Blog Posts from "Analyze This" - Gameriot.com

MLG on TV (and not at 9AM this time)!!!

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 08:04:55 -0400

Starting November 16th, Major League Gaming will be running a TV show on G4 (formerly TechTV) for their 2007 Boost Mobile circuit. The shows will be one hour long each, covering every stop of the Pro Circuit at 11 PM ET/PT every Friday night. To be honest I'm not a huge fan of console gaming and the Friday night scheduling is kind of a killer, but it still sounds like a great way to get some exposure for gaming. (More information and the full announcement can be found at MLGPro.com)

Here's the on-air announcement:

- Friday night...
- G4 is less accessible than some past networks, I think it requires digital cable or satellite?
- The MLG season is already over, I know who won each event including the finals...
- This could be wrong, but I don't think episodes will be aired multiple times (I would personally LOVE that since I don't have TiVO or DVR)

What pros/cons have I missed and who's going to watch? (Poll coming soon if our coder wakes up to fix something )

Warez doesn't hurt movies, gaming does

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 07:39:37 -0400

Okay so the title is a bit of a stretch but maybe the MPAA will be slipping Jack Thompson some money now?

I was actually kind of proud (geeky I know, but whatever) to see gaming play such an important role in society. How, you ask? The release of Halo 3 did some serious damage to the box offices according to the guys at adage.com, see it for yourself:

But there's more. Total industry ticket sales were only $80 million for the Oct. 5 weekend the film opened, a whopping 27% below the same weekend the year before, according to research firm Media by Numbers. That's the industry's worst performance for an October weekend since 1999. Overall, domestic receipts are down 6% from last fall.

Blame the Master Chief.

Many film executives are convinced audiences stayed home to play Microsoft's carpal-tunnel classic, "Halo 3," which went on sale on Sept. 26. The game sold an astonishing $170 million worth of copies on its first day, before going on to sell well over $300 million.

Read the rest...

Owned imo

I just hope that all of the hype going into some of these games can translate to eSports, then we'll all be set for our communities growing and such. Either way though, seeing video games start to overshadow the movie industry is pretty ******* awesome, don't you think?

CGS Chinese franchise in... Wuhan?

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 10:25:03 -0400

So the total population of Wuhan is about 8-9 million... Not bad, right? Beijing is almost double that though, as a quick Google search showed that they just broke the 15 million mark. Next on my list of predictions for CGS franchises in China was Shanghai, where the population has now climbed past 20 million. Furthermore, both of these cities are easily accessible, well connected to the rest of the world, modernized, and generally considered the "best" cities in the country.

On the other hand, I've heard Wuhan referred to as a "backwater" city and know from first hand experience that it's not exactly up to par with the other franchises. Now don't get me wrong, I love the place and met some great local people, but it's far from what comes to mind when I think of a big franchise city. The area is fairly rundown and although the flood of students going after WC3 players at the WSVG event was great, I'm confident that a bigger city could have outdone that with a more marketable audience. Again I don't mean to bash the city because I enjoyed it, but this isn't about personal preference, it's about picking the best cities to promote professional gaming.

So then why was Wuhan picked as the CGS franchise city instead of Beijing or Shanghai? Maybe it's the fact that I've been up all night and it's now 10am, but I simply can't come up with a reason. Sure the city supports eSports, as shown with WSVG China, but are you telling me that Beijing and Shanghai don't? Furthermore, with the Olympics being held in Beijing for 2008, wouldn't it be sweet to use that angle when trying to convince the world that the dawn of professional eSports has arrived? Overall Beijing seemed like a great pick to bring China into the CGS, and since the Asian market is definitely a valuable resource for any gaming organization, it's no trivial dispute. With the huge population and solid infrastructure, it would be a great place to try and convince the Asian community that games like CS and DoA4 are worth their attention... But I'm not so sure that the same can be done with Wuhan.

I don't know, maybe someone can present an argument going the other way, but to sum things up, I was pretty shocked when I saw a press release from Jason Bass come to my e-mail with the title "FW: Wuhan Release." Who else agrees?

CGS GM's avoid draft logic again?

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 14:24:23 -0400

Sorry for the harsh title, but what the ****? I can understand at the Region 1 draft getting a little bit off from the "perfect" choice since its hard to see the big picture with six franchises, but the UK draft was 1v1. I question how well Sujoy's first pick will work out, but O'Dell wasting the #7 pick flat out made my head hurt trying to figure out what he was thinking.

