NS2-attack! Suggestion for Twitch Show.
SantaClaws
Denmark Join Date: 2012-07-31 Member: 154491Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Denmark Join Date: 2012-07-31 Member: 154491Members, Reinforced - Shadow
This is a suggestion for a ns2 related twitch show- I'm hoping @WasabiOne or some of the prem teams sees this.
A bit of introduction first (sry, I'll be brief).
Back when there was no Starcraft2 - there was a game called Starcraft BroodWar. Like NS2, the learning curve and skill gaps were enormous- but it still managed to become one of the most popular competetive video games, if not THE most, especially in Korea.
In Korea they even had a frequent TV show called "Battlenet Attack", where a progamer would go to some TV studio where there would be two TV-show hosts - and the progamer would basically log on to battle net and battle the viewers on TV while the hosts would interview the progamer during the game. Mostly, the progamers would fool around and do silly strats and sometimes trash talk- but it would also be a huge embarassment to them if they ever lost a game, so that created a lot of tension and excitement. And the viewers would often try to do silly strats themselves, like nuking, to embarrass the progamer.
Example PART1 (Fast forward a lot to see the actual game)
Example Part2
Anyway, TeamLiquid picked up on this idea, and created TeamLiquidAttack - which is basically the same, except it would be "foreign pro-players", and there would be no TV studio, just a ventrilo channel between the player and the hosts. The hosts would give the players 'handicaps', to make it more even against the viewers. This continued briefly in SC2 as well. -Oh, and streamcheating is expected and accepted!
-that means, do not put a delay on the stream, you have to be able to communicate with the audience after all, or the whole thing makes no sense.
Example 1 (SC:BW)
Example 2 (SC2)
So for NS2 - there are obviously some differences between the two game/genres that require some logistical adjustments, if something similar would ever be pulled off for NS2.
Having one player participate in the show, would perhaps not be the best way to go about this, but I suppose it could be done like that. Preferably it would have to be an entire team or at least a mix. It does not have to be premiere level imo.
Inb4: "Why don't you do it yourself?" -
I have non of the skills, experience or contacts that organizing and executing something like this requires. But I cannot express how fond I was of the times where I'd watch this in Starcraft - I, for one, would love to see this for NS2.
inb4&2: "What's different from this and just a FPV regular stream" -
The difference is you have a dedicated show-host who decides the handicaps and who keeps an eye on the chat and can buffer questions directly to the pros while they play without the distraction of looking at their chat. Moreover, the showhost can juggle the logistics of organizing the games and stuff to make everything run as smoothly as possible.
TLDR; Have pro/skilled players compete against random viewers on twitch live, with handicaps to fool around and have a ton of fun, while still displaying some of the amazing skill some of these players have.
A bit of introduction first (sry, I'll be brief).
Back when there was no Starcraft2 - there was a game called Starcraft BroodWar. Like NS2, the learning curve and skill gaps were enormous- but it still managed to become one of the most popular competetive video games, if not THE most, especially in Korea.
In Korea they even had a frequent TV show called "Battlenet Attack", where a progamer would go to some TV studio where there would be two TV-show hosts - and the progamer would basically log on to battle net and battle the viewers on TV while the hosts would interview the progamer during the game. Mostly, the progamers would fool around and do silly strats and sometimes trash talk- but it would also be a huge embarassment to them if they ever lost a game, so that created a lot of tension and excitement. And the viewers would often try to do silly strats themselves, like nuking, to embarrass the progamer.
Example PART1 (Fast forward a lot to see the actual game)
Example Part2
Anyway, TeamLiquid picked up on this idea, and created TeamLiquidAttack - which is basically the same, except it would be "foreign pro-players", and there would be no TV studio, just a ventrilo channel between the player and the hosts. The hosts would give the players 'handicaps', to make it more even against the viewers. This continued briefly in SC2 as well. -Oh, and streamcheating is expected and accepted!
-that means, do not put a delay on the stream, you have to be able to communicate with the audience after all, or the whole thing makes no sense.Example 1 (SC:BW)
Example 2 (SC2)
So for NS2 - there are obviously some differences between the two game/genres that require some logistical adjustments, if something similar would ever be pulled off for NS2.
Having one player participate in the show, would perhaps not be the best way to go about this, but I suppose it could be done like that. Preferably it would have to be an entire team or at least a mix. It does not have to be premiere level imo.
Inb4: "Why don't you do it yourself?" -
I have non of the skills, experience or contacts that organizing and executing something like this requires. But I cannot express how fond I was of the times where I'd watch this in Starcraft - I, for one, would love to see this for NS2.
inb4&2: "What's different from this and just a FPV regular stream" -
The difference is you have a dedicated show-host who decides the handicaps and who keeps an eye on the chat and can buffer questions directly to the pros while they play without the distraction of looking at their chat. Moreover, the showhost can juggle the logistics of organizing the games and stuff to make everything run as smoothly as possible.
