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09/29/03 WCG France + ECG

I felt like using this little piece of web space to express my disappointment with those two events. There were the first real tournaments I was attending and I had great expectations: meeting the players, watching their games on big screen with a big crowd to cheer them up and share the appreciation for great skills, etc. The reality was a bit different (see pictures and video down below). First of all, in both events it was obvious right from the entrance that the real

That said, one can't really blame Samsung, who invested a lot in those events, for turning it into big promotion events instead of gaming events. They do what they want with their money. On the other hand, I think it could have been absolutely perfect if the 'managers' had had a little more respect for the games and those who play them, that is all the top gamers (most came from far away) playing the tournaments, but also all the anonymous gamers that were there to follow the event. Everything was there to make it perfect, but the organizers just fucked it up badly. Let me give you a few examples:

-Organizers say: we do a bo1 tournament with no losers bracket because we don't have enough time and not enough PCs. The truth is: there was plenty of time to do a losers bracket. At one stage, one guy was trying to gather all the losers of first round to organize the losers bracket. He was almost complete when one arrogant manager came in and yelled 'no losers bracket, no time, we need the PCs for Counter Strike'. Two hours later, thoses PCs were still standing there with BW running, just waiting for games to be played. Ridiculous.

-Scheduling: around 13h00, ElkY is about to play his first game vs Dune or Carls. He couldn't play earlier cause there were only 4 PCs for the whole BW tournament. He asks an admin if he can go to lunch before. Admin says: "yes, come back in about 20 minutes when Dune vs Carl is finished". He goes to lunch and hurry up to come back on time. When he's back, Dune is gone for lunch but some ECG manager comes in and say "ElkY & Dune play in the main theatre asap". So ElkY leaves to the main theatre and so do we to follow the game. TWO HOURS later, after some DDR exhib, some Soulcalibur2 public tourney, some ad for DeusEx and at least 30 minutes of setting up the PCs, the game finally took place on the main screen. Meanwhile, almost all other BW games were played, Destroyer was in semi vs Saft. Zelias was waiting for ElkY/Dune to come back for the other semi. So no time for a losers bracket? I don't think so mister.

-Security: what a fucking laugh! In both WCG France & ECG, you had NO access to the players and the area where the tournaments were taking place if you didn't have some fucking official badge. That basically means that you had no idea what was going on, you couldn't obs any game, couldn't talk to any player, etc. In other words: "get the hell out of here, go play some DDR with the kids". I mean, it wasn't like a thousand people were trying to approach the players. Just a bunch of addicted gamers that closely follow what's going on in the gaming scene. The players were there, 2 meters away, sometimes playing and most of time waiting for things to happen. There was plenty of room for admirers to come in and say hello or just obs from a little bit closer. But no, if you didn't have that bloody badge, you had to stand there next to the security guy.

Funny thing is, you could walk to the girl who was doing the badges for the press, preferably with someone who already had a badge (like a gamer) and bullshit her to death until she would issue a stupid badge with just your name on it. Then you could walk back to the bouncer, show him your badge (that you didnt have 10 minutes ago and he knew it) and he would let you in with a smile. How more stupid can it get?

About the gamers

To end on a positive note, I would like to say a few words about the gamers. Indeed, as soon as I got my 'fake' badge, I was able to enter the forbidden zone and meet the heroes. Knowing how things usually go on in Bnet chat or gaming oriented forums, I wasn't sure what to expect. But in fact, I found most of them to be extremely friendly, really easy going, very available to everyone, and not even complaining about the terrible conditions of this tournament. I don't know how they behave with each other, there is of course the tensions due to the hard competition, but all in all, it felt like a interesting group of people bound by a real passion for gaming.

In my opinion, it's a pity there wasn't any trace of some kind of management to represent the players as one strong voice. When that ECG manager came in and yelled there wouldn't be any losers bracket because he had just decided so, I would have liked someone to stand out for all the players and just tell him to f... off, in a very adult way of course. Can you imagine the manager of the US Open or Wimbledon going to Andre Agassi and Pete Sempras saying: "ok guys, i'm sorry but we don't care who's the best player in the world, we just have some commercial to play during the break and we need the tennis court for a DDR exhib, so you'll play it in one set and by the way we only have one box of tennis balls for everyone so you'll get one service only". The losers bracket should have taken place. That idiot of a manager wouldn't even have noticed it anyway.

In conclusion, I'd like to congratulate the players and all the people in the organization who helped them play in good conditions (there were a few trying their best). They gave us a great show. Thank you and good luck to everyone in Korea.

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