First let me run down the draft picks, as listed at TheCGS.com:

1. ChrissyB - Sujoy
2. Davey Skills - O'Dell
3. Dignitas - O'Dell
4. Paddaman - Sujoy
5. Stune - Sujoy
6. Ricochet - O'Dell
7. Bazza - O'Dell
8. Snuggles - Sujoy
9. NT_101 - Sujoy
10. NeoJake - O'Dell
11. Messy - O'Dell
12. 4Kings - Sujoy

#1 pick goes to... FIFA?!

The first pick was even surprising to me, not because of the player, but because of the game. If these GM's learned anything, it should have been how great of a pick Vanessa was for the OPTX. Her play led to 52 gained points with her 60:8 point ratio, something far beyond what any other franchise division accomplished. It took a lot of skill on her part, but most of the points came from the fact that nobody in the female division was on her level, and the game allowed for her to gain 5 points just by winning rounds. On the other hand, the top FIFA competitor from Region 1 only lost two matches, yet had a point ratio of just that gained only 23 points at at 37:14.

With that in mind, why would you worry about FIFA so much as to sacrifice your #1 pick? This gave O'Dell two #1 picks, allowing him the advantage in two higher scoring games while Sujoy would only have one at this point. If the picks give O'Dell a big win in either game, it will likely outweigh anything that ChrissyB can do.

Now if ChrissyB can take down peekay 30-0, then it would obviously be an unparalleled advantage for the London Mint. I think a more realistic result that can be produced regularly is a 3 or 4 point win, which yields less points than an average PGR, DoA, or CSS win. See my point? Maybe this guy will rock the FIFA world and be the unexpected key to a franchise victory, but if any player can't limit their opponent to 5 points in FIFA, they shouldn't be a "professional gamer" by any means.

Another random FIFA pick...

So after Sujoy made his first pick count for FIFA, O'Dell should have immediately known FIFA would be his last choice. Not only does it count for next to nothing, but with only two GM's at the draft, O'Dell had nobody to compete with for finding his own FIFA player.

Instead, O'Dell decided to make Bazza a mid-draft pick at #7, which makes no sense at all. While it's nothing against the player, he could be the best thing that happened to the franchise in some way, he was essentially reserved for the Birmingham Salvo. Instead O'Dell could have gone for his second PGR player. Again since I'm no DoA or UK expert, I can't tell you the skill gap between NT_101 and NeoJake, but I can tell you that O'Dell gave Sujoy the choice between which one he wanted instead of taking it himself. This may not be that big of a deal, but why risk it when you've gained nothing by sacrificing it?

So maybe I overreacted a little...

Maybe it's not THAT bad, since neither of these choices will be killer blows. In fact, Sujoy may have a perfectly logical and reasonable backing for his first pick, but O'Dell's FIFA mistake just bugs me. If you're going to be running a franchise properly, shouldn't you be prepared enough to understand how a draft works? Giving away picks like that is just stupid and there's no logical reason for him to have done it.

Singapore GM gets the boot

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 23:23:39 -0400

So earlier this week I, and many other eSports websites, reported about rumors that the CGS GM for Singapore was trying to force players under contracts which involved giving up 50% of their salary. Although at the time the majority of the "evidence" seemed to be hearsay, CGS launched an investigation immediately despite being unwilling to comment.

Now that the investigation is complete, however, they've got an official announcement to make:

Following the controversy surrounding last week’s CGS Singapore Qualifier and Draft, and after conducting a detailed investigation with all parties concerned, CGS and Chris Soh have mutually agreed that he will no longer serve as acting General Manager of the Singapore team. Effective immediately, Steven Yong will act as the League’s interim GM of the Singapore team. Steven is a seasoned veteran in competitive gaming and will manage the team until a permanent replacement is announced.

Mr. Yong will be making final draft selections for the Singapore team in the immediate future and CGS looks forward to announcing the members of the Singapore team soon.

The league regrets any inconvenience which may have been caused. The best interests of the gaming community remain the league’s top priority.

First off, great job CGS. Nobody blames you for the actions of this General Manager, although it would have been nice to avoid this mess. Once the problems were out in the open though, you guys were quick to take strong and swift action to fix it. I'm truly glad that the pleas of the affected gamers were heard despite being so far away from the "home base" for CGS, as who knows if anyone would have found out otherwise. The bottom line is that if the allegations in regards to what Chris Soh was doing with the franchise were true, he has no place in the league. It's great if gamers want to "give back to their community" or if his company pays for them to travel and then takes back a cut, but when CGS is paying for all of this stuff, it's out of line to demand the gamers cut their salaries in half for your own benefit.

