The State of the Starcraft Nation: With SC2 around the corner, where are We now?

This post is a reflection upon the current state of things in culture around Starcraft: Brood War, and where it may go in the future. The landscape is changing, but how can we be part of this process?

Starting with South Korea, a country that in terms of recognising eSports for its full capacity lies at least ten years ahead of the rest of world. There, Starcraft is the vehicle of a multi-million dollar industry that supplies fans and viewers with a never ceasing flood of progaming entertainment. Players, or – as I would like to call them – athletes, are afforded with the option of becoming sportsmen (sadly, the opportunities for e-sportswomen are still very limited), above and beyond being geeks.

I do not want to romanticise to much about the situation in the ‘Holy Land’ – Jaedong and Flash may be the Tiger Woods and David Beckham of Starcraft (though thankfully without their respective scandals), but it’s not a glamorous or easy life, even for them. A few Starcraft stars have made serious money out of their talent, but most Korean progamers live in and breathe the game exclusively for years without ever reaching sufficient celebrity status to taste the gaming equivalent of the Hollywood dream.

That is made evident by how the non-Korean Starcraft players who have gone there in recent years have been coping. Tyler ‘NonY’ Wasieleski went there in 2008 and stayed there for only a few months – gaining a lot skill on the way but for various reasons not able to fully capture the progaming dream. Click here to watch my recent interview with him, where he talks about his time in Korea and the Starcraft scene at large.

As of right now, 3rd of February 2010, Jos ‘ret’ De Kroon has only been back in the Netherlands for a couple of days after returning from Korea. Cultural differences have been quoted as the main reasons for why his time at the eSTRO progaming house was brief, and so he has like NonY returned to the foreign world of Starcraft with increased skill and stories of having been somewhat lost in cultural translation.

The one example who speaks for the possibility of coming to Korea as a foreigner and both managing the transition as well as getting better at Starcraft is Greg ‘Idra’ Fields. This American Terran player has lived and played in Korea for the better part of a year now, currently living in the house of the CJ team. He is still a B-teamer, meaning that he is a practice partner for the A-class stars and does not play televised games. However, he is working towards that goal and his rise in skill has been proven time and again by his utter dominance in the current Pokerstrategy.com TSL – the biggest foreign Starcraft tournament the world has ever seen.

My point is this: there are two worlds of Starcraft, marked by their collective difference in Starcraft skill and eSport institutions. Foreigners, with a few exceptions, hit rocks together trying to make fire while the Koreans are walking around with zippos - so to speak. However, that is essentially a technical question. The real difference is that of culture and the understanding of it. There is only so much one can do about that, and a subculture centered around a computer game is limited in what it can do to overcome such obstacles.

Instead, we need to build an international basis for a better future. eSports is big, and it will be bigger. The cultural and institutional differences that set the Korean world apart from the rest can be made into advantages – if we get a clean slate. Starcraft 2, which I until proven otherwise expect to become the title that ushers in the future, will generate opportunities that we – the existing global Starcraft community – can build on.

We will have the chance to take the expertise built up during the past twelve years and create a scene that is inclusive towards newcomers whilst also fiercely competitive at the top. Easy to fall in love with, impossible to master. I am not only talking about the game itself, but the culture around it. Currently, the Starcraft community is fairly closed, it is hard to get into both as a player and an unknowing newcomer. That must change with The Sequel.

Foreigners, that is all of us who are not living in Korea, know a lot of things. This part of the larger community are experts in organising online tournaments and grassroot enthusiasm for the game itself. It has done so for years with little to no money, and only very recently has the Teamliquid Starleagues offered serious cash as prizes. We also possess a huge base of fans, that’s You and me, who follow all the events through Youtube, VODs and hard-to-navigate forums. There is an army of commentators out there who give hundreds of hours of their time to increase the entertainment value of what is coming out of Korea. The passion for Starcraft is obvious, and relentless.

In the Holy Land, the Koreans know everything about how to build the marketing structure and commercial fan base necessary for making a game into a viable economic sport. There, You can make a living out of being a Starcraft genius, and that expertise is unrivalled in the world. From there come the best progamers. Regardless of what Blizzard and other powerhouses may believe, they need the Koreans to build eSports into a mainstream business without losing its soul or their own investment.

Of course, no one will easilylay down all of their own petty interests and start holding hands around the progaming camp fire – cultural differences and business concerns are huge obstacles in the way of fruitful collaboration. However, examples made by individuals can go a long way, and if one of us can provide a small solution to a bigger problem that is paving the way for greater things.

It’s already happening – the TSL deserves yet another mentioning, the Brent&Kenny Show received well over a 100,000 views when they hosted their own foreign pro-tournament in late 2009, and recently the dormant mapmaking community has beek woken by HuskyStarcraft’s Map Making Contest. We have iCCup – the undisputedly best online ladder system for a range of games including Starcraft, which is based in Russia and used by all players worldwide, Koreans or otherwise.

The grassroots are boiling, and that is the heat that keeps the machine running, and improving. Soon, within weeks, a tournament hosted and run by this very site will be announced to the community, with the intention of creating a new addition to the existing range of events. I do believe that somewhere among all these initiaves lie the passion, drive and know-how to form the force that brings eSport to the masses without downgrading it in the process.

The State of the Starcraft Nation is as promising as it is perilous. We need to think ahead while enjoying the game, we ought to work together to maximise the potential of what we are currently doing so that we are in the best possible shape to embrace the change that’s heading our way. We are at a threshold, which I find very exciting, because it demands the best of us. Starcraft – 1&2 – could lead the way for a new way of mass entertainment, and contributing to that would truly rock, don’t You think?

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