How REGION LOCK DAMAGED the Korean Proscene in StarCraft 2
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- Опубліковано 25 чер 2024
- The biggest matchfixing scandal - • This MATCHFIXING SCAND...
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Timecodes:
00:00 How and South Korea dominated in StarCraft 2
01:53 How Blizzard tried to make StarCraft 2 proscene more diverse
04:07 Why Korean Dominance was a bad thing
06:06 Pros and Cons of Region Lock
06:47 How Region Lock influenced StarCraft 2 in Europe and North America
09:21 How Region Lock damaged the Korean Scene
#sc2
#starcraft
#starcraft2
#esports - Ігри
Do you think there should be no region lock or it should stay?
The biggest matchfixing scandal - ua-cam.com/video/DWbaUr8kZaU/v-deo.html
Timecodes:
00:00 How and South Korea dominated in StarCraft 2
01:53 How Blizzard tried to make StarCraft 2 proscene more diverse
04:07 Why Korean Dominance was a bad thing
06:06 Pros and Cons of Region Lock
06:47 How Region Lock influenced StarCraft 2 in Europe and North America
09:21 How Region Lock damaged the Korean Scene
I think nowadays it prolly wouldnt make such a difference if it would be removed, the skill level seems much more similar. I would argue that with the Korean Scene massive reward cuts, maybe it should be removed., so they can compete abroad.
What they need to do is make the prize money far less top-heavy. The guys that finish top 16 at a major tournament can only do that if they play full time, but the money reward for this dedication is just not there. It is a problem in many sports and often leads to players being forced to make enough money through match-fixing... Snooker has had these scandals, tennis has had these scandals, football has had these scandals, SC2 is no different...
So Region lock didn't kill the Korean scene, the top-heavy prize pools did.
I also think Blizzard should have realized a long ass time ago that team sports are way more popular. The most popular E-sports (and regular sports) are team sports: Valorant, Dota, Mobile Legends, Counterstrike and LoL get waaaaaaaaay more viewers than any single player competition. Viewers like to support a team because they are more permanent then single players. And viewers like to see players interact with team-members, because it makes them more relatable. Maru hardly ever really speaks unless it is in a team event and then you find out he has a sense of humor and humility that is fun to see... So Blizzard should have facilitated and financed Proleague-type competitions more or introduced a competition that pits teams against each other in single player and 2v2 matches. But because they only supported 1v1 games with a world championship, all tournaments were catered towards that.
Having teams also supports those mid- and lower tier players which don't get to win tournaments for their income...
So there are several reasons why the Korean scene (and SC2 in general) died, but it comes back to one thing: little support for the mid to low-tier pro-player to make a living of playing SC2 full-time. And without those players, the scene just bleeds out...
These were the guys that really cared, that set up real teams, that practiced for 12 hours a day and did everything they could to make SC2 a real sport, and dominated every tournament before their scene was destroyed. And Blizzard shit on them.
Honestly, if a match fixing scandal happened at the same time as the region lock, then I don't believe that the region lock had a negative impact on the scene at all. Region lock made the international community stronger (as you said), so the Koreans had to trade some of their dominance for getting worldwide fame instead of just South Korean fame, and there ARE events like e.g. Home Story Cup, where they gathered donations to invite Koreans and pay for their expenses, and some pro gamers have become streamers, like PartinG. Therefore, in my opinion the region lock was a net positive which got overshadowed by the match fixing scandal's gigantic net negative.
I understand that it can be considered racist to handicap just one nation, so they should have negotiated with the South Korean scene first and told them "a boost in world wide ratings means more fame, more income, and thus higher prize pools".
Tbh, it has not much to do with region lock. It is more of a money talk. Prize pool is getting smaller, audiences leaving for other games, sponsor not paying as much etc. The cheating scandle did 10x more damage to korean pro scene than everything above combined.
That thumbnail! Oh, man, I wasn't even watching broodwar back then but still a tear formed in the corner of my eye.
I miss the old GSL with its code S, code A, code B.
next video: How Acti-Blizzard demolished the SC2 Pro Scene.
hey man, i left a comment some videos ago about how you could slow down your narration a bit - and you did! thank you so much, it really is easier to understand :)
You do know you can go to settings and slow it down as much as you want, just food for thought
@@DawnMayCry yeah matey, i know, but then he sounds kinda retarded and it was meant to be constructive criticism for his future content, which he asked for lol
Brood War will never die !
