and it is hard to call that stuff on the fly when you are thinking of other things too.
Either way--I really enjoyed all 4 casters and I will probably still watch all ther stuff until they decide to stop doing it
Give them a chance, IMO. The first LAN event is probably very stressful not to mention they had to deal with the stress of creating games and not being sure of what to do.
But i do agree it was a times grimacing to watch them both stare at the computer screen never to look at the camera for more than half a second. jeez I remember seeing more of the top of husky's head than anything, so it was very uncomfortable to watch at first. As the night went on they were improving. keep it up guys, no doubt will you learn to pros soon
Conversely, MAD props to Day9 and JP! You too are perhaps the best commentating team ive ever seen!
I'm not going to try to look for flaws with any of the current casters. I think they all did a really good job and made the games exponentially more enjoyable.
I strongly disagree with the OP. While Husky and HD do miss a few things, they are MUCH more entertaining than day[9] and JP. D9/JP are also great for their accurate analysis of the game. Imo, all of these Day [9] fanboys QQing about him not being all the time is just rude.
On August 28 2010 13:40 Rah wrote: At least day9 has improved a lot as a commentator. That chill vs combat ex grudge match commentary he did was a little too angsty for me lol.
You know that whole match and cast was a big joke for Day and Chill right? As in Day9 has said many times that he went totally over the top for that show just because the whole thing was supposed to be a spectacle
EPT
