GG Magazine Pilot

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t e k o c g ue

R ea L a t ke ke Roc

i R ise of L f O f k a ble

g ar n m e i k eR h t a T ment ing Do c u

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Hek Unc Tic Juk eZ ut on FIFA Lea 17: r with n how to fna tic’s play Can Von Lucio eth com Pokem il pet o itive n be gam a e?

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CONTENTS 3. Editorial Message 4-5. Who’s Hot? Who’s Not? 6-7. How to...

8-9. Elevate Your Game 10-11. Niche Esport of the Month

INTERVIEWS 12-13. Hektic Jukez 14-15. Ron Morrow 16-17. Scottish Warriors 18-19. Asim Khan 20-21. Jerry Jamieson 27. Deleo Devitt 36-40. Sujoy Roy

FEATURES 22-26. Rocket League 28-30. CS:GO Major Preview 31-35. Pokemon 41-43. Debates 2

MESSAGE FROM THE EDITOR gg

gg First things first, thank you for choosing to read GG Magazine. It’s been a long process, from first nervously pitching the idea to my university lecturers, to confidently talking about the scale of esports to my peers to the finished product you see today - and hopefully, will continue to see in the future. I believe in the future of esports, as I hope you do, and this is my first foray into the world of esports - as a long-time football (or soccer for 3

my American readers!) fan, that was what I’d always envisaged writing about. Then I discovered Counter-Strike and I’d found what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. That’s not all - I love a wide array of games and I hope that’s reflected throughout; I hope the coverage of every other game is as good. I’m especially excited for you all to read about Pokemon and Rocket League too, so please, enjoy. Should you wish to give any

feedback - positive, negative, anything drop me a message on Twitter @ElliottBCFC or email me, elliott. griffiths2@gmail.com or find me on reddit, where I assume the majority of you have found this.

My name is Elliott Griffiths, and I thank you all.

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WHO’S HOT?

GIGABYTE Marines (League of Legends)

The Leftovers (Rocket League)

Greninja (Pokemon + Smash 4)

The banning of The GIGABYTE Marines The Leftovers came out Mega-Metagross brought side earned themselves of absolutely nowhere to Greninja even further plenty of fans with some qualify for the RCS LAN ahead as the most impressive results at MSI, in second, taking dangerous threat around including a narrow loss everybody by in Pokemon right now. to NA champions Team surprise by taking third With a variety of sets, each Solomid and a convincing place, only missing out of which can break a win over finalists G2. The to Flipsid3 Tactics and different set of Pokemon, team may have Mock-it. The team, fallen short of history, but formed from the ‘leftovers’ it can break through any of its checks with a new showed themselves to be of other big teams, set. Got a Ferrothorn a pretty serious threat and consists of Snaski, Sikii problem? Protean HP one of the stronger and Ferra as their usual Fire. Trouble with Tapu wildcards ever to make three, and as a relatively Fini? Gunk Shot. Need MSI. Not only that, they new organisation weren’t a cleaner? Specs Battle were really fun to watch expected to be making Bond. and did everything they waves too early! could to shake up the Not just that, but Greninja meta. tabseN (CS:GO) has been plunged into the spotlight as a Smash Movistar Riders (OW) BIG managed to break character, with a new their way into the ESL Pro tournament - the 2GCC: The European side had a League with a series of Greninja Saga. A fantastic April, climbing impressive playoff wins, character that was the rankings on powered by the insane nerfed into the ground GosuGamers for a series fragging power of early on in the games of impressive wins, Johannes “tabseN” lifespan, Greninja remains especially a close-fought Wodarz. The German viable and now all of the 3-2 over eUnited. dropped 50 frags in two top-tier Greninja players maps against the Polish will culminate to fight for stars of Virtus.pro, before a $10,000 prize pool. dropping another 55 in two maps in the final playoff against Penta.

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WHO’S NOT? Ninjas in Pyjamas (CS:GO)

North America (League of Legends)

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Virtus.pro (Dota 2, CS:GO)

It was another sad day for The Polish veterans in The most successful North American LoL, as Counter-Strike were organisation in CS:GO relegated from the ESL hit a new rock bottom, as TSM failed to make it out of groups at the Pro League after a pretty they failed to even make Midsummer terrible set of online a minor. The five-times Invitational, and the results, culminating in major finalists were taken Europeans, through G2, losses to BIG and Penta down by iGame.com, made the final, despite NA that led to their demise Red Reserve and Space fans trying to claim - for the second year Soldiers and were Europe and NA were running. Last time they unceremoniously dumped around the same level. were bailed out by a rule out of the minor qualifier Never change, NA fans. change, but surely that’s - or the qualifier, for the not happening this time..? qualifier, for the qualifier, for the In Dota, they held their SetToDestroyX (Rocket major. Will we finally see second place ranking, League a change to the core four? but there have been some Rumours of a Swedish pretty dodgy results shuffle seem to be Oh dear. The new NA side including a draw against powered by fans rather didn’t just fail to qualify than anything concrete, for LAN - that wouldn’t be #125 ranked Elements Pro Gaming and a 2-0 loss to but Godsent have too bad - but went 0-7 in Team Secret. Are struggled to make an the RLCS Qualifiers. organisation-wide slumps impact with their lineObviously they were in a thing? Only time will up and there seems to with a bunch of good tell, but both teams need be some decent Swedish sides, but 0-7 is really to step their game up talent beyond that. quite sad to see - let’s all sharpish. hope it gets a little bit better for the side, who only formed a few months ago.

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HOW TO...

Fnatic star Oliver ‘Vonethil’ Lager breaks down h

1. Be communicative.

Your role depends heavily on communicating with your team, letting them know when you speed in, when they can expect your ultimate in fights etc. You can not play this character and sit quiet.

2. Peel for your other support.

3. Learn how to wall ride properly.

This is a tricky one. Your job as Lucio is to mainly try to protect your other support if that person is in danger. If the enemy team for instance has a Tracer that always go for your Ana you need to “peel” for him which means that you pressure that Tracer away from their Ana and instead has to deal with you. You as a Lucio need to play smart with your healing/ speed to try to force his blinks/recall while you can even get heals from your Ana in dangerous situations which means that their DPS is useless in the fight if he does not switch target. However if your other support is not getting pressured you can go in with your dive/ play around your tanks dealing DPS and trying to heal your team as much as possible.

The Lucio patch that reworked him made it possible to get to places very fast and even bunny hopping. What I use is “Jump” on both my space bar and my mouse scroll. You will be able to go faster with scrolling but you can not “stick” to the wall using it so I use my mouse when to get to places fast but switch over to space when I need to stay at a place on a wall or sometimes mid team fight when I use the same finger to shoot.

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P L AY L U C I O !

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his top 5 tips to using Lucio and playing support...

4. Help out your team as much as possible.

5. Understand when to use heal and speed.

And a bonus tip...

You as a Lucio while for instance pushing a payload will find time to help your team out with ultimates - maybe two of them have a combo they don’t know about? Help them set it up!

This comes with time. If people are low your job is to heal them up, but if your team is just missing a little bit of health but the enemy team is already pressured and might have lost people you can for instance speed onto them to secure the picks. It’s all about the situation.

Another tip here is that you can for instance speed your team back if the enemy team uses their i.e. Sound Barrier early which will make it useless to then go back in again however this requires that you are communicative and let your team know beforehand what to expect if this scenario would appear.

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ELEVATE y How to lead your team to victory in CS:GO

rugga Staying Calm

Counter-Stratting

Improving

I try to re-focus the individual whenever they get distracted or seem mentally off. It’s a tough call, but if I lose perspective and become stressed, then it spreads to my players which might lead to insecurity. It’s important that I never lose focus and stay calm myself so that the players have a person that can rely on no matter what.

I always look for tendencies and their CT-rotations. If a team has certain rotations that keeps being forced even in weird situations, then it is something you can exploit and take advantage from.

Whenever it comes to oppositions it’s important that the focus remains on your own game, so anti-stratting is about gaining small margins rather than trying to counter an entire gameplan.

When it comes to individuals and developing them, I use a lot of my teacher’s knowledge about learning. With my experience as a former pro and my knowledge of working with learning processes, I try to use a mix of the players’ own thought about their game and add to that how I think they can change the small margins to stimulate their learning curve.

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your GAME

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With North Coach Casper r‘ uggah’ Due

h on...

In-Game Leading

Bad games

Plans for North

Trust in whatever decision you make but don’t be too stubborn in changing things moving forward. A good leader is an example to follow, but also a person that admits whenever they are wrong and make stupid mistakes. Does the leader act arrogant and talk “down” to his team?

Then it’s a matter of time before things go to sh*t.

We try to speak the game through and focus on what went wrong and how we can fix it. It’s a tough thing to do since the loss is recent and still in the heads of the players. However it also helps getting frustration and specific situations out of the individuals’ emotional state instead of enhancing these emotions on their own in their hotel room.

I have specific plans but I keep them to myself since I’m trying to do different things to help developing the team, if I share it wouldn’t have the same effect or it would give an advantage to my competitors!

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GG MAGAZINE’S NICHE WHAT IS IT?

A football simulator where, unlike FIFA or Pro Evolution Soccer, you don’t explicitly control Cristiano Ronaldo, or John Akinde; but instead step into the fabled shoes of Jose Mourinho, or Phil Brown. It involves the biggest database of football players available in any game, with a ridiculous amount of volunteer scouts throughout the world who aim to make the players as close to their real-life partners as possible.

Players are described with 36 visible attributes and plenty of invisble ones, each with a rating from 1-20 which effects how adept a player is at certain facets of the game. The manager has to use these to make tactical decisions and improve their team. It’s long-time been the game of football fans with a more tactical view of the game and is known for it’s absurdly addictive gameplay that’s absorbed hours and hours of lives - but until now, has primarily been a single player game.

WHAT CHANGED? TheSetPieces, a blog set up by a group of FM playing friends who wrote about their experiences and journeys, took off.

The humorous writing and the fallibility of the writers made the writing and instant hit, and helped build something of a community. Building on that, the guys at TheSetPieces set up the FM Cup - a competitive Football Manager competition, where the winner took home £5,000.

HOW DOES IT WORK COMPETITIVELY? The inaugural FM Cup involved each player using a team of players that were identical and trying to outwit each other with tactics, team talks and substitutions alone. This takes away the squad building element of the game, which is one of the most interesting parts of the game for long-term saves, but for competitive play of course it levels the playing field. Some would argue that this could make it a little bit luck based - and it is - but so is football, and the guys at TheSetPieces thought it worked perfectly...

Football n Sports In addictive simulator co line for the trea

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ESPORT OF THE MONTH

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What inspired you to start the FM Cup?

nerds rejoice! nteractive’’s managerial ould be next in e competitive atment

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Matt Stanger of TheSetPieces chatted to us about the FM Cup:

“We set up the BetBright FM17 Cup because we wanted to do something nobody has ever done before with Football Manager. If you think about how people usually play the game, it’s on the sofa at home or on the morning commute, but through the success of the FM17 Project on The Set Pieces, we’ve seen how social the game can be.

We’ve hugely enjoyed reading everyone’s reactions to the Arsenal v Liverpool challenge in the FM17 Project (and the Celtic v Rangers debacle before that) and so the logical next step was to open it up for others to take part and prove they genuinely are better than Iain and Alex.”

How did it go?

How well does FM translate to a competitive game?

“I think it’s a relatively seamless transition from playing solo in the study at home to joining a host of other managers in a live tournament. In some ways it’s a lot more fun to apply the competitive nature we usually take out on the game’s AI to a one-on-one fixture against another human being. Throw in prize money worth thousands of pounds and the pressure cranks up another notch. The feedback we had from everyone who came to the events is that it was great to meet other players, who are often like-minded people, and see how they play, what tactics they use, and just chat about football in general.”

“We were delighted with the success of the tournament. It was fiercely contested, but all in good humour, and the feedback we’ve had from participants and viewers is that everyone hugely enjoyed the competition. We had hundreds of entries from around the world, so we would definitely consider making the FM Cup an international event in future.”

Will you carry this on?

“That’s the plan - watch this space!”

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nybody who has at least a passing interest in football and friends knows the meaning of ‘competitive FIFA’; but none more than HekTic JukeZ, who in seven years went from football game rookie to one of the best FIFA players in the world.

We spoke to JukeZ about the state of FIFA as an esport.

“I started playing FIFA back on the PS3. I played PES before that and once I got a PS3, FIFA was seen as the bigger and better game, so I wanted to try it out. Being an avid football/soccer fan, I wanted a video game to play. FIFA 09 was my first FIFA in years, because I had played PES on the PS2 days. I was frustrated with the game at first, because it was so different from PES. Eventually, I just kind of got used to it and never looked back I suppose.

“Initially, I just played H2H online with normal teams or vs friends from FIFA 09 to FIFA 11. I never really knew what Ultimate Team was, so I never got into it. I randomly started playing Ultimate Team on FIFA 12 with friends. I was hooked right away. Since then, FUT has been the game mode of choice when I play FIFA. I didn’t really think about YouTube/Twitch then, because I didn’t know there was an audience back then. I had a good record on FUT12. That carried over

“FIFA as a game has to compete with football: the most popular sport in the world.” into FUT13. I usually browsed the EA forums then and through a random discussion, I was told to write a formation guide. I was using the 4-1-2-1-2 wide at the time and there were no guides back then for that formation. I just kind of sat down and wrote for 2-3 hours. I made a thread when I finished and just kind of expected a few replies here and there.”

