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Four Kings, Schroet Kommando Go CS Movie Crazy
Simon Bysshe writes "Intel have just put online my latest film for them about competitive computer gaming, featuring a Counter-Strike match between Four Kings & the world's #1 Counter-Strike team Schroet Kommando. The movie includes pre-game interviews, animated tactical rundowns, live 'shoutcasted' games & finally a post-match analysis, and has already been downloaded over 40,000 times - we're trying to establish gaming as an entertaining spectator sport."
"has already been downloaded over 40,000 times"
Just wait till after the slashdotting.
Interview with 4K^Dark
Does anyone know this mofo? I sure as hell don't!One of the more famous CS players in the World, 4K^Dark sits down with GotFrag to talk about the recent Intel Extreme Edition Challenge 2.
Stop calling it a sport. A sport requires athletic exertion by definition. This is also a problem with non-video games; some people love to call chess a sport even though it's not (assuming that that chess boxing thing never takes off).
Instead, just take pride in what your game is--a fun, challenging game.
Rob
we're trying to establish gaming as an entertaining spectator sport
With such a low barrier for entry (the price of the game), and the ease of becoming good (just invest a lot of time) why should I watch somebody else play?
Try all you want to, video games will never become a spectator sport because it's easy enough for too many people to do.
Until Slashdot fixes the funny modifier, use insightful or interesting. The poster knows your intentions.
You wait 'till you see that /. post about "an avi of spectators watching games" - that's when you should worry.
-- Mod me down. I am not a karma tart. ffs,gag
One of the problems with Video Games as a spectator sport, is that they aren't designed for spectators. They're designed to give the player exactly what they need to know, and occasionally to occlude things from the player that they aren't supposed to know.
What they do not have are good angles for crowds. If you want really good camera shots, you need 5 or 6 ghost spectators floating around the arena, and someone to switch between them (like a traditional sporting event). In theory you can have automated roving, rotating, or fixed cameras, but they tend to be poor at anticipating action. Likewise, the most popular Sporting videogames are FPS. But thanks to the perspective and the needs of the game, FPS games tend to have terrible character animation / environmental interaction, which is exactly what the audience is going to be watching. Furthermore, effects and crowd-pleasers must be kept a bit down, as the player has to be able to see though that thick fog of whatever.
Except for racing titles, most gaming companies just don't devote resources to a "passive spectator" mode. All the better for the players, of course, but if gaming is going to take off as a spectator sport (not only doubtful, but of dubious value) they'll need a better passive spectator presentation.
The ______ Agenda
1.) Its faceless. Who the hell is [Sk]-l337sh00t3r- anyway? And besides the name, (which any player on any server can make their own) what is there to differentiate that player. Most clans will all use the same skin. Without being able to recognize the player quickly and easily it is more difficult to root or cheer for them.
2.) The teams come and go like the wind. If you stop going on the CS IRC servers for a couple of months, then the CPL or CAL-I teams that everyone is talking about are completely different the next time you go on. Theres no Red Sox-Yankees type rivalry, or even the possibility for that kind of rivalry.
3.) If I like a video game, Id rather play it then watch somebody else. This is different from other sports because if you are sitting on your couch and want to play say football, then you have to go through the hassle of getting people together and get off your couch and actually move. With video games, Im sitting at my box and can either spectate a match or jump on a server and play. No movement necessary. I want real competition? Go on IRC and find a scrim.
4.) Most people who do spectate video games are people who think they can at some point get to that professional level. You never hear of someone who doesnt play Counter-Strike watching a CPL match. Most people who watch football havent played in years, or at least dont play competitively. Yeah, there are a lot of people that play FPSs but by only drawing on that limited pool, they will never achieve a very high response to FPSs as spectator sports.