Thanks for another great video !
Thanks for the video!
Region looking isn't bad in principle, but the most powerful scene should have been given the most attention so it can thrive. Foreigners should have also been given incentives to go and train in Korea. Similarly, more people should have been allowed to qualify from Korea.
Yeah. Korea gets 36 spots, global gets 28 spots maybe.
Good ol round of 64.
racist saying racism isn't bad
If i remember correctly gsl was very close to your idea with a few selected foreigners like idra. Nonetheless i still believe starcraft 2 never came close to brood war and its popularity
@Strato Side can you explain?
@@grizzly311tr he thinks region locking is restricted by their nationality when it's done by their country of residence. MC was playing in the EU for a very long.
Well, ending the region lock now is kind of too late. But maintaining it just does not make sense anymore. The goal to boost the foreign scene was reached, so now it is better to give at least some Koreans more career opportunities
they have just as much career opportunities as everybody else.
Can you do a video on some of the most favoured strategies, like protoss all ins, 4 gates, blink all in, and the famous Parting cho cho train of immortal sentry and how they were figured out by other races?
This. Popular cheese would be interesting, too. Lol like terran or protoss rushing to block the opponents natural ramp in vanilla sc2
awesome idea! this could be even a series.
I'd love to see a hindsight overview of how to scout and beat the soul train. Snute, JD, was Rogue active back then m
Sc2 was unnatural from the beginning. And Blizzard shot themselves in the foot. Foreigners were going to give it a chance while Korean pros would mostly stick to BW, but Blizzard pumped money into Sc2 while meddling with the BW scene effectively killing it. Then when the Koreans dominated they meddled again.
The developer should not be the highest authority of the competitive scene. The American sports model just doesn't sustain itself in sports.
Exactly that is why CS grew into scene that is level above anything else. It grew organically.
bit OT: It feels kinda sad to go to watch GSL and the studio being 1/5 empty (the finals are completely full tho).
I don't blame them for the region lock. They had no way of knowing that it would coincide with Life tanking the entire scene in Korea.
At the same time, I think that the approach should have been more bottom up from the beginning. The difference between Korea and the west in eSports is that you can find in-person competition everywhere. Online tournaments are one thing, but you don't make the kind of connections with other players that you do in-person and that is huge for improving your game. Something smaller scale akin to the Hearthstone Fireside Gatherings might have been a good approach to bridge the gap between online tournaments and professional level tournaments.
What you have omitted is the legal battle between Blizzard and KeSPA over the TV etc. rights.
I think this was a massive factor for KeSPA to switch to a royalty free game.
On one hand, I think it's cool that the Foreign scene finally got good enough, and got enough support, to finally boost up some truly great players. It was a little sad to see the few foreign hopes get pushed out at every tournament; Ro16, maybe Ro8 at most, before the Koreans would take over. But, there's no denying that on the other hand, between the match-fixing scandal and the region lock, Korean dominance ended in SC2 partially because the skill of foreigners got high enough, but also partially because the Koreans gave up. They just didn't see the reward in it anymore, and they moved on. And that's sad, and I'm not sure what the best decision would have been in the end.
I think we should remove the region lock and do a server lock. All games on a server are played on that server. US West, Central, and East. Europe West and Central. China, Korea, Australia. Anyone from around the world can play in any server tournament they want. The catch is the potential of lag if you live far away, but you could always travel to reduce it. This would give NA an advantage in the NA server qualifiers but anyone could give it a shot. Same for all others, with the exception that Korea would not exist and be GSL. The advantage to this change would be that middle tier Koreans who can't get into GSL can now compete anywhere and I think this would revive the Korean scene
Enjoyed watching your game against Harstem. Hope you smash him next time! (=
Which game? send link!
@@habarvaz It is one of Harstem's recent BGMWSS videos, something with population control in the title, where he focuses on supply blocking his opponents
Blizzard is a company, they will always do what maximizes their coverage and player base. Hurt feelings and broken dreams don't really factor in for their decisions I imagine.
IMHO Region Lock didn't destroyed Korean SC2, it helped foreigners to get a sustained ecosystem outside Korea. Could have been handle better the Region Lock? Sure but that doesn't mean that allowing Korean to destroy foreigners in each and every region would have helped their scene, it would be only helped some players to get more money but not their ecosystem in Korea. In TL is already a good discussion about it explaining how the Korean sponsors focused on only on local audience, even those who were worldwide brands.