JukeZ’ became known for his 4-1-2-1-

2(2) guide among FIFA fanatics, and it’s held up as THE go-to guide when it comes to improving your game. You can find the guide here; it hasn’t changed since FIFA 16 and will still likely elevate your game this year. JukeZ’ willingness to interact with the community has made him a respected member of the community, and his stream blew up.

“To my surprise though, the thread blew up. I was getting messages every day. There were a constant stream of replies. I was tweeted out by Rob Hodson, the community manager.

Was featured on EA’s official FUT Facebook page.

I guess I kind of gained some exposure from a simple guide with not much planning done. Pretty soon, people were eager how I played. So I went out, got an Elgato. Kind of started some YouTube videos then and Twitch streams. And I guess the rest is history.”

JukeZ never had plans to play seriously, and claims it just sort of, well, happened.

“Started to stream more and more when FIFA 15 came out. Uploaded more and more videos. In the meantime, my record was getting better and better. I was playing more and more too. FIFA 15 was the first FIFA I played where I kind of thought to myself, “I’m pretty good at this game.” Of course, I don’t play FIFA to be the best or anything like that. I’ve always played for fun and just happen to be good at FIFA as well. However, I am competitive when it comes to FIFA. I don’t enjoy losing. But I always try and learn from losses and go from there.”

JukeZ believes that FIFA will never be as big as League of Legends or Counter-Strike, but he was critical of EA, who he believes can do a lot more – even if FIFA has real football to contend with.

“I think FIFA’s struggles as an “esport” can be explained in different ways by different people. Personally, I think it’ll be a struggle for EA to elevate FIFA into a big eSport, because of the alternative. Games like League of Legends, Dota, CS:GO, Call of Duty, etc. They don’t really have a real life alternative. FIFA as a game has to compete with football/soccer: the most popular sport in the world.

As an example, I’d rather watch a Premier League game than a competitive FIFA tournament game or even FIWC on Twitch/Tv. Those other games don’t have that battle. They don’t need to deal with that. It’s easier for them.

That said, those other games also have a focus on the competitive aspect. EA’s started to do it this year, but prior to FIFA 17, it was barren. FIWC was poorly run. Games were on a P2P basis, and

therefore there were a lot of people booting opponents to get perfect records.”

It’s an important point, and one that often goes under the radar. Nobody watches war on TV, nobody pays £30 a month to watch live battles on Sky MOBA HD. League of Legends doesn’t lose part of it’s viewership to real life fights between frost archers and mummies.

Sadly, JukeZ doesn’t think FIFA will ever be a big esport, but appreciates the attempts to increase the competitiveness.

“Gfinity did try to improve the competitive scene with more tournaments geared towards Ultimate Team. While their effort was valiant, I still think it fell short of what other games had with certain sites. For example, with Call of Duty. UMG has daily tournaments. But not just 1 tournament a day. Multiple tournaments each day. With better organization too and bigger prizes. Gfinity just doesn’t have that for FIFA. And their own LAN event, Play like a Legend had been restricted for a while for only people in Europe.

“EA is pushing competitive this year with FUT Champions and more FUT tournaments + a change to FIWC. So it’s a start. We’ll see if the changes are beneficial. But I would be surprised if FIFA ever became a huge esport. There’s too many obstacles I feel. It can be a successful esport certainly. But not up there with the biggest.”

JukeZ’ frustrations not only with the content for competitive play, but also the gameplay, are well-documented; but he has an idea to make FIFA a more fun game to watch and potentially increase the skill level.

“Because FIFA is 11vs11 and the fact you that can only really control 1 player at a time(somewhat 2 with 2nd man press/contain), a lot of what occurs is AI reliance. And the AI in FIFA is simply not advanced enough. Not only that, but the instructions/tactics you have to customize how the AI plays aren’t advanced enough either. The stay back instruction for full-backs this year is buggy. The attacking AI is very limited in runs. You never see players cut hard inside for runs. It’s all straight lined usually. The AI in general is inconsistent too. You don’t really control the keepers either, except for during penalties or calling for them to come out during open or crosses. There’s too many obstacles I feel in a 11v11 game.

“I think the best way to eliminate these obstacles is to come up with a 5-a-side or 4-a-side indoor mode that would serve as the competitive and esport mode for FIFA. It might seem far-fetched, but with a user controlling each player then, the AI no longer intrudes or interferes in what occurs. I

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With Hektic Jukez, winner of FIFA 16’s Pro F8tal tournament, consistent Top 100 FUT Champions Player and FIFA streamer and personality feel 11vs11 could potentially work too, but again I feel like that obstacle of actual football again kicks in. 11vs11 won’t be as exciting as a 5vs5 or 4vs4 game. So I do think for FIFA to become an eSport with success, it has to be a 4vs4 or 5vs5 specific mode. It can be Ultimate Team based or just H2H based with normal teams. I think either would work, but Ultimate Team would be more exciting.”

JukeZ’ idea is reminiscent of the old FIFA Street games, but less focused on the dribbling and skill move element. With each player

“But the most important thing is to play a lot if you want to get better.” being controlled individually, it could make for some really intricate team plays.

“You eliminate the AI inconsistency in this game. More users involved mean more excitement. You get the added bonus of communication which makes it exciting for the viewer to watch(if a small tourney is live-streamed by a participant).

I think there’s a lot of benefits and not many negatives.Take Call of Duty. Its esport scene is 4vs4 for the major tournaments. Imagine a respawn mode(like Capture the Flag) and there’s only 2 human players. The other 6 are bots. You can switch between players constantly, but you only control one at a time. Wouldn’t that completely fail as an esport? It’s kind of what FIFA is now.”

He’s also been very active in explaining his issues with this year’s edition of the best-selling football game. Often posted on the FIFA subreddit, JukeZ’ concerns have been echoed by other members of the community consistently, and he is often seen as a spokesman for the community, whether or not EA Sports listen.

“I have been very vocal. I think some misconstrue my complaints as simply whining for not winning. My record at the moment is the same as last year during the same period. I am vocal, because I think FIFA 17 should be much better.

My main two issues with the game are input delay and random AI inputs. Input delay, because I think it’s ridiculous for there to be a delay from your

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own user input. FIFA’s never had this problem before. It’s a new problem and I am surprised the community hasn’t complained more. I think it’s silly for a video game in 2016 with all the technological advancements to have input delay. Not only that, but I don’t think I’ve ever played a game with input delay. People counter to me that my player positioning is wrong and non-optimal, so a delay occurs. I counter back by saying if my positioning is wrong, then punish me with inaccuracy. And not delay of an action. I think the delay occurs even in optimal position either way.”

The input delay has been a point of contention for many players this year – it’s not just the top level players who have noticed – but JukeZ offers an authenticity to his complaints, having played the game to a competitive standard.

“It’s infuriating to me, because it’s random. It takes away consistency from the game and takes away control from the user. The random AI inputs occur whenever you hold the trigger buttons. Sometimes your player will make a pass or shot when you didn’t do so. It again, adds randomness. Takes away consistency. Blocks are also randomly done by the AI, even though the user can perform this. It bails out poor defense and again adds randomness. Same with clearances.

There’s a button to clear the ball, but the AI will do it for you at times. Again, it adds randomness.

Takes away consistency. Couple these 2 together and they make the game very inconsistent and RNG (Random Number Generator) based.”

That randomness is what appears to be holding back FIFA, and Ultimate Team, from being a big esport. It certainly has the player base, and EA Sports make enough money from Ultimate Team every year to run an actual top level football team, so there’s no reason these issues should be exacerbated in the ways that they are. Much of the concern about Counter Strike’s relative dip in popularity has been around the small amounts of variation and randomness that occurs in every gun on the game. Compare that to FIFA, and those complaints seem extremely minor.

“I do have other issues however.” JukeZ continues. “I think EA have overdone the skill move nerf. Skill move execution is entirely manual and creates a viable skill gap in the game. Despite what people say, it’s always possible to defend in FIFA. No matter what, you can always defend in FIFA. EA have made it easier to defend this year with the removal of attacking tools. The auto-tackle this year is more reliable than manual tackling, so people will rely on the AI to defend for them.

“I think passing is also far too easy.

Especially conservative passing. 180 passes from

FIFA 15 that were punished in FIFA 16 are again accurate and useful. People can spam pass on attack with no thought and get perfect accuracy.

It lessens the skill gap. With the skill move nerf, shielding has received a buff. A buff that was unnecessary for me, because it was already effective in FIFA 16. I don’t like shielding being effective, because it goes from being good at dribbling in a variety of ways, to simply pressing or holding 1 button in attack to keep possession.

“Add that fouls are a general rarity this year too and you get a mundane approach in games at times. A slow paced game occurs. I know people want FIFA to be a simulator of the sport, but with 2 6-minute halves, it’s not possible.

The game should be arcade-y. It should be easy to attack(relatively, but with lots of variety/tools) and hard to defend. With that, the skill gap is large.

The skill gap is larger when it’s easier to punish bad defenders compared to bad attackers. I feel like the skill gap this year is minimized. EA have made games much closer, through the changes to core mechanics. It doesn’t benefit the game nor the competitive aspect.”

The slower speed of this year’s game received mixed responses, with some people loving the emphasis on possession play and a slower speed, whereas others, much like JukeZ, hated the lower-scoring nature that this tended to bring, especially at the start of the game.

JukeZ did offer a few small tips to improve your game, but we can’t guarantee you’ll be winning tournaments in a few weeks.

“The best tip I can give is to play a lot.

Playing a lot will lead to improvement. Small or big. Another tip I can give is to find a formation that works and stick with that for 100-200 games.

Everything becomes 2nd nature then when you use the formation and you’ll get more success.

Another helpful tip is to re-watch your gameplay if you can. You notice mistakes you make. You notice what works and how you can re-create it.

Simply put, you get a better view of the game. You can learn a lot from re-watching games. I do this myself sometimes and it helps a lot. But the most important thing is to play a lot if you want to get better.”

JukeZ obviously recommends the 4-12-1-2(2), and you can read his guide which might help you that little bit more too.

You can find his streams at https:// www.twitch.tv/hektic_jukez and follow him on Twitter, @HekTic_JukeZ.

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BEHIND th

e all love watching esport events – from The International from DOTA 2, to CS:GO majors, to RLCS, but what’s it like organising one? We spoke to Ron Morrow who has experience in just that, about what it’s like to run a tournament, how to get involved, and first off, organising esport events for universities.

“I loved broadcasting Best of the South West and I absolutely think universities should be doing more to encourage and support esports, but I don’t think it should be treated like normal sports. At the 2016 conference, the NUS passed Motion 316 to petition BUCS to “recognise competitive esports”, which personally feels like the completely wrong approach.”

Ron added: “if people try to legitimise esports by having it included in the current conventional structures then it will always be second fiddle to the main event. The different associations and leagues that are being formed are developing their own structures to really take what’s different about competitive gaming and see what plays to its strengths.”

For those at university, or looking to run a tournament, Ron suggested it was pretty easy to set up.

“The University of Bath were supportive in terms of allowing us to use suitable spaces, but past that we weren’t looking for any other support. We had 28 teams compete, but as far as inter-university tournaments go for other non-esport events we were fairly low key, so

were dealing directly with the gaming societies themselves.”

Now, as a manager on a much bigger stage, Ron’s responsibilities have changed quite a bit.

“If people try to legitimise esports by having it included in the current conventional structures then it will always be second fiddle to the main event.”

“As Stage Manager I had final say on what shows we put on our two stages for the E-Games area of the Suisse Toy Expo, and then during the event itself was in charge of making sure we had everyone in the right place at the right time.

SwitzerLAN takes place in the hall next to E-Games and is the largest in Switzerland with 1000 gamers in attendance.”

“I wanted to make sure we had a good variety of games on show for the 52,000 visitors, so I focussed primarily on show matches with a few LAN tournament games shown where I could. Unless you’re focussed specifically on a given

tournament it’s very hard to get concrete timings which you need for a good show. In the end we had Hearthstone, Rocket League, DOTA 2, and Starcraft 2 show matches, with the LAN finals of CS:GO and LoL, as well as an invitational tournament for LoL that was stream-mirrored by Riot’s German Twitch channel and a national Swiss news outlet. I had to find casters the casters and players for each, as well as helping to decide on formats, so it helps to know a little bit about all the games!”

When it comes to esports in general, Ron has been involved for a long time. Back when esports were still considered the domain of outcasts, geeks and weirdos, Ron was broadcasting, so how does he feel about its growth?

“Undoubtedly esports has grown a lot in the time that I’ve been involved, but I feel that in real terms a lot of the perceived growth is actually just better representation and communication from the events that were already taking place. The first broadcasts I did were on Justin.

TV which was eventually rebranded to focus on its much more famous subsidiary: Twitch.TV.

“Now that people have seen that there’s an audience for the things they’re doing, all of a sudden every LAN party can broadcast its tournaments to a place where they’re no longer considered niche-interest. In turn, this helps promote the events and hopefully increases attendance at the next event. The fact that video game championships can now fill venues like Wembley Arena is

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he SCENES

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With Ron Morrow - ex-Stage Manager for the SwitzerLAN Event and now Competitions Manager for Ludicious Festival

mind-blowing. So how big can esports be? To some, the idea of gaming being mainstream is absurd, to some the idea of gaming being a real hobby and not just for children is still

uncomfortable – though I doubt anybody reading this feels that way!

