Hello illustrious Escapist forum goers,
I've come today to talk about two things, MLG and Starcraft 2. MLG began in 2002, when it was founded by the down to earth and outspoken, Sundance DiGiovanni (yes his real name is Sundance). When it began, it was primarily an organization focused on first person shooters such as the fan favorites Halo and later Call of Duty. As time went on MLG began accepting other titles into its roster, fighting games, MMORPG's, and most recently, Starcraft 2.
In the beginning, Starcraft was the ignored retarded step child of MLG, having claim to only a small, overcrowded side area and a measly 2,500 dollar prize pool. The once shunned step child has now taken the event by storm, helping MLG to break stream records [http://www.majorleaguegaming.com/news/mlg-delivers-record-breaking-22-5-million-online-video-streams-from-mlg-columbus]. There are now two dedicated Starcraft 2 streams, it is on the main stage of the event, it has forced MLG to full capacity, and has doubled the prize pool.
With all of this in mind, you may be wondering what all of the fuss is about and wish to check out professional Starcraft for yourself. Unfortunately, Starcraft is a game which requires effort to enjoy, but once you're in, it is a lifetime hobby. The rest of this post assumes a basic understanding of Starcraft 2, if you lack that basic understanding, check out the following links: Wikipedia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starcraft_2], The Escapists' Tips and Tricks [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-escapist-presents/1768-Starcraft-2-101-Tips-Tricks], Day9.tv [http://day9.tv/], and TeamLiquid [teamliquid.net].
Even if you understand what StarCraft is, you may not understand why MLG Anaheim was such a huge event in the worlds of StarCraft and E-SPORTS. I'll be elaborating on what happened so that hopefully you can catch up and be ready to check out the next MLG to see what all of the hype is about.
The first big piece of drama for the day was when White-Ra made it through the open losers bracket. The way that the MLG format works is that there is a "championship pool" in which the top 16 players (determined by past MLG performance) play against eachother in pool play (where every person plays every other person in the group) to determine seeding into "the championship bracket." Aside from these "championship pool players," anybody with 70$ can play in the open bracket tournament, to try and get enough points to be seeded into the pool next time.
To try and keep things fair, as in avoiding a situation in which a player won't get knocked out completely due to a single poorly played best of three, there is both the losers bracket and the winner bracket all within the open bracket. The winners bracket is six rounds long, and the four top players get placed into pools for an equal opportunity to fight for seeding into the championship bracket. If you lose though, the tournament becomes a grueling 9 round slugfest to get to only as far as the bottom seed of the championship pool.
With all of that explained, the fan favorite and second oldest professional player White-Ra [http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/White-Ra] was disqualified from the first round of the open bracket for arriving late. He was then in the 9 round losers bracket of the tournament, the most difficult place possible. White-ra continued to play 12 best of three's, 11 of which were on a single day, without losing a single match until he was knocked out of the tournament by Select on Sunday. This video can explain the crowds reaction to his incredible feat: video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI1vL-ZuYac].
The next big story line of the event was Boxer's, or as he is known in Korea, "The Emporer's" great performance. Explaining all of Boxer's history would be a far too difficult task that this [http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft/BoxeR] accomplishes much better anyways; suffice to say that he regarded as an e-sports and Starcraft icon due to his accomplishments in Starcraft: Brood War in Korea. A single example that gets across his iconic stature is the existence of a "best of" compilation DVD in Korea available of his play.
This legend of Starcraft was highly regarded around 2005-2007, but most "foreigners" and even Koreans(in the world of Starcraft, all non-Koreans are referenced as foreigners) had written him off as being far past his prime. Boxer proved them all wrong though, getting third place at the event, giving one of the most entertaining and nail bitingly close Terran vs. Terran's we've yet seen in Starcraft 2 (the highlights of which can be found here [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYy5CMnXp20]). Boxer is easily one of the most likable personalities in Starcraft 2, and everyone enjoyed seeing him do so well.
The final most dramatic moment of the tournament came from team Evil Genius' Idra. Idra is famous for his "bad boy" attitude as well as causing the most talked about drama at every tournament. For this tournament, that drama came in the form of Idra vs. Cruncher. These two players have quite a history considering the short amount of time that Starcraft 2 has been released. It all started in the tournament the "TeamLiquid StarLeague 3" or "TSL3." In this tournament, Cruncher was a darkhorse whom his first round opponent - Idra - considered a walk over and a thought would be a free win. Both players were giving each other plenty of "bad manner" (when a player is talking down to their opponent). In the deciding game three, at about 8 minurwa into the match, Cruncher typed a sarcastic "
" as he was about to win. This MLG was the first time the players had met since, and when both players went to shake hands, Idra did this [http://i53.tinypic.com/10oi2gx.jpg], before turning and walking away.
I hope this post helped entice some of you into the drama of Starcraft 2. I hope you all tune into mlgpro.com on August 26th to see what professional Starcraft is all about at MLG Raleigh!
