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readmore.de took Ben 'Mr. Bitter' Nichol aside at the Battle.net Invitational 2011 to ask him questions about his move to Cologne and the game in general.
Here's a snippet:
Regarding growth, do you still see Korea as being the place everyone looks up to as they did in Broodwar?
The Korean players are still the best, that has been undoubtedly proven. The StarCraft 2 business model has been more successful outside Korea in my opinion. You're seeing unprecedented growth in America and in Europe it's already an amazing scene that is about to boom again. It's a tough question...what I really think we're going to see is a migration of Korean players into the Western scene and StarCraft 2 will become a global thing instead of something where everyone has to be in Seoul or in Cologne.
So you're not afraid of tournaments becoming boring because of first places being occupied solely by Koreans? We have seen a glimpse of that in recent weeks.
I'm terrified of this possibility because it would make the spectator's experience stale in my opinion. There's nothign I can do about that, foreign players have to step up and bring their gameplay to the next level. The first part of that is starting to happen with Korean players moving to foreign teams, and in the team houses the work ethic really starts to rub off if they stay there together. That's going to happen eventually, Puma joined up with EG and I assume he's going to be in their house at some point. EG is a great example because it's a group of premier top level players who haven't been performing for a long time. I hope that this Korean influx is going to motivate foreign players, I worry that it might not. Time will tell, that really is the next big test.
Read the full interview at readmore international.
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Foreign players hwaiting! Hopefully the new competition will spur people on to heights of super awesomeness XD
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Absolutely agree with everything he said. I think one of the reasons why SC2 is so appealing is the idea that foreigners are not hopelessly inferior to the Koreans on the competitive scene. If the Koreans pull far ahead again it'll just make foreign pro players look less legitimate.
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Its nothing that hasn't already been said by many others. No one wants another SCBW skill gap.
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I agree
it's up to NA/EU players to up their skill level to that of Koreans and help keep growing the Western SC2 scene
if Korean domination is maintained, then growth will eventually stagnate and begin to decrease as the divide becomes too apparent
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I pray we don't end up in the same state as WC3 (a couple of top foreigners and the rest Asians)
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it's not about being a korean or not, it's all about the amount of time the foreinger players willing to sacrifice to practice. In korea and asian cultures in general, gaming is still not as accepted as in the western but it still has much stronger gaming teams and players. It's is because these players are willing to play at a professional level, they are willing to risk their future, some may even oppose their parents and friends to play starcraft 2. The foreingers must step up their attitude toward esport or else, they will never catch up. Even some lower level players in korea are more hardworking than most of the top foreginer i know.
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On August 07 2011 00:55 Cadgers wrote:
I pray we don't end up in the same state as WC3 (a couple of top foreigners and the rest Asians)
Consider it is lucky, because with this pace, there will be now foreingers at all, sc2 is still new and korean are already dominating sc2 scene.
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Maybe it's not only the players which are lacking, but also the teams.
Not many foreign teams can provide their players with the excellend practise conditions that are in Korea (team house and dedicated coach).
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On August 07 2011 00:59 brachester wrote:Show nested quote +On August 07 2011 00:55 Cadgers wrote:
I pray we don't end up in the same state as WC3 (a couple of top foreigners and the rest Asians) Consider it is lucky, because with this pace, there will be now foreingers at all, sc2 is still new and korean are already dominating sc2 scene.
sc2 is still new
You know, when America was new, the British were dominating.
What is true now, at this very moment, is not necessarily true in 10 years. That applies to everything.
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thats what i always say.....
its simple math.....12-14 practice mostly everyday is simple a bigger number than 4-8 hours very unfrequently....it just pays off....(ofc stupid mass gaming doesnt help, please keep in mind i include the professional practice atmosphere in korean teamhouses here)
the foreigners need teams that act more strict to practice...there are some teams that have contracts which include some hours they must play per day/week ....but thats just a joke because its not that much...if they really want to compete with the best, they need to train like the best and stop slacking...
there are really horrible examples how too less practice brings you down. like tyler for example which always excuses his slumps with things like "i didnt practice enough" "i should practice more"...but most of the time he just keeps excusing instead of starting to practice a lot ^^ (ofc he is really excused in some way way (marriage and stuff) )
thats why naniwa fits so perfect into the korean scene. hes a workaholic at starcraft and he will defenitly use his time in korea to get maximum results in terms of skill
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Can we just get a banner or something at the top of the website that says "yes, practising more makes you better" and have done with it?.. circular discussion every day on this very topic.
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On August 07 2011 01:04 Chargelot wrote:Show nested quote +On August 07 2011 00:59 brachester wrote:On August 07 2011 00:55 Cadgers wrote:
I pray we don't end up in the same state as WC3 (a couple of top foreigners and the rest Asians) Consider it is lucky, because with this pace, there will be now foreingers at all, sc2 is still new and korean are already dominating sc2 scene. You know, when America was new, the British were dominating. What is true now, at this very moment, is not necessarily true in 10 years. That applies to everything.
Your analogy doesn't apply to this case.. Just like BW, if Korean dominate for too long, most foreigners will just stop playing and fans will decrease outside of Korea.
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On August 07 2011 01:00 JustPassingBy wrote:
Maybe it's not only the players which are lacking, but also the teams.
Not many foreign teams can provide their players with the excellend practise conditions that are in Korea (team house and dedicated coach).
New Star HoSeo their practice house is a room in their school yet they somehow are the first on the team league.
You don't need that much as people like to claim it seems.
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It's just hard for foreigners to keep up with Korea. Even if few foreigners practice a lot (naniwa, thorzain, select) the player pool is just worse in Europe and Us than Korea, that's the main reason why I think foreigners won't be able to compete.
In like 2 years 90% of the players will probably be Koreans. Every NA/EU tournament/clanwar/team will just be tons of Koreans, that's how it was in WC3. We already seeing the trend towards this and it's going much faster than Wc3 started moving towards this trend.
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On August 07 2011 00:50 Jacko11 wrote:
Its nothing that hasn't already been said by many others. No one wants another SCBW skill gap.
This. Voiced by so many others so many times.
Commentator mentions it in part of an interview? Topicworthy.
It really is implied knowledge. We know the koreans are better, we know foreign players have to improve.
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O rly? I thought they were fine with getting raped every event. I'm sure most foreigners don't practice 11hrs/day 6days/week as most of the koreans.
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It's all about the time you put into the game.
If you're a foreigner and only play a few hours per day you probably don't deserve to be at the top.
As a spectator I don't care about the nationality of a player, I only care about seeing the best players of the world.
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On August 07 2011 01:04 Chargelot wrote:Show nested quote +On August 07 2011 00:59 brachester wrote:On August 07 2011 00:55 Cadgers wrote:
I pray we don't end up in the same state as WC3 (a couple of top foreigners and the rest Asians) Consider it is lucky, because with this pace, there will be now foreingers at all, sc2 is still new and korean are already dominating sc2 scene. You know, when America was new, the British were dominating. What is true now, at this very moment, is not necessarily true in 10 years. That applies to everything.
This doesn't make any sense.
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old news..
seriously its no secret foreigners need to step up their game. I think they are making a decent attempt at doing so too, moving into prohouses, moving to korea, playing on kr server etc.
we'll see in the coming months how big the skill gap truly is
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EPT