– but Ron believes we’re already there.

“I think it could be argued that the idea of “mainstream” is slowly being eroded altogether, and in that sense I would say esports is already there. Thanks to the very global nature of video games and their coverage, when a game is released people from all around the world can play it at the same time with the same rule set and understanding. That means that the audience for any events are also global and so it’s a lot easier to pull in an audience in the 10’s of thousands. What is currently considered mainstream is based largely on local societal factors, and in part because of that I think local communities is one area esports needs to improve on.

“It’s very easy for someone to see a video of an arena being filled in Asia and dismiss it as a cultural quirk, but now that it’s happening on the home soil too it becomes a lot harder to ignore.”

When it comes to individual games, one that Ron saw the birth and growth of was Hearthstone, the card game from Blizzard.

Hearthstone is an interesting game, because it’s so different from every other big esport. “Hearthstone had an enormous advantage from the

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outset by being from a huge company who knew they needed to remain relevant in a changing landscape.

From a game design perspective they have also struck a very fine balance between being approachable on a casual level, but with enough depth to be competitive, though people argue at length about where that line between the two should really be.”

“It’s very easy for someone to see a video of an arena being filled in Asia and dismiss it as a cultural quirk, but now that it’s happening on the home soil too it becomes a lot harder to ignore.”

Being so different has helped the game grow, he explains.

“Because it’s relatively slow paced, it has also benefited from being great for streamers to play and commentate along to, going into detail about their plays. It’s helped personalities to emerge who are not necessarily competitive players, which can be hard in team games

when you need to be talking to your team and not the audience if you’re going to play well.”

If running your own tournament – if it’s just for your mates or on a much bigger stage, Ron’s advice would just be jump in.

“I would really recommend jumping straight in and organising your own tournaments if you really want to learn and get involved. If you attend a regular LAN, then take the initiative and set up a specific tournament within it that you want to broadcast, find some casters, and bodge together whatever equipment you can to make it work. If you’re looking at larger events, then see what’s going on locally and contact the organisers to see if you can help in any way. Most large events take on volunteers in exchange for a free ticket and you’ll get to see first-hand what goes on behind the scenes, as well as creating a network of who’s who in the industry. Talk to people, put yourself forward, and people will remember you when they need help in the future. Past that, make sure you’re keeping an eye on the big tournaments to see what their stage and competition setups look like.”

If you’d like to learn more, or have questions, feel free to contact @TheNorthernNerd on Twitter, and of course, follow us @GGMagazineUK while you’re there!

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SCOT T I SH I N

We caught up with Scottish Warriors, a brand new team set up in Scotland to try and put the country on the esports map.

The UK scene has famously struggled in nearly all of the big esports, with only Rocket League and FIFA players seeing major success - and Scottish Warriors are looking to change that.

What inspired you to start a LoL team?

League of Legends is not a fun game to play. Solo queuing is a grind that most people don’t find enjoyable, but they do it for the ELO. However, playing 5v5 with old or new-found friends, it transforms into a completely different game; so the Scottish Warriors were formed.

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D E PE ND E NC E How good do you think you guys can be?

I would love to see Scottish Warriors on the main stage competing in the LCS, but that’s a long, long way into the distance. However, we do have some pretty good players within the organisation that could make it - if given the proper chance.

Do you think League of Legends is the best esport around?

I don’t think you can name any esport the best esport. It’s down to fans appreciation of the game they are talking about at the time. There are so many different games you can take competitively; that’s where esports gets it’s drive from. You’re a team player? Play CSGO. Don’t like Shooters? Play League.

Don’t like team games? Play StarCraft, or Hearthstone - they all play their own part in the esports scene.

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What tips do you have for somebody looking to start their own team?

First things first for starting a team is your logo and team name. Make sure it represents yourself as an organisation, where you are from, what your team’s common interest is and what theme you want to go for. Starting a team is the easy part - you can make a team, play on Battlefy or ESL and never leave your house. It’s the stages after and how serious you want to take it that brings the problems and barriers.

The Scottish/UK esports scene isn’t the best - what can be done to make it better?

The Scottish esports scene needs a home. If someone asks me ‘Do I want to go see the EU LCS finals in Germany?’, I can tell you where it’s held and probably the studio number. Scotland has the SECC in Glasgow which is absolute overkill right now at this stage, as the UK is dead in the water compared to Who should we be looking out for on your team? these other countries. You could argue that ESL have studios and do some big events but never have they The main problem with League of Legends is now it’s held something in Scotland on a consistent basis harder to put the game on your back and solely take where it’s easily doable. The best thing for Scotland is your team to victory; however Grant “SW Insomnia - which is in Birmingham…

Kazric” Robertson has the mechanics and the in-game knowledge to snowball any lane and win The SECC is more than capable of hosting a big open the game. If you catch Grant on the right day in the LAN for teams to compete four times a year easy in right mood - he could go at it with the best of the an industry that’s growing exponentially. best.

You’ve mentioned you have plans to make a CS:GO team - how will you go about finding players and making a team?

Any final words?

If anyone is interested in helping the organisation out or simply interested in joining, or seeking help do not hesitate to ask - we will help in any way we can.

Starting any team takes a matter of seconds - starting You can find us on a brand is another matter. As for finding players, it Facebook.com/Scottishwarriorslol, Twitter, will be through the power of social media, and ide@Scotwarriorlol or on our email address ally we will look and hunt down the top tier players Scottishwarriorslol@gmail.com. Thanks for having in Scotland that play Counter Strike but we will go us! further afield as long as players are willing to travel, if we do end up venturing to LAN events.

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KH

AN

AG

E!

Asim Khan a.k.a Khanage talks Smash 4, Peach and uni life!

Asim Khan’s gaming career started like most of ours – defying the everyday. “I’ve played the Smash games since the N64 era as an escape from the boredoms of Luton, my hometown.”

Luckily for Khan, he got a lucky break, and happens to be pretty good.

“My competitive gaming started a couple of years ago when I entered a London tournament after finding out

“Well, Peach’s character has the sass, zaniness and slight campness which resonate with my own personality!” about it on Facebook. The atmosphere and the friendliness of the competitors made it really fun for me. When I decided to

stay in my hometown to do work experience I got more opportunities to compete in weeklies at an esports bar. This allowed me to get into the Smash 4 esports scene where I met interesting people and helped me engage with the strongest players in the region.”

Something of a Smash veteran, Khan is, as the mildly disturbing picture (right) shows, a long-time Peach player.

“I’d started playing Peach non-competitively since Melee.

It just happened to be over time I got a better understanding of how she played and, by the time Smash 4 came out, I transferred these fundamentals over from previous titles.”

Why Peach, you ask?

“Well, Peach’s character has the sass, zaniness and slight campness which resonate with my own personality!”

Though Peach is a damsel in distress in the Mario Bros. games, she packs a pretty mean punch in Smash, and Asim

has a few tips on how to play her.

“On a technical level, her float mechanic is what makes Peach such a unique character and makes her stand out in the game. Peach can also be played in different styles and still have success in tournaments. I would recommend to those looking to pick her to study this float mechanic in conjunction with getting comfortable with her movement style. Another tool that I recommend is getting used to is her turnip game as it opens a lot of options in offensive and defensive strategies, it is still an aspect of her character that is not fully developed in the meta.”

For those who don’t play Smash, ‘turnip game’ is not a euphemism; Peach literally pulls turnips out of the ground to use in battle. Smash is not your typical fighter…

A lot of the community has suggested Melee is the best game in the series, and until Smash 4 that was almost uncontested within the community.

Khan, however, disagrees.

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“I think Smash 4 is definitely the best in the series. It is being constantly improved and balanced through patches and the diversity of characters provide unique mechanics which makes each match different and sets Smash 4 apart from its predecessors.”

Asim was also pretty high on the UK scene in general – though with a caveat.

“Regarding Smash, I think it still in its teething period – although I can’t say much for other games. Smash UK esports scene has been getting a lot of momentum recently due to the growth of new players along with good relations with other EU smash scenes. Hopefully soon UK will be a key hub when hosting international tournaments, although this has been put into doubt because of Brexit.”

One thing he did think could be improved was Nintendo themselves – though he was full of praise for the work they did in the game in terms of improvements and

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balance, he believes more could be done in the esport world.

“I think Nintendo can do a lot more to make smash a bigger esport as a whole. I think Smash is not as big of

“On a technical level, her float mechanic is what makes Peach such a unique character and makes her stand out in the game. a priority for them despite it being one of the biggest scenes internationally. In terms of the UK Nintendo has done little to improve smash as a scene, although for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, Nintendo did play a part in bringing our best player to take part in the esports games. Hopefully they will be more involved in the

near future, even if they just help out with equipment. With that said, there is a lot of untapped potential with esports.”

Asim has to balance uni work with gaming, (and anybody reading this can surely understand how difficult that is!) but seems to have a pretty solid grasp on it.

“The key to playing esports when studying is truly balance. As I’m in my final year, I aim to play just about enough games to keep me content, but will not take part in competitions should interrupt my studies. Essentially, while playing is important to my happiness, I understand that doing well in my degree is necessary for my long-term wellbeing. I find gaming to be the ultimate escape and it has allowed me to meet intriguing people and open doors which I did not know was possible, and for that I am truly grateful.”

Credit to Gabriela Woch for the picture!

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T H I S

I S

W

Whilst some of the biggest teams in the world are at battle, we speak to Jerry “Jerry” Jamieson, a Cambridge student fighting a war on the front-line... at the now-annual Oxford-Cambridge esports varsity!

W

atching competitive Counter-Strike is one thing – playing it is an altogether different adrenaline rush. Now imagine captaining one of the most prestigious universities in the country, against your long-standing rivals, and you’ve an idea what playing in the Ox-Bridge Varsity game was like.

Third year Law student Jerry Jamieson had the pleasure – and the ignominy – of playing such a competitive game, but it didn’t go entirely to plan.

“We lost a (very close) series 2-0, with the game’s scores being 16-12, on Overpass and 16-13, on Train. It was a shame but to be honest with you we were pretty pleased with our performance - we got absolutely smashed last year. Oxford’s CSGO team are skill-wise a lot better than us, and so we were pleased that we took it an awful lot closer this year with teamwork/strats in an attempt to counteract the mechanical skill gap.”

The uni teams have tried to make this annual event, and whilst there’s a competitive element there’s a

bit more to it than bragging rights.

“The varsity event is a laugh - I have been a part of it for the last 3 years. The first year that I took part was I think the second ever

“It’s all super amateur and spontaneous - but I think that that suits it down to a tee” Cambridge/Oxford esports varsity event. Production values are generally speaking through the floor, and it’s all super amateur and spontaneous - but I think that that suits it down to a tee; none of us are professional gamers none of us are even close, and so the purpose of varsity for us is to have a bit of a final showdown between two historically very competitive universities, and meet our Oxford counterparts.”

There’s no money in it for the players, or the universities, it’s just an inter-university competition.

“We have no budget at all so if we do get any sponsors/twitch viewers it’s a bonus; it’s an event by the competitors (the two Cambridge committee members who organised the majority of it this year were on the League of Legends and CSGO teams respectively), for the players.

“Having said that I do think that the event (and the respective cambridge and Oxford esports societies) have grown and improved in terms of the standard of play over the last few years. Just off the back of the twitch stream that we had over the event we have had two or three new members of the Cambridge Uni CSGO group join, and that just keeps building; we finished something like 30th in NUEL (the National University Esports League) last year, and 10th this year, with more and more players joining as we get more publicity and success.

“So at the very least the varsity event is incredibly healthy for the eSports scene at the respective universities, both in terms of introducing new people to esports, as well as

THE BATTLEGROUND: The calm before the storm 20

W A R- S I T Y ! encouraging those that already play to reach out to other players at the uni.”

It wasn’t just Counter-Strike on offer – Twitch viewers were treated to some top games in other genres – but Jerry didn’t keep it a secret what he prefers.

“I am incredibly biased, but I maintain that CSGO is the best sport for a neutral to watch; compared to MOBAs, for example - and this is a well-rehearsed argument! - for somebody that knows nothing about the game, it is inherently instinctive, and you instantly get a sense of what is going on. If a player from your university shoots a guy in the face, that is obviously a good result for that team.

On the other hand, a League of Legends player might pull off some incredible mechanics, but for people not familiar with the game, that will mean absolutely nothing - one has no idea what is going on unless you are already familiar with the game itself.”

It’s more than just the intuitive nature – Jerry believes even for those who fully understand the game, there are reasons why the FPS is superior as a spectator sport.

“Besides this, I feel that CSGO’s round-based nature does a lot to keep it fresh and exciting. Compared to MOBAs, where you might have a 40 minute game where the winner is somewhat of a foregone conclusion after the first 15 minutes or so (and yes, I know that this isn’t always the case), with CSGO every 2 minutes there is a new round, and with it a new opportunity for the team that you are supporting to win or lose in dramatic fashion.

