Intel Extreme Masters - China

posted by Michael Brito on November 05, 2009

We started off our team trip to Chengdu, China on a very high note.  Coming from New York, where the Counter-Strike division had just won the World Cyber Games USA national championship, confidence was high.  After winning the WCG title on a Sunday, we rushed to the airport (after doing some laundry) the next morning to fly directly to Chengdu.

The check-in and security process at the airport went as expected - no big issues, always a hassle, but over eventually.  We arrived at our gate and several of the players and I went around the terminal in search of food.  After getting some food, we sat down in a lounge area to eat, and started exchanging remarks about some of the planes outside.  We all noticed one plane which appeared to have a big piece of paneling missing by its exhaust pipe on the right side.  Always a nervous flier, I remarked, "Sure glad that's not our plane."

"...Wait, that IS our plane!" Our plane had a hole in it.  This didn't seem to unsettle anyone else in our group, or in the boarding area, but I found it a bit unusual that a Boeing jet would intentionally be designed with a big piece of paneling missing.  I didn't want to let it go, and I asked the gate attendant just to make sure.  She claimed it was part of the design (although she didn't actually go look at it), and that was enough to get me on the plane.  It was a bit of an old jet, but we arrived in Beijing after a bit of a bumpy ride.  Our flight to Chengdu was fine, too, and thankfully the plane was holeless for that flight.

(Note: we later found out that Boeing actually did make a limited run of 700-series jets with paneling intentionally missing by the exhaust pipe)

After a day of rest in Chengdu, and several terrifying experiences in taxis (which, in China, seem to follow no traffic laws whatsoever), it was time to head over to the tournament.  Our matches weren't scheduled until the afternoon, but Jordan "n0thing" Gilbert (one of the team's more famous players) and I decided to head over to the eSports stadium early.

One of the things you always look forward to, and have to deal with, when going to a Chinese tournament is the fan culture.  Generally, in terms of eSports fandom, Asia is the most evolved, followed by Europe, with North America the furthest behind.  For certain games, like Counter-Strike and WarCraft III, there are no more rabid fans in the world than the Chinese.  So Jordan and I were prepared to encounter crowds as soon as we came within 1,000 feet of the venue.

Sure enough, as we were walking towards the building, a group of fans came running towards us with pens and mousepads, asking for autographs.  This would be a pattern for the rest of the trip.  We waded through this crowd, walked into the stadium, and were greeted by a tournament area absolutely full of players and fans.  After some filming, and more autographs, we settled in to watch some of the early matches.

The first day of competition was exhausting, but went well.  The main competition in our group was MiBR (Made in Brazil), the best Brazilian team.  We knew that if we beat them in our first match, we'd be in good position to move on, regardless of the result of our other group match.  We had a bit of an advantage on them in that we had been in Chengdu for a few days already, while they were playing after arriving right from the airport.  Sure enough, we beat them fairly handily, 16-6.

At eSports tournaments, there's a lot of waiting in between matches sometimes.  And when you're in a new timezone halfway around the world, this can be brutal on your internal clock.  After playing our first match, we had a four-hour long wait until playing our other group match, and the wait really affected us.  By the time the second match began, the players were zombies.  We ended up losing our second match in close fashion, but still moved out of the group.

At night during the trip, we used our free time to enjoy some of the local food.  The highlight of the cuisine in Chengdu was definitely its famous spicy hot pot.  For those of you not familiar with hot pot, you're basically presented with a large pot of boiling broth in the center of your table, and you dip various raw meats and vegetables into the pot to cook them. 

I had been warned about the unique kind of spice offered by the Chengdu hot pot; friends had told me it was nothing like any kind of spice I had experienced.  They were right.  The broth was very spicy, but not with a burning sensation like most of our spicy food over here.  It was more of a mouth-numbing spice.  I didn't find myself grasping for water... I just couldn't feel my mouth.  In any case, it was good.

On the next day of competition, we were slated to face SK Gaming from Sweden in our first single-elimination bracket match.  The format for the match was best of three maps, so the first team to win two maps would win.  We ended up with a map pool of de_train, de_dust2, and de_nuke - a map pool which we liked.  We knew that, despite the toughness of the opponent, if we could take the fist map, we'd be in great shape to win the match.

After a lot of battling, we found ourselves down 10-14 on the first map; the first team to 16 would win the map.  And slowly, but surely, we started to mount a comeback.  The score went from 10-14, to 11-14, to 12-14... and soon enough, we found ourselves up 15-14 with a relatively easy round to win the match.

In Counter-Strike, the game operates on a money system, meaning that you aren't just given weapons at the beginning of each round - you have to buy your weapons.  Players are given money based on how many rounds their team has won or lost, and how many frags they have gotten so far.  It so happens that in this last round of the match, we were high on money, and SK Gaming was low on money.  Meaning we had a considerable weapon advantage, and a much better chance to win the round.

But, well, that's why you play all of the rounds.  SK Gaming utilized a relatively unconventional setup designed to catch one of our players off guard and steal one of our more expensive weapons, which they could then use to take down the rest of our team.  It worked, and the match went to overtime, where SK eventually prevailed.  With our momentum crushed, they also took the next map to win the match.  We ended up placing tied for 5th at the tournament, not too bad for playing against the world's best.

Overall, it was a good trip, even though we left disappointed in our performance.  It's always encouraging to visit Asia as a professional gamer, because you're greeted with such enthusiasm and admiration from fans.  I signed more autographs on this trip than ever before at a tournament, and I even had one fan say - really - "It... was... my... honor" after I had thanked him for getting us a taxi.  Seeing that kind of enthusiasm for pro gaming is wonderful, despite the near-death experiences provided by the taxis.

We'll be back in China three more times before the end of this year (for the WCG Grand Finals, the International eSports Festival, and the World eSports Masters).  I guess I'd better get used to the driving.

This post was written by by Alex Garfield, Executive Director of Team EG; you can follow them on Twitter to keep up with the latest.

 

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tagged: extrememasters, gaming