201211

vol. 32

N ewsletter

The dream stage for gamers IeSF 2012 World Championship, finished with flying colors in Cheon-an [IeSF 2012 World Championship special]

[2012 International e-sports symposium]

[IeSF 2012 General Meeting]

[IeSF 2012 special interview]

[Chinese Taipei rises as the new dominator for A.V.A]

[IeSF 2012 World Championship winner]

Our future goals are to further increase our members, both at the individual and corporate level. We look to 2013 to host a Canadian national tournament to find our best players to compete in the IeSF tournament and to aid the growth of eSports wherever possible.

Kenneth Silva_President of e-Sports Canada

Female Tekken Champion of IeSF 2012 Sofia Degay (Russian Female Tekken Player)

The Winner of StarcraftII Philip Simon (Austria)

IeSF Newsletter - vol32

www.ie-sf.com

2012. 11. 10

IeSF Headline

The dream stage for gamers, IeSF 2012 World Championship, finished with flying colors in Cheon-an IeSF 2012 World Championship hosted by IeSF(International e-Sports Federation) attracted over 300 players, Media and people concerned from government-approved 47 member countries and officially finished with a closing ceremony on 5th of Oct, 2012.

Korean team became the overall championship of the games by winning the first prize in the competitions,‘Tekken Tag Tournament 2’ and ‘A.V.A (Alliance of Variant Arms)’. Philip Simon from Austria of StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty(Blizzard Entertainment) and Hyeonjin Kim from Korea of Tekken Tag Tournament 2(NAMCO BANDAI Partners Korea) took the first place. Korean team won Taiwan team in the A.V.A as it was a tight finish.

IeSF 2012 World Championship known as a big festival for e-sports held ‘2012 International e-Sports Symposium’ and ‘IeSF 2012 General Meeting’.

In the 2012 International e-Sports Symposium, Issues like Building a global media network, International referee training program, Amateurism and proposals to advance e-sports were raised up. In the IeSF 2012 General Meeting, new member countries were approved and there were discussions about joining Sport Accord, International Sports Federations.

Live pictures of all competitions IeSF 2012 World Championship were broadcasted in Korea and all over the world via NICEGAME TV, Twitch TV, Africa TV, GOM TV and Own3d TV etc and the total number of visitors were one hundred thousand people. The reason of such a huge success is that this championship would tie in with local festivals held in Cheon-an taking place the same weeks as well as there would be many visitors based on family units.

Wonseok Oh, a secretary general of IeSF, said it’d be a good chance to retrospect our today and forecast our future. We’re looking forward to continuous supports from our member countries, players and people concerned.

IeSF is starting to challenge Sport Accord, International Sports Federations to be a member of them next year as IeSF 2012 World Championship was successfully held. If IeSF is approved by Sport Accord, Korea would have the 2nd International sports federation after World Taekwondo Federation.

Global Data

IeSF 2012 World Championship photo news

2012. 11. 10

IeSF 2012 World Championship photo news

2012. 11. 10

IeSF 2012 World Championship photo news

2012. 11. 10

IeSF 2012 World Championship news

2012. 11. 10

IeSF News

2012 International e-Sports Symposium With the IeSF 2012 World Championship successfully closed on last 5th of October, International e-Sports Federation held the 2012 International e-Sports Symposium on 4th of October. At the International e-Sports Symposium, four topics were handled.

1) Global Media Network, presented by Sophie Jeon, Global Team Manager at Kyunghyang Games (Media) 2) International Referee Training Program, presented by Hyung Suk Seo, Manager at Korea e-Sports Association (KeSPA) 3) e-Sports and Sports: Need for Amateurism, presented by Colin Webster, President of Mind Sports South Africa (MSSA) 4) 4th Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games, presented by Jay Shin, Manager of International e-Sports Federation (IeSF) For the topic of Global Media Network, the reason why global e-sports media network is important was investigated through reflecting the relation between global sports events & sports media and roles and impacts of media within the sports and e-sports market. Based on the importance of the global media network, the presenter, Sophie highlighted purposes of global media network, and summarized them as “to allow global coverage for e-sports in integrated manner and to enhance efficient access to globalized resources of e-sports”.

