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How the Cards Have Fallen
December 25th, 2008 23:11 | Article
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Text by Colbi |
| Profile # |
A deck of cards [is] built like the purest of hierarchies, with every card a master to those below it, a lackey to those above it.” – Ely Culbertson
How the Cards Have Fallen – The Rise and Fall of Non-Korean Sponsored Starcraft Teams
By Colbi
Teamliquid: Final Edits
Many multi-gaming organizations large and small have taken a crack at the Starcraft market at some point in time. They all had a lot in common, the creative banner, sleek website, and the backing of many so-called sponsors. They drew in the fans and picked up the players they wanted, some spitting the same old jargon they have used forever when searching for new talent. Gear, travel expenses, and salaries were sometimes promised, but not always handed out. The ones that did follow through on their promises, however, seem to still be around today.
The year of 2005 would change the community forever, particularly during the summer months. Before this time, a team that was supported with finances and hardware was a rarity. However, this year would change it all. Organizations like MYM and TmG were forming teams and famous teams of the past like the ToT were trying out a name reminiscent to many of us called pG. As some of you may recall though, that didn’t last long. It now seemed as though we were entering into a new era of Starcraft hierarchies (teams) all with similar goals, but all having different strengths.
The Question
The trend of sponsored teams was simply the norm in other games big-name games like Counter-Strike and Warcraft III, but for competitive Starcraft outside of Korea this was something new. This newfound interest in Starcraft was a boost in the morale of the community. Now, players were motivated to practice with hopes of possibly securing a spot on one of the sponsored teams.
Why were sponsors now so interested in Starcraft? The game had been out for many years already. Why were they so late to catch on? Did they know something that we didn’t? Was Starcraft II under development? Some say yes. Many of these questions are truly tough to answer without digging deeper into the heads of the team owners and administrators.
Dabbling in team management in the past and writing, I was in frequent contact with many owners of these organizations. Not being shy to ask how they managed their teams, I was interested in learning about how exactly they functioned on a day-to-day basis.
On several occasions my own curiosity got the best of me and I just had to ask these individuals their thoughts on Starcraft. Some knew of its success in South Korea, but failed to realize that people still played it around the globe. Others were familiar with its community, but had no intention in sharing any part of their cooperate pie. The remaining percentage decided to find Starcraft a place in their organizations…at least for awhile anyway.
The Beginning
To truly get an idea about why owners of multi-gaming organizations were so interested in Starcraft I chose to first direct my attention to one of the oldest sponsored teams. That team is Revolution Sports Gaming or rS as you might know them better. This North American-based team was successful in helping to produce some of the best American and Canadian talent even to this day. They were formed during a time when the Korean professional scene was beginning to springboard into a cultural phenomenon.
For the owners and administrators back in the states, this was one of the first games they played competitively. It seemed only necessary to dedicate a division in their organization to represent their first love in gaming. Unfortunately, sponsors outside of Asia were not so interested in supporting the game of Starcraft, but instead were more concerned about the events that it was involved in.
”North American based sponsors are not attracted to Starcraft based divisions at all. However, the events that Starcraft and such similar titles take part in, are,” said Adam “Killa” Bracken, owner of rSports. “So when you talk about events such as WCG, ESWC and the perhaps return of CPL sponsors really do listen.”
Even when the game began to catch on in popularity it was by no means just eye candy with a simple plot. The gameplay is what shined in Starcraft, involving three unique and balanced races. Without the stellar gameplay and the spirit of competition, the scene would have failed to take off.
The other important part of the competitive scene that caught on after awhile was the birth of teams or clans. While there are many unsponsored teams, we will only discuss the sponsored ones for the sake of this article.
When a sponsored Starcraft team is formed, it is because of two distinctive reasons:
To Conquer a Country
Multi-gaming organizations based in one particular country sought to not only have a foothold in one or two games, but everything they could. They formed squads for all different gaming genres, and filled them with the best local players they could find, or buy. In turn, these players would travel to every local event in hopes of trouncing their competition, making their organization look good and keeping sponsors happy. If they’re really good, new sponsors might take notice. This is a relatively inexpensive venture and perhaps the least difficult way to gain sponsors.
A few examples of teams formed with local players are aAa, BVG, NaW, and x6tence. While these teams, to some extent did well internationally, their main goal was to dominate in their own respective country.