I love your videos and research but I must really disagree with this one, and I hope you check the TL thread and read a lot of the opinions not maybe to change yours but to get a more broad view about it, since I despised foreigner tournaments without koreans for a lot of a time and only watched GSL thinking the same as you over the region lock and after years I understood the situation with a different perspective and I think I myself was wrong because I was biased and lacked knowledge about how the sponsorship and ecosystem worked.
I was always in favor of region lock in 2012-2013, but I think it was a wrong timing to pull it down in 2016 when the Korean scene was going through such a disaster.
It definitely played a big part. Can't be bothered explaining much but in the end, better players at the time should win the most money but region lock made it unfair. For example, let's say you are the 4th best student in a class of whatever subject so you don't win an award, but you did better than the person from another class who came 1st in that class and wins an award. That is unfair isn't it? Or you could say unlucky I guess.
@@jazbas_aoe6357 The analogy is no the best but as I stated that wouldn't help the scene, only that 4th student to get a reward, while his class was suffering of the same ill.
It would have destroyed other scenes which have an already healthier ecosystem by themselves (and I didn't even care in the past) and did nothing for the Korean scene excepting those few players flying to other places to destroy lesser competitors and their scene/ecosystem when getting their money and moving back to Korea.
Again this has been explained way better in TL, I used to think as you do and even from a fan's perspective of "I only care about the highest level of SC2, not lower players trying to get money in their local tournaments" but I admit I was wrong since facts and other evidence of a broader view made me realise that.
@@Lanzetsu it's similar to having a quota in certain jobs. You are rewarding certain people and punishing certain type of people for literally just being a certain type of person instead of looking at the skills required to do the job as the main or only factor.
@@jazbas_aoe6357 nah, a better example is: imagine if you are a pretty good fighter and you are #1 in your hometown, and then your hometown hosts a tournament and a bunch of professional UFC fighters fly in from Brazil to destroy you and your other hometown rivals. That would suck, no? Especially because after the tournament is over they will just take their cash and skip town, and you won't even get the chance to learn from the higher competition.
I think they should have tried Korean blood transfusions. That would have fixed the skill gap no problem 😂😂😂
As I remember, there were tons of foreign pros contemplating on leaving the game before the region lock. We do remember the high profile names, IdrA, Stephano, Naniwa but tons and tons more of the "mid-tier" players also left. The koreans in one sense put other regions under a strangle hold by sucking up big chunk of available prize money. In that sense, there was a real sense of the region lock just had to be done or foreign audience largely would lost interest in the game.
And yes, I was one of those who just turned off the stream once last foreigner lost. For me the problem as a viewer was that especially how HotS worked, there was only a handful of ways the game could progress. The only incentive to watch was if I was emotionally invested in the game.
Also to be completely fair, I think SC2 in its current form also suffers from same thing. The gaps between tiers is yet again so high there's low chance of upsets happening. Olivera being the exception to the rule. Now instead of bracket full of koreans, it's a small group of foreigners and koreans that do effectively the same thing as in 2015 and before. Even back then I was hoping more "farm league" tournaments where top tier pros are not playing. But alas, not enough money nor interest left to get the ball rolling.
Hmm atm there is a group of top tier players in SC2 who each of them can win a tournament. Serral, Maru, Clem,Hero,Reynor, Dark,MaxPax Oliveiria, Cure, Solar probably you could add to that list. What would you like for it to be tottaly random, that suddenly a 100 ranked GM wins a global touranement?
It's not a terrible idea to region lock. I don't consider that the problem. The timing was. They introduced the region lock very shortly after Korea got slammed by the match fixing scandal. They didn't let Korea recover from that, making give a "fuck you" energy to the Koreans who play the game for a living.
0:20 Um, "like real stars"? You meant to say "they were actual real stars", right? 🙂
Many real-world sports can also be considered region locked. For example, table-tennis. No one want to see Chinese players flood the world for prize money. Chinese answer was letting their second-tier players naturalized in other countries and represent them. Unlike in e-sports, these players can build professional local communities.
is that lowkow at 1:42? wearing yellow T
I disapprove region lock. If you want to win, you have to improve, that's that. I dislike participation medals, only the best deserve it. Also skill levels equalized nowadays, region lock is no longer needed.
haha 4k grabby's sc2 career was kind of short
Which Koreans were forced to change games? And I mean before they went into military.
ive always wondered *put tin foil hat on* how much is actual skill from players like serral, vs how much is blizzard nerfs to for example Byun Reapers, and similar nerf cases, an attempt from blizzard to have EU in the top of the world.
