Hey guys. I’ve been holding off on writing a blog about this for a while. It’s a topic that’s always bothered me for various reasons, but I needed time to investigate various things and solidify my opinions a bit more before talking about it. Since the subject is fresh in everyone’s minds after the section on NASL’s Pulse today (starts at ~2:00:00 http://www.twitch.tv/nasltv/b/363697714 ) I thought it would be a good time to write down my thoughts in it.
Where to start? I suppose we can begin with a comment that was made on the Pulse today.
”LoL is like Walmart and SC2 is like Whole Foods. We’re a bit stuffy...”
Now one could make an argument that this comment refers to the popularity of the two in terms of sheer viewership. The “we’re a bit stuffy” part at the end along with the context of the comment reveals the intent of the statement for what it really is though; a commentary on the quality of the games in question, not their popularity. Walmart is known for being a place to consume cheap, low quality goods while Whole Foods stores have more expensive, higher quality fare. Essentially this is saying that LoL is cheap in quality while SC2 is not. This is simply a thinly veiled insult whether that was the intent or not. A very similar comment was made awhile back that included text to the tune of “LoL is like American Idol and SC2 is like Breaking Bad.” Again, possibly (probably/politically) spun as talking about popularity, but these types of comments at their core are a commentary on quality.
“Wow Doa must be pretty butt-hurt or something about someone knocking LoL” you might think to yourself. This isn’t the case. I’m personally not bothered by it at all. What I’m bothered by is the implications of comments like this in terms of the influence that they have on esports fans individually and as a community. Making comments likes this aren't just an insult to the game. It’s an insult to the game’s players, fans, and commentators. It says that the interest and effort they put into their game isn't worthwhile. In esports we should always try our best to respect each other’s games and statements like this coming from prominent personalities in the industry do the opposite of that. It helps to cultivate a divisive, self destructive culture that we certainly don’t need in esports and frankly can’t afford in an industry so young.
During the NASL segment Frodan was actually “booed” for having casted LoL in the past. While I’m sure this was done in jest, professionals in the industry really need to be careful about the examples they set for the community. It’s not OK to boo someone for liking a game you don’t like. It’s worse do it publicly on a popular talk show. I’m calling on all the professionals in esports to make an effort to really understand their place and understand the examples that they set through their actions. I’m not saying everyone needs to be G-rated and starched and pressed, but there are certain things that simply aren’t up for debate or even conversation on these shows if we want this industry to grow in a healthy manner. Criticising people for the games they are involved in is definitely one of those things. If you’re lucky enough to be listened to by a lot of people you need to remember what Bob Denver (who played Gilligan on GIlligan’s Island) said once:
“It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”
In the end bashing a game someone likes and then mentally high-fiving yourself or a friend about it just comes off as this:
A funny thing I’ve noticed about esports fans is that for some reason it seems to be very difficult for them to acknowledge that it’s OK to like one game and not like a different one while at the same time accepting that people like the game that you don’t. It’s fine to have preferences, but that doesn’t entitle you to impose those preferences on other people. Doing this as a prominent person in one game community or the other is an abuse of power in my mind. It's certainly possible to talk about the virtues of your favorite game without condemning another. Fans should be able to make up their own minds about what they like without any sort of artificial guilt placed on them by figures they may look up to.
Mechanically there is more to do in Starcraft 2 than in LoL. This is a fact and not an opinion. Keep in mind thought that this simply means that your hands are doing more things, not your brain. There is also the common human fallacy that says more = better and less = worse. People like to apply that a lot when they talk about Starcraft and LoL. They’d like to think that doing more mechanically means you’re more talented as a videogame player. Anyone who applied that logic to other sports would be laughed at. You won’t see any LoL players switching to SC2 because they don’t feel “hardcore” enough just like you won’t see Football players switching to Hockey because Hockey players perform on ice with skates and manipulate their game object with a bent stick instead of just their body. Sounds silly, doesn’t it?
I don’t want to get into specifics with SC2 and LoL that much because of the above reasons, but I do briefly talk about the mental aspect of LoL. I think everyone on TL is pretty familiar with the multitude of things that go through a pro player’s mind during a game of SC2, but perhaps not as much from the perspective of a LoL pro player. I’d argue that they’re fairly equal, all things considered. Before you rate my blog a 1 and close the tab, let’s take a moment to examine what a Top Lane player is thinking about during the early stages of a typical pro LoL game. It would go something like the following. Don’t worry if you don’t understand all of the terminology. We’re concerned about volume here.
