Esport Talk

Although outsiders hear little about World of Tanks in the esports scene, it is highly regarded by its fans. The tank shooter by Wargaming has an incredibly huge fanbase, ranging from casuals over semi-pros to real pros. But what is so fascinating about this game? We invited Milan 'Mailand' S�ß from Team 'Oops' to our podcast to find out! The German plays in one of the best teams in the world. In his opinion, WoT always offers new goals you can set yourself. Be it grinding for a new tank or rising in rank, the game knows how to reward its players. Accordingly, many players stick to WoT for years. Milan, for instance, has been playing it for six years. Become a pro Becoming a professional was by no means easy for him, though. When he had to invest more time in order to improve, but got nothing more out of it, Milan's parents got skeptical about his passion. But he kept playing and managed to become a professional, convincing also his parents that WoT is more than just shooting, killing and wasting time. Face y

Being a pro at 34? Of course, why not? Age as a factor for success in esports has been often deconstructed as a myth lately. Our today's guest is the living proof that passion and practice are the only key aspects that count in esports. Klaus Wiedemann, maybe better known as "frag^m", is a true Unreal Tournament legend. His World and European championship in UT in 2004 and 2005 are his most renown achievements but certainly not his only ones.  Very recently, Klaus has returned to professional gaming at mousesports. At first, he attempted to shape a world-class Overwatch team. However, the team's chemistry and his lack of passion for the game lead to the squad's disbandment in January. UT is not for casuals Still, this wasn't the end of frag^m's comeback as Epic Games is currently working on a new installment of their classic, called Unreal Tournament 4. Of course, Klaus immediately started playing again and has formed a brand-new UT squad for mouz. In comparison to later FPSs on the market like Overwatch

Is the time of big teams in StarCraft 2 over? Ever since the disbandment of several Korean teams, people have declared Blizzard's RTS dead. Okay, to be fair, this claim has been around for many years now. But after the collapse of the biggest Korean team houses, it finally seemed to be a matter of fact rather than a bold statement. Also European teams do not have as strong rosters anymore. One prime example would be mYinsanity which used to contract players such as Rain, jjakji, or StarDust. Nowadays, the roster list is not as impressive anymore. But to be fair once again, with Beastyqt, Golden, and PtitDrogo, they still maintain some top players of the scene. So, what's in store for mYinsanity's StarCraft department this year? After Stefan 'PengWin' Mott's departure, the crafters were without team manager. Luckily, they found a worthy replacement with Mark 'Yogmark' Meijdam. The Dutchman fell in love with esports when he watched good old Grubby's StarCraft streams back in the day. Ever since, Mark has wanted

Wird Youtube eines Tages Twitch als Esport-Plattform Nummer 1 ablösen? Dieser und anderen spannenden Fragen widmen wir uns heute in dieser ganz besonderen Episode des Esport-Talk. Wir begr�ßen heute einen Gast, der vor allem den deutschen Dota-Fans unter euch ein Begriff sein wird. Die Rede ist natürlich von Alexander ‚Blacklight' Englisch, Founder und Caster beim Dota 2-Kanal SaphiraTV auf Twitch. Mittlerweile hat sich Alex eine treue Community und ein kleines Team aufgebaut, die ihn tatkräftig beim Kommentieren unterstützen. Das Projekt ist seit drei Jahren am Start und covert alles, was es an kleineren und gr�ßeren Events gibt auf Deutsch. Dota 2 ist neben League of Legends das Alphatier im Bereich MOBAs. Doch trotz seiner großen Beliebtheit, ist die Caster-Szene in Deutschland eher klein. Tatsächlich ist SaphiraTV der gr�ßte Anbieter auf dem Markt hierzulande. Dieser Erfolg kommt sicherlich nicht vom Nichtstun. Im Podcast zeigt sich Alex als fleißiger, esportverrückter (im besten Sinne) Mensch, der seine

Dota 2 is a game that breaks all records. Not only is the Valve MOBA one of the most famous esport titles in the world, it is also by far the most lucrative one. "The International" alone offers several millions of dollars to the best teams. Accordingly, the competitive Dota scene is a strongly contested domain where only the fittest can survive. Its reputation of being elitist derives from its sheer difficulty to get on the top. One of the most promising rising stars in Dota 2 were certainly Ad Finem. The Greek team existed only for about two years but they had nevertheless a noticeable impact on the scene. Their greatest success before their very recent dissolution was finishing second at the Boston Major 2016 where they earned $500,000. This run was especially impressive, as no one saw this happen. As the tourney's underdog, Ad Finem nearly dropped out of the group stage. But they managed to fight back and go all the way through to make it to the grand finals. They proved that hard work and team spirit can

