Starcraft: A Noobs descent into the vast reaches of online multiplayer

Starcraft II. Even the name strikes terror into my heart. For those who don't know, Starcraft is an RTS or Real Time Strategy game. I've always liked RTS games, from the entire command and conquer series, to Age of Empires to the Total War series, even Halo Wars, I love RTS games. However, I have had very limited success playing this game. I can work my way through the campaign fine, having a decent control over my units, knowing which ones to build and counter enemy units with little to no worries, but, as soon as I take my training wheels off and venture into the realms of online multiplayer, it is a whole new ball game. The sheer amount of strategy involved in balancing a good economy with the right combination of units to counter your foe is staggering. The tactics you need to use must be pinpoint and precise, there will be no lucky grenade kills in this game. (I'm looking at YOU CODMW and Halo players....) What has happened with Starcraft II is the sheer premise of the online multiplayer being a thing for fun and random battles has become a lucrative business and one of major strategy and skill. It's almost unprecedented. I knew people who were pretty damn serious about their Kill/Death ratio in Halo 3 and Reach but what starcraft does is take it to a whole new level, having a ranked leaderboard system set into differing leagues, bronze, silver, gold and platinum. Someone like me, who whilst knowing the ins and outs of the game will still struggle in the bronze leagues, it takes someone who has finely tuned their playing skills and mastered every aspect of their chosen race (amongst my friends, this is mainly Zerg) to start rising through the ranks and working their way up from league to league. I'm not saying it isn't fun to play, quite the contrary, the mono-battles variant helps new comers like myself get to grips with a single unit, learning it's strengths and weaknesses, but to get to a master like stage you need to get literally tens of hours of practice in and have hands faster than Usain Bolt to keep up with all the hotkeys.

When you look at the pro gamers who play Starcraft like Naniwa, Huk, Idra, MC and MVP, the sheer speed at which they play is, to me anyway, mind boggling. And then it leads us to what has been the strangest thing for me to discover, Major League Gaming. What an awesome concept! I had heard of before delving into being an SC online minion, but I didn't release just how much of a well established and major online culture it had become. There are many cult gamers, and the western SC players are revered seeing as Starcraft is the NATIONAL SPORT of Korea. The majority of the most well known players are Korean, such as MVP and MC and they currently dominate the majority of games, however western competitors are now emerging. MLG has just named Naniwa their SC player of the year, having emerged as the brightest star in the years bout of MLG tournaments. But how can I, a noob of the most greenest proportions ever think to achieve the dizzying heights of MLG greatness. In short, not a fucking hope in the seven circles of hell. However, I feel I shall keep you all informed of just how well/bad/gob smackingly appalling I do, and how many times I get cheesed, steam rollered, zerg rushed, MMM'd and bum puckeringly abused by the Starcraft community. Onwards I go to more monobatltles.

If you'd like to know more about Major League Gaming then head to the following site : http://www.majorleaguegaming.com/

Keep a look out, one day JONESY may just appear on there...in top ten fails of the week. Rob Draugr signing off.
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