TLDR; Have pro/skilled players compete against random viewers on twitch live, with handicaps to fool around and have a ton of fun, while still displaying some of the amazing skill some of these players have.
Comments
Although a rookie tournament in which you have 5 brand new players on each team and one experienced commander would - imo - be jumping-the-shark-tier awesome.
You can easily troll servers with welders. Take 2 or 3 marines with just welders and pistols, have the comm spam meds and get armor upgrades and you have an unkillable deathball in the first few minutes of the game.
It's not so much about educating people - it's an opportunity for pros to display raw skill, show the rookies exactly what is possible, demonstrate the skill gaps, brag, trash talk, and have fun with viewers, interacting with them. If anyone happens to learn something useful, that's great, but it's not supposed to be the focus of it. Otherwise, as you said, you might as well just watch a scrim or a pug.
Edit: Oh, and let me add this. Fun-day-monday with day9tv in starcraft, is a concept show where he specifically puts a bunch of restrictions on the players i.e. (queens only, must take a expansion every 3 minutes no matter what, etc.). Believe it or not, but that show has caused some major meta-game shifts in sc2 before, simply because you're forced to think differently about the game, and that leads to new discoveries that are useful in your standard games.
Before the 'Queen only' challenge, queens were primarily used for injects, you wouldn't typically make more than one per hatchery - but after the challenge, people would use them a lot for all kinds of things, like spreading creep and defense. So I definetely disagree; that there's nothing to learn- even from the pro players perspectives there are new aspects to learn, which can be discovered with handicaps.
We could also try to rope in some youtube/twitch celebrities to push things out to a larger audience? A sort of celebrity showmatch hybrid with half comp, half celebs.
If those celebs never played ns2 before you shouldn't let them face more than three comp players, though
I think that is more suitable for a long-term goal. First, try it out on a smaller scale to see if it even makes sense at all in this game.
How long would they have to practice in ns2?
It may actually have to be more than 10... joshhhy can own half of them himself lol.
I'd try it out before saying yay or nay. May need to adjust playercount ... but it could be funny and awesome.
Not comp aliens... pug or pub. Otherwise it'd look bad if the learning curve and strats seem waaay too difficult from 'pros' of other games to enjoy such an idea. We want more of them, not less.
Like I said, I'd mess around with it to see if any such thing could work before seriously suggesting it.
I would say let them play for about a week. That would be long enough to get the basics of the game. Whether it gets people interested in the game is questionable, but I think it would be fun to watch.
I have heard from ns2 pros that they lose their ability to shoot in ns2 if they go play CS for awhile, and vise versa.
Meh, this won't work. My idea included (with 'pro' gamers). You'd have to teach them the core of the game. Otherwise, the team may be able to shoot... but they will lose. And if they are given a lot of time to grasp the game, they may get some dedicated people to learn a lot. At that point, that person wouldn't be much of a new but 'pro' player, but more of a pub to pug quality ns2er that is a 'pro'.
Only real thing I see working would be in the combat version... but that would defeat most of the purpose of this...
I'm no pro, but yea, the skillsets are very different, so you do have to re-adjust your aiming when you transition - however, I find that somewhere between one and three hours worth of drills and you're pretty much back in shape. The mistake is going in to public games and expect to get their aim back, that won't happen in my experience.
This is getting slightly OT compared to the OP.
But, if you want to do a showmatch like that, then lets instead make a weekly or bi-weekly show, where ns2 pros teach pros or celebs from other games, and then have a big showmatch as a conclusion.
It will keep the transfered players more invested in the game, compared to just leaving them to train on their own, and this way viewers will get to learn as well.
I like the idea of having pro teams from other games. However, I think it would be more interesting to have 2 such teams and pit them against each other with a pro comm on each team (with some prep time).
Either have competitive teams from within the same game, or a team (or mixed group of comp players) from the same genre.
So you would have 2 CS teams go against each other one month, then 2 battlefield teams or whatever. Or for genres you could have allstar/team battles between COD and Battlefield, then DOTA vs LoL in the next month, then Smash Bros vs Street Fighter, then Quake vs Team Fortress, then Starcraft vs some other RTS game. Could even have battles between teams of popular streamers/lets-play/reviewers.
I think the biggest problem would be convincing the teams to bother with a game they've likely never played (and likely haven't even heard of). Although, maybe I'm just a pessimist.
But the idea is fun. I know Wasabi and I are trying to get some twitch streaming events planned. I steam 4 weekdays a week and am always open to fun ideas as well. Like Virsoul's welder challenge, some of my viewers made me skulk an entire game without jumping at all. It's quite amusing.