Heyyo, bunch of outdated stuff below. For SSL8 news, take a look over at this post
I need to find a bigger image
First off, what the hell is SOSPA?
Created by the Afreeca BJ (Broadcasting Jockey) Sonic, SOSPA's original purpose was a sort of a joke/parody of KeSPA. Currently, the main function of SOSPA is providing a ranking of players who participate in Sonic's various events/tournies.
Events? Tournies??
Yep! Sonic organizes and hosts these tournies/events on a regular basis for the SOSPA players. Currently there are five main things he organizes that count toward SOSPA ranking:
- King of the Hill - Self-explanatory. The more you win, the more money you get!
- Sonic All-stars vs Clan/Team/Country/Anything - Basically, Sonic assembles a team of whoever is available vs any team that takes up the challenge. 6v6 All-kill format. Usually there is some amount of Balloons at stake here (like 1k Balloons, which is 100k won)
- BJ Ranking Tourney - Basically a normal tournament, but unsponsored. Smaller prize pool.
- Starleague - A tournament that has a sponsor. Bigger prize pool!
- Event matches - Usually BoX between two players
In addition to those, a SOSPA Proleague is in the works, complete with sponsored teams and salaried players!
My god, where can I watch them?!?!!
Two methods:
[*]Go to afreeca.com and use the web player! It's super easy, just install whatever it wants you to and it should be fine :D
[*]If you have a smartphone or tablet, you can download the free Afreeca app and watch it anywhere through that. There is a guide at the bottom of this post detailing how to use the Android Afreeca Mobile app.
How can I help???
Afreeca streamers make money by cashing in Balloons or Stickers they receive from their viewers. Sonic also runs/manages an online store called "신발팜" (Shoe Farm), and making a purchase through that would also help him. Unfortunately, I believe this is out of the question for most people
So, the best way to show your support to Sonic and other BW Broadcasters is to watch their stream and "Recommend" (give 추천) it (explained in the Afreeca Mobile section below). It'll boost the BJ's ranking, and to more exposure.
So yea, that's the gist of SOSPA!! Now .. onto some news of some recent things
October SOSPA Starcraft BJ Ranking
+ Show Spoiler [previous ranking] +
September SOSPA Starcraft BJ Ranking
Source
7th SonicTV Starleague
A few details:
- 1st Place:
3mil Won4mil Won!!
2nd Place: 2mil Won
3rd Place: 1mil Won - Starts at Ro32 will be an offline Dual tournament (each match Bo3, split over 2 days), Ro16 onward will be BoX held in an offline setting at Sonic's office/studio.
- Ro32 Maps:
1. Neo Jade
2. Neo Electric Circuit
3. Fighting Spirit
Ro16 Maps:
4. Wind and Cloud (one of the new maps by Rose.Of.Dream)
5. New Sniper Ridge
It's gonna start sometime soon, so please be patient!
Source - Ro32 groups and schedule of the Starleague
Source - Additional sponsor to the upcoming Starleague, 1st place now gets 4mil Won
Source - prize pool and sponsors, and some money used to fund offline section of SL
Source - Players signed up for Starleague
SOSPA Proleague!
Details
- Eight teams will participate in a month-long teamleague format, culminating w/ the Champion team earning 5mil Won.
- Each team is set to have 5 players, each having a small salary. Coaches and practice partners are also supposed to be part of this
- The format is Winners League All-kill style.
- 99% sure that this Starleague will use the new maps by Rose.Of.Dream.
