by stuchiu

The clock is ticking. Not just to the end of 2013, but to annihilation.

Throughout a long and hectic year where HotS and WCS re-ordered the entire scene, and many of our favorite teams and players were swept away on waves of retirement, one overarching thread has gone largely unnoticed: Korea has won every single Premier event in 2013. Each and every one of the MLG, DreamHack, ASUS ROG, HomeStory, IEM and WCS trophies have been taken by players hailing from the Mecca of competitive StarCraft.

Korea only needs to take four more events to close out the year with a perfect all-kill on the rest of the world: Dreamhack Winter, IEM Singapore, WCG, and ASUS ROG NorthCon. Three of those events will happen this weekend, and NorthCon just the week after that. Given the track record of foreigners in 2013, it is a very real possibility that 2013 will become the single worst year for foreigners in the history of SC2.

Yes, there have been some notable performances and close calls. Stephano got to the finals of WCS Europe Season One. Naniwa came within just a single map of defeating Leenock to win DreamHack Stockholm, and also ran through a gauntlet of Koreans to reach the finals of IEM New York. When Scarlett was on her game she looked every bit like a top Korean pro, reaching the semifinals of WCS America and giving WCS champion sOs a run for his money at Red Bull NYC. Even outside the holy trinity of foreigners, others like Snute, Grubby, TLO and Goswser showed they could get hot and make deep runs.

While those are results worthy of respect and admiration, it doesn’t change the fact that they failed to go all the way. For better or for worse we measure everything with championships, and the distance between first and second is even wider than the distance between second and last (ask Jaedong about it). There's no doubt that foreigners taking second gives us hope. But it gives us no satisfaction.

How did this happen? How did this quiet armageddon sneak up on us? No one disputes that the Koreans are the best players in the world, having had deeper roots and a superior infrastructure from the very start of StarCraft 2. But even with its inherent disadvantages, the foreigner scene always had heroes that could stand up to the Koreans and leave them bloodied. 2011 saw players like ThorZaIN, HuK, and even IdrA take points for the West, while Stephano was the standard-bearer of the foreigner cause for all of 2012.

Compared to that, 2013 has been a massacre. Some will point to the fact that the Korean scene got a huge influx of players from the KeSPA switch. While most players from the association failed to live up to elephant-sized expectations, players like INnoVation, sOs, and Soulkey have shown themselves to be world-beaters. Then there's Stephano's retirement to consider. As painful as it might be to admit, a disproportionate amount of foreigner hope had come to rest on his narrow shoulders. On top of that, Koreans just seem to be more interested in taking Euros and dollars. Even with a decrease in paid flights and invitations, more and more Koreans have worked their way to major international tournaments by any means necessary. Whatever the reasons behind it, the situation has never been more grim.

By December 7th, we will know the results of those final four internationals. On December 8th, GSL director Mr. Chae will dress in black tie finery and host the grand finals of the Hot6ix Cup, the final Korean tournament to close the year.

Depending on what happens during those last four minutes until midnight, Mr. Chae might greet the returning Koreans and congratulate them on their finest year yet. He might hand the champion his trophy and tell him he is the best in Korea, and thus truly the best in the world. As he checks the stream numbers, NaNiwa and Scarlett might cross his mind for a moment, before he laughs and wonders why he even thought for a split second that they deserved to be there.

Or, he might look out on the luminaries gathered—all the best Korean progamers, coaches, and teams—and know that for all their success, they are still just one part of a larger world.

Writers: stuchiu.
Graphics & Photos: shiroiusagi, Silverfire.
Editor: Waxangel.