Then, she provided establishing measure for global media group in compliance with the process that IeSF is taking and the media network that IeSF is collecting. Based on this process, she also suggested operation plan of global media group and future vision of it. For the future vision, she suggested international e-sports media organization in compliance with IeSF, and profit share model with IeSF global e-sports magazine.

The presentation threw a significant question on current e-sports market which is professionalism oriented that the amateur base may bring the new opportunities to the e-sports market for overcoming the current operational limit and financial crisis. Also, it suggests the national e-sports associations and institutions for the direction to nurture the ability to propagate in the future.

At the last session of the symposium, IeSF introduces the 4th Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games (AIMAG) which is a mega sports event hosted by Olympic This subject derived the most favorable reaction of audiences. There were a lot of question regarding the condition for becoming IeSF’s official global partner to Council of Asia. E-sports has been selected as one of the official sports be involved in global e-sports media group as well as the details of its operation. discipline within this event, and IeSF is taking role official counterpart of OCA for e-sports. Within the e-sports discipline of 4th AIMAG, 6 e-sports titles have Due to the time limitation, IeSF held special meeting for global media group been selected in 6 genres: Starcraft II (RTS), Special Force (FPS), League of with representatives of national associations and media, and derived conclusion Legend (MOBA), Tekken Tag Tournament 2 (Fighting Action), FIFA (Sports) to set up rules and regulation for becoming IeSF’s partner media. It seems that and Need for Speed Unleashed (Racing). All the technical regulations for each IeSF will announce more detailed measure to invite partner media and to title have already designed by IeSF. IeSF once again informed the roles and actually operate the global media group by the end of the year. responsibilities of each member national associations in Asia region, and requested to cooperate with each National Olympic Committee.

For the topic of International Referee Training Program, current status of esports referee operation was reviewed. With needs for international e-sports With this AIMAG, IeSF upraised its global status as official international sports referee demanded from the lack of professional e-sports referees, IeSF and governing body with the recognition of Continental Olympic Council. It seems Korea e-Sports Association (KeSPA) are cooperating to design international that it will make the Sport Accord affiliation project of IeSF and recognition of referee training program, and the outline of this training program such as IOC for e-sports as official sports a lot closer. Moreover, it is expected that this curriculum composition and plan of operation were introduced during the symposium. The referee training program being designed by IeSF is designed to AIMAG will impact positively on e-sports market not only for e-sports governing body, but for publishers to decrease negative perception against cover from the national level to international level of referee training with the games and to expand the realm of its market as making close relationship with differentiated levels. Also, as the case of national level referee training support, sport governing body. Even for sport governing body such as OCA and IOC and the presentation introduced the “e-Sports Referee Training in Vietnam” which governments, it can also benefit from this with acquiring new paradigm of sports was held on August 2012 in Hanoi, Vietnam. With the result of the program 40 title and improving leisure cultures and creating related occupations. national referee were cultivated in Vietnam.

It seems that the program focuses on creating new professional occupation within e-sports field for the gamers for their future career. Also, it suggests the new paradigm of cultivating and operating human resources within e-sports market, which will resolve the problem of gamers not having the future vision for professional occupation. The presentation also suggested the measure to expand the realm for the referees to be dispatched.

At the 3rd session held after the lunch break, the topic of “e-Sports and Sports” was handled. The presentation investigated the matrix of how general sports are developed, and introduced the factors influencing on development of the sports.

With these factors, the presentation emphasized the importance of amateurism.

Also, it showed that, through promoting e-sports as an amateur sport, e-sports is able to make use and feed off all the existing tools that are currently at the disposal of sport. Furthermore, since amateur bodies are able to access local, provincial and national government funding as well as the national lottery funding, the accreditation given by the public authorities which concern amateur bases will lead to greater and better opportunities for e-sports.

To top it off the useful resources and contents disclosed by the symposium, the significance of the symposium is that IeSF, as the governing body for e-sports in non-profit sector, keeps endeavoring to create a stage for all parties in the esports market to share their opinions and resources as well as set up a circumstance for academic contemplation for e-sports.