- The drafting process isn't complete yet, but here are the teams so far:
-PC Family: Hiya(T), Mong(T), beast(Z), Perfectman(P), By.Sw(P)
-노친네팀 (Old Man's Team??): Terror(Z), Cola(Z), 김희경(P)(Female player!), 노친네(Z), 최민수(P)
-물건 Farm (stuff farm?) : Minho(Z), Pusan(P), minus)eagle(P), Mahell(Z), 프발(P)
-iStarPC Mall: Sexy(T), Force[name](Z), Shinee(T), LYH(P), Ample(T)
-Shoe Farm: Killer(Z), 정태훈(P), Icarus(T), Larva(Z), minus)zelot(Z)
-대치동 1014 Team: Sky(p), koala(T), hint(TBD), Minus)Cookie(T), AsiaSin[ScM](T)
-이재경 Brand Team: Saber(Z), NtO'Smile(T), Always(T), Soma[Kal](Z), StarCue(Z)
-Apple File: (Empty)
Source - most up-to-date team/roster, details about the league and prize money
Source - initial announcement of the teams, sponsors, details
Source - SOSPA Proleague happening for sure
Source - the teams and their sponsors
Some other things ..
Pretty graphics! Same guy who worked on the graphics for the following leagues:
- Korean Air ONGAMENET Starleague 2010 Dual Tournament
- MBC GAME Hana-Daetoo MSL 2010
- MBC GAME ABCMart MSL 2011
- SK Planet Pro League Season1 2011
Recent/other stuff
- Sonic All-stars vs jat clan I heard was pretty good, ending with Killer beasting it up at the end. I haven't seen it yet, but I think it should be shown on the rerun
- Killer won the most recent (9th) Ranking Tourney against .. some terran in a very close series 4-3.
- A SOSPA website is supposed to go up sometime in the future. Not sure of the details.
- Sonic sometimes does fun/random shit instead of broadcasting leagues. Most recently, he broadcasted him playing while Mong "coached" him (i.e. cussing at him a lot lolol)[
- I would like to note that, a lot of these things are personally funded by Sonic himself. He is the owner/manager of a fairly successfuly online store called 신발팜 (Shoe Farm) and he uses the profits to help fund a lot of these things. Sonic really does love Broodwar
For those of you who can read/comprehend Korean, you can visit Sonic's Afreeca page for his announcements. It'll be better than relying on my shoddy summarizations of these things heh
Many thanks to my friend John who really helped me out with this! Couldn't have done this without you
A small guide to Afreeca
How to register an Afreeca account:
- + Show Spoiler +
- Go to http://www.afreeca.com/ and click on register (as indicated by the red box)
- Click on the right-most blue icon, which is the foreign registration
- Fill out all the fields.
- Check the box and finish up
How to Afreeca - a small guide to the web player
- 1. Launching the web player:
+ Show Spoiler +
First off, go to the website afreeca.com. Making an account is recommended, but not necessary. Click on the circle highlighted to launch the web player.
If this is your first time, say yes to downloading the program/plugin. During the installation, you can uncheck everything since spam is bad.
If this is your first time, say yes to downloading the program/plugin. During the installation, you can uncheck everything since spam is bad.
2. The web player itself: An explanation
+ Show Spoiler +
The image should be self-explanatory
You can customize it by clicking on the top rightmost button, which I forgot to highlight. That, in itself, should be self-explanatory too.
You can customize it by clicking on the top rightmost button, which I forgot to highlight. That, in itself, should be self-explanatory too.
3a. Finding a game to watch: Category Method
+ Show Spoiler +
First, click on the highlighted button, 게임.
Once selected, it should roll down even more options. You want to click on the one I have highlighted, 스타.
And there we go, all the Starcraft streams.
Once selected, it should roll down even more options. You want to click on the one I have highlighted, 스타.
And there we go, all the Starcraft streams.
3b. Finding a game to watch: Search Method.
+ Show Spoiler +
Find the search bar, highlighted in the picture.
With this method, you can be more specific with your search. Type in whatever. In this case, I plugged in Sonic's Afreeca ID "sogoodtt". Some other popular streams are "h78rt" (Killer) "aiseiteru99" (Hiya) "cksgmldbs" (Mong), etc etc.
If you typed it in correctly and they're online, you should get a result like this. Notice how of the 3 results, there's one w/ a different view count. That's a "Relay Room", which is created when a broadcaster's room is full. You can use this search method to find a broadcaster's relay room when their main room is full.