1) I must last-hit to gain gold 2) How do I farm and harass regarding my opponent’s abilities 3) How do I farm and harass regarding my opponent’s starting items 4) Where is my Jungler? 5) Where on the map is the enemy Jungler likely to be due to the farming and ganking path I expect him to follow? 6) Should I push my lane, freeze it, or farm under my turret? 7) Can I leave my lane to go gank another one? 8) When will a good time be to leave my lane to recall and buy items without putting pressure on my lane and thusly, my teammates because of it? 9) What items should I buy considering the state of the other players in the game and the state of my lane? 10) In what order do I level my skills based on the enemy team composition and the items they buy?
Keep in mind these things are being thought about at the same time and that the list will be very different for each of the 5 positions on the team. This list is also probably pretty incomplete (I’m no pro) and changes as the game goes on. My point in listing all that is that very few people really understand the challenge that games like LoL, Dota, HoN, etc have at the professional level. Add to that list that you’ll be doing all that while coordinating as a cohesive unit with four other people against another cohesive unit that will be playing at your level. Playing solo or with a friend or two even at a very high level is literally a different game than the game the pros play. The MOBA genre is just as challenging at the pro level as the RTS genre. The same goes for any fighting game, FPS, you name it. One's just as good as the other and decisions on what to watch are based on personal preference rather than which is the "better game".
In the end mechanics aren’t actually that important. Pro-gaming is a beautiful thing in any game and any genre. Putting mechanical difficulty first is like saying that the instrument someone plays is more important than the music that they make with it. You can’t tell me Wilhelm Kempff is a better musician than BB King because one plays the piano and the other plays the guitar. You could, however tell me that you like BB King more because you like listening to the guitar more than the piano. That difference is one that I wish everyone in esports understood and appreciated. I’m aware that some never will and we’ll have to endure their comments on reddit, casts, and shows (maybe even in this thread!) for all of eternity, but my hope is that as time goes on more and more people will get it. If you’ve gone this far at least I hope you’re bored enough to go and actually play or watch a game you like! We’re wasting our time having to deal with this issue.
I’ll appear on the next episode of The Pulse to discuss it a bit more, but after that I’m done. There’s nothing more to be said and I’ve got casts to prepare for, a HotS clan to run, business-type stuff to do, and games to enjoy myself. You've got a lot of better stuff to do to.
p.s. to Rotterdam, you will come to me for hearing about changes in the PvZ metagame in HotS, but that's a whole different conversation.
imo it's a boring game to watch and play, but people have said the same about SC2. I don't think there's anything wrong with mocking other games, but trying to tear down other people just because they are involved in a different game is stupid.
On February 04 2013 21:21 kafkaesque wrote: DoA, please come back to SC2.
Sincerely,
Everyone
I never left. Just didn't have a tournament to cast! OSL will be back with HotS after March. I'll be casting practice games from [DOa] Clan twice a week starting tomorrow too!
Nice blog DoA and I agree that there is more depth to LoL than most SC fans realize. That being said I would not take it too serious when they make jokes at NASL. I think it really is just friendly banter and simple jests at LoL and by talking about LoL on NASL.tv and interviewing Montechristo, I think they proved that they respect the scene and are all for growing e-sports together. It feels like you underestimate the community's ability to grasp jokes or overestimate the caster's influence imo. I at least know, that there will be a lot of trash talk and joking on the Pulse when I tune in and don't take everything they say 100% serious. Booing at Frodan for example, was just friends joking around in my eyes. Mabye it is me that underestimates their influence as Pros? I don't know, but I just didn't see a problem with their banter.
Well, it will be great to see you on the show next week and expect me in the DOa practice group .
Nice post DoA. unluckily the internet is filled with brain-dead people who will not understand arguments and have a healthy discussion on a topic. its all about hardcore fan-boysm. LoL vs Sc2, android vs iOS, emacs vs vi, etc etc etc... ppl just dont understand that its not about whats better, its about what YOU think fits YOU better.