”The main aim of aAa will be to be efficient in its own country,” said Julien “ResT” Sanchez during his teams announcement. “With such a line-up, we will have to win everything in France.”
With a squad full of talented players, aAa was looking to become the next major threat to the European Starcraft scene. With big promises and an even bigger reputation the players initially appeared motivated. However, as Pierre “SarenS” Guivarch noted the excitement didn’t last too long and the team eventually fell into inactivity thus causing him to do the same. Without an active roster, the team was destined to fail.
”I felt that the team would die soon. And time confirmed this,” Pierre “SarenS” Guivarch told GosuGamers.
The Spanish multi-gaming powerhouse x6tence backed by the likes of AMD and ATI at the time, had a very similar model. The only real difference was they wanted to become the first professional team from Spain and with their backing, it was certainly possible.
”x6tence e-Sports Club is a corporation and we could say that it's the first Professional Team in Spain,” said Alberto “Ozmita” Martinez, leader of x6tence to GosuGamers. “In a future if all is done as we hope, we will be like a Korean Professional Team.”
Unfortunately for them, the team never quite reached their goal. They actually only stayed together as a team for around one year. Surprisingly, they lasted much longer than many of those in their category that came before them.
Past failures have shown that sponsored teams made up of players from one or two countries generally do not last very long. RoX comes to mind as a possible exception.
It is interesting to note, while a majority of these sponsored teams gained their funding through the successes in their other games, there are a few exceptions. To keep the team active and functioning properly, NaW and ToT extended their recruiting limits outside the country where their sponsors are based. This was a move that paid off in the long run. Both teams are part of the rare few who were able to secure such sponsors as Qpad and Razer with their Starcraft division alone, for the most part.
Out of all of the organization based outside of Asia, the Germans possess a strong passion for Starcraft. While not all of their teams lasted long, they did have a lot of them. Teams like pG, ToT, mTw, DkH, SSV Lehnitz, and faculty are among those who tested the Starcraft waters. Some have even gone down in the books as the most successful ever in the community.
To Conquer the World
Some other teams had a much broader, long term plan. The more common route teams seem to take partially due to it being easier to re-equip your roster with new talent whenever needed. They will recruit anyone with the skill and attitude to fit into their squad without discriminating by nationality. MYM and ToT are two that fit this example. To a lesser extent, former teams Excello and TeamPlay.it also match this criterion.
All of their main goals were the same; they wanted to be the best non-Korean team. Even to this day though, both teams are still jockeying back and forth for the title of who is the best. As a matter of fact, both of these teams have currently met eighteen times with ToT winning eleven of those encounters.
For years, ToT has remained the highest pinnacle in the non-Korean scene. Their frequent success in leagues, tournaments, and against Korean professional gamers has made playing for them an honor. Being invited to such a team met that your skills were on-par with the best of the foreigner community. However, recently the team has been under fire for lowering their standards when recruiting.
”MYM will now continue and lead Starcraft and e-sports into new dimensions,” said MYM management during their official announcement.
You have to give the Danish-based organization credit for keeping their word. Throughout all of the comings and goings of players, they have stuck to the community instead of jumping ship like many teams have when things were looking down. In return, their players have brought them a massive amount of achievements.
The Future
Throughout my research, I remembering looking back at post made back in the olden days and seeing people talking about when Starcraft would die off. Little did they their era in which they were competing was just the beginning of a game that arguably has yet to reach its pinnacle of success.
We of course all know that Starcraft II is on the horizon, but are left with wondering when it is actually going to be released. Are sponsors and tournaments going to catch on? I believe so. Sponsors are already interested and I know for a fact that several major multi-gaming organizations will be jumping on the Starcraft II bandwagon that haven’t had anything to do with Starcraft in the past.
” Jumping on the bandwagon early does more good then anything as it will have a cause and effect reaction to other teams that compete,” Killa said. “The other advantages are that of players, first teams to commit will get their pick of the litter.”
Teams like fnatic and mTw.AMD, both multi-gaming powerhouses, have caught the Starcraft bug early and if all works out will continue the transition into SC2. From the looks of it, MYM will continue down the path in preparing for an SC2 team. With their money along with talented player pool made up of Starcraft and Warcraft III players there is no doubt they will be off to a strong start. It is only a matter a matter of time before we might witness an SK, Dignitas, or Pandemic tag on iCCup.
