I wanted to open up a discussion that I feel is important for the Long term legacy of Starcraft;
In the beginning of 2019 it is safe to say that BW is fully alive and well again; With ASL, KSL, Foreign tours such as BSL, Defiler Tours starting up again, Have at you Tours that have been running for over a year. Contents such as Write-ups, the power rank, medry' s 24/7 VOD stream. basically you name it. Yes everything is going rather well right now for good ol bw, but what about its long term future?
EDIT:
The scene restarted back in 2013 (well, there were some online before I believe, but 2013 was thee start imo) and gained prominence over the years as more ex-pros returned so 2014 and 2015 is off the mark.
From 2012, the beginning of the game that must not be named, people went on and on that bw was dead, is was finished, it was over. Surprise to some, the Scene restarted I believe in 2014 or 2015 in Korea with sbenu running tours out of his pocket, the poor fellow went broke pouring all his attention and money into bw tours. The Shield battery project, which unfortunately run out of luck cause of the outbreak of remastered, and the return of many pros and non Koreans to the scene, and the rest is history as we know it.
Few know what happened in the "dark Ages" of bw. The basic point is, apart from there being very few tournaments, in or outside Korea, little content, and such things, there where still people playing the game all over the place. You could still log on like right now and find a game, play. And trust me, for I have been there in that time, that people where playing and playing with passion, just like today. Whatever rank, whatever skill, whatever kind of bw game. Just like in the past.
That' s what the scene is all about if you break it down. Forget streams, forget tournaments, forget content and write-ups, the basic point is people playing the game. But most people who are playing, are people that have always played, people who are over 25 years old. We are seeing this inside Korea and outside Korea. These are the top players that are dominating the scene.
EDIT: What the problem is and what I would like people to discuss in this thread is type of structure there is to support new players, new blood, new generations especially younger players that see the game, and would like to play it on a competitive level. What I mean, is that basically there are no new names out there, either in Korea, or outside, meaning there is no support structure to someone new who has never played who wants to rise and shine, improve and get to the top levels. This is the real challenge I believe, and if a solution is not found, in the long run, BW will die out, simply because there will be no one who will play it anymore...
EDIT:
LMaster and others have made tons of noobie-friendly content, and there is a newbie server.
EDIT: Thank you everybody for your input to the conversation; It would also be interesting if beginners would post their view on the subject and how it feels to start playing Broodwar; Or even if people who have been playing for years would care to "recall" their experience and hardships of getting into the game;
uhhh...I'm seeing new players all the time. Tinkle just qualified for ASL 7, and community events for both Koreans and non-Koreans are springing up all the time.
If your referring to "support structure" as teamhouses or direct involvment by Blizzard, then yes that likely isn't going to happen in the current StarCraft climate. But any player with enough desire could climb and perhaps even make it into the KSL or ASL.
The era of sponsored teams and teamhouses is likely over for good, but StarCraft can & will adapt to that. It always finds a way.
I've met a few younger than 30 players from outside Korea. Many don't stick around because the game is too "old school" and "hard".
Not saying some will keep at it but pebble makes a fair point, which could be applied to any game really. At some point the player base may and could literally die out.
I mean shit. I'm 34. I've been playing off and on since 1998.
It’s a good point. It’s difficult for new players to break through when there aren’t the same structures that used to be in play to develop up and coming talent. Not sure what can be done about it but the scene does need new talent to keep it interesting and relevant.
The scene restarted back in 2013 (well, there were some online before I believe, but 2013 was thee start imo) and gained prominence over the years as more ex-pros returned so 2014 and 2015 is off the mark. Having said that, new blood is and will always been an issue for an old game such as BW. It can't be helped seeing that most players nowadays prefer easier games and unless you find someone who's equally skilled and wants to play, you'll have to potentially grind early on to get your mechanics up.
I think we should just enjoy what we have and try to keep things going. I'm sure once more ex-pros leave for the military, we'll see more amateurs qualify for ASL, and who knows just what we'll see or how the game will move from that point on.
Its fair and square to say that getting new people into this game has been hard for the past decade...
However when I started playing we had tools and community support in the D ranks Teamleague; Honestly I do not think I would have started playing if it had not been for that; For Example the BSL is a great example of what zzzero and others are doing to support the foreign community at a high level, not to mention the entertainment it provides and the motivation for players to ladder, improve and compete. However that regards more high level play. It wasn't born yesterday either, I think remembering it was based around the Polish community which has always had a large player pool, so that was in their favour from the start, and they succeeded in building a community and eventually bringing it out available internationally.
I see invisible barriers that maybe people who have been involved in the community for so long don' t see... One of the things that I hear often as advice to newcomers who come to watch a stream and have played a couple of games is "go to Liquipedia" or "study a pros build and practice it" or "ladder it out" I think its all advice that is given with a good heart but actually terrible. The information available on Liquipedia is overwhelming for the beginner, even the beginners portal. Honestly I got lost in there. Studying a build requires prior knowledge of broodwar that a beginner simply does not have. And laddering is not a friendly place, and not a place where people play in a standard way.