The international coordinator at IeSF, Mr. Alex Lim stated his aspiration that, “We believe that our continuous attempts are certainly bearing the seed for academic movement in e-sports field, and will bear fruit for all parties in e-sports world can share someday. We will keep inviting more parties to the international symposium, and expect there will be more various parties participating in the symposium such as global tournament organizers, publishers, broadcasters, professional teams, press, sponsors, suppliers and etc. We will come back with more various and useful subjects and debates next year which all parties can benefit and share.”

The International e-Sports Symposium is 7th one, and has been held since 2006 annually for the purpose of global e-sports opinion share and trend reading.

IeSF 2012 World Championship news

2012. 11. 10

IeSF News

IeSF 2012 General Meeting On last 5th of October, IeSF, as its 5th annual general meeting starting since 2008, held IeSF 2012 General Meeting during the IeSF 2012 World Championship. As the supreme legislative body composed of IeSF Members, all members of IeSF receive the annual report of the previous year’s IeSF businesses, and approve the business plans and affairs for following year. Also, IeSF General Meeting approves new member nations.

IeSF Secretariat has presented its business report for the year of 2012. Then, with all members attended, the General Meeting discussed the measure of title and host city selection for following year’s World Championship and operation plan of other events such as Asia and Euro Championships and Conferences, International e-Sports Symposium, and 4th Asia Indoor and Martial Arts Games as well as the projects for Global Standardization such as International e-Sports Referee Training Program.

Also, to make another leap for the future, IeSF Secretariat proposed amended Statutes of IeSF. With intensive discussion among members and some correction suggested by some members, new Statutes of IeSF finally had approved by the General Meeting, which may allow IeSF to operate its business with higher efficiency.

At this year’s IeSF General Meeting, 10 candidate nations had applied for IeSF membership: Australia, Canada, Egypt, Finland, France, Georgia, Mexico, Mongolia, Philippines and Turkey. Among these new member candidates, except for Australia who did not attend the General Meeting, 9 nations were accepted as member of IeSF. All of these new member candidates presented status of their organizations, and were reviewed by members attended. As the result, 8 national associations, which are eSports Canada, Egyptian Federation of Electronic Games (EFEG), Finnish e-Sports Federation (SEUL Ry), French Video Games Federation (FFJVR), Georgia Cyber Sports Federation (GCSF), Mongolia e-Sports Association (MeSA), Philippine e-Sports Organization (PESO) and Turkish Electronic Sports Association, were approved as full member of IeSF, and 1 national association, eSports Mexico was denied its full membership but accepted as an associate member of IeSF. Finally, as inviting 9 more member nations, IeSF secured total of 42 member nations, and have accomplished its goal over 40 member nations which have carried on since 2008 starting with 8 founding member nations. Also, with this accomplishment, IeSF has come closer to another primary goal which is “Sport Accord” affiliation as satisfying the condition over 40 member nations that is one of its requirements. Thus, from 2013, it is expected that IeSF take a whole new leap for the future as its expanded global coverage and capacity.

IeSF News

Bangladesh, promoted to become a Full Member of IeSF On last 5th of October, at the IeSF 2012 General Meeting which was held during the IeSF 22012 World Championship, a member nation of IeSF has got rewarded for its past year of exertion within all attended members’ congratulation.

9 candidates for new membership have presented, and among them, 8 full members were approved, and 1 associate member was accepted by the General Meeting. After approving the new members of IeSF, Mr. Constantine Surkont, the Secretary General of Russian e-Sports Federation (RESF), brought up an issue related to membership status of Bangladesh, an associate member of IeSF, to the fore. The issue was to promote the status of membership for Bangladesh from the associate membership to the full membership.