Controversy over CGS GM

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 16:42:08 -0400

So everyone just kind of assumed that The Titans would be picked up as the Singapore franchise's Counter-Strike:Source team, right? If not, you probably should have considering they've been the country's top team for quite a while and have even made some progress in the international scene.

That's not what happened though, instead the GM chose a team that was blown out twice by The Titans, 10-3 and 10-5, in the upper bracket finals and grand finals. DoA4's female choice saw a similar shock, when "Cindy" was chosen over a girl that beat her 10-2 in the finals while players vouched that there was a large skill gap between the two.

So maybe the 2nd place teams were just more marketable or showed more potential, right? Well there's another theory floating around. A reporter over at GGL Wire has managed to get some quotes from various players and it seems there's a big conspiracy building up. One example of the quotes explaining the mess can be found from team captain of The Titans, StrykerX, who told them, "He has cited unsportsmanlike conduct, but I would love for him to find ANY team from here to the US/Euroupe that has met us and believes we act in an unprofessional manner."

Their alternate theory, as GGL has revealed, is that players will be forced to sign contracts with the GM's company, "Chris Soh’s company, the Singapore Gamers’ Association, has got a sponsorship program under which players commit to give 50% of their winnings back to SGGA."

Obviously none of this has been confirmed and it's quite hard to believe that the CGS would let anything like this slip by, but the claims are surely interesting. Why so many players would be coming with the same story and why a GM would overlook the country's top team is beyond me, but perhaps the story will further develop and explanations will be provided soon. In the mean time, head over to GGL Wire for the full story.

CGS + $1,000,000 = US win?

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 22:53:40 -0400

So we all knew that NewsCorp (the corporation that owns DirecTV) had the money to write big checks for the Championship Gaming Series, but who expected so many zeros for the World Championships? They weren't kidding when they said they were ready to invest and take gaming to the next level, but will it work beyond creating hype?

There's no way you can doubt that $500,000 is enough money to make any team happy. The players are all salaried, but will now be getting tons of extra spending money if they can go all the way. What about everyone else though? $500,000 is a lot, but that also means it takes a huge chunk out of the $1,000,000 prize pot. If I had to guess, the breakdown will go something along these lines:

Possible Prize Breakdowns?

Option A

1st. $500,000

2nd. $300,000

3rd. $100,000

4th. $75,000

Option B

1st. $500,000

2nd. $250,000

3rd. $50,000

4th. $50,000

5th. $25,000

6th. $15,000

7th. $10,000

Option C

1st. $500,000

2nd. $200,000

3rd. $100,000

4th. $50,000

5th. $25,000

6th. $15,000

7th. $5,000

8th. $5,000

It's hard to predict since they can do it however they want, but it's obvious that if a team doesn't place in the very top, it won't be that significant of a prize for a franchise splitting the winnings up between ten rostered players (5 css, 2 doa, 2 pgr3, 1 fifa). Don't take that as a complaint, because after all, these teams are being flown to compete in the tournament and get to have fun for three weeks regardless, but what are their chances of actually getting rich?

Here goes another assumption, but without further details announced, my money would be that the rules for awarding points to each game will remain the same. Let's think about what that means for each game and let me tell you why that means North America will win:

Attending Franchises*

Chicago Chimera
Carolina Core
Shanghai
Seoul
Dubai
Singapore
Stockholm
Berlin
London
Birmingham
Latin America #1
Latin America #2

* This list is subject to change.

Counter-Strike:Source - Traditionally Europe and Asia were strong competitors against the US in the Counter-Strike realm, but Source will change things up. It's uncertain whether the top European teams and players will even make the switch, much less fully commit to learning the game in time to compete against the now veterans of the game (Core/Chimera). Asia will benefit from the speed boost the game has seen, in my opinion, but aren't far enough ahead to win their games by a huge margin. As for the other regions, maybe Latin America will put up a fight, but I don't think anyone is as well prepared for the game as the NA.

FIFA 07 - So this is my one exception that I can see the NA teams losing. It's not out of the question for Peekay and Anomoly to upset someone, but I'd put my money on the Euros beating them without breaking a sweat. The problem is that in order to make much of a difference, they won't just have to beat the US players. Instead they'll need to shut them out and score about five goals to have an impact, something that is not likely to happen. I would assume the Latin Americans are strong in this game due to the popularity of futbol as a sport over there, but still all Peekay has to do is play safe and make sure he doesn't get blown out.