With this method, you can be more specific with your search. Type in whatever. In this case, I plugged in Sonic's Afreeca ID "sogoodtt". Some other popular streams are "h78rt" (Killer) "aiseiteru99" (Hiya) "cksgmldbs" (Mong), etc etc.
If you typed it in correctly and they're online, you should get a result like this. Notice how of the 3 results, there's one w/ a different view count. That's a "Relay Room", which is created when a broadcaster's room is full. You can use this search method to find a broadcaster's relay room when their main room is full.
4. Watching the Broadcast - Options
+ Show Spoiler +
So you wanna watch the broadcast, but you don't know what to click. There are three different things you can click
Clicking on the image to the left will initiate the broadcast. Once you click on it, the Broadcast window should go black and start loading. Ads need to load before you can watch a stream, and it can take a looooooooooong time to load. Make sure you have ad-block turned off.
The two buttons highlighted on the bottom do two different things. The left button will take you to the BJ's home page. The right button will give you 3 more options:
-Top button is "Pop-up" which spawns another Afreeca player, with less options.
-Second button is PIP, which spawns another broadcast within the broadcast you are already watching. Broadcastception
-Third button is "Mini-Mode", which is pretty much the same thing as the pop-up player ..
Clicking on the image to the left will initiate the broadcast. Once you click on it, the Broadcast window should go black and start loading. Ads need to load before you can watch a stream, and it can take a looooooooooong time to load. Make sure you have ad-block turned off.
The two buttons highlighted on the bottom do two different things. The left button will take you to the BJ's home page. The right button will give you 3 more options:
-Top button is "Pop-up" which spawns another Afreeca player, with less options.
-Second button is PIP, which spawns another broadcast within the broadcast you are already watching. Broadcastception
-Third button is "Mini-Mode", which is pretty much the same thing as the pop-up player ..
5. The Broadcast itself - Supporting the Broadcaster via "Recommend"
+ Show Spoiler +
I feel this particular tidbit deserves a section by itself, because this is the best way one can support.
The "Recommend" button is the one highlighted in the picture. You can give it to each BJ once a day. If your popup blocker is off, then it will pop up a window giving you the option to post on the broadcaster's msg board (you can't anyways lol).
Doing this on a regular basis will increase the broadcaster's ranking, and exposure. If you want to support, but don't have money to give, this is the best way to do it.
The "Recommend" button is the one highlighted in the picture. You can give it to each BJ once a day. If your popup blocker is off, then it will pop up a window giving you the option to post on the broadcaster's msg board (you can't anyways lol).
Doing this on a regular basis will increase the broadcaster's ranking, and exposure. If you want to support, but don't have money to give, this is the best way to do it.
6. The Broadcast itself - stuff explained
+ Show Spoiler +
There are numbers top-left of each thing that I will explain
1 - Logout
2 - Toggles chat box on and off
3 - Toggles Broadcast list on and off
4 - Title of the broadcast
5 - BJ's Afreeca ID
6 - Information about the Broadcast, comes up if you move your mouse over the stream. In the order, its:
-Views by PC, Mobile, Relay Room, and total viewers that watched since it started.
-Then it the 2000k is the quality.
-Then it shows the resolution of the Broadcast.
-And finally, it shows which date the broadcast was started, and for how long it's been running
7 - Aspect ratio options
8 - Stop player
9 - Sound Control
10 - Give Balloons (money required)
11 - Give Stickers (Money required)
12 - Give Recommend (Boosts ranking, no money required)
13 - Add to bookmarks/favorites
14 - Previously seen Broadcast history
15 - Users who are viewer, sorted by ID and then their nickname
16 - Chat room
17 - chat box
1 - Logout
2 - Toggles chat box on and off
3 - Toggles Broadcast list on and off
4 - Title of the broadcast
5 - BJ's Afreeca ID
6 - Information about the Broadcast, comes up if you move your mouse over the stream. In the order, its:
-Views by PC, Mobile, Relay Room, and total viewers that watched since it started.