Mr. Mohammed Irfan Hussain, the representative of Bangladesh stepped forward, and presented their current status. There was intensive discussion among the members attended, and finally, full membership for Bangladesh approved by the General Meeting with the 100% of agreement among the members attended with the condition that they submit the proof document for its recognition and registration by Bangladesh government. Thus, now, Bangladesh will obtain the right to vote at the General Meeting for all issues which will be handled for the business of IeSF as soon as they finalize documentation. e-Sports in Bangladesh has been introduced in 2005, and since then, it has grown rapidly to get the attention of the government, media and the mass. F1 IT, as the representative governing body of e-sports in Bangladesh, applied for its membership of IeSF in 2011.

However, the full membership approval was denied since F1 IT was a bit more profit oriented organization, and did not have governmental recognition as the sole governing body representing e-sports of Bangladesh. Then, F1 IT was accepted as an associate member of IeSF with the 2 years of probation period given for satisfying the requirement to become full member of IeSF. With the objective to institutionalize e-sports with proper government legislative involvement and support, F1 IT has worked to build an e-sports infrastructure which shall nurture and enrich e-sports community as a whole as well as establishing an association within non-profit sector.

Finally, few months ago, F1 It successfully transformed to “Bangladesh e-Sports Association”, and has got it recognized by Bangladesh government. Everybody may know that getting recognized by any government takes investment of a lot of effort and time. In some nations, it even takes bunch of money. Overcoming all these obstacles, they finally made it happen.

The achievement of Bangladesh e-Sports Association (former F1 IT) has set a good paragon for motivating other associate members and the candidates who are working for the requirements to become a member of IeSF. Bangladesh e-Sports Association is much anticipated to take an active role within IeSF as its full member in the future.

IeSF 2012 World Championship news

2012. 11. 10

IeSF News

Chinese Taipei rises as the new dominator for A.V.A From last 3rd to 5th of October for 3 days, IeSF 2012 World Championship has been held on the e-sports special stage built at the Cheonan Samgori Park in Cheon-An city, Korea with 3 official game titles (A.V.A, Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and Starcraft II) and 1 demonstration title (Screen Golf), as approximately 300 people from 47 nations participating in this event.

International e-Sports Federation (IeSF), from 2009 to this year, has been hosting 4 times of IeSF World Championship as the competition among national teams.

Alliance of Variant Arms (A.V.A) was shown at the IeSF World Championship for the first time in 2010 as a demonstration title. For past 3 years, Korea, Japan, and United States have ruled and kept the 1st to 3rd places on the title of A.V.A. However, for this year, Taiwanese A.V.A team’s performance was just enough to impress all the participating nations and players. Taiwanese A.V.A team was appraised as magnificent by other national A.V.A teams for their exquisite operation of shots, brilliant movement and excellent interpretation of the maps. At the group full league stage for Asia Continental Preliminary, Taiwanese A.V.A team dominated as wining all matches within Group B (vs. Thailand, China and Japan), and advanced to the main full league stage as 1st place of the group.

Moreover, even at the main full league stage, although they lost against Korean A.V. A team, Taiwanese A.V.A team defeated Belgium, United States and Israel who are the strong nations for FPS in Europe and North America one at a time. Then, they grabbed 2nd place of the group, and advanced directly to the semi-final.

It seems that Taiwanese players’ level of performance has been upraised as A.V.A tournaments are activated in Chinese Taipei. Especially, there is a rumor that their performance has been developed a lot more through the exchange match with Korean teams which held in Chinese Taipei on last August. According to the official who was casting their matches, he says, “The level of Taiwanese team’s skills and performances are not practically behind or different. For the shot sense, it even seems better than Korean players’ skill.” Also, fans already started expecting and wondering how good performance Taiwanese A.V.A team will show at the IeSF 2013 World Championship.

In compliance with this, the popularity of A.V.A is beyond Korea, and active among the communities in Europe and North America. The VODs of A.V.A matches on Youtube are already recording more than 12,000 hits on its first day uploaded. A.V.A has already secured its fan and user base in Asia such as Korea, Japan, China, Chinese Taipei, and etc with its excellent shot sense and detailed graphics. Also, it is preparing another leap through launching it in North America and Europe with Aeria Games in 2012.

Opinion

First Impression People meet new people every day. Especially, people working for media like me have lots of chances to meet new people. Although someone has the appearance of favor, I sometimes feel there is no truth in what he or she says and of course, the reverse is the case.