“For example, the Cambridge team were down 15-7 in the final game of our Varsity match this year. In a MOBA this would likely result in a snowball, however because of the round system we actually had a better buy going into the 15-7 round than the Oxford team had. As a result of this we were able to mount what was very nearly an amazing comeback ultimately we brought it back to 15-13 before sadly losing 16-13 - which was exciting for both sets of spectators.”

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Part of the fun of varsity is that everybody involved is human – not to say that coldzera isn’t human (though we’d forgive you for believing that) but there was something of a disparity in skill, and this gave the game a different dynamic.

“In the NUEL, the very top teams have roughly 5 globals. The Cambridge and Oxford teams are certainly not top-tier however, we have way too many lectures… and hence the Oxford team were comprised of 3 Globals, with the Cambridge team

“If a player from your university shoots a guy in the face, that is obviously a good result for that team!” having none at all – we have 3 SMFCs, 1 LEM, and 1 MGE - you work with what you get!”

On a wider scale, Jerry believes that this is generally a good thing for students and for universities – but probably won’t help the UK harness more talent.

“To be quite honest with you, if you look at the players at the front of the competitive CSGO scene, the vast, vast majority of them have come to a fore before they were even 20. These university leagues are phenomenal for players at the universities, however by university age players are already almost a bit too old to get properly into competitive, professional esports.”

Jerry was positive about the work other organisations were doing to help the scene, and was upbeat about the future for UK CS.

“What is great for harnessing talent is the work that Faceit and ECS are doing (I.e. Hosting top-tier international events in the U.K. Every year), as well as NUEL’s major final LAN event (‘NUEL live’) which they throw twice a year at the end of each term’s league. Exposing a potentially younger audience to top-tier professional CS in person has to have a

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tremendously influential and inspirational effect for those select young players that might have the natural talent to reach the upper echelons of professional play.”

For those of you at university, or plan ning to go, Jerry has managed to juggle a Law degree at one of the best universities in the world with playing a bunch of Counter-Strike – so don’t sweat it!

“The Cambridge team is somewhat unusual in that 2 of our players are deep into their respective PhDs, and so are only available for practice/games once or twice a week from about 9pm onwards, and the rest of us undergraduates have exams/deadlines at semi-regular intervals throughout the year. For good or for bad, this means that pretty much the best that we can do in terms of team practice is ~4 hours a week (2 hour sessions twice a week). As much as I would love to paint the picture that I am the most diligent student in the world who is glued to his desk 24/7, I can definitely spare 4 hours per week to play a bit of CSGO without it impacting my work!”

In fact, Jerry believes that playing and being involved has helped him immeasurably, and somewhat guffaws at the old ideas that playing games melts your mind.

“What I can say is that captaining the CSGO for the last two years has almost certainly had a beneficial effect on me as a person, and probably by extension on my academic work. It does teach you (by necessity if anything) to organise your time and to manage 4/5 other people all with different commitments at different times, which can only be helpful. It is also lovely to be able to do something completely different for a few hours per week: competitive CSGO with a team that all have the same mindset is so much fun, and hence it provides a great opportunity to have a break from whatever work I am doing and focus on something completely different.”

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F

YOU’LL NE VER

ootball is a simple game: six cars chase an oversized ball around for five minutes something something Germans and penalties? I can’t quite remember the saying…

Two days into playing Rocket League and football has changed forever, for me. No longer does it involve silky skills from the toes of Neymar, no longer does it involve the tough tackling of Giorgio Chiellini – it certainly does not involve the goalkeeping skills of Gianluigi Buffon, if my games are anything to go by – it involves crashing into the ball, flying somewhere near the ball, and importantly, blowing up your opponents.

It’s been nearly 24 months now, and football just seems so dull. Where’s the sick aerials? Why are there so many players? Who’s

this idiot stopping the game every time the cars – erm, players – crash into each other?

“Watching Kronovi spin around in the air before dunking a high ball past a hopeless keeper was a moment on par with seeing Thierry Henry in the flesh” This is what Rocket League does to you, everything becomes an imitation of the game. Work, school, spending time with friends and family; all become a countdown to when you can next drive around in ‘DFH Stadium Stormy’, which I now call home. If you’re from Neo Tokyo – well, I’m

not sure we can be friends.

The best part of Rocket League, as an Englishman, is that there’s no penalties, and as such we have a chance of winning something. It’s simply a 1v1, or a 2v2, or a 3v3 game of football with cars instead of players. That’s it.

Most goals in five minutes wins, and any draw means it’s next goal wins – and anybody who’s ever played football in a playground knows what that means.

Upon discovering there was a competitive scene for Rocket League, I was overjoyed – followed shortly by the crushing disappointment of knowing I’ll never be good enough. Watching Kronovi spin around in the air before dunking a high ball past a hopeless keeper was a moment on par with seeing Thierry Henry in the flesh – that was the moment I

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DR I VE ALONE. ..

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An ode to everybody’s favourite driving-meets-football game, and it’s meteoric rise

“If God wanted us to play football in the sky, he’d have put grass up there” Brian Clough, before watching a JHZER montage

“Rugby is a game for barbarians played by gentlemen. Football is a game for gentlemen played by barbarians. (Rocket League, however, is bloody ace.)”

Oscar Wilde (probably)

knew I was never going to be good enough, but watching that display of skill was enough to make me practice.

That’s the simple joy of Rocket League – it captures the essence of football, the joy of scoring a goal, the horrors of losing to a friend or rival, the simple intuitive nature of invasion sports – but ties it with the ridiculous mechanical skill of any esport. It’s incredibly addictive, and easy to watch.

Psyonix, the creators, were overjoyed with the incomprehensible success of Rocket League, and announced the RLCS – the Rocket League Championship Series – which allowed the best players in the world to play against each other for money, and showcase their skills to the wider world – and suddenly, a new esport was born.

Callum ‘MegaShogun’ Keir is a caster for the RLCS, and has overseen the atmospheric rise of the game from the front line, and echoes my thoughts.

“Rocket League is one of the most accessible games for casual and hardcore gamers to 23

understand. In the same vein as Street Fighter, where the audience can easily clue into the fact that the win condition is for one person to beat the snot out of the other person,

“It captures the essence of football, the joy of scoring a goal, the horrors of losing to friend or rival” Rocket League is just car football.

“Not only does it have the easy to understand premise behind it, but we had pro-level players from day one. The prequel allowed us to begin an esports scene immediately since we already had twenty or so players that could play strong, and set a level that all the new players could aspire to.

So we had millions of new players picking up the game and looking at players like Kronovi while thinking to themselves “man I’d really like to be able to do that”.”

It’s just car football, he

says, but it’s so much more than that. There’s plenty of Rocket League fans who don’t even like football – so how can you explain that?

“The major complaints from those who don’t like watching football are usually the following; the matches are too long, the players pretend to be injured and that there’s not enough action to justify watching a 90 minute match. Coming from a fan of football, even I can see the validity of these complaints.

“Now look at Rocket League - which has five minute matches with usually three or more goals in a match, and contact with another player is not only accepted but praised when used correctly. Draws don’t exist either.

2-2 at the end of the match?

Perfect; next goal wins then.”

“Then look at the game itself. Yes, it is similar to football but the game itself feels almost dystopian, or like something you would see in a movie. It’s close to something everybody already knows whilst mixing in elements that you could only dream of.”

As a caster, Keir has his

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his own challenges that don’t involve controlling a car in the air, or beating a defence.

“Goals could happen at any time from any particularly good play.; while in real sports you can have a lot of downtime where you can tell nothing is really happening and when things to start to happen you can tell because the action takes 10-20 seconds to ramp up - compare this to watching Pocket Aces play where they can take the ball from their goal and score in less than 4 seconds.”

Keir drops a hint as to his next venture…

“I’d honestly have to try commentating on a real sport before I could give you a real answer. Maybe I’ll try football... or chess.”

MegaShogun might have a few challenges, but it’s fair to say there are perks to the job.

“I get to talk about a game that I’ve played for years and never thought would grow beyond a particularly small community to thousands of people, I work with some of the most driven and most

creative personalities in esports and I can travel the world while doing it.

“It’s alright I guess.”

Adam ‘Lawler’ Thornton, a fellow caster, echoes the perks of the job – for anybody looking for a career, it seems caster might be something to aim for!

“Goals could happen at any time from any particularly good play; while in real sports you can have a lot of downtime where you can tell nothing is really happening”

“I love what I do. I was lucky enough to be brought on the RLCS team and it has truly changed my life. Getting to travel (I officially hate flying) to talk about a video game and be around a community that is truly supportive is awesome. Getting to have my thoughts be respected among the developers of the game

I love regarding decisions/changes... it’s unreal. I get to hang out with a casting crew I pretty much consider brothers, constant jokes and laughs. I’m truly blessed and thankful to be given this chance.

“All us RLCS guys understand we were a risk. To bring grass-root community casters with no professional experience... That has to be scary to put your production in the hands of us, but we are all super passionate and want nothing but the best for this game and community. I guess that’s all I ever wanted in a job, is to truly love what I do and have it be something I’m passionate about.”

Lawler was a little less certain on the reasons for the game being quite so successful.

“To be honest, I don’t think anyone really knows why. So many different factors had to come together. People had to be willing to give this game technically a second chance. Publicity from the big streamers had to go well, PS+ for free had to not kill all the profits.

The sheer fun as a sit-down party game but still has that high skill ceiling. We compare it to Super 24

Smash Bros for that same reason.”

He did know, for certain, why it become so successful as an esport”

“As for the esport, it makes sense. It’s the most played sport in the world, there’s no killing, no champions, no abilities to learn. It’s so easily accessible and within seconds of watching the concept of the game can be understood. We have a dev that is more than willing to make it grow and partnered with the platform that makes it all come together.

Add in a strong community that won’t let it do anything but flourish.”

“Once you play it it’s hard not to fall in love”

The common theme is the sheer simplicity of the game, especially watching it. What Psyonix have done is somehow

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grasp the beautiful simplicity of football and improve the most popular game in the world.

It’s what sets it apart from any other esport – the mechanics of Counter-Strike and the tactical element make it harder to understand, and MOBAs require some level of aptitude to even understand – even FIFA has never truly captured the joy of football in the same way as Rocket League.

Even the best FIFA players in the world (see the JukeZ interview!) get frustrated at the game, but everybody involved with Rocket League seems to love it. Watching Rocket League only makes you want to play it, even if you never have before.

Lawler concurs: “It’s so fast paced. Something exciting can happen at any moment. For those that have never played a soccer game, they’re missing out. I have plenty of friends who dislike the sport but love FIFA. Rocket League has the appeal that its arcade-y/less serious so I

feel it gets over that initial bias.

Also, once you play it it’s hard not to fall in love.”

James Copeland, otherwise known as Tonguein-Loftus-Cheek, wrote some of the most beloved and funniest articles about his first few weeks in Rocket League, and he had his say on the reasons for the success of the game.

“The game has a clear and attainable learning curve.

This, combined with a fantastic ranking system that makes progression genuinely desirable, makes it incredibly playable. Its beauty lies in its simplicity. You can’t buy special advantages, or exploit flaws in the system to your own benefit.

If you practice, you’ll get better, and I really like that.”

More than just the simplicity of the game, it’s easier for those who don’t have a ridiculous amount of time to game (an alien concept to me, as I’m sure it is to you…)

“I like that playing

A goal, the author is reliably informed

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gg commitment. I don’t need to set aside an evening for it, but likewise, I could quite easily if I wanted to. The 5 minute games mean that if I only have half an hour, I can still squeeze in a few games and still have a great time.

“It combines 2 of my favourite genres of game: racing games and football games.

Whilst I was initially skeptical at a hybrid, I have to say it satiates both my thirst for scoring goals and my thirst for racing around in a cool looking car.

“The ceiling for improvement is infinitely high too. Because of the physics of the game

(which, by the way, are also spot on) it means there will always be room for chance and unpredictability. As such, even the best players in the world will never be able to perfect the game. There is always a reason to come back to Rocket League, no matter your skill level.”

From Rocket League’s predecessor, Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle Cars, a cult hit, to the version of Rocket League we have now – the game has evolved a lot. It’s growth has been atmospheric – it passed over 25 million – 25 million! – players, with over one billion

games played just this January.

With sports teams getting involved with esports and buying up teams and players, it’s probably not long until they get involved with Rocket League and with that comes money, coverage and mainstream acceptance. We can also have sporting rivalries in Rocket League which could be pretty fun especially if some of the bigger English teams get involved.

Maybe, just maybe, Arsenal could finish higher than fourth – but I won’t hold my breath.

Grassroots Football Reddit user /u/spankmeimnaughty (look, I didn’t pick the name) talks Rocket League and other esports at the grassroots level after being involved in a reddit-wide Rocket League game and playing for his university...

I think that grassroots esports are a very good way to get people engaged with the professional level. Playing a game in a more professional setting makes me more attuned to pro play and makes it more interesting to me. When I play Rocket League on my own, I generally play solo standard with my mic muted. Any coordination there has to be assumed based on how I think my teammates will act and how they think I will act. When I played in the Reddit match, it was an entirely different experience. The communication was at a much higher level, and as such we executed plays far above what you would see in solo queue, and really made the pro level plays that I see on twitch more accessible to me - having a similar (but much less intense) experience helps build viewership.

I feel that the best thing grassroots eSports does is improve fan engagement.

