![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/92GyV.jpg)
Today on Tuesday May 15, 2012 I am very proud and incredibly happy to announce the re-birth of ROOT Gaming.
I have been reading all of the threads about the news of drew and I departing from compLexity and I was moved by the amount of comments hoping that ROOT would come back, so we decided not to wait a second longer.
I can't think of a better way to do this than with an interview, so here we go!
MeanCatZ: I am not great at interviews so my questions will be sort of raw and perhaps uncomfortable for you to answer. ROOT Gaming huh?, that name was tabu for a while, sort of like Voldemort, I must admit it was my favorite team at one point, but... why now?
ROOTCatZ: + Show Spoiler +
Well i'll be completely honest, I never wanted to disband ROOT in the first place but the circumstances before didn't really make it easy for us to stick around, I feel like now we're a bit more comfortable financially and have gained a lot of experience to make it work, why now now? well because we couldn't wait any longer.
MeanCatZ: Is this something that you, drewbie and the rest of the guys have been planning for a while or is it a last minute kind of thing?
ROOTCatZ: + Show Spoiler +
we have a ROOT Gaming chat on skype, for a few months now, we've been talking about this day and making plans to re launch for a long while, figuring out the logistics and making plans to make this team unique and successful in the eSports scene, we all missed ROOT so much. We couldn't really talk or hint about this any what sooner though, as we were under contract to a team (compLexity) that has been great to us and we have great respect for, so we had to wait until our contract was over, at least we owed them that much, shoutout to them for being awesome.
MeanCatz: that's cool, I see you guys got a new logo too, it looks sick.. did you design it?
ROOTCatZ:+ Show Spoiler +
ITS AWESOME isnt it?! I wish I had drawn that, but no, the mascot was drawn by Alex Tingey (@highboo69420BBQ on twitter), an extremely talented artist, based on the original design. Alex devoted many hours consulting me and making drafts of potential mascots, when we found 'the one' we tweaked it a bunch and came up with this final product. Later on I added the typography, the shield and the rest of the logo to compliment it. I first saw Alex's art on reddit, drawing of a stalker getting chased by marines, I fall in love with his style of drawing and thought to myself, this guy could do a better job than I could, so I stalked him a bit and he was kind enough to not just help us out in this process but also he was excited while doing this, without asking for anything in return. please tweet at him and thank him on behalf of ROOT!
MeanCatZ: Nice. So a bit of an uncomfortable question, ROOT 'failed' once before, what has changed this time around that makes you think it'll work this time around?
ROOTCatZ: + Show Spoiler +
thank you for asking that, last time we held together for a year+ thanks to the community we had behind us. We came close to getting PokerStars as our main sponsor but then it went down in the US, and with that, our last hope went down the drain, it just didn't make much sense financially and despite us all loving the team we couldn't really afford to live off of the game we love while staying and devoting time to ROOT. Now we're in a much better place, and we're doing things more calmly, now we realize we can't do this on our own, we realize we need help of more experienced people. The logo is an example of that, I am a very proud person and my ego isnt exactly small I mean, im interviewing myself... but drewbie and I now realize we need help of people who can do a better job than us, and so we're seeking it, Alex is a better Artist than I am, period. My close friend Diego Acosta, will be part owner of ROOT , you'll see him on my stream sometimes. Diego's not just a great friend of mine but he's also a business major from a very prestigious school, and so he will be handling the majority of the business side of the team. Hell, even Jason Lake of compLexity was kind enough to offer us free advice if we ever needed it, I know we will, and when we do, we won't be afraid to ask. In that sense we've grown more humble and aware that there's always people who know more, so arrogance and ego will have to be thrown to the side when it comes to the good and success of the team.
MeanCatZ: Cool Speech man LOL, seems like you've thought this through, but if you're trying like you say to 'do everything right' this time around. I don't think announcing a team that doesn't even have an operational website is the best business decision, what do you have to say to that?
ROOTCatZ: + Show Spoiler +
nice... LOL, I don't know how, but I just KNEW you were gonna ask that next. Well, we talked about this a lot, you see ROOT is not a brand new team that's popping out of nowhere, we already have a following, and we owed everything to the sc2 community. You see none of us were really big or famous players when ROOT was created, we were built based on talent and personalities, and it is the community that accepted us and made us their own, made us big and made us who we are today as gamers. ROOT was sort of a team 'of the people for the people' you know? haha. We don't expect to get 5 sponsors in a couple months by any means. But we will need volunteers to help us run the team website for example, moderate our streams, help us with banners, writing articles and become a part of something bigger in eSports doing something that they enjoy. This would be much harder for us to assemble a team such as this from 'the shadows' and we know this.
MeanCatZ: fair enough, now... this isn't the beta anymore man, things have changed arround here, do you think ROOT has what it takes to compete at the highest level of sc2? do you think that you can be appealing as a team for sponsors in this sense?
ROOTCatZ:+ Show Spoiler +
if not now, I think that in the near future, definetly. We built up ROOT based on scouting potential and building it up and it became the best team in NA, so I am confident that our squad is full of potential, I think that if we can't beat the best teams, we'll make sure to try our best to put up a good fight and a hell of a show. As of for sponsors, I think that we can be appealing regardless, as our team now has some popular players with large followings that can provide as much exposure as any team out there, I feel like personality and authenticity won't be an issue at ROOT gaming.
MeanCatZ: when will the site be up?
ROOTCatZ:+ Show Spoiler +
it will be up when its ready dood, hopefully it won't take too long but we want to do everything as best as we can.
MeanCatZ: ok mang, before you tell me your lineup, you wanna give any shoutouts or have any last words?
ROOTCatZ:+ Show Spoiler +
yes, from all of us at ROOT Gaming, thank you for the kind words that I've been reading everywhere, it makes me really happy to see people haven't forgotten about us. Please continue to follow us and support us, ROOT4ROOT!
MeanCatZ: ok, you type too much btw. why don't you go and announce your squad already, not like everyone doesn't know what it is anyways.
+ Show Spoiler +
ROOT Gaming - Starcraft II
-ROOTdrewbie (T)
-ROOTCatZ (Z)
-ROOTKiWiKaKi (P)
-ROOTDestiny (Z)
-ROOTslush (Z)
-ROOTFayth (P)
-ROOTdrewbie (T)
-ROOTCatZ (Z)
-ROOTKiWiKaKi (P)
-ROOTDestiny (Z)
-ROOTslush (Z)
-ROOTFayth (P)
one more time, thank you all for your support, and go like us on facebook, gogo:
http://www.facebook.com/ROOTGaming#
and follow us on twitter: @sc2rootgaming