Check out the full R&S standings thread for the Survivor Tournament here, and the MSL R&S standings thread here.

There have been many accusations made against Brood War over the years, and one accusation that hasn't died is that the scene is, well, boring. The players don't seem to have a personality, while the games have gotten so competitive to the point where everyone just plays standard. There's supposedly no magic to the game anymore -- even Boxer commented on the matter, saying that the game had gotten too competitive, and that the players don't care about showing an entertaining match to the fans anymore but only care about winning.

But it's not that the players stopped caring about entertaining the fans -- it's just that the times had changed. Indeed, if the games weren't entertaining, then there would be no more fans. If the progamers were boring, then there would also be no more fans. But the fact of the matter is that the fans still do exist, both here and in Korea, so there has to have been something.

While it is true that some progamers are indeed boring [Hi, Light!], let's put it into perspective -- progamers are just normal people after all, and are affected by shyness and formality especially when they're new. Thankfully, we do have enough entertainers in the mix to make up for all the players like Action. And when else do they shine better than when they're all together like in the Group Ceremonies?

MBC Game and PDPOP seemed to have realized this, and as a result, put in a lot of prizes for the Progamers. When the prizes for the MSL Group Ceremonies were announced, the jaws of many progamers dropped. A top of the line notebook for best ceremony? A Galaxy Tab for the Best Conversation Maker? Oh my! Well then, let's look at the entrance ceremonies.

As a note, please realize that all the quotes are not necessarily literal translations. They're paraphrased and sometimes translated to the English idiom equivalent.


The key point is Leta's unshaved legs. Leta danced to Orange Caramel's Magical Girl, absolutely shocking everyone. He had prepared this ceremony for a month. He commented that while it was awkward at first, but eventually, he got used to it. In the end, we all wonder how Kal had felt about this -- considering Kal had commented before saying that Leta looked like his ex-girlfriend.


The audience was stunned by the Bear and the Tiger that suddenly entered. Were they dancing? And what is this, the Bear is jumping hulahoops! The Bear falls, the Tiger points and laughs. It was quite awesome of Midas to bring in Baby into the ceremony -- although Baby did it cause he owed Midas a favor. But it was adorable.

Best Improvised: Sea - Hyun
A few hours before, Sea and Hyun decided to put together a ceremony -- where they improvised a scene from a famous Korean movie called AhJeoSsi. Sea even cut his hair.

Most Suited to Nickname: Light
Light did an invisible Terran routine, where he had entered "invisibly", and got one of the models to act as he were there, even doing Rock Paper Scissors. After a scan at the second door, Light was revealed.

Reminding us of the 70s: Perfectman - Hiya
Perfectman with a flashy gold jacket showed you how KPop looked like before girlbands. Hiya came around with a toy guitar, playing the supporting cast. Perfectman and Hiya apparently made a 80-20 deal on the prize.

Only if it was Really Money: Hydra
Parodying a Korean Drama, Hydra had some money printed with his name and threw them into the crowd. If he was a bigger baller, he'd have done it more stylishly.

You Were Better off Doing Nothing: Stats

Leta won first prize, not surprisingly considering how shocking it was. Midas got second, although he played it down, claiming that the fans voted for him only because he's been around the scene forever. Sea got the third prize.

Sea talked about how he created his ceremony -- an hour before. He then commented on how low he has went to try and get that prize.


Hiya then popped in, and talked about how Perfectman and he decided on the ceremony. He apologized, and then mimicked Sea's comment. Hiya talks about how Sea has used all of his ammo in the last group selections, and because Perfectman is an amusing kid, he thinks Perfectman can win the prize as the best conversation maker.

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Of course, the rebellious comments are always amusing to watch. They show the pride, the class, and the confidence each of the players have. Some of the comments came as players selected their opponents. Here's some of the more few interesting remarks.

One of the more amusing came around when Soulkey chose Fantasy. He wanted to beat Fantasy, just to show that he was better than Zero, who lost to Fantasy in a recent Proleague game, to show that he is better than Zero.

In the meanwhile, Bisu somehow ended up being the center of a lot of comments, as many players expressed desire to play him. One of the more stuck up comments was:


When asked if he would play anyone else, Miso refused -- he only wanted to play Bisu. But too bad for him, since Shine took him first.


Bisu smiled and nodded as if he knew it was coming. He accepted the challenge.


Bisu tells everyone to not move Shine, and their matchup is set in stone from that moment. Meanwhile there were some fun interactions happened between Light and Free, as Free chose to play Light.


He was playing on Light's "Invisible Terran" theme, claiming that he didn't see Light's name there. But then upon further inquiries, he clarified.


Light however, responded:


Free immediately shows regret regarding his decision. After all, what Protoss wants to play Jaedong? Kal saves him later and brings Free to his group, creating what began to look like the group of death.

Of course, you can't have a fun discussion without Sea. Perfectman got voted as the "Most Overrated Player" that, is, most filled with Bubbles. When asked to comment, Sea responds


Perfectman responds:

Sea cracks up, and then asks Perfectman if he was serious. After being driven, Perfectman just responds he was just kidding.


Sea understands, but reveals that he intended on picking Perfectman, mostly because he stuck his tongue out during his game against MBCGame HERO. Sea talks about Perfectman:


After sorting out their misunderstanding, Sea brings Free out of the group of death with his choice instead of killing Perfectman.

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The MSL also tried to do a special with Lee-Ssang, where they tried to get players to talk about Lee-Ssang under a mosaic. Of course, when we're talking about Flash, we can't get by this comment.