I think that there could be a longer curve in growth of esports at lower levels relative to real sports. I played basketball and was a runner and a swimmer in middle/high school, and I grew up

wanting to be Michael Jordan or Michael Phelps. The fascination with traditional sports is there from an early age, and in the US they are incredibly prevalent because the generation before us idolized

“There simply isn’t that culturally ingrained following of esports that spans generations like there is with traditional sports. their own heroes just like the generation before them, etc. There is an abundance of people willing to coach since they loved and played the sports themselves growing up. This is where esports have a lot of work to do- Rocket League is a bit over 1 year old. Even an “old” game like Super Smash Brothers Melee is only 11 years old.

There simply isn’t that culturally ingrained following of esports that spans generations like there is with traditional sports.

I think another problem with esports developing at lower levels would be continuity. For example, basketball has been largely unchanged since the NBAABA merger. There have been tweaks to the rules, but the game is still fundamentally the same. It’s unclear right now if the games that are popular esports right now will have the staying power that traditional sports have. Eventually, most video games get pretty dull, and playing video games doesn’t have the same endorphin rush that keeps traditional athletes coming back to their sport. Will RLCS still be here in 10, 15 30 years? We don’t have enough precedent to know, and I think that the variety of games and short life cycles could prevent esports from fully developing lower level systems.

I don’t hear a whole lot of coverage about eSports at the university level here. There are gaming clubs and similar organization that like to promote them, but most students are probably unaware that esports are growing by the day or even exist.

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WHAT’S THE DELEO? Deleo ‘Zerg’ Devitt talks to us about old Call of Duty, new Call of Duty and... well, current Call of Duty!

“Individually, I was happy with my performance to a certain extent, I feel I played well but could have played a lot better,” starts Devitt. His newly formed team, playing under the Team Vitality moniker, finished in 9-12th in the Call of Duty World League at Insomnia in Birmingham, which some might be disappointed with – but Deleo was upbeat.

“As for team performance, I was very happy, for the problems that the event had and the scheduling, and the little time to practice we had, we showed that we were capable of being able to take top teams all the way – and with more practice over time we could have beaten them.”

Zerg is a new name on the competitive CoD scene, but CoD is not new to him.

“I have always been into playing Call of Duty, but I

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never knew about the competitive aspect until around 2015. That’s when I got introduced to it by friends and began to take it seriously, and I slowly began to build a profile in the Call of Duty community.

“My favourite CoD map would be either Raid or Firing Range, the best game mode would have to be Hardpoint and for a gun, the BAL from Advance Warfare was great.”

As a long time player, he isn’t a massive fan of the current iteration, even though it’s the one where he’s started to gather some success.

“Honestly? Infinite Warfare is not a great game. I feel like it was rushed and not ever really completed; as for an esport, it’s alright but compared to other titles like Black Ops 3, and some of the earlier games, this game has a small fraction of enjoyment compared to them as a

competitive game.”

He does have some hope for the next episode of the CoD saga – CoD WWII has promised to go back to its roots as a shooter-first parkour-second FPS, and this has excited quite a lot of long time fans.

“I’m very excited for World War Two, for the simple fact that it is back to boots on the ground and I am yet to play or compete in a boots on the ground title, so for me it will be something new. It’s also what the whole of the competitive scene wanted, so I feel next year could be massive for Call Of Duty esports, but also casual players.”

If you’d like to try and compete against Deleo, he has some tips to try and become as good as him – but warns it will take a while!

“The tips that I would give somebody for trying to get better at CoD would simply be, make sure you put time and commitment into the game, watch streams, watch YouTube videos - whatever it may be and find a way to enjoy the game. For me it was playing with a group of people you like and just put hours in together; over time you will see improvement.”

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M AJOR E X

As minor qualifiers and minors start, we look ahead to the WHERE AND WHEN IS IT HAPPENING? Hosted by PGL in Krakow, Poland, the next major will begin on the 16th July, lasting a full week. However, Minors have already begun, and there’s already been some interesting results - none bigger than Swedish legends Ninjas in Pyjamas bombing out in the Minor Qualifier.

Alongside them, Heroic and Space Soldiers failed to qualify, which came as something as a surprise to many.

The Tauron Arena - the battleground for the finals..

WHO IS GOING TO BE THERE, THEN?

WHO ELSE SHOULD I LOOK OUT FOR?

Astralis, Fnatic, Virtus.pro, North, FaZe, SK Gaming, Natus Vincere and Gambit take the eight Legend spots - the rest are up for grabs.

SK Gaming won a major last year, and look back to their best with Felps in the line-up. They even beat FaZe Clan to win IEM Sydney. Gambit have been on fire recently too, and make for such an interesting team - and AdreN will be looking to prove he’s a true superstar and not just a flash-in-the-pan. Virtus.pro have something to prove, and if form in the 2v2 Tournament is anything to go by, North with aizy and G2 with superstars Shox and KennyS could do some damage.

WHO’S THE FAVOURITE? Astralis took the trophy home last time, beating the Polish veterans Virtus.pro in a pulsating final. It’s difficult to look past the Danish side for a second consecutive major - though the resurgent FaZe Clan, powered

by NiKo, have beaten them in two tournaments since.

WHAT ABOUT NA? Sadly, NA still doesn’t seem to have a major-ready team. OpTic under JasonR’s leadership have had some interesting results, but have failed to recreate the success of the few months under Stanislaw. Cloud 9 had a great Beyond the Summit, but that involved Braxton ‘Swag’ Pierce, who cannot play at the major.

They do seem to have the beating of SK Gaming; but this alone will not carry them. Liquid - the last NA team to make a splash at a major - are similarly strange.

The addition of Twistzz has made them a better side, but they seem to have a shallow map pool so could struggle in Bo3’s.

CLG and Misfits are the wildcards - both have had some impressive performances recently.

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C ITEM ENT

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e main event - the second Counter-Strike major of the year hlt v.org’s RANKINGS

GGMAGAZINE’S RANKINGS

1. Astralis

1. FaZe Clan

2, FaZe Clan

2, Astralis

3. SK Gaming

3. SK Gaming

4. Virtus.pro

4. G2

5. G2

5. Gambit

6. North

6. Virtus.pro

7. Natus Vincere

7. Natus Vincere

8. Hellraisers

8. Hellraisers

9. Gambit

9. North

10. OpTic

10. Fnatic

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OUR EXPLANATION FaZe have bested Astralis over the last few match-ups and have the talent advantage - when you have Kioshima, allu and rain as back-up stars, you’re pretty stacked. Virtus.pro have been shocking online - and though those results don’t matter too much, they’ve been exceptionally bad - but were also terrible at the last LAN they attended.

Gambit deserve to rise, as a consistent threat, where NaVi and North have struggled recently. We thought about putting Hellraisers above NaVi, but NaVi have been somewhat consistent over the last six months. Fnatic deserve a top 10 place, or at least we think so, as a ridiculously talented team who can beat any team at any point, even if they struggle for consistency.

We don’t believe in the OpTic resurgence - though ignoring them entirely could be dangerous. Finally, G2 move up to fourth, after some impressive results and a stacked line-up - with KennyS looking back to his absurd best.

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MAJOR PREDICTIONS

We put our necks on the line with a prediction for the likely winner, dark horse and a team who is likely to be disappointed - and then we get the expert opinion from former pro and current analyst Tomi ‘lurppis’ Kovanen!

WINNER

DARK HORSE

WILL BE DISAPPOINTED

WE THINK:

WE THINK:

WE THINK:

We fancy FaZe Clan. They’ve bested Astralis in the last few games between the sides, and with the ridiculous star power of NiKo as well as players like allu and rain who can win games on their own, they don’tget upset on LAN very often. Yes, SK beat them in a best of 5 last time around - but now karrigan has had time to research SK we trust him to get the better of the Brazilian superstars.

We’re pretty excited by Mousesports. Yes, they lost NiKo - but they’ve slowly been getting better since. They do need to qualify (and as such we stand to look like fools...) but should they get to the major, the new blood of Estonian wunderkind ropz and the talented Oskar make them a wildcard pick, especially as we have little idea how good ropz is offline. Alongside those two, denis has been performing much better recently, so what was something of a weak link is no longer.

Natus Vincere, months later, are still missing Zeus after the coaching rule change, and have struggled to find form since.

Despite the obscene amount of talent they have in s1mple and flamie alone, without leadership and with the poor form of main AWPer GuardiaN, NaVi aren’t in any position to make a run at the top 4 just yet. Zeus,on the other hand, with Gambit, might just have a good chance at that.

EXPERT OPINION: Whereas Astralis and FaZe are the fan favorites going in, they may have already peaked.

Meanwhile. SK have been trending upwards with felps, coldzera remains the world’s best player and FalleN has woken up from hibernation, so the Brazilians do have a reasonable chance at a third title.

EXPERT OPINION: Their odds of winning are low, but fnatic have a long history of doing better than expected at the majors, with flusha known as the best player there. Like SK, they have been steadily improving recently, and if they catch a few breaks could conceivably make the grand final.

EXPERT OPINION: With more than six months of disappointments following their EPICENTER victory, North are badly in need of some success.

They have been trending down with ever-more disappointing losses knocking them out at recent tournaments. Given their poor play of late and the added pressure, the Danes could well go out in groups in Krakow.

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CHILD’S PLAY?

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How Pokemon could change the face of esports as we know it - and is quite a bit more than the kid’s game you remember playing 20 years ago.

Millions of kids do play, or have played Pokemon. I imagine a decent amount of you guys and gals played Pokemon whilst growing up. It was the perfect kids game; it combined collection and the wonder of discovery and exploration, with a story just interesting enough for children to get into it, and the element of battling that was so addictive.

What most people don’t seem to realise, is that for many, it’s the perfect game for adults too. Anybody who’s ever watched some competitive Pokemon battling will tell you, that the battling that was so addictive as a kid seems so strategic and thick with prediction, numbers and skill compared to the gym battles against Brock and Misty 15 years ago.

However Pokemon has never been accepted as an esport. We’re here to look at why, and what the arguments for and against Pokemon being a real competitive game - with the help of competitive players Joey, known as PokeaimMD, and Raphael Bagara.

“Pokemon finds new ways to keep its hardcore audience while also appealing to those who didn’t grow up with the game.” starts Raphael.

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“Competitive Pokemon tests your ability in ways that would have been impossible to fully comprehend when you were younger and just trying to collect gym badges, and this competitive nature is definitely the biggest appeal of Pokemon to me.

Second, the advent of Pokemon Go was a great example of how to appeal to a wider variety of people. It attached the Pokemon brand to a concept that was easy to indulge in, especially given how it promoted a community of players to engage in the game together.”

What Bagara touches on is the way Pokemon has managed to worm its way into our hearts and stay there the fact that I’m still playing Pokemon and playing it somewhat competitively is testament to the staying power but also the incredible work Nintendo, and the Pokemon Company, have done in creating such a ridiculously deep game.

Could The Pokemon Company (TPC) do more to support the game as a competitive game, though? There hasn’t been much in terms of prize money, events and hype around Pokemon there’s a disconnect between how the community plays the game and the way they consume it, too. Joey thinks that

they can do a little more, but they have to feel the love too.

“I think Nintendo and Game Freak are starting to step it up, because the prizes are also a big thing. Pokemon costs money to play competitively - I have to fly to events, I have to pay for events, and they do give out prizes but if they want to take it to the next level, they do have to give out more. But like I said, we need more people showing up at events to show we do care about this game. Because the more people there are showing up, the more they’ll be willing to invest. And they definitely do care somewhat about competitive, making sets and changing things based on doubles, and in general. One big change we got were that dark types are now not affected by Prankster, and that was in part to counter Swagger Liepard.

Limiting megas, like making Mega-Kangaskhan hit less hard, and that was because he was in every top team at one point. I’m pretty sure they’re doing these things for doubles specifically, but they definitely do care.

I’m not sure if they’re doing enough right now, but they’re trying to get more involved, and there’s still the whole community based thing. The more the

gg community gets involved, the more Pokemon sees that, and as attendance rises they’ll see that ‘oh man, people are actually interested in this game, okay, we have to invest more into this game, as it’s making us money’. At the end of the day it’s about that as well - Pokemon has to make money!”

The biggest disconnect between how the community interacts with the game and TPC’s vision for it comes in the format - most online simulators use 6v6 singles as the most common format, and to most battlers, singles is the best format.

TPC, however, think 4v4 doubles is the way to go. Bagara, unusually, agrees with TPC.

“As long as people are willing to play it in a competitive way, it can be competitive.”

“I started out playing singles but I definitely prefer playing doubles more.

Given that it’s the format for official tournaments, GameFreak has designed competitive Pokemon to be more tailor made for doubles. A lot of the moves, abilities, items, and general strategies are less suited for singles. Beyond that, though, I find doubles to be more in depth.

There are a lot more possible outcomes to consider on any given turn, and when building teams, you not only have to take into account how each individual Pokemon performs on their own, but also how they interact with the other Pokemon on your team. This allows for more creative solutions to the problem-solving that is involved with the game. Furthermore, the very nature of having four Pokemon on the field makes the game far more stable. Facing only one Pokemon at a time in singles allows for offensive threats to spiral out of control far too easily. In doubles however, it is more difficult overwhelm two opposing Pokemon with offense.