Like if it was any other company i would have some doubts but with blizzard you can picture them changing the game just to favour a non korean world champion agenda...
The more gradual ladder is hardly an argument. Anyone could just go on the Korean ladder instead and get to Masters or GM if they need the practice that bad.
Or they could also just make their own training facilities. Things were in motion, no need to turn on baby mode for them foreigners.
Theory is great, but in practice region lock worked and saved sc2.
@@firestarter000001 Hard to say in retrospec. I think the skill gap was already shrinking.
Why punish so much hard work.
@@Broockle It does seem unfair. On other hand, it would seem if region lock wouldnt have been introduced, foreign scene would die and the Koreans would also loose all that price money + prolly more as overall SC2 viewership would plummet.
@@firestarter000001
maybe....
I still dun like it...
it's "lose" not "loose" 😆
@@BroockleBut they aren't punishing hard work. The fact is just that you somehow have to make a living if you want to go pro. And realistically, you can't do that if all your attempts at earning money hit the wall that is called "Korean". It's just that there's less space available for those residing in South Korea instead of other regions. When you're not protecting the sapplings then they can't grow. That's only logical.
🤔 Hmm make me wonder what would have happened if they didn't do so.
The foreigner scene would be probably in a bad state
@@EsportsStoryteller XD true
What do you think would have been a better compromise?
I dont see region locked was bad. I never liked to see koreans winning everything in west because they could connect from there and obliterate everyone. That didnt help to export or to create pro players in europe or NA, so for me i never saw that as a bad move. In fact, thanks to it we saw a lot of western players turning pros.
Interesting idea taking out region lock, now that GSL has been defunded...
Dificulty level : Asian
Region locking didn't kill the Korean scene and neither did match-fixing. If there is any one thing that killed it then it was Broodwar. SC2 just isn't that popular in Korea, they might have a lot of good players because of the Broodwar legacy but they don't have enough, uh, bad players to watch the tournaments.
this channel is just one of many in videoessayists atempts at clickbait
"you know this relatively irrelevant thing that achieved slow and natural death over a decade of proud history... IT WAS ACTUALLY MUDERED ON STREAM, BY A BUNCH OF MOAI STATUES *MOAI NOISES* *VINE BOOM SOUND EFFECT* *TACO BELL RING* "
I can´t find Brood War compelling to watch. SC2 is so much faster and snapping. Is strange how never take off in Korea.
cuz brood war is the better game, ez. shit may run smoother and "faster" in sc2 but it ain't fun or balanced. people would rather deal with the strained number of units they can select and wonky ass AI over sc2 and well since they've been doing that in the first place and loved it already.
Region lock single handedly killed my interest in SC2 back in the day. When I watch esports I want to see the best play the best. It was like an attempt at social welfare for the foreigner scene. Ended up just watching GSL after that. Nevermind them capping the prize pool for GSL so crap players playing in WCS got similar rewards to GSL. It was just a joke and to be frank yes I seen it as racist. Couldn't be bothered anymore.
I enjoy this channel as I get to live the days when the scene was vibrant now its just a shadow of its former glory. Even if you lift the region lock the Korean scene is dead. Went to the GSL final last year and it was so small it was rather heartbreaking even IEM early stages had more viewers back in the day. Between Life and the region lock the game might be alive in the west although it looks like its still on life support there but by god is it dead in Korea.
I dont understand this, Korean SC pros are statistically better than anyone else, and region lock meant they mostly competed with other Koreans, so players on the same level as them, instead of world players who are statistically weaker.
Does it not stand to reason to then conclude that the Korean scene died because they werent able to seal-club weaker players?
And if thats what kept it going did it really deserve to survive?
No region locking is not a problem. At this point you are blaming every detail Blizzard did wrong without acknowledging the root cause. RTS genre had it's time and it's time to move on. Maybe it will come back in the future but who knows so stop expecting it can keep popular.