What I think new people need is a place to meet and play against each other. When you play against someone of your same skill then I don' t think newcomers will find it "too hard" , they need to have personal interactions with people who can explain something as simple as how sending your miners to work in the beginning of the game works, which is a complicated process that involves insta-splitting. This comes second nature because we have all done it and seen it a million times, but imagine someone who sees it for the first time.
As I said now its not a problem, but it may be a problem, and a huge one in the future. Its a complicated scenario furthermore, because there are no examples of past e-sports that have been going on for so long and so no one can really know how things will turn out.
You cannot just drink from the well and if it never rains expect it to replenish itself, because it won' t
And it would be a shame because I think something we can all agree on is that most if not all of the people who do things for this community do it out of sheer love for the game, and this is something pretty unique to Starcraft
Broodwars winner stays on culture is also antithetical to growth because anyone picking it up will feel like a “noob” “dumb” want to quit” right away feeling and called “stupid” compared to experienced or longtime players. Not saying this can really be fixed but since battle net is just sort of cold a lot of the new generation might see overwatch fortnight hearthstone and whatever as more appealing where it isn’t quite so easy to just “lose” in 5 minutes.
On January 24 2019 15:53 pebble444 wrote: Its fair and square to say that getting new people into this game has been hard for the past decade...
However when I started playing we had tools and community support in the D ranks Teamleague; Honestly I do not think I would have started playing if it had not been for that; For Example the BSL is a great example of what zzzero and others are doing to support the foreign community at a high level, not to mention the entertainment it provides and the motivation for players to ladder, improve and compete. However that regards more high level play. It wasn't born yesterday either, I think remembering it was based around the Polish community which has always had a large player pool, so that was in their favour from the start, and they succeeded in building a community and eventually bringing it out available internationally.
I see invisible barriers that maybe people who have been involved in the community for so long don' t see... One of the things that I hear often as advice to newcomers who come to watch a stream and have played a couple of games is "go to Liquipedia" or "study a pros build and practice it" or "ladder it out" I think its all advice that is given with a good heart but actually terrible. The information available on Liquipedia is overwhelming for the beginner, even the beginners portal. Honestly I got lost in there. Studying a build requires prior knowledge of broodwar that a beginner simply does not have. And laddering is not a friendly place, and not a place where people play in a standard way.
What I think new people need is a place to meet and play against each other. When you play against someone of your same skill then I don' t think newcomers will find it "too hard" , they need to have personal interactions with people who can explain something as simple as how sending your miners to work in the beginning of the game works, which is a complicated process that involves insta-splitting. This comes second nature because we have all done it and seen it a million times, but imagine someone who sees it for the first time.
As I said now its not a problem, but it may be a problem, and a huge one in the future. Its a complicated scenario furthermore, because there are no examples of past e-sports that have been going on for so long and so no one can really know how things will turn out.
You cannot just drink from the well and if it never rains expect it to replenish itself, because it won' t
And it would be a shame because I think something we can all agree on is that most if not all of the people who do things for this community do it out of sheer love for the game, and this is something pretty unique to Starcraft
Again, the resources available now are better than they have ever been, and yet we all still managed to learn this game and get better and play it for years without them. What's changed?
As for DRTL and the like, as I said, CPL is a thing. FBW Discord has hundreds of people ready to answer questions and for your to practice with. LMaster and others have made tons of noobie-friendly content, and there is a newbie server. What more are you suggesting we as a community do???
I agree, the problem doesn't seem to be viewership or the younger generations of Korea not enjoying watching it or appreciating it as an esport, but as you stated, that there will be fewer "high level" players once all the KeSpa guys retire.
So it isn't purely the numbers of people watching or even playing it in PC bangs etc., but the fact that it is just not favorable for new players to make it their career. In 2019, it would require insane talent, love for the game and practice hours to compete with the FlaShes and Larvas instead of leaning towards a more popular and easy game such as LoL or OW.
As other people have pointed out, the other games available have changed, as well as probably the way younger kids are growing up have changed, for one none of us who are 25 and over ever remotely was using a smartphone, whereas nowadays I see 2 years old watching videos on youtube.... things in the outer world have changed;
I am not targeting you Jealous or anyone or the community, please do not take my words as a request for someone to do something; Rather I am trying to bring awareness to the topic and stimulate a discussion, and yeah, maybe my words are hard to you, I' m not sure why, but I' m trying to expose my point of view strongly I admit;
Yes, the resources today are better than they have ever been, and that I believe is a positive thing for people already involved for years in this community, because you and me would know how to navigate to get that information quickly and how to apply it, wheres to a beginner it might not be the case. More knowledge and information does not necessarily mean a better learning experience.
On January 24 2019 18:12 pebble444 wrote: nowadays I see 2 years old watching videos on youtube.... things in the outer world have changed;
So kids attention span isn't as much as it was 20 years ago.
Every year the average level on bnet increases, whereas the brand new player starts off where everyone else did when they first picked up the game 20+ years ago.So while it's true that people here learnt the game they did it as the game was evolving over the course of many years so they still managed to win games whereas someone starting from scratch now will probably lose 90%+ of their first 50 games, custom or ladder.