Additionally, because there are more mismatches between Pokemon in singles, the doubles format becomes less of a glorified guessing game. Pokemon can cover each other’s weaknesses better in doubles, which allows for more safe maneuvering as opposed to the high risk, high reward gambles that is commonplace

in singles.”

However, Joey plays almost solely singles, but knows that if we really want TPC to change their mind, it’s up to us as a community.

“I hate to go back to the community thing, but you know Project M, in Smash? That was community support that was taken so far it was allowed in official tournaments. If we want singles to actually be something, we have to keep playing it and make it bigger ourselves, and eventually they’ll notice, but at the moment, I don’t think they care about it at all. So while it might be an issue, the best thing for us to do is keep playing!”

Bagara has some explanation for the disconnect between the players and the creators of the game.

“It is worth remembering that Pokemon was not originally meant to be a competitive game. GameFreak at times will have different goals in mind when designing the game, and unfortunately, some of those decisions will not be to the benefit of the competitive aspect of Pokemon. However, it is important to understand that Pokemon is still in its growing phase competitively, and GameFreak has definitely taken steps to improve the game substantially from its earlier days, where the game was horribly unstable. The game isn’t nearly as luck based as it may appear on the surface, and with each new generation, we see fewer and fewer of the flaws that people take issue with in competitive Pokemon (largely involving the RNG).”

One of the biggest issues with Pokemon as a competitive game is the inherent randomness and ‘luck’ factor.

For those who don’t know, critical hits can occur on any attacking move, with a 6.25% chance of occurring - and those moves do 1.5x as much damage and ignore any defensive stat boosts. There’s other instances of RNG in the game too, and a lot of it can be irritating to play with, but does it stop the game being competitive? Joey doesn’t think so.

“There are competitive games with RNG, I compare Pokemon to Hearthstone, or any card game. You know, Pokemon does have the Trading Card Game too, and that’s match-up reliant. The Pokemon Company is doing things to limit luck in the game, you see from generation six the crits don’t do as much damage, they do 1.5x instead of 2, so we see them

changing things and limiting the randomness and this is all based on stuff that’s happening at VGC - we’ve seen people fall down to crits in top tournaments. I still think it’s competitive, because though these things can be considered overpowered - like if I get hit by a crit in a tournament, in the finals, I’ll be upset; I just lost a Pokemon for no reason - but they are doing things to limit that.

Changing critical hit mechanics and weakening the power of gems, because they were pretty broken back in around 2011, when Latios with Dragon Gem could do like 80% to Metagross… but things like that, they’re changing. It’s still competitive.

It depends on how you play, sometimes I’ll get myself into a position where even if an opponent crits me here I can still be in a good position, because I made a specific play where I don’t need my pokemon at full to win. There’s strategy in that, I can put myself in a position to win even if I get hit with a crit, even if I do miss this move.

It’s all about positioning. If I win a game because I hit this Fire Blast, or because I hit this Hydro Pump, I’ve put myself in an 80% position to win the game. But if there was a way I could have won the game by clicking Thunderbolt, if I’d done something different a turn before, that’s a 100% chance to win. So while hax does sometimes make us feel like ‘ah man, this game isn’t competitive’, a lot of the time you can play around it. Not always, of course - freezing, for example, is one of the worst status conditions. If I get frozen, I have a 10% chance every turn to thaw - it’s almost impossible to account for every bit of hax. Crits can happen every single turn.

You have to think, ‘if I switch out, there’s a 6% chance I get crit right here’. Even though luck is a huge aspect it can still be competitive. You see that in Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh, even poker, with any card game there’s luck of the draw. As long as people are willing to play it in a competitive way, it can be competitive.”

When it comes to making the game competitive and growing, there’s no doubt in Raphael’s mind that it can be done., even if it’s unlikely.

“I do think Pokemon has the ability to grow as an esport, however, it won’t happen in its current form with how a lot of behind the scenes stuff is run. The biggest issue, as mentioned in the previous question, has to be the fact that a lot of GameFreak and TPC’s interests

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gg conflict with what needs to be done to grow the game. Play! Pokemon currently has no sponsors apart from a select group of players, which leads to limited prize money that will also be disengaging to a lot of players. Furthermore, Pokemon and the playerbase currently do a poor job of promoting the game and giving it exposure to a casual audience. All these improvements are easier said than done though, and while I think Pokemon CAN become a bigger esport, I don’t necessarily think that it will.”

One thing that does make Pokemon so interesting is the way the meta changes to adapt to what is strong at any given time, or what gets banned, and this allows for real innovation as certain things are unexplored. The way the meta adapts is pretty similar to the way MOBAs have to change and evolve, and that’s a pretty cool feature that makes the game such a cool competitive game.

Joey has his say on the way the game has changed and is changing, including a discussion on stuff that’s currently defining the meta.

“If a ‘mon isn’t exactly healthy or is too limiting for the tier, it gets removed, and I like that the meta changes. For example, Mega-Metagross was limiting defoggers in the OU tier because it was really hard for defoggers like Latios and Latias - they can’t switch in, they can’t even outspeed on the first turn any more and fire off a HP Fire. Mandibuzz couldn’t come in either and Tapu Fini isn’t appreciating Meteor Mash or Thunderpunch. The meta is always changing - there will be a point I think where Mega-Mawile will be one of the most powerful Pokemon in the meta as we continue to ban - that’s just what happens as a metagame evolves.

Greninja will definitely be suspect tested soon - and actually right now, there’s a discussion on banning Baton Pass. Speed Passing is something that’s just really centralising in ladder play. People will just use Scolipede and Baton Pass, especially with Mega-Heracross being released.

“I do think it’s fair that the meta changes - we can go back to Hearthstone, or even the TCG - in TCG you get new packs and new cards and then the metagame shifts.We just got the Tapu Lele card in TCG and there will constantly be new cards and they will be better and then we’ll make decks to fit those cards. The meta shifts to what is banned and what is

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allowed, so even though Greninja is now allowed, I think it’s fine that in six months Greninja will probably not be allowed. It opens up the door for more creativity as the meta shifts - what people fail to realise is that Smogon doesn’t limit the Pokemon you can use, it puts them in tiers where you can actually use them and they can be actually be good. If I want to bring a Pachirisu to the OU tier, I’m completely outclassed by even Tapu Fini, because Pachirisu only has Super Fang where Fini can Nature’s Madness you, which hits ghost types, or I can use Zapdos instead where I have Static and Discharge and its coverage moves. Whereas if I was to bring Pachirisu to the PU or NU tiers, it can actually do something because there aren’t giant monsters up there like Landorus and Garchomp. I don’t mind the game changing because it makes new pokemon more viable, even if not in one tier, a lower one. That’s not to say I won’t bring Pachirisu to OU, I might do!”

With the amount of Pokemon games there have been, there’s plenty of different formats to play in, and the game has changed so immensely from year to year, and Joey gives some notable examples of how the game has changed.

“What people fail to realise is that Smogon doesn’t limit the Pokemon you can use, it puts them in tiers where you can actually use them and they can be actually be good.”

“There was a point in 6th gen where Mega Alakazam wasn’t that good, because Aegislash, Mawile, Greninja…

Pokemon like that were allowed. Starmie is a good example - it was OU every generation up to that, but it was in UU in XY because Aegislash was the best spinblocker ever. Starmie lost its job as a spinner, and as an offensive water type Greninja was better. Once Aegislash got banned, once Greninja got banned, Starmie shot back up to OU as a top-tier threat.

I’m good with the meta switching because it allows for innovation and Pokemon to become better that might never have seen the light and been able to shine.

“You’ll always have overpowered pokemon. Landorus is always going to be good. That doesn’t it’s bad, or a problem, or unhealthy for the metagame - it just means Landorus is a really good Pokemon!”

When it comes to competitive Pokemon, one of the play styles that is pretty controversial is stall - and some argue it limits the game as an esport because it can make the game pretty dull to watch. As the name suggests, it’s a primarily defensive strategy that revolves around chip damage, stacking up entry hazards, status conditions and recovering health.

However, in many competitive games, there are play styles which can be boring to watch, and it’s never stopped them. There’s plenty of dull, tactical LoL games that thousands of people watch, and not only that, stall is incredibly difficult to play with as well as against.

“I think a lot of people hate stall because they want the game to always be fun,” says Joey. “ I think stall is a very, very viable play style and people feel like it’s brainless, and that is not true. Maybe in ladder play it’s brainless, but in a tournament, and I’m playing a really high level player, and I have to decide ‘okay, if I sack [sacrifice] my Toxapex here, will he beat me later with Charizard-X, or do I have to double here into Skarmory predicting U-Turn, thinking he’s predicting my own Dugtrio, so he can’t trap me with his Focus Sash Dugtrio?’ It’s stuff like that. It’s still a Pokemon battle.

Yes, I might have switch-ins like Chansey or Toxapex, but because stall is also so cookie-cutter in what it has, you know exactly what I have to do to, and my opponent can make aggressive plays and outplay the stall just like that. Stall is like any other team, especially against a good player - you still have to decide ‘do I sack this? What’s the weakest part of this chain?’ and sometimes you have to make plays too.

I used stall in my Road to Top 10 series, because I wanted to see how it did, and how it works. I think one of the best ways to learn how to combat something is to use it yourself so you understand how it works.

This stall team used Banded Weavile, and sometimes I had to make aggressive double switches to get rid of Calm Mind Latios who completely destroyed my stall, so I

gg could get Weavile in and Pursuit trap it.

“People always want to have fun playing the game, and sometimes there are playstyles which limit that fun.

That doesn’t make it broken - it might make it boring for you, but it doesn’t make it brainless. If you bring a bad team with zero stallbreakers, sure, if you don’t match up well with stall, that ain’t stall’s fault. That’s fine - there’s over 700 Pokemon and sometimes you’ll pick six that struggle with stall. One thing I’ve always thought about in tournament play, is ‘don’t be weak to stall’. Don’t be weak to Baton Pass. Stall isn’t super common but if my opponent sees I’m not bringing stallbreakers every week - if I saw I wasn’t bringing stallbreakers every week and I was playing me, I’d bring stall. That’s my fault for not preparing.

Dugtrio is holding stall together - we had Dugtrio suspect tested and it stayed, but I think that was the wrong test anyway. We should have suspected Arena Trap - I had some success with Trapinch and Diglett in stall. People just find it boring to play, which is fine. I stray away from it in videos - automatically if people see stall they hate it. I don’t care, to me, it’s a playstyle, I’ll play it if I need to and if my team is weak to it, that’s fine, that’s my choice, I chose to use it.“

There are plenty of people who stopped playing Pokemon early on, who don’t get the magic and strategy of Pokemon right now. There are also plenty who insist that the early games, Red, Yellow and Blue, were the absolute best in the series and cannot be topped. These people are labelled ‘Genwunners’.

Both the pro players, obviously, disagree.

“I think Genwunners are largely blinded by nostalgia,” Raphael suggests.

“Red/Blue/Yellow were primitive games, full of flaws that we only realized were flaws as the game started to change, and not only has the game improved, it has innovated new ways to keep the franchise exciting. There have definitely been some silly additions introduced in some of the more recent games, but focusing on those ignores the fact that the first generation itself had serious problems.”

Joey concurs.

“I think Genwunners just can’t let go, or adapt with change. One thing a friend told me seven years ago, when Black and White was coming out, was

“ I wouldn’t necessarily say immerse yourself in Pokemon, but it’s one of the best things you can do. To get into Pokemon, you have to fully get into Pokemon.” ‘good players will adapt, the rest will be left behind’. I thnk if you have a problem with Pokemon, it’s just cause you’re not playing it as much. If I’ve got a problem with 7th Gen but I love 1st and 2nd, maybe I just need to get into the game.

I loved DPP. I loved 4th Gen OU, it’s my absolute favourite. It’s amazing right? I love that there’s no team preview, I love that I can have a late game Lucario, or Agility Zapdos, and because I concealed it I can win. We can’t have that any more, we have over 700 Pokemon, we have Zoroark who literally destroys team preview as a whole because I can disguise it as any Pokemon in the world. Zoroark would actually be broken if there was no team preview! If it had come in in Gen 4, it would be a huge problem. But now, it’s tough enough to pick a team of six that beats so many different Pokemon anyway, imagine that if you had no idea what your opponent was using? If you had no idea what they had in the back?

You couldn’t play against that. Those people just need to understand that we have more Pokemon now, we have stronger Pokemon now - the power gap has definitely increased, we have Pokemon hitting over 600 Attack with Huge Power and Pure Power, like Medicham and Mawile, and Mega Heracross has 504 Attack - you just got to understand, the game has shifted, more Pokemon were released and the game is good! Even if you don’t like the newer generations, there’s still tournaments on Smogon from old generations.”

Finally, both players have some advice for getting into Pokemon and improving your own game - and it’s oddly similar.

Joey first: “The best thing to do is practice, play, read, watch. Those are

the best things you can do. Say you found my channel, or Shofu’s channel, or anybody’s channel - the best thing you can do is get on Showdown yourself. Don’t have a team? That’s fine, I leave teams in the description, there’s plenty of sample teams on Smogon, and read. Find out what different Pokemon do. That’s the best way to get into the meta. Learn what Pokemon do, learn the mechanics, and just play. You’ll lose - a lot. But you learn more from a loss than a win. If I won, I carry on my day, but if I lose, I’m replaying, rewatching the replay and seeing, ‘oh, I could have done this differently, oh, that crit may have sucked but what play could I have made differently so that crit didn’t matter?’. I wouldn’t necessarily say immerse yourself in Pokemon, but it’s one of the best things you can do. To get into Pokemon, you have to fully get into Pokemon.”