Project Gotham Racing 3 - How many people even play this game outside of the US? If any foreigner can take down Ch0mpr I will be truly impressed, but he's mastered the game over the past years and it'd take some serious luck to overcome that. Some of Europe will put up a fight no doubt, but I question whether any franchise will have a duo that can compete with that of the Chimera pros. On the other hand, an accidental crash or suicide knockout from a partner could spice things up, but otherwise I see a dominant US performance for this game. Combine that with the advantage the US duos have in teamwork/communication, since as far as I know CGS was the only place to use PGR as a team game, that may prove to be important come match time.

Dead or Alive 4 - Again, you may have guessed that I'm no DoA expert, but the internet is a valuable source for information. With that said, I'm still not really sure who is actually going to put up a fight. I didn't mention this for PGR, but I don't think the Xbox 360 has even been officially released in China. South Korea is pretty serious about the arcade style games, but have yet to show anything at any international events. Still with Asia as a major force in fighting games, they can't be excluded completely. Latin America was a big contender at WCG, but with Offbeatninja coming in as the WCG 2006 champ and after spending months perfecting his play for the first season, who's going to dethrown him?

Seriously, I'm not just some dumb, cocky American right now that is claiming we're better at video games than everyone. What I am saying though is that because of the Region 1 Season that gave players a great opportunity to warm up and practice, combined with the national popularity of the titles CGS chose, how will anyone compete with the Carolina Core or the Chicago Chimera?

It's pretty simple, they won't. Instead these two teams will be taking home the majority of the huge $1,000,000 prizepot you heard about, so I hope everyone else has fun when they come over here for three weeks.

War is not a game!

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 04:24:34 -0400

I've seen growing support for America's Army in the eSports scene, with a growing section on GotFrag.com and all of the stuff that GGL does, but it looks like they're seeing a bit more than the normal "video games cause violence" mess.

I've got to be honest here though, I don't get what point they're trying to push with the motto "War is not a game!" In what way does playing a game based around the Army claim that war in real life is a game? I think the majority of the concept behind video games is to create an alternate reality, or does Sim City also claim that being a Mayor is just a game? If some poor guy playing a video game can't make the connection that there's a difference between a game where you can hit the reset button and real life where there is no undo, please blame him/his parents/his school/etc for the underlying problem, not a video game for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Pilots even use flight simulators, which are essentially video games, to train in an environment where they can make mistakes without putting people at risk, but I don't think that's making anyone fear that they're 30,000 ft above ground level in the mercy of a guy who thinks he's just playing a game.

I'm hoping that if I took the time to read into it further I'd find that they're just upset about the Army trying to use video games to entice the youth into wanting to join the Army without knowing what the real deal is like... Which I could see as a valid point, because it does kind of use that "cool factor" to push their recruitment, but I really hope this doesn't turn into another case of "Let's blame video games!" You can dig back in history as far as you want, only to find similar tactics used to lure people into the military. Everything from printed posters to TV commercials has been designed to do this, because it's inevitable that if a country wants people to sign up for the military then they're either going to market it or start a draft...

Maybe that's a reason to yell at the government, and by all means every citizen should have the right question these kind of things, but please don't blame a video game wrongly. Perhaps I'm the one who's wrong, but I like to assume that none of us (excluding FPS Doug from Pure Pwnage) are going, "Man I'd really love to go start a war so we can use some of these point and click skills for real!"

Warhammer Online Interview

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 10:59:37 -0400

So apparently Carmac can do serious interviews too This time he caught up with a guy from the Warhammer team at GC2007 and even though Carmac is far from a MMO expert, it's still decent.

Check it out below and head over to GGL Wire for more Games Convention stuff.

Carmac Attacks Female Gaming (Video)

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 13:16:27 -0400

WARNING: If you take things too seriously, chances are you won't find this video to be funny so lighten up or don't bother watching

I've always found Carmac's LANtics videos to be quite hilarious, but this was one of the best. He interviewed Jess from Evil Geniuses (burntpink) and was quite blunt with his questions.

Highlights include:

• "You have good female team?" "Us? Uhh we're pretty good." "Good? You beat 3D?" "Umm no." "So you not good."
• "All cs player say stupid girl not play good, no skill, and uh take our sponsors."
• "One more question, why most gamer girl have trouser? All feminist?" "Trousers?" "Yes trousers." "Jeans?" "Jeans, yes." "Why?" "What are they supposed to wear?" "Skirt, dress."
• "I am pretty sure you make fun of me and you lie."

Chinese Gold Farmer Or GMP Office Worker?

no.spam@gameriot.com (Brian) — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 12:09:34 -0400

So that guy from the New York Times released a photo album of his visit to the WoW Gold Farmers in China (link)... Am I alone in thinking this is the Chinese version of the GMP office?