What: A $150, best of 7 series showmatch between two amazing players!
Who: qxc, Terran terror from the United States, beloved streamer and long-time member of Root Gaming! He's got tournament credentials out the wazoo and will be competing at Winter Assembly in Helsinki this coming weekend!
VS.
Steven Bonnell II, as he is known on the featured streams right here on TeamLiquid.net, or 'Destiny' if you meet him on the ladder. Destiny is a Master league Zerg player with an army of fans that hang on his every "YEEAAAAHHHH!!" and "NOOOOOO!" as he streams essentially every single day, not hiding his enthusiasm and/or disgust with the balance of StarCraft 2's three unique races.
When: Tuesday, February 8th, at 4 p.m. EST, Game 1 will go live on AskJoshy. The rest of the games will be accessed one by one by clicking on the annotations at the end of each game. This way, viewers can begin watching whenever they like and still have the seamlessness of going from one game to the next. (Every game after Game 1 will be set to unlisted.)
Sponsors: Some of the prize money for this showmatch was provided by @Alex on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/Alex - He is a tech blogger and writes for the Huffington Post! Alex sent me a message on YouTube saying that he wanted to throw some money at some of his favorite players! He's not trying to sell a product or advertise anything, he just wanted some great games from some great players, so if you have a Twitter account, go say hello to Alex. If you have some extra money you'd like to get in the hands of some of your favorite players, contact me here on Team Liquid or on YouTube and I'll see if I can help you out. =)
The rest of the prize money for this showmatch was provided by Clicky! http://www.getclicky.com - Clicky is a real-time web analytics service that can provide you with nearly-live traffic reports for your website, blog, or other online property. It's better than Google Analytics, which can provide you with reports from the previous day! If you have a promotion or a link on Digg or Reddit and you need to know how your traffic is fluctuating in minutes, and not hours, Clicky is just the service for you! Go show them some support by visiting the site and perhaps they'll be interested in sponsoring more showmatches in the future!
Note from Josh: This is the first exclusive showmatch that I've ever been lucky enough to have, so I want to thank everyone for watching! I've been casting games since the beta and would appreciate any feedback you may have for me. I hope you enjoy the picture-in-picture that I've included where appropriate, the 1080p quality, and the annotations linking you from one game to the next! In a sea of commentators, I try to use video editing to make the StarCraft 2 viewing experience better for my audience, so if you like what you see I urge you to subscribe so you'll be the first to see future showmatches, interviews from live events, giveaways, casts, and other videos as they're put up. =)
Also, this is my 1,000th post on TeamLiquid.net, so of course I want to thank Team Liquid for all they have done for the StarCraft community, and for me personally. You guys and gals rock my socks off, please don't ever change. =)
Warning! As these games have already been played, it has come to my attention that the results of this showmatch have already been uncovered by match history snoops, so be very careful when reading anything beyond this point! If you don't want to know who wins in advance, be sure to just check http://www.youtube.com/AskJoshy at 4 p.m. EST (21:00 GMT (+00:00)) on Tuesday, February 8th!
Feel free to leave predictions or love below until the games go live!
Game 1 is now LIVE! Right here! To get to Game 2 and onward, you must click on the annotations at the end of each game. This is done to prevent spoilers and to help you transition from one game to the next easily in one sitting.
Was awesome to be able to support some great players. Can't wait to see the games. Thanks to Josh for being such a boss and running the whole show. Also, thanks for GetClicky for putting up two thirds of the prize pool.
This is the first SC2 event that they have ever sponsored, so check 'em out and they might do more.
I'm thinking 4-2 in QXC's favor. Big fan of Destiny, as his infestor usage is awesome (maybe in ZvT if I'm lucky? probably not, but still...), but I'm not entirely sure he can take down QXC. Hope for some good games though! Can't wait for them Suthy
Ive watched Destinys stream lots tvz, he has incredible unit control and APM. But he always gets these muta balls of like 20 mutas, and uses them to engage marines. He never harasses their mineral lines. Most of the time they will have 1 turret at their base, he will crush their army, and NOT harass their base while he remacros zerglings. He lets them rebuild and re-engages With his mutas/lings/banelings when he could have crushed a mineral line 3 times over. Seems strange to me. As much as I love him, I think QXC will take this 4-1.