”The top teams around the world have an ability to "make or break" a title by their support,” he adds.
It will be up to these teams and their sponsor to make the decision of whether or not it will be a hit. Sure, selling the game to millions of fans is important, but if teams are not formed the sponsors have no way to market their products. It is more than likely we will see more sponsored teams come and go with Starcraft II. However, this time around hopefully fewer cards will fall.Last edit: 2008-12-27 12:56:12 |
| | Editor-in-Chief for Team EG - http://www.twitter.com/LColbi |
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 Plexa Administrator December 26 2008 05:30. | Profile Blog # |
| excellent article about a topic that we don't talk about often on TL |
| | ~ Spirit will set you free ~ | |
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| Zoler Sweden. December 26 2008 05:39. Posts 5922 | Profile Blog # |
Very nice article. SC2 will - as we all know - really turn everything upside down  |
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 JWD United States. December 26 2008 05:43. Posts 12566 | Profile Blog # |
| Loved the timeline. Very informative, nicely done Colbi! |
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| GogoKodo Canada. December 26 2008 06:00. Posts 1591 | Profile Blog # |
| Very nice, I especially appreciate the timeline. I've never really followed non-korean starcraft except at the very beginning when I would read battle reports all the time. |
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 heyoka Administrator December 26 2008 06:05. | Profile Blog # |
| Very interesting, cool stuff |
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 GearitUP United States. December 26 2008 06:09. Posts 337 | Profile # |
| Wow awesome post, makes me reminice of the time when Rekrul ,Elky, and Froz were owning it up pretty much everywhere on west. :'( the good ol days |
| | Own<Owned<Ownt<Pwn<Pwned<PwnT< YOU NEWB! |
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| LemOn United Kingdom. December 26 2008 06:17. Posts 1897 | Profile Blog # |
What about CDS), the Czech-Only clan that was sponsored first by some companies outside of the industry, and later by Progamers, the czech form that controls progaming in the country.
Founded in 2001, they started to have sponsors and pay players LAN expenses in 2004, only to die off in late 2007 because the Czech bw scene died off. |
| | Much is the father figure that I miss in my life. Go Daddy! DoC.LemOn, LemOn[5thF] |
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| InfeSteD United States. December 26 2008 06:20. Posts 4658 | Profile Blog # |
I love the article lots of new cool topics in december ^_^
Merry X-mas!  |
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| cRaZypYRo Germany. December 26 2008 06:24. Posts 188 | Profile # | |
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| Not_Computer Canada. December 26 2008 06:26. Posts 2076 | Profile Blog # |
| Great article! Great read and very informative graphs. There's a lot I still don't know so posts/topics like these help fill me in on all that I've been missing out on. It's a shame that SC hasn't been very successful outside of korea, but as those before me said, SC2 will change things. |
| | "Jaedong hyung better be ready. I'm going to order the most expensive dinner in Korea." |
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| The.Crow December 26 2008 06:32. Posts 619 | Profile Blog # |
Nice write up and great that TL.net posted it! (p.s.: u don't work for gotfrag anymore?)
I think we should also think about what sponsored team means. Teams like NaW don't receive any money but only hardware, that is different with for example mTw or MYM, since some players are paid here.
Also a team like BOSS was not sponsored by a real sponsor but by cash that was paid by a private person and I still don't know were is the sense in that, I also doubt in were sponsors see the sense in sponsoring teams.
I can speak at least for MYM that it is fact that our sales people don't go out and sell the StarCraft team. Means, they can't attract any sponsor with them.
When I asked Maik Brodowski, the former Sales and Media Manager of ESNation, the company that owns a couple of eSports pages and also the team MYM, why teams outside Korea still have a StarCraft team, he couldn't give me a straight answer. For him one major aspect if he wants to attract a new sponsor is to show the offline performance of the players he wants to 'sell'. At offline events pictures and videos are taken, at offline events the big prize money is given out, but where are the offline events for StarCraft outside Korea? Next to WCG National Qualifiers and the finals there is maybe no other event that really is interesting to the sponsors and that really attracts the big players and visitors from all over the world. Having a StarCraft team to present it at only one or two events?