Yesterday, the eleventh season of the Intel Extreme Masters concluded in Katowice, Poland. The StarCraft 2 Championship was one of the IEM's highlights, especially its showdown between TY and Stats. The Polish crowd saw how Koreans dominated the tournament, although local hero Nerchio had quite a run as well. Mikołaj 'Elazer' Ogonowski took part in the tourney as well but didn't do as well as 'King Artur'. He lost to HeRoMaRinE and PiLiPiLi in the offline qualifier, but he is still a force to be reckoned with in European StarCraft. After all, Elazer defeated Nerchio at BlizzCon in November 2016, and made it to the semifinals beating ShoWTime in the Round-of-Eight. The 19-year-old Zerg player is a rising star of the StarCraft scene, and today we are going to talk about his first steps in RTS and gaming in general. Who were his idols when he started playing competitively? Are there players he still looks up to? Despite his young age, Elazer is one of the most consistent and resilient players in the scene. This

Last summer, people went crazy when the mobile game Pokémon GO was released. Since its heyday in the early 2000s, the little pocket monsters havn't been so successful. Many people who were on the hunt for Pokémon considered themselves 'Pokémon Masters' but little did they know. In fact, there is a competitive Pokémon scene. As an esports discipline, Pokémon is a strategic turn-based battle game. Each player has a team of six monsters of which they choose four for the battle. Before they make their choices, they have a look at the six creatures of their opponents. Thus, they can make predictions on which of their opponent's Pokémon are actually going to fight. In order to avoid too defensive strategies, and excessive exchanges, each player fights with two Pokémon at once. With its more than 700 different Pokémon, the game offers many strategic options to its players. Mind games are as important as the right training of your fighting pets. Although, there are line-ups that have displayed their viability, there

SK Gaming is one of the oldest and most accomplished organizations in esports. Since its foundation in 1997, the team has assumed a leading role in the scene. This pioneer spirit is still palpable today, as SK Gaming is willing to take risks that eventually pay off. For this reason, among others, SK now has one of the biggest teams in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Also, they recently announced their partnership with Visa. Not only was this a historic step for SK Gaming but for the esports industry in general, as it marks its increasing popularity and importance. Therefore, calling SK a door opener is no overstatement. Next to their squads and players in CS:GO, Hearthstone, and World of WarCraft, SK opened a department for the mobile Moba Vainglory. The innovative game is comparable to League of Legends. However, in contrast to the Riot game, Vainglory is a 3v3 title that reduces the Moba mechanics to its essence, which is very fun to play. Today, we welcome Martin Marquardt in our podcast. Martin is the t

Once again, we have a very delicious surprise for all the StarCraft fans in store. Can there be ever enough podcasts about Blizzard's esport RTS? Certainly not, and this is why we are very proud to present you today's guest. He is from Poland, plays for Team Liquid, and he's notorious for his insane looks. Please welcome Grzegorz 'MaNa' Komincz! The 23-year-old player has been with Liquid for almost three years not, after leaving mouseports after four. As it turns out in the interview, MaNa is a man for long relationships. Also, he likes dogs. His interesting playstyle and his open, friendly personality have contributed to his fantastic reputation in the StarCraft scene. Not only has MaNa won some very impressive tournaments during the Wings of Liberty era. But he has had some quite successful runs in the World Championship Series. His most remarkable success might be his second place at the third 2015 WCS Finals in his homecountry. The crowd celebrated his performance like he was a rockstar, a moment which b