Judging from a first impression seems a half-baked idea, but in our super busy modern society, it’s likely that we don’t have enough time to take a closer look.

The result of this analysis is quite interesting that the number of users is the lowest and the payment rate is the highest at the same time; Users would pay for items as a countermeasure because they have experienced the lack of time to play. .

These days, we can play most of games with Free To Play mode. More exciting facts is that the 60~70% of users of Pay To Play (P2P) games stay in the game after commercial launch.

It seems that users of Pay To Play (P2P) games decide to pay for it even before it starts. So it’s When it comes to games, the same thing happens a lot. I think It could be judged by more severe standard in the game industry than that of meeting new people. There would be ‘The likely that Free To Play mode encourages users to leave games more easily.

Law of 10 Minutes’: Users playing a new release game decides whether he continues to play the game in 10 minutes.

Among thousands of new games every day, one way to make our games survive is nice first impression as I mentioned above. It’s like a silly man going to a blind date, thinking “today my Here is an interesting research from ‘Playnomics’ which is specialized in analyzing social date is not interested in me and doesn’t want to meet me again, but I’ll try my best to make games in the North American market. According to the research, the rate that users playing her feel interested in me next time.” Once you make your date meet you, you should try your a new social game re-play the game the next day is only 10.4%. It means 89.6% of users best to prepare a lot for the first date. One CEO of game companies told me “We’re going to leave the game on the first day. As two days passed, the descending curve declines slowly: hold lots of brilliant events and updates one week from the opening date; it sounds his appeal 2% of users leave it on the 2nd day, 1.1% of users leave it on the 3rd day, and 0.8% of users has a hollowing ring. leave it on the 4th day. The rate that users keep playing the game is 4.5% after 10 days passed.

Another research sounds interesting. The day when users spend more time playing social games in a week is Monday and Tuesday, they don’t spend more time playing social games on Friday. But the payment rate is at its highest on Friday and Saturday.

Member Nation Reports

2012. 11. 10

Philippine Reports

Bridging the Digital Divide through Philippine E-sports and IeSF Membership The Philippines is referred to as the text capital of the world with 90 million mobile phone users and 2 billion text messages sent every day. Among all countries using mobile internet, the Philippines ranks 10th.

The Philippines is also the social networking capital of the world with a Facebook penetration rate of 93.9%. The country also holds the highest percentage of online gamers in the world; with 3 out of 4 respondents reporting that online gaming was their primary reason for accessing the Internet in both PC and Mobile platforms .

These statistics are remarkable given that the Philippines is still a developing country, with the potential of a widening digital divide, if digital access and digital content are not effectively managed.

E-sports can serve to bridge that digital gap, a creative medium that can open an innovative path out of poverty.

With the nature of electronic sports and its accessibility, It is easy to draw the interest of various sectors, including the youth and the masses, to learn simple games by teaching them basic computer operations. Aside from basic computer skills, those interested can progress to more complex games that require great hand-eye- coordination such as FPS (First Person Shooter) or to those games that require team playing such MOBA (Multiplayer online battle field arena) or to those that emphasize decision-making such as RTS (Real time strategy) games.

Using these games as initial doors to lure those interested among the youth from all classes, the Philippine eSports Organization (PeSO) envisions the use of games and computers to promote and develop other skills that will enhance the knowledge and other capabilities of the users. The Philippine eSports Organization would want to harness eSports as a tool to bridge the digital divide.

In the face of global competitiveness, the Philippine economy is ready to take off. Closing the gap of the digital divide, through eSports as one tool, will play an important role in the global shift to the information technology age and will provide opportunity for the masses to have a better chance out of poverty, through added knowledge and skills.

The establishment of the Philippine eSports Organization & obtaining IeSF membership (International e-Sports Federation) could not have come at a more crucial time when Philippine eSports is still at young and fragmented without standardization. Being a member of the International eSports Federation will enhance the capacities of the PeSO, especially to attain its goal of using eSports to help bridge the digital divide among peoples, among and within countries.