Raphael’s advice goes along the same lines: “ I think the most important factor to improving is your willingness to learn. I mean this is several different aspects. For one, and this goes for anything else in life, becoming skilled in Pokemon takes time and dedication. There are many different skills that you need to master in order to become a high level VGC player, and much of this information can only be gained through many, many hours of practice. Beyond putting in the time and effort, you also have to be smart and efficient about your practice.

Practice isn’t the same as simply playing a lot of games. You have to play with the intention of improving upon your skills and knowledge rather than just playing for the sake of playing. There are also many useful resources that you can seen out. Lastly, and to me this is even more important, but you have to be honest and humble with yourself with where your level of ability is. What I mean by this is that one of the biggest mistakes I see people make is that they refuse to adapt because they start to believe that they have all the answers whenever they see any sort of success. The truth is, though, that no matter how successful you are, there are still so much more that you can learn, and there’s always a higher bar to clear. It’s damaging to be satisfied with stagnating. You always have to try to improve, even if it means admitting to yourself that your previous style needs to change.”

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WHAT YOU SAID

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The reddit users of /r/stunfisk, a competitive Pokemon subreddit, had their say on Pokemon as a competitive game. /u/Sovee: In its current form, no Pokemon could not be a proper esport. In the future maybe, but only in a new game. Currently Pokemon has the largest entry barrier to play of any esport. It’s simply not possible for a prospective player to pick up a copy of the game and start playing competively. Not only would they have to beat the game first (a 20 hour investment), but they need to understand breeding mechanics, something which has no bearing on their playing ability. /u/AtomicWalrus: I think really the only big thing that’s stopping competitive pokemon from growing is the sheer amount of hacking that’s allowed. Sure, making fully trained pokemon is one thing, but it’s another when players can straight up alter stats between matches to give themselves an advantage. Another potential is that there’s a lot of nuances to competitive that may not be easy to convey to the more casual player or viewer. /u/DrMuggy: Pokemon is a hidden information game and the broadcasts reflect that. When you watch pokemon streaming at a tournament you don’t get all the information.

Whether it’s items or move sets, broadcasters do not reveal them directly unless they have to.

This makes it way harder to follow for casual players and can decrease the excitement/tension for more experienced players.

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/u/PacoTaco19: If casual pokemon fans can get over the “I don’t like to use Legendary Pokemon” mentality then I think Pokemon has a chance to become an esport. Pokemon has a wide appeal, but a lot of casual viewers see the best players using similar teams and get turned off by the lack of diversity. Even this season, the most diverse metagame I’ve ever played in, I see people complaining about Arcanine’s >50% usage. /u/TheVoiceOfPleasin: Honestly the amount of cheese (percentage chance of getting a status condition or stat drop, missing, critting, flinching, etc.) makes the game far less competitive. /u/iheartaegislash:To me it’s hard for Pokemon to be considered an esport like the ones that people normally think of. That’s because normally when you think about the common ones, there is usually a combination of physical talent and game knowledge. Pokemon is entirely mental of game knowledge, reading the other person, and making predictions based on that. For a poor analogy, consider something like golf versus poker. Golf is mostly mental, but still requires some physical training that most people don’t have. Poker on the other hand is all about predicting what your opponent will do/has in their hand, while trying to hide your actions. Even if the physical training for other esports is just fast reflexes, it’s way more than you or I have, but Pokemon/poker wouldn’t require anything like that.

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TH E G R EAT BR IT Sujoy Roy, the UK’s first ever pro gamer speaks to us about old-school gaming, Quake Champions and everything in bet ween...

If you’ve ever played a modern FPS, you owe a lot to id Software and their Quake games, as the shooter which really defined the genre. If you’ve ever watched a competitive FPS, you owe a lot to Sujoy Roy and his contemporaries.

Sujoy was the first UK pro gamer, back in the early 2000’s, and he and many others started the esports scene back before they even knew what esports meant.

Quake, for those who might be a bit too young to have played it, was the original arena shooter, but with an array of absurd weapons, including a lightning gun and a rocket launcher and was known for it’s high-paced all-action gameplay, but the Duel mode, a 1v1 shootout, was famous for its tactical elements too, and it was this mode that spawned the competitive gameplay.

Sujoy Roy gave us the pleasure of talking to us about the early Quake days and everything since.

“Professional gaming didn’t exist when Quake came out, I mean there was a competitive scene of Doom and Doom II and Quake when it first came out, but it wasn’t anything like what you’d expect now, it was just people who had the reputation of being the best. You know, sort of a Wild West atmosphere where the better players started getting notoriety, but it was nothing like what we have now.

When Quake came out, I think that was the big shift - it became pretty straightforward to play people outside your LAN essentially, because it was always tricky to do this in Doom. Quake really unlocked opportunities to play

people around the world and to REALLY find out who was the best.

“They all felt like a World Championship back then, in the small community we had.”

“That was the first time where you had a scene where people were really competing against each other to be the best - not for prizes or anything, just because. It was only a few years later where we started having all of these organised LANs - I think it was Red Annihilation where Thresh won a Ferrari. John Carmack put his Ferrari up for a competition, I think at an E3 thing in 1997. It was the biggest prize for gaming by far but anything you did back then was brand new, was a big deal, and you know, pretty spectacular. Any time anybody did any kind of innovation in what was, I suppose the fledgling esports scene, it was a huge deal.”

Originally, of course, nobody really knew who the best in the world was. There was no online tournaments, and there were no huge tournaments to win money.

But Sujoy didn’t stop playing, and later iterations made it easier for him.

“I didn’t turn professional until Quake 3, I was top of the scene in Quake, and we had stuff like server-side ranking and stuff like that where you’d have an idea of how good you were, but I think the transformation was Quake 3. CPL started hosting events in hotel

rooms where all the best players would turn up, because the prize money was decent - when I say decent, I think first place was a few thousand dollars! But it was an opportunity, and you knew the best players in the world would be there.

They all felt like a World Championship back then, in the small community we had. You have to remember that at this time, there was no YouTube, no video recording, no Twitch, no live streams... the only way to watch was in-game spectating, but viewership was obviously really small anyway and it was only the people who were at the top of the game who really cared. We didn’t have an audience back then, you’d get TV coverage, and newspapers and magazines because it was kind of interesting, but there wasn’t the endemic audience, that was the difference. But it was a big deal, and that’s when I turned pro with a sponsorship from Razer and tried to get coverage and become well-known.”

Even after turning professional, Sujoy wasn’t convinced that esports could give him the full-time career he’d always dreamed of.

“I didn’t think you could be a player full-time. When I decided to do this full-time and quit my main job, the plan wasn’t ‘oh I’m going to be a player and that’s my path to success in my career’, the plan was to build a media portal, a media empire. It was all about building - I had a website then that was the esports portal for Quake, and me being professional gave me an avenue to build a hub for the Quake community. I never imagined being a player could be that lucrative, because as I say, we

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T I SH QUAK E OFF didn’t have that audience. It was more of a novelty I think, you know, imagine it’s a group of people that play Quake, it’s not a huge group, it’s big - bigger than anything else competitive at the time - but it never felt big enough to support esports as it was. That change only came later, with the release of tools like YouTube and Twitch, essentially.

Back then I just couldn’t imagine it, maybe FATAL1TY could make a living out of it, because he could make a living out of being a brand.

Thresh used his position whilst being probably the best known gamer in the world, back in 98/99, to start building a platform for his other projects and has been doing that ever since. FATAL1TY used his position to make a brand, so people could put top-end gaming gear under the FATAL1TY name.

But just being a pro gamer? I don’t think anybody really thought that would ever really be possible. That change came with video content online.”

YouTube and Twitch has changed the way we look at video

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games altogether, and Sujoy obviously puts a lot of stock into the emergence of those websites, but alongside that, he thinks there has been a wider societal change that has affected video games and esports.

“Oh, there’s other people like me, I don’t have to pretend to be someone I’m not”

“The big difference between then and now is a difference in culture, that’s what we’re talking about essentially. 20 years ago, when this was all kicking off, you weren’t always so outwardly... geeky, let’s say!” Sujoy laughs.

“You couldn’t just be somebody who just loved to play video games, and think that’s enough in your life, you know?

Today, you don’t have to apologise for liking certain things, maybe you like watching sci-fi, or playing video games, you know, you like things

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that aren’t thought of as traditionally cool, you just didn’t do that before.

You wouldn’t talk about video games unless you were with other people gaming people, and you wouldn’t celebrate the culture of games and stuff that wasn’t considered cool.

Now we have an ability to create communities, you realise ‘oh, there’s other people like me, I don’t have to pretend to be someone I’m not’.

There always used to be this sort of apologising for what you like attitude, today, it’s like hey, I like what I like and there are other people watching on online channels and playing the same games as me and it’s fine, I don’t have to apologise for being who I am. Yet when you talk to more ‘mainstream’ people, they still just don’t get it, they just don’t have any idea why somebody would want to watch someone playing video games. Now, I think that position just seems so closed-minded rather than just that straight-forward position, you’re almost becoming something of a bigot if you say ‘oh I just don’t understand why someone would like this’ because you know

gg what, it’s not your position to say that. The world is a bit more accepting of people as who they are, and that’s a nice thing.”

“This is something huge in esports particularly - you can be a big esports nerd and you know what, that’s fine, that’s fine by me!

I meet people who are really into video games, and the celebrity players and the top-end players and have discussions about professional gaming and that’s fine, I love doing that. I think that’s the big difference, and I think it’s better now.”

Moving on, Sujoy was very modest about his own skills, and didn’t bemoan the fact that he played before the big money came in.

“My skill set was very specific, I don’t think I would ever be like the greatest gamer in the world. What makes a great gamer?

It comes down to the natural talent you have and the motivation you have to improve yourself. They’re two very difficult things to have and be the best at, for someone to be the best they really have to devote a lot of their lives to improving their game and studying other people - and that’s not easy, that isn’t something that comes naturally. Top gamers who pretend that they’re really laid back; they’re not really, they’re working hard all the time and it’s not easy and you sometimes forget that, as someone from the outside. You forget how much work goes into it. I don’t think that would have been me. I excelled early on in the game where certain creativity and certain knowledge of patterns and figuring out the game very quickly served me very well, but I don’t think I could have been a pro gamer nowadays, I wouldn’t have what some of these guys have.

They’re really, exceptionally talented, which is why I celebrate top gamers as much as anyone else. I think they’re pretty incredible, and I don’t think I could challenge them.

“I don’t resent that pro gamers nowadays have so much coverage - they have so much more competition to put up with that. The field of play is millions and millions of players and you have to be in the top tier in that now. That’s hard, and if a top tier gamer nowadays makes a lot of money you know what, they probably deserve it. They probably put in the effort or have some incredible talent that has put them in that position, so I don’t think anybody should resent a pro gamer for making money or doing well.”

Sujoy clearly believes in the future of esports and thinks that esports stars should be held in the same regard as traditional sports stars - or maybe even higher!

“I like celebrating people who are good at video games. Not

“Running fast used to be really important when you needed to get away from a saber-tooth tiger but that doesn’t happen so much anymore...” that I dislike sport, but I don’t like how we celebrate sportsmen and women as being such superheroes, because I think we should celebrate other things more. If it were me, I’d celebrate doctors, and lawyers, and scientists and other things that are really hard to do. I don’t think sports represents what a good human is.

What are the skills you need to survive in the world? It’s not running fast, running fast isn’t all that useful any more! I mean, it used to be, it used to be really important when you needed to get away from a saber-tooth tiger but that doesn’t happen so much anymore...

“The skills you learn in video games are just much more relevant,” he continues. He’s aware of how controversial that statement is, but it prepared to defend it.

“ It’s all planning, strategy, efficiency and parallel processing, communication, leadership... so many useful skills that will serve you well in the world. The ability to gather food doesn’t require you to throw a javelin or chase after prey any more. Maybe after the apocalypse, yeah, the faster, more accurate throwers will be doing better, but that’s a risk I’m willing to take. I honestly think that the skills it takes to be a pro gamer are more worthy of being celebrated, in my view. But I’m biased!”

“Adding to this, Sujoy wouldn’t really support esports being involved in the Olympics or something similar, as he thinks there is a very different atmosphere to traditional sports.

“There’s a split in how things are covered. For example, I watch very little TV, so whenever I visit my parents I’m always surprised to see who the celebrities are, I have no idea who the people on Strictly Come Dancing are or why they’re famous. TV has its heroes, and they’re a very different set of heroes to say, the internet generation. Whatever you think of people like Pewdiepie, he’s an influence to a different generation, and there’s another faction of media who maybe don’t like it so much. I don’t think the crossover works so well, there’s a split in society of old versus new, and the new stuff is totally different.

I feel this old way of doing things will slowly die off, and the new ways will take over, I don’t think they’ll mix very well.