Btw, I don't work for MLG, I just want more people to be interested in Starcraft <3 Thank you for reading
I've come today to talk about two things, MLG and Starcraft 2. MLG began in 2002, when it was founded by the down to earth and outspoken, Sundance DiGiovanni (yes his real name is Sundance). When it began, it was primarily an organization focused on first person shooters such as the fan favorites Halo and later Call of Duty. As time went on MLG began accepting other titles into its roster, fighting games, MMORPG's, and most recently, Starcraft 2.
In the beginning, Starcraft was the ignored retarded step child of MLG, having claim to only a small, overcrowded side area and a measly 2,500 dollar prize pool. The once shunned step child has now taken the event by storm, helping MLG to break stream records [http://www.majorleaguegaming.com/news/mlg-delivers-record-breaking-22-5-million-online-video-streams-from-mlg-columbus]. There are now two dedicated Starcraft 2 streams, it is on the main stage of the event, it has forced MLG to full capacity, and has doubled the prize pool.
With all of this in mind, you may be wondering what all of the fuss is about and wish to check out professional Starcraft for yourself. Unfortunately, Starcraft is a game which requires effort to enjoy, but once you're in, it is a lifetime hobby. The rest of this post assumes a basic understanding of Starcraft 2, if you lack that basic understanding, check out the following links: Wikipedia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starcraft_2], The Escapists' Tips and Tricks [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-escapist-presents/1768-Starcraft-2-101-Tips-Tricks], Day9.tv [http://day9.tv/], and TeamLiquid [teamliquid.net].
Even if you understand what StarCraft is, you may not understand why MLG Anaheim was such a huge event in the worlds of StarCraft and E-SPORTS. I'll be elaborating on what happened so that hopefully you can catch up and be ready to check out the next MLG to see what all of the hype is about.
The first big piece of drama for the day was when White-Ra made it through the open losers bracket. The way that the MLG format works is that there is a "championship pool" in which the top 16 players (determined by past MLG performance) play against eachother in pool play (where every person plays every other person in the group) to determine seeding into "the championship bracket." Aside from these "championship pool players," anybody with 70$ can play in the open bracket tournament, to try and get enough points to be seeded into the pool next time.
To try and keep things fair, as in avoiding a situation in which a player won't get knocked out completely due to a single poorly played best of three, there is both the losers bracket and the winner bracket all within the open bracket. The winners bracket is six rounds long, and the four top players get placed into pools for an equal opportunity to fight for seeding into the championship bracket. If you lose though, the tournament becomes a grueling 9 round slugfest to get to only as far as the bottom seed of the championship pool.
With all of that explained, the fan favorite and second oldest professional player White-Ra [http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/White-Ra] was disqualified from the first round of the open bracket for arriving late. He was then in the 9 round losers bracket of the tournament, the most difficult place possible. White-ra continued to play 12 best of three's, 11 of which were on a single day, without losing a single match until he was knocked out of the tournament by Select on Sunday. This video can explain the crowds reaction to his incredible feat: video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI1vL-ZuYac].
The next big story line of the event was Boxer's, or as he is known in Korea, "The Emporer's" great performance. Explaining all of Boxer's history would be a far too difficult task that this [http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft/BoxeR] accomplishes much better anyways; suffice to say that he regarded as an e-sports and Starcraft icon due to his accomplishments in Starcraft: Brood War in Korea. A single example that gets across his iconic stature is the existence of a "best of" compilation DVD in Korea available of his play.
This legend of Starcraft was highly regarded around 2005-2007, but most "foreigners" and even Koreans(in the world of Starcraft, all non-Koreans are referenced as foreigners) had written him off as being far past his prime. Boxer proved them all wrong though, getting third place at the event, giving one of the most entertaining and nail bitingly close Terran vs. Terran's we've yet seen in Starcraft 2 (the highlights of which can be found here [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYy5CMnXp20]). Boxer is easily one of the most likable personalities in Starcraft 2, and everyone enjoyed seeing him do so well.
The final most dramatic moment of the tournament came from team Evil Genius' Idra. Idra is famous for his "bad boy" attitude as well as causing the most talked about drama at every tournament. For this tournament, that drama came in the form of Idra vs. Cruncher. These two players have quite a history considering the short amount of time that Starcraft 2 has been released. It all started in the tournament the "TeamLiquid StarLeague 3" or "TSL3." In this tournament, Cruncher was a darkhorse whom his first round opponent - Idra - considered a walk over and a thought would be a free win. Both players were giving each other plenty of "bad manner" (when a player is talking down to their opponent). In the deciding game three, at about 8 minurwa into the match, Cruncher typed a sarcastic "
" as he was about to win. This MLG was the first time the players had met since, and when both players went to shake hands, Idra did this [http://i53.tinypic.com/10oi2gx.jpg], before turning and walking away.I hope this post helped entice some of you into the drama of Starcraft 2. I hope you all tune into mlgpro.com on August 26th to see what professional Starcraft is all about at MLG Raleigh!
Btw, I don't work for MLG, I just want more people to be interested in Starcraft <3 Thank you for reading