PeSO recognizes the lure of computer games for all sectors of Philippine society. Even those in urban poor areas have been observed to spend the equivalent of US$0.15 for internet time, including playing games.

PeSO sees that being interested in computers, especially games, can be the start of a whole world of further learning. Interested users can learn how to create other games by programming, graphic or even web designing and learn blogging & social media marketing.

PeSO intends to use eSports as the platform for human resource development that can meet the demands of an expanded global network of outsourcing centers and other sectors that will improve employment rates and the economic status of the country and enhance as well global collaborative initiatives.

To date, the Philippine eSports Organization in cooperation with Government and Non Government sectors, is now awaiting the implementation of the plan to help bridge the digital divide in a sustainable yet far reaching manner through the conduct of eSports tournaments.

Not only will the conduct of e-Sports tournaments in accessible participating centers attract more interested participants, portions of the proceeds will go into a charity fund that will be used to host free I.T. clinic in different towns and provinces in which participants are welcome to play, for free, any of their favorite eSports titles.

The participants, after 1 hour spent for games, will be given an equivalent 1 hour in free training in a section that interests them most: programming, web designing, social media marketing, graphic design, video or audio editing.

Those that show the most promising progress will be then given a chance to further the free I.T. education. eSports tournaments can be held where winners who maintain a certain grade level can be entitled to a scholarship grant.

For more information on PeSO and it’s projects you may visit facebook.com/ philesports or www.esports.com.ph

INTERVIEW

2012. 11. 10

Interview, Kenneth Silva President of e-Sports Canada

Q) Please explain about the status of e-sports in Canada. eSports Canada (ESC) is growing at a very fast pace. We have an existing community that is very supportive, and more and more business are taking interest in this new niche.

Our membership with the IeSF is getting a lot of Canadians excited, and the future is looking very bright.

Q) How is the perception of public toward e-sports in Canada? and How is e-sport recognized in Canadian market?

Currently, the are many organizations we are in discussions with to become ESC corporate members. A revolution is currently underway that will unite Canada as an eSports Nation, thereby overcoming the previous city state status.

As the Canadian market is very heavily influenced by American media, many eSports fans recognize it as a North American market.

Q) We heard that you were occupied in other filed than e-sports before. Is there any special motivation or occasion to establish the e-Sports Canada?

Previously, I was a manager of a portfolio of non-profit corporations for a global company. My previous occupation provide me with enough knowledge and experience to have the courage to move forward with a non-profit organization for Canadian eSports. The motivation among our founders was to revolutionize the Canadian eSports landscape.

Q) We heard that e-Sports Canada consists of a lot of volunteers.

Please let us know if there was any episode or obstacle to gather and operate these volunteers.

As the second largest nation (by land mass) with a population density that is very scattered, there were many complications that needed to be overcome. There were always a lot of eSports events; however, the issue was they were not networked and operated without national exposure.

Through effective communication, efficient recruitment programs, and standardized policies and procedures, the community has come to recognize that an organization like eSports Canada is the future for eSports in Canada.

Q) There are several other national associations in such situation consist of volunteers. If there is any know-how or efficient process to recruit and operate volunteers effectively, please let us know.

A good structure is the first step to efficient operations. Secondly, a good interview process for applicants interested in volunteering will ensure that you find the right places for the right people.

Lining up positions with specific skill sets and desired outcomes will ensure that your volunteers grow and better themselves as professionals with the eSports industry. Reaching out to new volunteers is far more successful when you have a standard process and answers to all their questions.

Q) There may be some disadvantage on managing an organization with volunteers since they are not professionals. Is there any measure to supplement this issue?

Many of our volunteers choose to help our organization "out of love for eSports", however, we are aware that life changes can have an impact on volunteer positions. This is why we operate in structured teams and maintain transparency. Several volunteers are professionals in fields like management, journalism, and the production industry. As a result of this, many volunteers gain experience and knowledge from these individuals that help them grow. Having a "plan B" will only benefit everyone when these issues arise.

Q) Is this your first visit in Korea? How is your impression on the game industry and e-sports in Korea?