Wanted to take this opportunity to congrulate you on how well you are casting together with Montecristo. OGN LoL finals was a true treat. You have learned really fast and show great synergy with your casting partner. Finally found a caster that can both understand and appreciate your nerdy jokes, haha.
" We’re wasting our time having to deal with this issue." I agree to a certain extent. In some cases it gets out of control. However people bash sports they don't like/play every day. Hell people bash teams in sports they do like to watch. this has always gone on and will happen in e-sports as well. So people don't like LoL in the DotA2/sc2 communities and express that in a rather disrespectful way, it's the same in the 'real world' as well. I don't know how many people I've talked to who bad mouth Hockey, Football, Soccer, Basketball, Baseball ect.
Fans of different games BM each other? No kidding. I don't see the point in it (other than a dick swinging contest) but it's never going to stop. It would be nice if we could all hold hands but that isn't realistic. Barmy Army for example.
Again using your idea of sports, it's used on a regular basis to compare sports and make 1 superior to the others on some level. They aren't all equal. This is a GOOD thing. The fact that they all use different techniques and skills is what makes them unique and interesting to watch. Trying to pretend all e-sports are equal is dumb, the different skills required for each one is what makes them popular to its own crowd. It's also what creates the divide.
I think one thing we can learn from the Korean scene is this, players of both scene's watch each other's games. I know that many LoL pros have played and watched starcraft (some even being pretty high level BW and sc2 players before playing League), and most sc2 progamers play LoL and watch the OGN tournament in their free time. Fun revelent fact. I know Byun and Classic from prime both play LoL quite often in their free time and enjoy the game a lot (I've seen them play while I lived in the prime house last year). I even saw classic playing League before his matches at the recent code A qualifers. I've also talked to KT coach Clide about LoL and he says that he enjoys LoL a lot.
This is standard for them and they don't have any grudges against each other. They see LoL growing big as a good thing for Esports.
We should take this approach when dealing in Esports more. if you can't support all esports, then keep to your own and don't try to bring others down, at least in a public enviroment.
I agree on all your initial points and while I think strong bias is ok for fans and very healthy (a game where you're emotionally invested will always be more interesting), it's completely unacceptable for professionals. I think it is the general consensus that fan opinions are just fluff and are to be treated as such. No one will stop eating apples just because someone tells him pears are superior. Professionals speak with some kind of authority however and thus should refrain from judgmental statements.
In other news I had a good chuckle when you implied LoL was as hard as Sc. We can easily resolve this however just by asking Testie. (A game being harder obviously doesn't magically make it "better" or more fun.)
I totally agree with you. Live and let live. I agree that the decisions you have to make in those MOBAs are equally as hard to make as in RTS. BUT you have to accept, that it is way harder to think about and make those decisions while you need to focus on several mechnical demanding things (f.e. the distribution of your vision between gamescreen, as simple as it sounds, is really hard to learn). The connection between the mechanical difficulties and hard decisions to be made are the reason, why RTS games are so hard to play. And because in LoL one part (mechanics) nearly completely dissipates, it's easier to play in the end. That doesn't mean there is no skill ceiling and that doesn't mean it's not a legal esport or anything like that, and I also don't want to blame anybody who plays it or works in any position in the LoL esport scene. I just want that everyone accepts those facts and accepts the other side like it is.
I tried tuning in t the recent finals, but it just didn't work out for me. LoL is a decently fun game to play imo, but it's not something I'm going to ever watch, it just doesn't really entertain me in that regard. Even with you casting. Which game is better, I don't know. Subjective, yo. Though I'm fairly certain SC2 is a more demanding game in that it puts all of the pressure on a single player instead of a team of five.
Then again, I don't watch nore play a lot of LoL so I might just be completely wrong. I feel that is the same for many of the people that talk bad about lol, they haven't actually played it themselves, or watched it, and they don't know how demanding it is.
I just have a hard time overcoming the general disgust with Riot's business and "creative" practices, that's all. Even the official game trailer and the graphics of LoL scream "cheap" and "walmarty" to me, sorry T_T. Otherwise, the same argument (about mechanics) can be made for Dota 2, and it's a valid argument. In fact, one could apply this argument when comparing SC2 and BW too - SC2 is certainly less mechanically demanding than BW. The football-hockey comparison was great, I'd add another one. Compare a bodybuilder and a long-distance runner. One is proud with muscles, and that's fine, but those muscles don't mean he can be competitive in a long-distance run. It's just different qualities that need to be developed.
