EPTWhen I got to Korea, the mighty and feared X’ds~Grrrr...’s reign over the Starcraft world, was begining to shake. First symptom was that he didn’t win straight up the KBK. However, no doubt that for the time beeing and until a year, Grrrr... would remain THE Starcraft Superstar every single gamer was looking up to. I’ll start up on Grrrr... through my gaming views on him.
Nowadays, due to the level of accuracy and speed of the professional gameplay, it’s somewhat harder to actually experience first hand, what’s unique in someone’s way of playing the game. I’m not talking here about strategics, talent or ability, nor their subsequent logical results. You can admire someone for beeing very good, dominating, and impressing you. What I’m talking about here, is much more common feeling, although very deep and somewhat complexe. Basically when you get to a Lan, and get to opportunity to watch someone playing while you stand behind him. You’ll then grasp something that is impossible to do online, as you will compare your own way of playing the game, with the one your watching right there. It’s about just like any other manual task, in the way you will learn how another beeing physically accomplish a same given task. That’s basically why and how you can increase your rudementary gaming capability so fast, when you spend time in a hardcore gaming environement. The simple fact of how someone moves his mouse, how he clicks, where and when and why, can tell alot about how his mind interprets the game and base his decisions on how to interact with it. I wont digress too much on this topic, because this can last for a while. I will just state I could stay behind a very good player, such as Grrrr... or some others, and watch him play for hours. It actually often happened, and countless of times at night, Grrrr... would discretly remove the cigaret still smoking from my hand, while I had fallen a sleep in a chair behind him watching him play for hours.
Anyway, watching Grrrr... was always something very special. Grrrr.. was never physically nervous in any circonstance. He’s hands would never shake nor tremble nor sweat. He would always stand very straight, turning his keyboard 45 degrees clockwise, with the escape button part of the keyboard on the upper left, having all the length of his left arm extended as much as he could, and firmly disposed on the table. His face was playing always kept the very same facial expression. Mouth closed, eyes moving real fast, some very close observation could spot his neck slightly rotating sometimes, but thats about it. Eventho Grrrr... wasn’t as fast as the new gen of Korean players, his action patterns were, and that’s prolly what made him so dominant at first for so long, absolutely perfect. Never would he miss a unit when clicking, never would he click at the wrong spot and correct himself by doing another action. Grrrr... always played like he was reading an invisible music score that was right in front of him and that he was the only one to see. Not a single second was wasted. That’s what I call playing flawlessly. Exactly knowing what you’re doing, with that supreme confidence of beeing right when doing it.
He could later in the course time, get outplayed by new and better players, that were more dedicated than he was, but Grrrr... always was strong, sharp, resilient, and dangerous. Grrrr... was truely a bamboo, gamewise. He would handle an in game strategical, tactical, bad case scenario pressure like no one else. Even when he seemed to be losing, things would seem as they were going his plan, and he would at last, after countless of game momentums, come on top.
As Starcraft game variety was in a way much wilder than today, many unexpected scenarios would rise up in games. And that’s where he would excell. While his opponent would basically appear to wander onto new and unknown situational lands, Grrrr...’s play would actually behave like he had played this scenario hundreds of times before.
I can’t tell, even today, what was the source of this. Was it a rock strong confidence, of overall superiority to anyone in this game, that had grown within himself through his countless victories? Or some kind of uncommon brain aptitude and talent for this game ? Maybe alot of boths, combined in the form of what you could call genius.
Watching Grrrr... playing, you could be sure to always get that same thought to yourself : “ Yeah, that’s how this game is meant to be played.”
At last, while 90% of the protoss of his time, were basically playing the same, trying to reproduce and execute the most obvious and efficient pattern, that either was 9/10 gate rush into speed lot / psi storm expanding and pressure, or Corsair / dt fast expansion, Grrrr... would show up every PVZ game, playing a new strategy that he would come up with on the moment.