I feel that Destiny is going to be practicing really hard for this and QXC won't be practicing for it at all. I still think QXC has it, but I wouldn't be surprised if Steven takes a game or two in the series.
As someone who watched qxc's former stream a lot and currently watches Destiny's stream every day, this is something I'm quite interested in watching despite already knowing the outcome (won't spoil).
Mildly annoyed that Josh didn't let Destiny stream the matches as they happened, though.
Im totally rooting(no pun intended) for qxc, but to be honest, last i saw him he wasnt doing so well, and TLO kinda sorta slaughtered him in their show match
He seemed really out of practice, but thats completely my opinion and he doesnt stream anymore so I havent seen anytihng too recent of qxc's play now Destiny isnt TLO, but still an amazing player
so i highly doubt qxc is gonna 4-0 Destiny as so many are saying above
either way it should be very entertaining, Go QXC!!!!
On February 08 2011 10:54 JoshSuth wrote: What: A $150, best of 7 series showmatch between two amazing players!
Who: qxc, Terran terror from the United States, beloved streamer and long-time member of Root Gaming! He's got tournament credentials out the wazoo and will be competing at Winter Assembly in Helsinki this coming weekend!
VS.
Steven Bonnell II
Yes, YES, YEEEEEAAAHHHSS!!!!!
Can't wait to see the clash of both.
As zerg and fellow stream follower, I root for Destiny, of course.
this is kinda comparing a master player to a gold player, even though they both masters there if an obvious skill gap.. oh well good luck to all grats qxc on free 150$
On February 09 2011 05:28 lizzuma wrote: so show matches are now "let's give a guy 150$ for free?"
interesting
I'll go ahead and tell you, I was given a list of players to contact and qxc and Destiny were the first to accept. Three other very good players all declined for various, very understandable reasons.
Also, there will be a slight delay because I goofed up on the first game and had to reupload a new version and it's still processing. Unless you want to watch in 240p, that is. =P
Ok, here's Game 1! The only way to get to Game 2 and onward is by using the annotations at the end of each game. This is to prevent spoilers and to help you watch the series end-to-end without having to look around for the next game.
On February 09 2011 06:36 FrostyTreats wrote: man not even 1 fight... qxc picking every unit off... lol
Yeah, QXC's upgraded marines pretty much shut down every idea Destiny had.
na, destiny just sacced everything constantly... He had such a huge lead taking out 2 of qxc's armies early on.. he really should have had an easy time holding off qxcs push up the 3rd and had done alot more damage with mutas.. qxc really needed a thor but this guys muta harass couldn't punish qxc... Regardless i fucking loved the Turret armor + Range upgrade and putting them all around the map... was quite a sight.
I thought both players played well. QXC just played so solidly and took every little thing he could and saved as much as he could. Be the time he was 15 minutes into a game he just had an edge over Destiny as the little things in each game added up. Great games. The soundboard was amusing as always. . QXC 4 - 1 Destiny
I have to say I really liked the caster (AskJoshy). I will check out some of his YT stuff. And this picture in picture stuff was just great, more casters need to adopt that.
Though (predictively) rather one-sided. Was surprised to see qxc fall on steppes (qxc has impeccable micro which tends to be more important on small aggressive maps with early game being important), but congrats on winning anyway.
On February 09 2011 19:06 DrunkenTemplar wrote: Awesome work on the sound board josh, really enjoyed your casting!
While I enjoyed the cast I must say I found the sound board very annoying and distracting. Maybe I'm in the minority about the soundboard, but I feel you have enough skill as a caster to not rely on weird gimmicky tricks like this, and they don't really add anything to your cast anyway.
EDIT: And BTW picture-in-picture is an awesome feature.
While I enjoyed the cast I must say I found the sound board very annoying and distracting. Maybe I'm in the minority about the soundboard, but I feel you have enough skill as a caster to not rely on weird gimmicky tricks like this, and they don't really add anything to your cast anyway.
EDIT: And BTW picture-in-picture is an awesome feature.
Well don't worry, you're in the vocal majority on not liking the soundboard, but I was trying to do it as more of an homage to Destiny than to actually greatly enhance the cast. I just wanted to do something fun and it became painfully aware to me yesterday that most people hate(d) it. Lesson learned.