This was my first trip to Korea, and I was very excited. Once there, the citizens of Korean were extremely kind and helpful. I was amazed at the professionalism, organization, and support displayed by the IeSF. The staff was extremely supportive and helpful, the schedules were accurate, and the meetings were very well structured and truly valued by everyone who attended. Korea truly is the "Mecca of eSports". I cannot wait to for an opportunity to return in the future.

Q) How is your impression and opinion of the IeSF World Championship and Symposium?

The IeSF tournament was held in the beautiful city of Cheon-an. This was the first ever outdoor eSports event I attended, and I couldn't have asked to attend a better venue. The festival was breathtaking, and the excitement of seeing the nation's best competing for global eSports glory was an extremely memorable experience. I was honored with an invite to the International eSports Symposium, where we were given the opportunity to provide discuss and provide input on matters vital to the development of international eSports.

Q) What would be the impact on the status of e-Sports Canada and esports in Canada as e-Sports Canada obtaining the membership of IeSF? If there is anything that you would like to comment about IeSF Staffs or other members of IeSF, please tell us.

ESC becoming an member of IeSF will help us tremendously with further developing and improving our amateur players, our referee knowledge base, and, of course, our participation in future IeSF tournaments. I had the opportunity to meet with many of the representatives from the IeSF and member nations, who all displayed a vast knowledge and experience within their respective nations. Mr. Alex Lim, the international coordinator of IeSF, was exemplary host and most professional in conducting meetings and communications.

Q) What are the plans and goals for e-Sports Canada?

Our future goals are to further increase our members, both at the individual and corporate level. We look to 2013 to host a Canadian national tournament to find our best players to compete in the IeSF tournament and to aid the growth of eSports wherever possible.

INTERVIEW

2012. 11. 10

Female Tekken Champion of IeSF 2012 World Championship

Sofia Degay

In compliance with the IOC movement which also put a lot weigh on ‘Female Promotion’, IeSF held its first Women’s Invitational Tournament with 2 of its official titles (Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and Starcraft II) during IeSF 2012 World Championship. IeSF attempts to expand female gamers’ pool as promoting more female tournament in the future.

The hardest things were to choose second character and to feel the new tag system. She mentioned that she found and studied a lot of useful information at TekkenZaibatsu.com. She knew she rained some good skills before the Championship, but she was very afraid of female players from Asia, and was pretty sure that Ye Sol from Korea would become the winner.

Young Russian female gamer ‘Sofia Degay’ won the champion within the tournament for Tekken Tag Tournament 2, and surprised other players and fans as she defeated Ye Sol Gil, the Korean female Tekken player who was anticipated the most to be the champion in this tournament. She is quite famous in Russia as ‘female master of Tekken’. As for other gamers, at the beginning, she started this for hobby, but she got into it intensively since she hates losing. Since most people agrees, even herself, that the Korean players are the strongest competitors, it is even surprising achievement for her as well. She mentioned that the Final stage with Ye Sol was the hardest match ever, and added that, “Ye Sol’s combo and skills were so much powerful. I am even more exited since I was not even expected that I would win.”

For the question asking her favorite player, she answered that she has heard of ‘Knee’ very much, because he is one of the world most famous Tekken players, and JDCR.

She is a 21years old student of the First Moscow Law Institute, and her life is quite typical for a student. She studies law and has a few hobbies such as drawing, writing stories. At the moment she spent most of her leisure time practicing in fighting games and participating in tournaments. she’s been playing videogames for almost 15 years and tried many fighting games such as BlazBlue: CS II, DoA, FF: Dicsidia, Soul Caibur and, of course, Tekken.

She entered her first tournament in 2011, it was Moscow Fighting Arena (MFA) – the biggest Russian annual event among fighting competitions. Then, she started participating local and online tournaments regularly. When in 2012 SC5 came out, she was very impressed by the game and decided to participate in Fighting.ru Invitational. She showed very modest results at the prelims, since they didn’t have separate contest for female players.