Grrrr... was a very bad practice partner. He would lose alot, and would hate to practice. He would only consider playing with other champions outside of tournaments, that he hadn’t played yet, or whom he was admiring the skill. Unlike every single other champion that came after him, he didn’t care at all about Starcraft. Just like maybe you wouldn’t care about breathing, walking or talking. At some point, he even claimed (and did it), that practicing before important games was useless, and that playing Tetris online was helping him much more. I recall many nights before important games, or even finals, where we’d just go clubbing or getting drunk, and as Grrrr... always had troubles with hangovers, I would see him going on stage just as green as you can get from a bad hangover. Nevertheless, when Grrrr... at that time was going on stage, when it mattered, when it was for fame and money, he wasn’t only winning, he was live raping people, in such a shameless fashion, that his shocked opponents, would almost come and thank him after the game that he beaten them. That’s what I call true dominance.
As a person now. We were the same age, he was a few days older than me. We had the same height, spoke the same language, both ready to share and have fun partying at any occasion. We both loved pretty Korean girls. Eventho I didn’t hold the required talent to achieve anything big in Pro gaming, he never discouraged me, told me that I suck and that I should give up. He always lended me a friendly hand whenever I needed it. And this happened quite alot. All these things, and the fact I was staying in Kang nam, leaded us to pretty much spend our entire time together when we weren’t with our girl friends. Especially the first few months where he forced the whole team he was in at that time, to move to the PC bang where I was playing, first, because it was slightly better place, and second, cuz I was playing in N.E.T. for free, and he knew I couldn’t afford another PC room. Many times he would treat me to nice places, and furthermore, he showed me around every single of the places he would hang around. He was a great teacher at first. But what Grrrr... couldn’t teach me, and that I had to do alone, was somewhat of another side of Korea, that because of the rather easy life the huge money from the sponsors he was getting was providing him, he didn’t experience, and never did he quite understandd the fun and happiness I was finding in my own situation – Grrrr... hated beeing poor and didn’t wanted to hang out with random other Korean individuals. He was kind of a lone wolf anyway, and but Everlast that was stucked to him, shamelessly advertising himself to try and get a sponsor through Grrrr...’s contact, and me and his girl friend, he wasn’t really close to anyone.
At that time I think Grrrr...’s contract with his “new” team (wich I can’t fucking remember the name. The one before this was U2U4, an internet company sponsor. They sponsored him and Thor before the deal went off, and Thor then went back to Canada. Pillars had left earlier. Maynard was with KPGL), was something like this : basically it was a team without a sponsor, that means a group of managers and somewhat business men, trying to get sponsor for their players. They had to pay Grrrr... of course, as he wouldn’t have joined them otherwise. Deal was that he was getting about 6000 $ / month, with a house, PC BANG expense and travel expenses. The total ammount was about 10 000$ a month or was ot 9000, can’t remember. The basic idea was that they would find a company read to hand over a crapload of money to sponsor them. They failed and ended up giving all their money to Grrrrr... while their other players were basically getting not a dime. Amongst the players their roster had, you had IloveU, a terran player that I will talk alot about in later entries, his Grilfriend, su yon, the cutest pro gaming chick ever, she was playing protoss and microing dragoons just like any other pro. Cezanne also was somewhat on a semi contract with the team. Many pro gamers back then, didn’t want to have any manager, or even a sponsorship to support them. Their plans were to live from the cash prizes they would win. They also had Clone[S.G], a good player, but that wasn’t talking much, nor beeing friendly at all. I never seen him actually play in the PC bang, but his lvl 88 barbarian at Diablo II. But since he had qualified in the Starleague, they would let him basically do what he felt like. Some other players were on this team, but I don’t really remember them, as they would spend more time playing from their home, than the PC BANG.
Grrrr...’s personal coach and slave hired by the team for him, was Jong Min, who was pro gamer at first. That guy, while beeing the funniest and dumbest guy ever, was the biggest naive liar you could find around. Spunky told me that later, he turned to be a cook for the house of the z-zone semi pro team (or was it another name ? thing I know is that most ppl on this team, were in the z-zone clan.).
