Starcraft Playback: Week 1

The lack of quality games in the last week have caused me to reach a little further back in providing exciting games. Pusan's only gateway is part of the wall at his choke. Kwanro makes use of the neutral creep to offensive sunken the wall with zergling support while Pusan tries getting cannons up to desperately defend. A short game, but the impulsive build by Kwanro makes it worth watching.

CJ has their back against the wall as their captain fights for their comeback. Much seems to be at a slight disadvantage for much of the game, but with a few moments of impeccable timing and an amazing use of psionic storms he is able to repel Hyun's attacks as the players move toward the endgame. Much eventually presses his slight advantage into a nail biter victory.

In this rematch of the first game of the series Darkelf uses an aggressive and unique build order that throws Sea off guard. It was a build that Darkelf prepared for non-opposite positions as he scouts across the map first to determine his next steps. Darkelf moves in at just the right time and with micro, and perhaps a little bit of luck, CJ's Ace completes one of Proleague's best comebacks.

I hesitate to recommend this game except that there really wasn't anything better. This game is not here for the entertainment factor, though it is more so than most of the chaff that came out of this week. With the new map we see both players emerge with interesting build orders and play styles. A Terran better than Frozean would have likely provided a better game while Much, the far superior player, turns the map into islands to deny Frozean of metal mobility.

The Finals matches were overall a weak set of games. Xellos is the true savior of CJ for this 2v2 match. With Savior getting cut from his gas for a bit and falling behind early, Xellos takes advantage of his superior build order to Dongrae's in harassing the opponent Terran and keeping Bright from being able to get fully back into the game. Xellos keeps the pressure on for a long time, forcing Lecaf to stay on the defensive in what is very nearly a 1v2 battle.

Kal played very solid against Kwanro, who obviously didn't know what to go for (MSL game). Luxury showed how the proper Muta -> Ultra transition could look like, though Xellos got really paranoid on the towers (OSL). And finally there is Jaedong vs. Iris which was one of the "what did Iris wrong" games - Jaedong just had impeccable timing and Iris was bashing his head against the darkswarm wall. Technically he did everything right, but there still weren't the holes which were supposed to be there. (PL finals) Certainly interesting for educational value and shows that Jaedong can play management style just as well as short term harass. edit: of that very game, there was apparently a subtitled version added!

and how every single game you recommend was one won by CJ players , which of course means I've seen all of those games before

The first 2v2 with nbs and SaviOr features a cute build which didn't seal the deal mainly because of nbs decisions. the MBC terran (i think it was Light?) did a nice job holding the 2v2 on his shoulders

The second 2v2 isn't great strategically speaking but the whole playoff depends on a micro battle near the end of the game. Really entertaining to watch hearing the screaming of the fans knowing what was at stake.