Rts is killing it what do you even mean lol
I think the region lock worked great. You even say it yourself in the video near the end how now we have some incredibly competitive starcraft, and I think it's the best it's ever been in terms of competition. Your crux about how the region locked killed Korea is only looking at one thing, and you only touch on the real factors at the end. The biggest fact here is that SC2 was never as popular in Korea as Brood War was, and today BW well outpaces SC2 in Korea. To say that the region lock destroyed everything is selective truth at best. And additionally, you mention how sad it is that some people at the lower end of pro can't make livings on it. Would you rather trade that for the entire rest of the world? I don't see how this was a net negative for the scene as a whole, instead of just a setback for people who want to be pro gamers in Korea.
Ah yes. When you reach GM rank 1 in NA, you're recognized as worthy of switching to the Korean ladder at Bronze 3.
Lol
unsubbed after your last two videos. you're basically spreading misinformation and your personal opinions at this point
Could you tell me exactly what you mean? I can link you to sources and data I used for my vids. I never share my opinion in the videos unless I state that directly. If you talk about Nathanias story, it's a theory by the community and Reddit, and I added his comment to the top with his further clarification and his point of view. I'm sorry if it came out looking as it was my take and it's my bad I didn't reach out directly to him, but as for other stuff, all my vids are either bases on facts or community's perception of a situation. If I share my opinion, I highlight it with words like "In my opinion"
@@EsportsStoryteller I agree that you get a lot of good sources to gather your information but some details could be more subjective to opinions formed based on that, since there isn't always an universal truth on some subjects, as for this one I agree that region lock kind of damaged korean scene but was not the responsible for killing it, in your video you also explain really interesting topics about it, which as I previously stated I could argue about some of them.
Even won't be subbing like the previous guy who took it personally almost, and it is nice of you to ask him about puntual facts and reasons he made those claims.
This topic was really controversial so it is natural the video would get some heat, but I think it was a good video overall. If you are interested I will explain better why region lock didn't hurt Korean Scene as much as you think in this video but it will take me a wall of text three times this one. As I stated before I took the video without that much salt because I used to think exactly what you said in the video, blame region lock and even ignore events without koreans, but after I became older, understood a lot more of economics and learned business when needed at my job (I am 37 by now) my view on this completely changed, not only that but similar situations happened in other scenes I follow (mainly FGC) and it made me compare it to SC2 even more.
Me: beating pros isn't that difficult tbh.
Also me: whelp..forgot to expand again..
Everyone has good and bad days
I think region lock or a similar version will be unnecessary in the future. People seem to generally be over needing to root for their home country now that there are no guarantees: The remaining viewers of SC2 are watching because they enjoy the game, not because they want to see their nationality play. Hopefully this attitude continues into Stormgate and people can just enjoy the game for what it is.
The region lock came way too late.
Get rid of region locks, that’s ridiculous
I dont care if i sound racist. I love region lock games as every "global" game is over run with Chinese hackers. So if its locked, they have to vpn which is illegal in China, thus no more mass hackers. Of course cheaters are every where, but the mass acceptance of cheating in china seems cultural and it ozzes from their demographic. Just keep them cheating among each other.
But why Koreans are better in Games? Is it dedication or some sort of biological advantage?
They treat it as work and they're really diligent. Also esports got popular in Korea 7-8 years earlier than in Europe or USA
Gotta give it their all before the mandatory military service. 1.5-2 years of stopping whatever passion you're invested in really takes a toll on your skill when everyone else continues to grow.
@@EsportsStoryteller If what you're saying is correct, then there is no difference in cognitive skill(not sure if that's the right term to describe what I mean) between Korean and Caucasian. That means it's player's(non-Korean) fault for not being skilled enough?
@@blacklight4720 racial differences are either cosmetic or such a small difference that it doesn't truly matter. The big differences come from social behaviors. Take an American baby and grow them up on Korea and, assuming they didn't face discrimination issues, the person will act Korean. So no, Korean vs Caucasian means nothing here.
Korea treats StarCraft far more seriously than the west to the point where some viewed it as a career, not just a passion that pays money. Been that way since StarCraft 1. Thus more practice and the simple "I need this to survive" along with a general work ethic within the culture (which is causing issues within the country but that's a different matter) created a stronger scene.
Then you show that world that "Koreans beat everyone" and you create a feedback loop. Other countries won't try as hard since no one likes losing (and you can't make a living out of it if you keep losing) while new Koreans can imagine themselves becoming the next stars someday.
That is how you can turn several small advantages into a realm of dominance. It typically takes several big shakeups (like a region lock that wasn't really fair combined with a massive scandal combined with a global pandemic) to break that.
@@iandakariann Thanks for the detailed explanation, it makes sense.