Many were the ones that hold a grudge against him, for tons of reasons. But I can’t be one of them, as when I was later on managerless, sponsorless, homeless, moneyless, he took care of me for a few weeks, secretly spending a part of the managing money on my food and giving 20 bucks a day for my other expenses. He even tried to arrange games with other team players, and tell them to lose against me in practice when the head staffs of the team were around, so they would contract me, I however declined this offer in respect of the other players that were my friends. Jongmin’s ID was [.....?] I think, and he was in the very old AKUTA clan, where Samjjang was also.
The first time I met him and the rest of the staff was a night Grrrr.. called at N.E.T. (I still didnt have a cellphone), and asked to put me on the phone. He told me to get on a cab and join the fun at B.O.S.S., Grrrr...’s long time favorite night club in Apkujong. When I got there, thrilled and pumped up to the max, as this was the first time ever I was stepping into a Korean nightclub, a waiter went to come and pick me up outside (That waiter btw, was a good friend of Grrrr... and an excellent Stracraft player, that had a 1900ish gamei rating.). As I got to the boot table with the sole idea in mind to get drunk and finally start to hit on all those insanly hot chicks I could see everyday on the street, half of the managing staff was dead drunk. However my arrival reanimated them from the deads, and all their combined efforts got me drunk after 30 minutes or so. Grrrr... did one hell of an effort that night. Grrrr... hates to dance. However, he wanted to show me I guess, and we went together for a minute or two on the dance floor. I never had any problem really to dance, as I enjoy it, but he hasly left me seeing I was perfectly fiting in the picture, and went on to drink some more.
I went back and forth drinking and dancing, until the point where I was standing alone on the high step of the stage, dancing like a madman and getting dragged to some other tables by random chicks, when the music would pause.
I’m tall, thin, have long hairs, very blue eyes and a very white skin. Koreans love that. So that first night, I realised things would be fine for me here on the girl topic.
After a couple of hours, me randomly experiencing communication with local night club folks, at various tables (I’m a very talkative and socially opened character), that got me past the alcool tolerance limit, after wich possibilies of blackout were dangerously rising, I headed back to our table, where everybody but Jongmin, was asleep. Jongmin seeing me, woke up his superior, and told him it was time to go. He then proceeded to tell me we had to take care of Grrrr... because he had gotten really drunk. So what happened next, was that me and Jongmin had first to untie a random somewhat half naked sleepy and drunken chick,from Grrrr... while she was fighting to not be. Then, Jongmin, as lazy as always, told me to duck, and basically throwed Grrrr...’s dead body on my back, after what he started to open me a way through the mob. Gosh Grrrr... was heavy. I weighted about 75 kg, we were the same height, but Grrrr... was more musculated and was prolly around 85kg. But alcool helping, I was feeling stronger than I really was. Once we got outside, waiting for the Van, Grrrr... woke up, and started randomly trying to fight with us. We throwed him in the Van, and after a few seconds, he felt back to sleep.
Van dropped me at N.E.T. and that’s how ended the first of a very, very, very long list of clubbing nights in Seoul.
A couple of days later, as I was feeling kind of down in my not started yet pro gaming career, because I had missed KBK, Hong suh dropped by N.E.T. one night after work, telling me to practice hard tonight, because tomorrow I would play my first broadcasted games against Korean players. Needless today 4 gramms of pure cocaïne in the same hour wouldn’t have excited me more than these news. I called Grrrr... and spammed my ICQ to spread the info, and everybody wished me luck. The target was once again showing at the horizon, and I played all night with my russian Orky team mates.
I’m going now to briefly talk about GAMEQ, wich is a company that should be reverred and remembered much more than it is nowadays, as these people prolly done more for pro gaming and gamers especially, than anyone else in Korea.
GameQ was a website dedicated to professional gaming and games in general. They would broadcast their own leagues, set them up, find the money for it, and greatly value the players that would play in, by always making sure they would pay the ones that needed it the most right away, eventho they not always had the money in bank, had it sometimes even, for the workers to physically get money out their wallets on the spot, to pays the players.