-Then it the 2000k is the quality.
-Then it shows the resolution of the Broadcast.
-And finally, it shows which date the broadcast was started, and for how long it's been running
7 - Aspect ratio options
8 - Stop player
9 - Sound Control
10 - Give Balloons (money required)
11 - Give Stickers (Money required)
12 - Give Recommend (Boosts ranking, no money required)
13 - Add to bookmarks/favorites
14 - Previously seen Broadcast history
15 - Users who are viewer, sorted by ID and then their nickname
16 - Chat room
17 - chat box
7. Managing the Bookmarks
+ Show Spoiler +
On the "Broadcast List" box, you notice there's a second tab "즐겨찾기" That's your bookmarks/favorites list
It'll show all your favorites that are online, and the offline ones too. The button by the Refresh button top right, "목록편집" will toggle the ability to delete streams from your favorites. To delete, click on the grey circle w/ an x in it on the top right of the stream preview image.
It'll show all your favorites that are online, and the offline ones too. The button by the Refresh button top right, "목록편집" will toggle the ability to delete streams from your favorites. To delete, click on the grey circle w/ an x in it on the top right of the stream preview image.
8. A few things to note
+ Show Spoiler +
Afreeca is a P2P based connection system, instead of a server-based. The more viewers there are, the more chatting there's going on, the further away you are from Korea, the laggier your stream is gonna be. Unless you have a fucken boss internet, lag will be unavoidable w/ the more popular streams.
Prime time Afreeca is night-late night at Korea. There are some BJs who leave a restream on 24/7 or play/stream at weird hours, but most of them don't stream until that time.
If you wanna chat and stuff, you have to verify yourself by sending an ID to Afreeca. I haven't bothered doing this myself, so I don't know all the details
Prime time Afreeca is night-late night at Korea. There are some BJs who leave a restream on 24/7 or play/stream at weird hours, but most of them don't stream until that time.
If you wanna chat and stuff, you have to verify yourself by sending an ID to Afreeca. I haven't bothered doing this myself, so I don't know all the details
How to use Android Mobile Afreeca:
- The first page:
+ Show Spoiler +This is what you should see when you first launch it. The icon on the left is for Broadcasting, and the icon on the right is for watching Broadcasts. For the purposes of this guy, just select the right one.
This is the page you should see next, - Logging in:
+ Show Spoiler +To login, select the top right icon, translated to "More".
Select the "Log in" icon on the left
Enter in your ID/Password, and you should be good
If you logged in successfully, you should see this page - Setting options
+ Show Spoiler +Get to the "More" page, and select the "Options" icon
Here is the Options page translated/summarized. Do as you wish
Here is the translation for the Broadcast Organization preferences - Finding a Broadcast to watch:
-Category method:
+ Show Spoiler +Select the "Category" icon
Select "Game"
Look through broadcasts
-Search method:
+ Show Spoiler +Select the "Search" icon
Type in 스타 (press the symbols ㅅㅡㅌㅏ in that order) to show you all the online Starcraft streams
You can also type the broadcaster's ID specifically. For instance, Sonic's is sogoodtt, while Mong's is cksgmldbs - Broadcast Features
+ Show Spoiler +- Broadcast title
- Viewer number
- Orientation lock
- Aspect ratio (I like 4:3 better)
- Recommend (boosts ranking)
- Give Balloons (you buy them, broadcaster cashes it in)
- Give Stickers (same as balloons
- Give Balloons I think
- Chat
- Bookmark
- Recent Broadcasts history
- Broadcaster nickname (changeable)
- Broadcaster ID
- I think this is sharing not sure
- Sound
- Broadcast title
- Managing Bookmarks
+ Show Spoiler +Click on the Bookmarks icon
The broadcasts you've bookmarked are here. You can watch them, delete them, or change the notification settings
To delete, long press the broadcast and select the second option (sorry no image as of now)
All bookmarked broadcasts are set to notify when they go online by default. To change, select the "Notification Settings" icon.