After half of year hardcore practicing she took the 3rd place at solo and the 2nd place in command tournament in SC5 at MFA 2012. At the same time, she won Tekken Female competition, the IeSF Russian National Qualifier (which was hold for the first time in MFA history, only for Tekken) and qualified to the IeSF World Championship.

First time she tried playing Tekken is when she was 9. Since then she never gave up this game.

The road started from Tekken 3 through Tekken 6 and now she is trying to master TTT2. She says that she likes mechanism of the game. Also, she found some interesting characters to play. In Russia, she said, “Tekken is one of the most popular games among fighting genre of games, and it has the biggest community and the one of the strongest competition level.”

She stated hardship of her competition this time that she didn’t have much time, because the game was released 3 weeks before the Championship.

She thinks she won this championship because of proper matchup knowledge. She trained most of characters that she fought against at the competition, and she was lucky to have many mirror matches in this tournament. So she could know strong points and weak spots of the rivals.

Also she had time to prepare herself to the final match against Ye Sol Gil since she lost her at the group stage. Her teammate Sineman (Sergei) helped her with this to make game plan for the match and to focus on it.

She described IeSF World Championship as very interesting experience. It was her first international event, and she had opportunity to play with many skilled players and met many new interesting people. She added that she hopes that it’s not her last tournament of this high level, and many thanks to the IeSF for everything organized very well.

In Russia, she mentioned about the states of female gamers, “There are not as many female gamers. Usually there is no such tournament especially for girls. I know only one girl in Moscow who trains her skill and participates in fighting games tournaments. Others play just for fan or because their boyfriends play. I was very surprised when 12 girls came to Russian IeSF qualifiers.” She added, “Right now it is too hard for a female player to compete with male players at usual competitions. A newbie needs really strong motivation to train hard and usually girls don’t have it. I think that female tournament can attract new female players, and even can help some girls become skilled players.

For the future, her primary goal is to graduate the university, and get a job. As for her future as a gamer, she wishes to participate in more international tournaments and see different countries. As stated above, her hope is the IeSF 2012 Championship would not be her last one.

She hopes there will be more female tournaments in e-sports in future.

At last, she commented, “Play Tekken, get hype! “

The Winner of Starcraft 2, Philip Simon Hyunwoo Park from Korea, regarded as the heavy favorite, suffered a shocking defeat to Philip Simon from Austria in the Starcraft 2 match, one of official titles of IeSF 2012 World Championship.

Philip Simon from Austria won the first prize in the Starcraft 2 with experienced handling of the game and aggressive play to win.

On the specially prepared stage, Philip Simon from Austria beat Silviu Alexandru Lazar by 3 to 1 after a breathtakingly close match. They both chose Protoss tribe, it showed what the true war between the same tribe was.

It was the first experience for Philip Simon to win the official championship in his own capacity without joining a professional team. Lots of people were interested in his future plan about whether he joins a professional team or not, there would be a rumor that he’ll join a famous professional team as It’s yet to be revealed.

Q: You played an incredible match and won the first prize for the first time, how do you feel?

A: I had a hard time due to jet lag, so it wasn’t easy to be back in shape on the first day of championship. Fortunately, I am in a good shape today to play the game well. I’m so pleased to win the first prize for the first time even I don’t have enough experience to join such a huge competition.

Q: Most people said that Hyunwoo Park would be a hot favorite to win, but you beat him at the semi finals. Do you think what the power of victory is?

A: As he has been a very famous player, I’ve studied his skills based on previous matched he had played. I’ve never imagined that I can beat him this time. I think I’m lucky enough and the power of victory is that I just did better than usual in good condition.

Q: As far as I know, it’s your first time to visit Korea. Are you going to join Korean Pro leagues?

A: Korean players are excellent at playing Starcraft 2 in the world, so the level of Korean Pro leagues is also high. Personally, I want to join the leagues as often as possible, but I don’t’ have plans confirmed.

Q: Is there any special plan in the future?

A: I was originally planning to try being a professional player during a month, now I can continue my career if I achieve this kind of good results consecutively.(smile) I’m not in the professional team now, but I think I’ll join a new professional team maybe next week. I’ll try my best to score a fine match, please give me a continuous interest and support.