Most of the GameQ staff is now the same people running MBC game leagues that you all watch and know. Well the big and important thing that it is now, started off a very small structure in a far away building, at some of the last floors, with a bunch of truely dedicated people, ready to sacrifice anything for their passion to grow. Every single one of them was a starcraft fan and a gamer. Most of the staff would spend their nights after work over battle net, observing games, chatting, and taking part of that huge and popular fashion online starcraft was then.
They hosted the first online gameq world championship, that I played in myself, a team league, anscestor of the today’s proleague format, where different teams and clans would duke it over the course of one whole year. At this time, female gamers were much more numerous, and the league format was this one : two male 1v1s, 1 female 1v1, one male / male 2v2, and one female / male 2v2. I can’t remember the name of this league, maybe was it IGL ? I’m really not sure now or KPL ? NO FUCKING CLUE T_T.
Anyway, aside that, they would host many show games, events, featuring the top players, from any place, and with any background. There were no prelimns whatsoever, they would just msn, mail, icq, msg you on bnet or call you, contact you by any mean to set up if something they were feeling able to produce good games. I never met such interest for truely what gaming is in any other business structure related to gaming.
Ophium, was the handle of the guy contacting players and setting up games most of the times. He was Korean american, and was basically single because he would spend his entire time on battle net. Everyone loved that guy.
He was a tall handsome asian male, wearing black santiag boots with half of a james bond suit, and bad ass glasses. He had a deep and dark voice, and from his look, he could as well just have been, some kind of movie secret agent, or an anymonouse gouvernement assassin.
He would often set up dinners, with a few players that knew each other, and that he liked on battle net, and we’d meet to have dinner and go on drinking cocktails and beer in a Jazz bar of Sinchon (spelling it wrong, student area or so) after that.
So we got to the GameQ building with Hong suh after somewhat of a long drive (was pretty far from Kang nam, in the business area that is near many official buildings if i remember correct). I’m a nervous person, in many situations, and for many reasons. Even before we got in the elevator, my right arm was already shaking.
The GameQ office wasn’t big, and had a very simple setting. Upon entering the office, you’d basically have on your right a door to a small conferonce room with a screen, where players would stay and watch the game currently playing, waiting for their turn to come. In front you had a corridor leading straight into a landscaped style office, wich’s left wall followed would lead you to the broadcasting studio : a room with two computers next to the broadcasting station studio boxe itself, wich was closed and separted by a glass from the gaming area.
Hong suh pretty much introduced to everyone in the office, as he knew most of them, having worked together on some projects before. He then took me in the director office to sign up some contract papers written in Korean. After that I was presented to Ophium and his Harvard english, who then proceeded to introduce to the three smiling players I was going to play.
Now, I have to say, that when I got back from this to N.E.T. as Grrrr... was waiting for my return, and asked who I played and how it went. His first reaction to my answer was this :
“Ahahaha, what the fuck, these guys you played are fucking gods.”.
So, the actual story is that these three players were nobody else than Slayer’s_Boxer, Saint Eagle and Intotherain, prolly 3 of the 5 hottest gamers at that time in the circuit. I had no idea who they were, but Intotherain that I had played with many times before online, and that I had a good record against. We were actually very happy to meet, and I’ll more stories about Intotherain later on, as he was one of my good friends in Korea.
Now what follows, could’ve turned as stuff of legend. And the first game I ever played in Korea, bielive it or not, with a little more focus, preparation or luck, could’ve make everything turn out different.
I first played Boxer, me Zerg against him Terrran. All games played that day where on Lost temple.
I never had played on a flat screen before, and at that time it was a very new thing, but technology sucked, and the delay was insanly long. Gamers complained alot and for very long about flat screens beeing used in tv leagues, and thats what leaded them to use since now only RTC screens rather than LCD or Plasma.
My mouse, wich was the very first laser microsoft mouse, wouldn’t work on the computer no matter the drivers we used.
These things really weren’t of a big deal, it just raised the tension, anxiety and pressure I was already feeling. But everybody was very friendly, and trying to make me confortable. Especially Boxer and Intotherain.