When I first read that quote I thought it was a complement to LoL.
Walmart is a place that has something for everyone, while whole foods is really only enjoyed by a select few who can afford it. Therefore I thought it was saying that LoL is a game that can be enjoyed by everyone while SC2 is something that only an elite few will enjoy.
I'm sorry doa but when you have a better understanding of the overall arts/moba esports scene ill accept some kind of thought out defense of league of legends and riot games, but for me this doesn't cut it. I simply cant like the company, the people behind it, or the game.
I'll apologize if it seems rude but it seems the idea behind your post is just stating the obvious, which you did...
Of course it is a fact that LoL has an incredibly low mechanical or even personal skillcap. Even a professional LoL player: skOcelote was talking about it in an interview on the gd couch back at dreamhack summer 2012, how he was irritated with the lack of any difference in personal skill between any random good player and a great player as a result of the low personal skillcap of the game; though he'd come to the conclusion that there was enough depth in regards to teamplay that allowed teams to set themselves apart.
I imagine only a few sc2 players are actually ignorant enough to seriously hate on LoL due to its low mechanical skillcap. Those are kids that probably hate on any game that isn't sc2 or broodwar. Congrats on telling them doa, who knows maybe these kids will listen and stop hating, though i imagine that's not in their nature, look at the internet.
So I guess I'd ask what is the point of you even posting this. you seem to say: Arts/moba games require different skills than sc2 games, as such its not really applicable to try and measure skill difference between the two. So don't hate on something you don't understand.
So I guess I would respond by asking you doa that you don't mindlessly defend LoL with a weak, partial-argument without understanding the bigger picture. I get that this is aimed mostly at the immature sc2 players i mentioned above so to address them it is perhaps a compete argument. Yet all the same I cant help but react.
On February 04 2013 22:04 masterbreti wrote: We should take this approach when dealing in Esports more. if you can't support all esports, then keep to your own and don't try to bring others down
On February 04 2013 21:36 centinel4 wrote: ppl just dont understand that its not about whats better, its about what YOU think fits YOU better.
Certainly, as long as you're certain it fits you. I get the impression that a lot of ex-sc2 LoL players are lying to themselves, thinking LoL suits them better when in reality they just feel like that as a result of not feeling any pressure to perform due to the mechanical accessibility of the game compared to sc2. LoL has such a strong following because its both a casual game and an esport. Seemingly anyone can become decent over time without really trying/just playing the game(without thinking or making a more conscious effort). Yet these players also get to feel like their personal skill means something(unlike in other casual games) because LoL its an esport.
I play DotA 2, SC2 (almost exclusively HotS beta atm though), and I'm gonna start playing LoL on the request of some friends. While I really only dedicate time watching SC2, I understand the dedication towards other games and recognize that they're all fun. Honestly the LoL hatred only exists because it was a convenient scapegoat in that ridiculous part of 2012 where everyone on TL had managed to convince themselves that all the gigantic prizepools and stream viewerships was translating to "starcraft is dying".
On February 04 2013 22:04 masterbreti wrote: We should take this approach when dealing in Esports more. if you can't support all esports, then keep to your own and don't try to bring others down
If only Riot took this approach...
I'm not quite sure what you mean. Riot hasn't brought any other esports down, in fact they are raising the game with their production quality and giving other esports a standard to look to.
I personally feel that sc2 and LoL have a very similar skillcap. Just in different areas. sc2 is more about speed, whereas LoL is more knowledge. someone can get very far in sc2 with just pure macro, in league you need to understand the game very well to do well.
Doa provided a good example of what a top laner needs to pay attention to when in the early game, but there is much more that he didn't touch on (I guess he forgot, but he pointed out the main things).
You have to also remember LoL is a team game and so you need to understand the strenghs and weakness' of your teammates just as much, if not more than your opponents. That is something sc2 players don't even have to consider. since it is a 1v1 game, you don't have to worry about anyone else.
I do feel your hate of Riot is rather unjust and I think is strife with bias, if you could point out why you don't like Riot, maybe someone could help dispell your disagreements.
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