WarCraft III: The Frozen Throne is a masterpiece of computer game history. The RTS classic has still a very decent player base, especially in China. Also, one must not forget its effect on esports. About ten years ago, before StarCraft 2 or League of Legends, WC was the gold standard of gaming outside Korea. Not only was it a very popular strategy game but it gave birth to the MOBA genre, too. After all, it was the game the mod Defense of the Ancients has its origins in. Therefore, we are happy to introduce a very special guest to you. The one and only mighty Marc 'yAwS' Förster honors our podcast with his presence today! The 27-year-old German is one of the big names in WC3, and has achieved some very impressive feats. In 2015, he went to China as "the tourist", and came back as runner-up of the World Cyber Arena, the WarCraft world championship. Marc was probably the person who was most surprised by this outcome. He talks about his experiences in China, and shares his passion for the Asian cuisine. But what

Heroes of the Storm is not just second choice in esports anymore. The Blizzard MOBA has still a long way to go to become as big as Dota 2 or LoL. But the game has got quite a huge fanbase that is very passionate about it. This development has not escaped the attention of the German-based home electronics company Expert. As a result, they signed the former team Two Bees Determined. The up-and-coming squad's captain Sebastian 'bLaDe' Petraschke is our guest today. He is going to talk about his gamer history, and how it happened that he became the team's leader. As most professional gamers today, Sebastian has also started when he was quite young. After exploring RTS games such as The Settlers, he got interested in League of Legends a few years ago. When he heard about Blizzard's MOBA, Sebastian left the Riot hit to explore new horizons. Despite their similarities, that is playing a unique hero, farming creep, and destroying your opponents' base, HotS and LoL are quite different from another. And what's more, Bl

StarCraft 2 is widely regarded as the first esport title of the Twitch era. And although the game hasn't quite the audience it used to have, many people are still interested in the esport scene of this game. Today we have one of the most popular and remarkable personalities of StarCraft 2 in our podcast. Do we really need to introduce this legend to you? Of course, we are talking about Dario 'TLO' Wünsch, aka 'Wunderwünsch', aka 'Dr. Dario'. The German Team Liquid player has been a pro for nearly seven years now. His skill pales only in comparison to his popularity which goes beyond the realms of StarCraft. Therefore, we are proud to welcome Dario to tonight's episode. In a very nice atmosphere, the fan favorite tells us about his beginnings in gaming. As the youngest of four brothers, Dario has always had a competitive nature. The will to be the best was later also his motivation for his RTS career. Because of his profession as a gamer, Dario also spent some time in Korea in a teamhouse. He shares his experi

Little did Wargaming know that their game would be one of the most popular esports titles ever. When they released their tactical team shooter World of Tanks in 2010, they couldn't have known how big their project would become eventually. Today, World of Tanks has more players than any other game on the market, except League of Legends. Millions of gamers are part of the WoT community that is especially huge in Russia. Considering its gigantic player base, it is quite remarkable what our guest today has achieved already. Kevin 'TheDeadZone' van Huit from Team Oops is one of the best players in the world. The Dutchman has had some very good runs in many tournaments, although he wasn't able to win a season final yet. Despite his parents being against a career in esports at first, Kevin's success convinced them that he knows what he's doing. If you want to be the best tanker out there, you need to invest quite a lot of time. Because of that, Kevin practices nine times per week. And there is certainly much to kno

Hearthstone is a very special part of esports that has maybe more in common with poker than with computer games. After all, Blizzard's digital card game is not about fast reactions, team play, or fancy micro. Therefore, a Hearthstone pro has to have other to beat their opponents. They have to be patient and calm to make up their minds every turn. On top of that, they need knowledge about common and uncommon builds and strategies. And what is more, they have to know their opponent. Despite (or because) its unusual game mechanics for an esports title, Hearthstone is a very popular game. On Twitch it is often ranked the second after League of Legends. The game is played by casuals and pros alike and sticks to Blizzard's rule "easy to learn, hard to master". In today's podcast, we welcome Esteban 'AKAWonder' Serrano, a Hearthstone professional from Spain. Serrano is best known for winning the ESL Hearthstone Legendary Series 2016 in Katowice in March. We will talk with him about how his first major championship a

StarCraft II is the game of choice for quite a number of special characters. The pioneer esports title has been around for six years and will continue doing so for the next two years at least. In today's podcast we welcome another very special guest, who's been playing the game since release. Stefan 'PengWin' Mott is a Zerg player from Switzerland who is known and popular for casting StarCraft matches. The 23-year-old doesn't only play for his team PSISTORM Gaming but he is also their player manager. Despite his fairly young age, PengWin is one of the most experienced personalities in the scene. Unlike many other pro gamers who went on to other titles or quit esports entirely, Stefan has remained loyal to the SC2 community over the years. In this episode, our guest talks about his early days in StarCraft and how it came to pass that he was signed by MyInsanity, his first professional team. Although Stefan doesn't see himself as one of the best, he is still quite a decent player. Therefore, he is a popular com