When I was good to go, Ophium started the game. I was 6, boxer 12. I 13 hatched 13 pooled like a greedy motherfucker, and 2 hatched lair into 3 hatch lurker, while boxer failed his first M&M rush on two sunkens, group of backtrap hidden zerglings and my first hydralisks. Boxer tried a first dropped that didn’t work while setting up his natural. I had about 22 lurkers and 20 or so speedlings and 9 oclock main morphing when his new force of 2 tanks and 24 marines went out to siege me. I pincered him between my sunkens and my army, losing about 10 lurkers and my zerglings. Meanwhile the battle a new drop ship had taken my newly 9 main expand. As his army died, and 8 new lurkers hatched, I sent all I had to him face, and for about 2 minutes I was 100% sure that I had won. I teared off all his army in his base, and burrowed 12 lurkers next to his barracks. His expansion died. His barracks started to float. I was happy.
My smile just weared off as I saw 3 dropships dropping in my almost defensless main, 2 tanks, and a pack and a half of M&M, that for sure, that motherfucking monster microed like a god cuz he had nothing else to do at time. Only, repairing that damn newly builded bunker in his main that was protecting his factory, the sole last producing building he had, from wich a new tank popped out. And with a vessel and yet another tank, he handled easily my already harmed lurkers, while I was typing GG in.
We regamed then, and I picked Terran. The TvT turned out to last about 35 minutes, with me basically fighting him off the whole game, and him slightly ahead. The kind of TVT game you don’t wanna quit, because eventho your slightly behind you’re far from dead, and there is a chance to fight back. But Boxer hold tight and eventually won.
Now these first two games were nice, and the fun part of the day. What followed was just as close as it gets to an anal game rape. I picked Zerg all the remaining games. I had to go up against Saint Eagle now. This smartass seeing I went 13 hatch the first game, opted for a 5 or 6 barrack in midle of the map, and bunker rushed me with all he got. We regamed, him 9 me 6 again, and he did the exact same thing. I thought a 12 pool would be good. I was wrong.
Beeing kind of sick of the joys of bunkering, I went then up against Intotherain. Somehow, the online trend of us trading wins, didn’t persist in real life. First game, him 3, me 6 (I drew 6 every single game, but the TVT where I was 12 and Boxer 9), he dual 9 gated my ass and owned my 12 hatchery rather easily. Next game, because he was 9 and me 6 again, he of course had to proxy gate me. I pooled first that game and held him. He camped my ramp while I was going for a two hatch hydra rush (no real other option heh), I kind of chased him back, for some time... but he promptly came back with speed lots, denying me from kill the two gates. I had to expand and make some more drones. Next thing I see is a pack a speedlots, 2 archons, 2 dragoons, running over my 24 ish hydralisks.
I left GameQ that day like a traumatized nerd, that just faced a bunch of bloodthirsty skinheads. Boxer and Intotherain kind of comforted me however, trying all their best at english. Saint Eagle didn’t give a fuck. He was happy with his bunkering I guess. Well overall I was still happy to have met Intotherain, because we liked each other online. I didn’t knew then, the future that young and smiling terran player was promised to. GameQ paid me about 500 $, and told me that I did good the first games, and that I had to get used to Korean gamestyle, that was very different from online gamestyle (ORLY?), aka playing to win and not for fun. I was also told I was officialy invited to the first GameQ world championship, that would feature the 8 “best” westerners agains the 8 best Koreans.
Hong suh in the car, was somewhat pissed, because he then realised I wasn’t Grrrr..., and things wouldn’t be as easy as they were, back when he was managing him. On a sidenote, the overal level was starting to raise at that time, and I wasn’t ahead of my time at all. So if I wanted to succeed, unlike Grrrr... I would have to hop on the pro gaming skill train that was departing right now.
Next entry will be a little less about players, a little more about Korea, how things really started for me after these first 2 weeks. And a little in depth description of N.E.T, where I was basically living. How I ditched my manager and began my own journey without any help, on the pro gaming road.
These stories are sick, I mean c'mon, a battlereport of your games against Boxer, IntoTheRain, and StEagle? Thats cool. Very cool.