5.) This is kind of flame-starting, but I find that most people really into the culture of a video game, Counter-Strike in particular, are 12-yr old kids who have way too much time on their hands. As soon as they grow up a little and start having other responsibilities, they are going to spend less time on video games and what is the first thing theyll cut out of their gaming habits? Watching someone else play. Most likely theyd rather spend the time actually playing.
bleh..
Just one thing about the actual video. What the hell was the point of the commentary? First off, I'm sure they gave away some relevant information to the other team. Secondly, they didn't say anything that wasn't blatantly obvious from watching. I think a birds-eye view map with all the players displayed and some selected screenshots (Picture in Picture, the map clipped into whatever the given first person view happens to be) would be a better way.
The commentating was bloody annoying.
I'm not interested in worthless comentary and having someone else determine which part of the match I'm watching. The only reason to watch it is to see what "uber-l33t" cs players play like and video of monitors showing them in third person is pretty useless. Why not just release the hltv demo and let me decide what part of the match I'm watching?
...Tetris has just been accepted for the comming Olympics.
A new 50,000 seat stadium is being build with a floor-mounted 400x300ft display, state-of-the art security measures will be installed to prevent hooliganism.
I can see how trying to make this into a spectator sport is going to be tough just as it is with paintball. Many players want to be able to watch PB matches but this type of action just isn't formatted to be watched comfortably. Most popular sports have one main focus, the ball. In CS or paintball the action is all over the place and very difficult to get a good viewing angle on. If I were to watch either one (PB or CS), I would want to see it from the ground level slightly behind a player. That way it would be possible to see the strategy involved in shootouts verses an aireal view of people just plinking at each other. When the action jumps from one player to another it's very jarring and it takes a while to refocus on what is going on. I guess about the only way I could truely enjoy watching either PB or CS is to have a head-cam on each player and view the game splitscreen with enemies on each side. Even doing this it would still be necessary to watch the same game several time to see what was going on with other players throughout the field.
Chika Chik-ah... do-e ow ow.
...with video games becoming a spectator sport, is that so many people so desperately want it to become a spectator sport.
No sport hit the ground running as a viable spectator sport. You think anyone gave a shit back in 1820 when a bunch of nuts went chasing a little white and red-stitched ball all round a grass field? Maybe their families and drinking buddies, but that was about it. It took 50-60 years before even the first signs of professional baseball started to show up in places like New York, Boston and Cincinnati, and even longer than that until you had an MLB that could legitimately be recognized as a national sports league. How old is multiplayer gaming, at least the kind that we could classify as ever having a chance at becoming a spectator sport? Quake 2 is only about 7 years old. Starcraft was released in 98. I'm sure you can think of other examples that are older, but the point is that competitive gaming is still in it's infancy.
Competitive gaming as a spectator sport will occur naturally. When we can produce fully immersive 3-D virtual worlds that 30,000 people can plug into and view the action simultaneously, then people are going to pay money to watch the worlds best Quake 9 players frag each other. Players will be reproduced in this virtual world exactly, down to the last mole on their cheek. They'll move their avatars not with a keyboard and mouse but with Gundam-style movement suits, which will even perhaps require them to be in top physical shape. Their reaction and hand-eye skills will be world class.
But people can't resist trying to make this happen now, and it's just not going to work when the best you can offer them is essentially watching a TV show of someone playing a video game.
FOR ME TO POOP ON!!!
Come on, videogames are fun because YOU ARE IN CONTROL. I find boring to sit and watch some guys play soccer, basketball, whatever, if I can be playing some Mario Kart, or some other thing, with a friend or alone.
Yeah, you can watch the ocasional "ten minutes" ran on SMB3, but apart from that...
Ever talked to a soldier who's been deployed? They talk about it like a big game.
Apart from that, most people actually watch racing because of the possibility of maiming injuries, they just don't want to admit it.
Some years ago, they installed a (mandatory) computer system in all F-1 cars that automatically slowed them down, just a smidgeon, whenever they turned.
Injury rates fell, so did viewer figures.
Then they removed the computers, viewers came back.