Big sports events such as American football, soccer, or the Olympic Games have become increasingly more popular in the last couple of years when it comes to watching them in public. The phenomenon of public screening grows also more popular in the esports scene. Tournaments in Dota 2, League of Legends, Counter-Strike, and others, are often shown in bars and other public places and invite fans to share the experience of professional gaming. The most prominent example for this might be the Meltdown project that was originally started in France in 2012. Within four years, it has developed into a successful franchise with bars in many different countries. Therefore, we are proud to welcome our today's guest Sophia 'foxy' Metz who happens to be the CEO of Meltdown. In this interesting episode, Sophia will tell us all about her history as a gamer, and how it came to pass that she founded the first chain of esports bars in the world. Interestingly enough, she comes from a family that is really enthusiastic about co

StarCraft II is arguably the hardest game esports has to offer these days. The RTS by Blizzard Entertainment has been around for six years and is said to be the game that basically started off the esports era in 2010. Nowadays, the game has not as much viewers as it used to have, but we guarantee you that this does not affect the level of play at all. You don't believe us? Okay, then! We'd like to call a very special person to the witness stand. Tonight, we have the honor to welcome a true StarCraft II icon. A man who's beaten more players than anyone cares to count. A man who's played about 1,200 tournament games in 2016 alone! A man who's earned more than 100,000 dollars prize money in his career. Of course, we are talking about the one and only Artur 'Nerchio' Block from Euronics Gaming. Nerchio is a zerg player from Poland who started playing StarCraft right at its release. He's been one of the most consistent players in the non-Korean scene and has won countless tournaments. Although we didn't hear too m

Starting your own esports organization is by no means an easy task. Not only do you have to find co-workers you can rely on but also decent players for your team. But what does it take to build up a new brand from the scratch? Nick 'Airborner' Konstado is CEO of Team Refuse and has managed the team for more than five years. The Greek talks with us about his gaming past and how he founded Team Refuse which features LoL and CS:GO squads. On top of that, two Hearthstone players have joined their ranks. Nick tells us about the positions a team needs on an organizational level. Team Refuse currently consists of five people who pull the strings in the background to support the players. Nick emphasizes, however, that a successful team has to go international these days. Very recently, their League of Legends squad claimed the Polish ESL Championship for example. Konstado sees his organization as European, although they used to have pros from other continents as well. Thanks to the current boom of gaming, his job get

Considering its numerous prequels, Street Fighter is a real classic of esports history. If you are in your mid or late twenties (or even older), you might well remember the good old times when you and your friends used to beat up each other on your SNES console after school. Its competitive nature made it easy for the game to transition into a modern esports title. Although not as big as the top MOBAs or CS:GO, Street Fighter is played by a very loyal and passionate community. Therefore, it does not lack the professionalism of the other scenes mentioned. In today's episode we welcome one of the world's top players, Armin Hanjani, also known as Phenom. The Norwegian player won the 2016 DreamHack Summer and the European Brooklyn Beatdown Finals. Apart from these impressive achievements, Phenom is doing well in any tournament he enters. Armin will introduce us into the world of Street Fighter V and will explains what it takes to become a Beat 'em up pro. At higher levels, players require as much technical skill

What a time to be alive because today, we celebrate two special premiers at once! Not only is this episode the first one we dedicate to the popular shooter Halo, but it's also the first time we welcome a guest from South Africa to our podcast. The incredible Ronan Irish is going to tell us everything worth knowing about the famous FPS by Microsoft. Halo 5 is the most recent installment of series that was started off in 2001 and has been one of the commercially most successful games of the company. The latest part is competitively played in different 4v4 modes such as Capture the Flag or Strongholds, in which you have to capture and hold strategically important points on the map. Ronan emphasizes the significance of team movement because Halo is a much lower paced shooter than its more popular relative Counter-Strike. Therefore, he argues, the matches are very demanding in an intellectual fashion since you need to predict your opponents' movements and force them to react. Just like most gamers, Ronan started p