And how many would pick up the game in the first place considering they made SC2 free to play and thats a far more active game.Blizz fucked us over there.I was only half joking when i said have more kids and get them to play.
I got into bw in 1999 because of LANs and private bnet servers. In my college a lot of people were playing and learning the game was a fun journey because you did it shoulder to shoulder with your friends. No way in hell i would do that alone even back then, not to say today. So unless there is an ecosystem where groups of people, communities, colleges, camps - whatever, do it together, i don't see any possible growth potential among youngsters
I totally agree with pebble. You have some very good points. For a new player it's so hard to find the correct information. I've started playing again when remastered came out (before that just some casual games with brothers/friends, not on BNET, so I consider(ed) myself a beginner) and when I tried to improve myself it was so damn hard. It took like 10 months till I discovered Foreign Broodwar Discord (I didn't even know what discord was before), and like 8 months that someone mentioned Day 9's "let's learn starcraft" series which was a great help. Also I completely agree that a liquipedia article is too hard to understand for a beginner. I had to "restart" reading an article like 3 times (some time apart) to fully comprehend one (or maybe I still don't understand it fully). Another thing is teamliquid, I don't even know how I got here. I think as a beginner it's too hard to find the "correct" information and sources. And also I agree that the oldtimers most of the time aren't really helpful... This is one thing I think everyone could change and could have a nice effect! If you see someone who is much lower than your skill level, he is a beginner, don't say he is a noob, but try to help him, give him some pointers. It makes a world of difference believe me. The sad thing is that I played SC before so I'm not that really new blood, for an absolutely new blood I have no idea what would make him/her stay here in SC. Maybe in Korea where you have enough players but... I've played with some new players and it made me feel bad/sad how hard it is for them. To tell you the truth other then this "attitude change" I don't really know what to do. (children of old BW players is a nice thing, and maybe one central easy to find "article" on where to start, what is TL, foreign bw discord and LMaster's things you mentioned, everything explained. Strange thing is that many people are talking about CPL it took like a year for me to learn that it exists and what does it mean... I mention these time frames because an absolute newcomer most likely will not stay for that long.) Maybe it's that I'm just a retard and everyone else finds information right away.
Pebble thank you for bringing this up! It is very important! But I don't really know the answer.
Also what could help is Clans "hiring" new blood as well. At least a clan (I've just joined one) is a friendly place, they will help the newcomer. And I see that in the finding clan topic many clans don't look for newcomers, maybe that could change (but maybe there are good reasons why they don't, I don't know, I'm still new and learning).
Sorry for my post not being organized, one last thing I forgot: if somehow many new players could be drawn to SC at the same time it could work because they could play at the same skill level. But this seems almost impossible.
Honestly a lot of the time playing SC is not really fun. It can sometimes be extremle frustating. Maybe the most frustrating game i ever played. And the more I play the more I think I should win.
I´ve been playing now for over 10 years and I cant get past D-level. I still hover around my 100-150 apm which i had 7 years ago. When I start a session i will loose 7 out 10 games. Once every 2 weeks or so there is a win which will keep me going but its sooooo much work.
If the KESPA Era didn´t leave such a mark in me I´m sure I would have moved on a long time ago.
It has to go free to play so that more people will try it and if only 5% of those players stick we can maybe get some new blood in the long run. Otherwise I´m sure it will die out or we still see flash / larva etc. play in their 40s
On January 24 2019 21:35 heynes wrote: Honestly a lot of the time playing SC is not really fun. It can sometimes be extremle frustating. Maybe the most frustrating game i ever played. And the more I play the more I think I should win.
[...]
If the KESPA Era didn´t leave such a mark in me I´m sure I would have moved on a long time ago.
[...]
I think one important point about the new blood discussion would be that you have to focus on keeping those who're motivated already. BW is infamous enough to have new people stumble across it from time to time, someone will always give it a try. I'm not sure if you need KESPA-Era fire, but the game has to make strong enough a mark on you for what it is to keep you going by yourself.
I don't think Fortnite and LoL etc. actually take players away from BW. Who plays RTS these days anyway? Keep in mind that today with that genre you can target maybe 5-10% or something of the whole gaming-community. More people played in in the old days because there was not so much to choose from, not in today's quality.
RTS and BW especially is just not for everyone. When I stumbled across professional BW in 2011-12, all it took was to watch Flash play in OSL and PL to crawl me through the back-then-TL and learn "everything" from the scattered bits and pieces, right when those "dark ages" began. Making the start easier for noobs will only do so and so much because the game itself is just hard as F and you will have to look for the info you personally need yourself, no way around it. Who doesn't catch the fire won't stay.
edit: On reading that someone wrote they didn't find out about useful info-sources for month: Maybe we should all visit the common-channel (dunno the name) on Bnet (i mean: in game) regularly and just post something like "Hey, listen! If you're interested in improving and looking for help, visit teamliquid.net [discord, etc.] and join our community!" (if that's legal)