“I could be wrong - we’re seeing events now where they bring in traditional celebrities - rappers, sports stars - to take part, because it seems to make sense, but I’m not sure it works. I’m happy to have

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“Now Quake Champions is in beta I’m playing and it feels good, there’s something to playing a game that you understand and you have this instinctive grasp of.

It makes you feel like, kind of a superhero you know?” esports events where we just do our own thing. Everything else is too much of a compromise, personally.

You don’t want nerds to compromise too much towards sports to fit in - be the best nerd you can! Be a grandmaster at chess, you don’t have to play football as well to be accepted. Just be great in your world.”

The former Quake player still dabbles in the famous shooter, with the upcoming Quake Champions game looking to bring back the glory days, but not before dabbling in a few other games.

“When Overwatch came out I played a bit, but I never really liked it that much. I played a lot of Dota for a while but I stop and start, and haven’t really played since the last huge update and haven’t felt like taking it up. Now Quake Champions is in beta I’m playing and it feels good, there’s something to playing a game that you understand and you have this instinctive grasp of. It makes you feel like, kind of a superhero you know? Like you have these special abilities that make the world easier for you. I’m enjoying Quake so far, but I doubt I’ll play as much as I used to! I have a job, I have things to do, I have a social life to maintain, I can’t be playing all hours of the day... But I’ll play Quake, and who knows, maybe I’ll get involved with the community, I’d love to get more involved. I’ve done community work for Dota - chatting on streams, getting involved with bits and pieces but Quake is, you know, my home. Since Champions is coming out, I’ll see what I can do.

Maybe I can get on commentary panels or do some analysis or see if

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I can contribute to the scene in any way. I’ll be playing Quake again for sure.”

Though he describes himself as a superhero, he doesn’t claim to be back to his old level of mind-melting skill just yet in Quake Champions - though you don’t lose all of your skill, certain elements do go away from you.

“Be the best nerd you can! Be a grandmaster at chess, you don’t have to play football as well to be accepted. Just be great in your world”

“I wouldn’t say I’m good at it!” chuckles Sujoy.

“The last time I played seriously was around 2005-2006, so it’s been more than 10 years, and I promise you, your aim drops off, it’s quite frustrating. In Quake, you need to track with the lightning gun or flick with the railgun, and using them is the most frustrating thing ever because I know I should be hitting shots and when I miss, gah, it drives me crazy. But it’s something to work towards; if I can get my aim back I think I still have the rest of it. There are skills you don’t lose, like awareness, and the biggest skill in Quake is strategy and predicting your opponent, forcing them into doing something they don’t want to do. That part I feel I’m still good at, but the physical stuff I need to improve on.”

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Though Sujoy welcomed the societal changes that led to esports getting some sort of mainstream acceptance, he doesn’t think the work is done, especially within the UK, and thinks this could be the thing holding back the UK in some of the bigger esports.

“20 years ago there was plenty of UK players at the top of the scene. Back then, it was something you did on your own, you didn’t shout about it too much, you just played. And it was the same everywhere around the world - you wouldn’t broadcast this as ‘this is who I am, a guy who’s really good at video games’ but obviously it’s changed now - people who are pro gamers today will be shouting about it because it’s what they identify with. I think in the UK, it’s still a bit unacceptable to be a video gamer.

If you go to BarCraft nights there’s people sneering at you because you’re at a bar watching video games rather than football, and the UK still hasn’t shaken that off. We’re still getting there, but I think the rest of the world has surpassed us. It’s almost like if you don’t drink beer and watch football, what’s wrong with you? I don’t think the UK is a place where we develop pro gamers yet.

It’ll come, and there will be a shift, it’s just we’re taking longer in the UK. But strangely, before YouTube and Twitch, we had some of the best players in the world. I don’t think it’s a talent issue, I just think British society doesn’t welcome it so much yet.”

Sujoy loves esports - especially Dota - and believes that more focus on the backstories and

gg rivalries would really improve the viewing experience.

“I watch a hell of a lot of Dota, and I have a lot of friends around the Dota scene as well.

Strangely enough, I really like watching SingSing even though he’s such a horrible troll (laughs). I disagree with a lot of things he says but he’s very entertaining and of the pro gamers I really enjoy watching EG and Secret - but I wouldn’t say I like these guys because there’s something better about them, but because I know these guys on a personal level and I know their back stories, I know the rivalries, it means that when I watch a game with these player I enjoy watching it a lot more.

One of the challenges is trying to educate the audience as to why this game is so interesting and what’s so spectacular about it. Once we develop those identities a bit more it’ll be a bit more fun to watch. The whole esports scene is working on presenting these ideas in the best

light. “

The concerns for the viewer don’t end there, as Sujoy expresses a few concerns about Quake.

“Why is Overwatch so difficult to watch? It feels so messy - and I’ve played it, I get the game, but it’s very hard to spectate a pro game - maybe that’s something that will improve over time but it’s very hard to watch and I don’t know if Quake will suffer the same problems, in how do you broadcast it?

Of course you can watch one players point of view, but how do you watch a whole game of 4v4? We don’t really know if it’ll broadcast well until we try. Duel too, what’s interesting in Quake Duel is not whether a player is hitting his shots, it’s the underlying strategy. The meta has been developing for so many years now, and to get that is a really difficult story to tell. It’s very subtle, how you control a map, how you push somebody away from a certain area... there’s so many subtle mind-

games going on, and I don’t know how well you can broadcast that. It’s a challenge we’ll have to take on slowly. Quake is going to be popular, with a lot of stuff going on, and unless we answer these questions early on, people might turn off.”

Finally, he offers some premonitions about the next few years, and hopes for some fresh new ideas.

“Esports is young remember, and we have a pretty good idea about how we broadcast a MOBA - but we don’t know what works and what doesn’t. Every time you try something new you might stumble on something, on a new amazing way of showing esports. We don’t know yet. I like to see change in esports, and we’re going to see an evolution in how we broadcast these things, presenting players and how you talk about games. I think it’s going to be unrecognisable in another 5 years.”

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT QUAKE CHAMPIONS? WILL IT BE A SUCCESS? GET IN TOUCH ON TWITTER @GGMAGAZINEUK AND LET US KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS! 40

DEBATES AND ANALYSIS

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We have our say on the hot debates in esports right now, with a little bit of help from you guys!

Stay in touch on Twitter @GGMagazineUK and find out what the questions are next month- and maybe you can be featured.

WILL QUAKE CHAMPIONS CAPTURE THE MAGIC OF THE ORIGINAL, OR WILL IT BE A MISS?

As mentioned in the Sujoy Roy interview, Quake was the original arena shooter - being good at it requires combining incredible movement, insane reflexes and the ability to read your opponent like a book - and that combination of skills required was what made it so difficultto master and yet so fun to play. It was so fast paced, that it made for a good spectator sport, and yet so tactical to give it depth as a competitive game. But how do you build on such a dense legacy?

id Software have the chance to make the next big competitive shooter, but could also ruin all the good work they’ve done. Early signs are good - the beta has gone pretty well, and there are some insane clips already. FATAL1TY did a 24 hour stream, and if he likes it, who are we to comment?

You have to worry though. Quake is such an 41

iconic series, and this is the biggest chance they will have to make Quake a real esport and id have to get it right. I’d love to see it on the big stage, but how many times have we as gamers been promised something special and been disappointed?

It’s easy to see 15 second clips of rocketjump-to-rocket-launcher kills and get excited.

You see the sick railgun flickshots, and the insane reflexes of the best players in the world - but until the game has been out for a while, we’ve no idea how good the game will be.

Thankfully, they seem aware of the need to get it right.

In a move that’s, sadly, often overlooked by other developers, they asked the pros what they thought, what they wanted, and even supposedly hired ‘ZeRo4”, a legend of earlier Quake games, as esports manager. All signs point to something great, but I don’t

want to be disappointed again.

Creative Director Tim Willits has spoken about the need to make it easy to broadcast, a concern of Sujoy Roy’s, but being aware of something and making it a reality are very different. Broadcasting Quake will be really tough, because it’s insanely fast if nothing else.

Basically, I’m pretty confident Quake will be a success. The fanbase is there, the old school pros seem to love it, the developers seem aware of what they need to do and mainly, the beta was a ridiculous amount of fun. But I won’t let myself go all in just yet - I’ve been hurt too many times before.

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D E BAT E S

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THE UMP-45 (CS:GO)

Economy is one of the defining features of Counter-Strike, and the one thing which really sets it apart from any other FPS. The economic system allows teams some flexibility in buying - teams who are execute heavy might buy less often or weaker guns for more utility, whereas somebody like Fnatic could just go wild and buy as often as possible, especially with the Tec-9 another gun we would like to see changed a little bit, but before that, there’s a more obvious issue - the UMP45.

Everybody knows how flat-out absurd the UMP is, except, it seems, Valve. The gun itself isn’t that obscene - the armour penetration is extremely good with a good DPS, but a smaller clip and low-ish fire rate, combined with the damage drop, make it an inferior choice to the M4 variants and the AK-47, but that isn’t really the point. The UMP in a 1v1 at mid-range will lose to the rifles, but it’s what the gun allows you do that makes it an issue.

On the CT side, the UMP is economy-breaking, because the CT’s are supposed to be tight on cash to stop the game being CT-sided. However, if you can take a UMP instead of a rifle, you’re saving $1900 plus making an extra $300 per kill (one thing which makes this gun so absurd) for basically no drop off in fragging power.

“But you just said the gun was inferior!” Yes, it is, but as a CT

you can basically choose at what range you engage, so playing a tight angle, playing in claustrophobic, contested areas such as apartments on Inferno, or pushing tunnels on Dust 2, means the gun is as useful, if not more, than an M4, due to the running speed and accuracy.

This means the CT team can build much more money with the stupid $600 reward, buy more often and importantly, rather than grabbing less utility to get firepower, the CT’s can nearly always have incendiaries, smokes and HE grenades to hold off pushes even if they’re getting reset often, which ruins the economic aspect of the game.

Not only that, but winning the pistol often means the team can just buy five UMP’s, rather than a mix of SMG’s and Rifles, bagging themselves a massive economic advantage where the side can pick up $6000 solely from killing opponents, which can lead to huge snowballing effects - especially as one can keep the UMP into the first buy round and keep farming silly amounts of cash. This extra cash means double AWP set-ups can be so much more viable as it’s less restrictive on the economy.

Essentially, the issue with the UMP isn’t the UMP itself - the SMG’s should be somewhat viable - but what it means for the economy and how it changes the game just by existing. For $1200, you get a gun almost as powerful as the rifles, with run and gun

potential and an increased kill reward. In order to fix it, I probably wouldn’t change the gun itself - I’d reduce the kill reward to $300, and increase the price of the gun to $1700.

What would this mean? It might mean the MP7 becomes the SMG of choice, as that boasts high armour penetration and a high fire rate, which could mean that all SMG’s go down to $300 kill reward. People are sleeping on the MP7 right now, as I don’t think it’s particularly balanced either; if the UMP wasn’t cheaper and so on-meta, I think we’d see the MP7 a lot more.

However, a reduced kill reward and upped price make buying the UMP more of a drawback - there’s no drawback to it right now, and it makes the FAMAS and Galil useless. With the same kill reward and similar price, I think we’ll see the FAMAS so much more for the range and versatility. The UMP would still be very useful and players who can use it extremely well right now would still buy it. It would fill a niche, as a close range, fast-moving gun, and for $1700 it’s still cheap and allows for the CT’s (especially) to force and get more grenades, but the FAMAS is viable, and the MAG-7 and SSG can become equally as useful as force weapons.

Basically - the UMP has to be changed. Then, maybe we can look at the pistols; because they need to be fixed too.

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D

A N A LY S I S

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WITH THE RETURN OF QUAKE AS A COMPETITIVE GAME, WHAT OLD SCHOOL GAMES WOULD MAKE A GREAT ESPORT? I for one would love to see the return of skateboarding games and maybe even snowboarding games. If we could somehow restore Tony Hawk’s games to the glory days of THPS3 or THUG2, I think it would make an incredibly fun esport. I absolutely loved THUG2 and the skill ceiling was insanely high, but we never really got to see what the absolute best players in the world could do with the game. Similarly with SSX Tricky - it was something of a cult hit, with some really unique and i nteresting mechanics and I’d love to see how the absolute best coming up against each other would change the way I played the game, and also just love to see the insane stuff that other people could do with that game. So I’m advocating for the return of skateboarding and snowboarding games, and for them to become real competitive games.

WHAT YOU SAID:

Ooh I’d love to see this, or at least an updated version of the game.

With the new series too, it could pave the way for a new game.

Great minds think alike...

Erm... I can’t see this one happening. I’d love to see it, though!

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gg THANKS FOR READING! It really does mean a lot to me if you’ve got this far and haven’t tuned out and started doing something else. Please, if you have any feedback, contact me @GGMagazineUK or @ElliottBCFC on Twitter - I’m always open to ideas, thoughts, criticisms and even praise if you think it’s deserved.

Normally, here is where I would tell you all my incredible plans for next month’s issue, and you’d be wowed - “man, how DID he get to interview zzirGrizz?”* - but I don’t know if there will be another issue of GG Magazine. Maybe there will - maybe it’ll be somewhere else, maybe it’ll have a different name. Maybe there won’t. If you’ve enjoyed this, please let me know so I can keep doing it. *zzirGrizz, if you’re reading, get in touch.