The money they get and the hardware is cut from deals that are there due to CS or WC3 players. If you look at the new teams that came up this year, it might be the same: mTw (have a world class wc3 team), fnatic (top cs team), Excello (had some cs team that was 'ok'). RoX? I doubt they have a real sponsor.
If we move outside Asia (let us leave China out of this discussion) and take a look at Europe we have right now two major problems: The first thing is that the RTS community lacks, compared to the FPS community, a strong and large fan base. Games like Counter-Strike always had much more fans. More and more people were interested to buy the gear and mousepads their idols used. Would have companies like SteelSeries or Razer been able to become what they are and invest those huge amounts of money in eSports without FPS games? I am not sure! I won't say that RTS is not an interesting genre for the sponsors, but if you can attract a possible audience of 65 000 people on Steam that play Counter-Strike 1.6 at the same time and 'only' 20 000 people that play StarCraft at the same time on Battle.net, the teams of which game would you choose to sponsor?
And we also miss the "superstars" in Europe.
Where are all those heroes like Elky, Grrr and co. that made people like me and you to buy StarCraft. Without them you won't attract sponsors, without them you won't make new people start playing StarCraft, without them you cannot get people to your community page, without them you can't make people read StarCraft news, without them it doesn't make sense to create merchandise. What would football be if you put all the Ronaldos, Beckhams and Ballacks away? It would be like in StarCraft, the hardcore fans watch it, but the huge audience cannot be attrackted.
So all in all, where is the sense for teams like Excello, RoX or MYM to have a StarCraft team? Those teams are in fact companies that have to make money with what they do.
The only answer for me is the SC2 factor. But that is a huge risk... and teams like SK, MYM, fnatic, mTw and Co don't need to build players up, if they want the best, they just buy them... those teams did the same within the last years, only a very few new talents grew up within MYM or within SK.
Having a StarCraft team in 2008 to be ready for StarCraft 2 (mTw, fnatic), or to have it because you are in love with the game (RoX, Excello, ToT), no matter if you can make profit out of it buisness wise?
I hate to be so negative, but I don't see many reasons to spend money for a SC team in 2008. Yes, individual players are worth, but not a whole team. The WarCraft 3 scene is going the same trend right now. Teams like SK, mTw and MYM may disband their teams in January and keep only 1-2 'stars.Last edit: 2008-12-26 06:33:45 |
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| Comeh United States. December 26 2008 06:34. Posts 3810 | Profile Blog # |
God, what I would give for starcraft to be like in euro/america like cs 1.6 or halo is...
Amazing article, a great christmas present :D! |
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| ZerGuy Poland. December 26 2008 06:50. Posts 204 | Profile # | |
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| zoLo United States. December 26 2008 06:55. Posts 4511 | Profile Blog # |
On December 26 2008 06:34 Comeh wrote:
God, what I would give for starcraft to be like in euro/america like cs 1.6 or halo is...
Amazing article, a great christmas present :D!
Yup... but it'll be hard to tell because of the financial crisis we are going through. Just recently, NVIDIA stopped being ESWC's sponsor because of it. |
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| s.a.y Croatia. December 26 2008 07:45. Posts 3582 | Profile Blog # |
a good article, but not great. it misses conclusions like The.Crow added.
i've been following the CS,Q3,UT ( ut2k4 & ut3 ) series and the start is that the game must be very popular between the noobs and have good multiplayer. Q3 failed because the community splited, UT3 was just trash out of the box, CS was perfect.
i hope sc2 will be also good for a large community, then sponsors will invest money into competitive play.
go fnatic ! |
| | hot_bid / R1CH fan | www.sc2croatia.com | Croatian SC2 scene | |
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| emucxg Finland. December 26 2008 08:11. Posts 3616 | Profile Blog # |
nice artical, thanks
and also, thanks to The.Crow =) |
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| Makhno Sweden. December 26 2008 08:31. Posts 584 | Profile Blog # |
| Great article, and a very interesting post by the Crow. I really hope SCII picks the whole E-sports scene up and just shakes the dust of it, makes it new. |
| | "If I think, everything is lost" |
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| EGMachine United States. December 26 2008 09:03. Posts 1588 | Profile Blog # |
| colbi is amazing jesus, alot of hard work was put into this! |
| | http://www.gosucoaching.com/ |
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