Flash then comments on how he thinks he and Jaedong will not fall easily. Many players comment on Lee-Ssang under the veil of anonymity (although it's kinda obvious who most of them are), allowing them to be bold ("I was never afraid of Lee-Ssang", "I'll get so stressed out if there's another Lee-Ssang finals"). However, this comment stuck out the most:


The attention immediately shifts to Flash and Jaedong, who talks about the video made by the players. Jaedong likes the attention, since it is admittance that they are at the top. Flash comments on Shine's comment, and Shine plays it down.

Later on, when Flash and Jaedong gets their opportunities to use their selection powers, Stork talks about how he just wants to leave the group of death (Kal - Stork - Shine - Bisu). Flash talks about how he wanted to take all 3 SKT players into his group, but says that it's not professional to do so. s2 makes a comment about how he's in the same group as Flash again, and wonders why Flash likes him so much. Sun steps up to the plate, and says that he would play Flash, and s2 and Sun are swapped. After Stork shows his desperation a bit more, even taking back his previous remark that he respects the decisions of the Seeded players, and he would not beg. But luckily, Flash is a nice guy and accepts Stork's request.

Of course, the group selection ceremony contained much more -- from polls to prizes, to many more random episodes. But it'd be too much to cover them all here, and we end our coverage here. However, we will always do our best to bring the best of group ceremonies.

As usual, this is the "who besides Flash?" group, and it's definitely one of the weakest I've ever seen. Honestly, since it's so weak it's quite hard to call--my money's on Ssak. Classic hasn't been playing too well while Ssak is gaining confidence (even though Flash says he's going to crush him for BMing Tempest), and MIsO is just a mediocre Zerg. This is probably going to be a boring group, since whoever plays Flash is either going to try to cheese and fail or play standard and get crushed. Then again, perhaps Ssak will have a genius cheese that involves four command centers? That's what we can love about Starcraft, anything can happen!

Though who am I kidding; none of these players can beat Flash.


My god, Jaedong's in heaven. Granted, none of his opponents are bad--all are actually quite good, but they're going to get demolished by Jaedong. This group promises to provide some good games, with two JvPs and three PvPs. However, it seems that none of the other three are performing up to par (and really, Jaedong's not at 100% yet given his Ace match losses...) but besides Jaedong, free should be escaping this group.


Group of Death #1! This is definitely going to be fantastic. Fantasy versus Soulkey? Yes yes yes. On Triathlon? Yes yes yes! On the other hand, great versus Leta has promise as well. If everything goes right, we won't have to even watch TvT! Though the way TvT has been lately, something between Fantasy and Leta would be fast-paced and exciting. Honestly, this is really hard to call. I'd say Fantasy still has the edge over Soulkey, since he'll probably have some very innovative build that relies probably on the deus ex machina valkyrie/vulture/wraith/battlecruiser/science vessel... Either way, Soulkey isn't too well known for his early game tactics, since his preferred time of fighting is at Hive tech. However, Soulkey is also pretty good... so now I don't know what to say. On the other hand, great has been failing this season, but here's hoping this Group of Death brings out the Death God in him. Leta, as we know, will 2port wraith, bless his heart. This group's too hard to call, but I say Fantasy and Leta are going to advance. I said it just a bit above, but I really mean it now: anything can happen in this group. Definitely going to be one to watch.


Ah, Shy not having a picture is kind of sad... but we probably won't be covering him after this round, probably. Also, now I can't make the Invisible Terran joke... Anyway, Light's definitely not happy with this group, since he ran into the best PvT player on the scene right now. I really don't think he's going to get past Stork, and he could potentially be in trouble if RorO wins, since that means Light will have to play two TvPs. However, even with Light's subpar TvP I think he can take Shy, meaning that once Stork makes mincemeat of RorO Light should be happy with a TvZ in the final game. Stork 2-0 and Light 2-1.


Ahh this group has so much potential for calamity. Besides Hydra, none of the other three players have been really "stable" players. With Jaehoon's random failings and Killer's random flailings, it's really hard to say who's making it out of this group. Add to that the fact that there's going to be three ZvZs... and it's hard to say. My head tells me to call Hydra and Calm, but for some reason there's a nagging feeling that Jaehoon is going to unleash his practice bonjwa mode and 2-0 this way out of the Zerg-infested group. Yeah, right.


This is another one of those groups that I'm like "meh" about. fOrGG is kind of failing, Perfectman is generally fail but sometimes unpredictable, and I still don't know how HoGiL got here, though I'm very impressed. Still, Midas is in this group and that means it automatically becomes 745% cuter. Given the level of competition as well, I think Midas will have an easy 2-0 out of the group. The question, then, is saying who's going to be following him. Just like with the past group, some little portion of my brain is screaming "PERFECTMAN", and unlike last time, I'll follow it. Why not?


This group also has the potential to be very, very good. So far though, Action has been this season's biggest troll, since he's failing on all fronts. I must say though, he played the most amazing ZvP yesterday, though I'm not going to spoil it. Regardless, the chance of a Sea vs ZerO match is high, though it could be blocked by s2. Either way, Sea and ZerO should advance from this group after some nice TvZs and (hopefully) eventful ZvZs involving Hive tech.


Group of Death #2! Kal's PvT against Really's TvP? Really's not failing recently? Awesome! But wait who cares about that, we've got Shine versus Bisu again! I predict this group, though it be the last, to have the most comments in the thread, and if Shine wins again I predict we'll be seeing a third wave of bans due to raging. This group is also very hard to call, since so many things can happen. If Really faces off against Bisu his TvP should trump Bisu's PvT, and nobody knows what happens when Shine is in the picture. I want to say that I know Kal will advance, but I'm not sure between Bisu/Shine. I think whoever wins the opening match between them will advance to the Round of 16.