Another 'StarCraft' Cheating Scandal Rocks Korea (playerattack.com)

dotarray writes: "Five years ago, the professional StarCraft community was rocked by a massive cheating scandal – now it looks like history is repeating, as twelve StarCraft II gamers have been arrested in South Korea over charges of match-fixing and illegal betting." From the article: Those arrested include Gerrard (Park Wae-Sik), head coach of pro gaming team PRIME, and one of his team members, YoDa (Choi Byeong-Heon). ... The games in question, according to the prosecutor's investigation, include five professional-level StarCraft II matches, which were played between January and June 2015 including as part of the GSL Season 1 and SKT Proleague Season 1. Pro-gamer YoDa has been accused of receiving money to deliberately lose matches, while Gerrard stands charged with receiving money from brokers, connecting players to brokers, and suggesting to players that they might like to lose a game or two and get paid.

Comments

What happened to human beings?

[Taco Cowboy]

Video games are just ... games

Isn't game supposed to be fun?

Re:What happened to human beings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Video games are just ... games

Isn't game supposed to be fun?

Yeah, as if this kind of cheating (deliberate loss + brokers) never happened in sports. You know, the sports that are supposed to be games as well.
Takeaway: the fun goes away when there's a lot of money in play.
I wish there weren't that much money in sports, but it won't change because people want this; you know, panem et circem..

Re:What happened to human beings?

[RogueyWon]

Yeah, well, the same could be said for sports, and look at all the crap that's accumulated around those.

There's money involved in eSports now, both in terms of the prize money, the sponsorship cash and in terms of the associated gambling scene. Where there's money on offer (particularly though not exclusively through gambling), there will be people trying to get their hands on that money via illegitimate means.

There's always been an ugly side to "professional gaming". I was running a Counter-Strike league back in 2002-3 with no cash prizes (though you could win a year's server rental) and was already seeing early signs of that ugly side. We had teams throwing a tantrum over every loss, and crucially over how losses were reported, because of the impact it would have on "potential sponsors". In some cases, these complaints were coming from teams who I, as an only-slightly-above-average player (I was always more of an organiser than a player) could have beaten 5 vs 1 without breaking a sweat.

If all of the stuff associated with professional gaming annoys you (like it does me), then the best thing to do is ignore it. The misbehaviour, match fixing and general whining isn't going to go away; chances are, it's only going to get worse. But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter very much for the average gamer. There are a small number of developers who pitch their games at the eSports market (and even some of those, like Blizzard, don't exclusively focus on it), but the rest of the industry mostly ignores it due to high risks and poor commercial returns for developers in most cases.

Re:What happened to human beings?

[Chris Mattern]

panem et circem..

I believe the latin phrase you're trying for is "panem et circenses", "bread and circuses", coined by the Roman poet Juvenal around 100 A.D.: "For the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions -- everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses."

Re:What happened to human beings?

[TheRaven64]

wouldn't you want to get paid for your hobby?

I do! But the problem for these people (as with professional sports players) is that they get paid for something that is superficially like their hobby, but isn't really the same. It's the hobby with the enjoyment removed and replaced with a hyper-competitive need to win.

Re:Dying pro league

[Anonymous Coward]

Might as well milk

MOO !! You starcraft cow! STARCRAFT COW MOO !!

Re:Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or remarkably few problems in a society that is so idyllic that it cares deeply about trivialities.

Re:What happened = gambling + sports

[elwinc]

Any time gambling gets mixed with sports you have a mechanism where cheating can get you money. Whether it's the 1919 Chicago "Black Sox" or one of these point shavers gambling always has the potential to lead to sports cheating.

... Which makes you wonder why the US professional leagues have invested their own money in fantasy sports gambling sites.

Re:What happened = gambling + sports

[Chris Mattern]

Haven't you heard? Fantasy sports isn't gambling, it's a game of skill! *snerk*

Re:match-fixing and illegal betting is not cheatin

[Chris Mattern]

Illegal betting is not cheating (although it does encourage cheating), but match-fixing sure as hell is. Just because you haven't subverted the game program doesn't mean you're not cheating.

If there's money, there's cheating ...

[gstoddart]

It really is simple: if there is money changing hands, or prestige, or pretty much anything else ... then it will be worth it for someone to cheat, take a dive, or otherwise engage in fixing the outcome.

It happens in pretty much any endeavor in which people are betting, getting paid, or pretty much anything else which is a reward.

Why the heck would anybody think video games would be any different?

This is pretty much basic human nature. Getting all breathless that it happens in a video game seems kind of stupid. It has happened in every other endeavor, why the hell not this?

You don't go all weepy after you discover it, you start off and say "I bet some crooked bastard cheats". You pass rules about it. You check it. You monitor it.

But you don't suddenly go "zomg, teh cheaterz" and act like nobody saw it coming. Someone somewhere will always find a way to cheat if there is something to be had out of it.

Re:Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cough*Deflategate*cough

Re:Gambling

[Translation Error]

Gambling is stupid. Anyone who gambles is already being ripped off.

Wanna bet?

Re:Banned for life?

[bobbied]

Don't be too sarcastic here..

Look, like it or not, *some* of these players do it professionally. They get PAID to play the games and if they get banned it means the loss of their jobs. They will have to go out and find new work now. What kind of work do you think they can get with experience like this?

This is like a professional sports player getting caught rigging games and getting tossed out of their sport, only in these cases, playing video games doesn't pay all that well and it's doubtful they have enough saved up to live on for very long. You don't have to feel sad for them, but, hey... It's going to be a real shock for some of them having to find real work...

Re:Dying pro league

[dysmal]

MOO !! You starcraft cow! STARCRAFT COW MOO !!

"There is now cow level"

False summary

[reve_etrange]

The summary is extremely misleading at best. The 12 indicted individuals include one team coach and two progamers only, not 12 gamers as claimed.

All of the rest of the 12 are brokers or gangsters who instigated the match fixing. One is currently a fugitive in Korea.