Interview by GosuGamers.net's 'sergei.s'
Amidst MC's swagger, Idra's antics and Slayers_Boxer's undeniable charm, the men in black, the people behind the curtains, the crew that keeps this show going are often overshadowed. But what if you're one of those people working in the dark, more inclined to manage and lead than to manipulate keys at super-human speeds? Then your path might to be a bit rockier than that of e-sports rock stars. There are no replays of team management, there are no streams of how to set up a live event, no guides to optimal employee recruitment.
Today we will try to shed some light on the situation with an interview of two people behind the scenes with a different kind of upstart - CyberCraft New York StarCraft 2 Championship - that has enjoyed a successful run for 7 months - and counting.
Hi, tell us a bit about yourself, who are you, where are you from and what is your pedigree as far as the gaming history is concerned.
Certified: My name is Sterling Yau and I go by the alias "Certified" everywhere Starcraft related. I was introduced to Starcraft when BroodWar first came out but I was young and wasn't good enough to follow it. Pretty much only played casually against AI on BGH. At the time I mostly did online events for Forza 2 and 3 (for the xbox360) but then I found casts of SCBW games by Husky and i started watching them as i raced. I started to learn what I could and started playing BW more.
Eventually met Lisa (btway) at school who played Starcraft and things just went from there. I had a starcraft friend and the game became more of an interest. The beta came out shortly after and she somehow won a beta key and she would let me play on it. During the beta/early release I played in a lot of online tournaments and KotHs.
Later on Lisa and I went to our first LAN which was the NYC LAN 6 on TL and thats were I discovered the awesomeness that is the TL NY community.
btway: My name is Lisa (IGN btway) and I'm a college kid going to school in New York. Starcraft 2 is the first RTS that I was really serious about. Before Stracraft, I was a competitive Pokemon metagame player and hardcore MMORPG grinder. I migrated to Brood War over a year ago, and have been obsessed with Starcraft ever since.
So tell us how did this idea of a New York lan series was born and how it came to be.
Certified: I have no idea how the New York LANs began, cuz I wasn't around until the 6th one. That event thread was started by Amnesia, and at the event everyone decided to have a starcraft2 tournament which Phelix ran. It was awesome and I 4gated my first opponent before 4gating was even popular Razz and then died to Micronesia's 3rax.
It was after attending that LAN that Cybercraft opened up and Lisa wanted another LAN before the next semester of school started. We decided to hold the LAN at Cybercraft because it was so much better than the place where LAN 6 was held. The following LAN (might be the one after) Cybercraft decided to sponsor a prize and 50+ people decided to show up unannounced so we realized future events would take more organization and thats when the Cybercraft LAN Tournament series started.
btway: SC2 was released in July of 2010 and back then, the guys at teamliquid.net were having Brood War LANs. Certified and I attended the Brood War LAN in August and we loved the atmosphere and people. The only problem was that the LANs were held at another tiny netcafe a few blocks down, so we moved it to a much larger venue. I remember how big of a deal it was when we held our first LAN and got 32 sign-ups in a month. Thanks to word of mouth, we now get 32 sign-ups in one night and consistently get enough people for a 64-man tournament with backups.
With the closing of New York most famous LAN center- web2zone- were there any concerns regarding a LAN tournament surviving in a city not used to such events?
Certified: NYC LAN 6 was an online battle between people who wanted it to be in Manhattan and the people who wanted it to be in Queens. If Queens hadn't won, Cybercraft might not have been accepted as the location of LAN 7 so things might've played out a lot differently if web2zone was still around. Luckily Cybercraft is around to keep LAN events alive in the city.
btway: For the first few LANs, there were actually people complaining about the location of Cybercraft. It was a 5050 vote on whether the LAN should be held in Manhattan (at web2zone) or in Queens (at Cybercraft). After we convinced everyone that it should be in Queens, the regulars developed a loyalty to Cybercraft. Not only is the place cheap, it also has enough computers for a 64-man tournament and a big screen TV to broadcast the games on. Ever since, even the Manhattanites prefer Cybercraft and advocate it whenever someone complains about its location on our threads.
How did you decide on CyberCraft as the location for the events?
Certified: Cybercraft opened up in the right place at the right time. Cybercraft is just better than everything in the area that we know of. They're bigger, better equipped and they offer prize money for the events.
btway: The first LAN that I attended was at a netcafe a few blocks down from Cybercraft. I saw how many people showed up and how little computers there were, and thought that it'd be a better idea to move to a netcafe just down the street.
Were there any logistic problems you have encountered during the 6 month run of the event and how did you manage to find a solution?
Certified: It started small and there weren't any issues from the start. It wasn't until the event that Cybercraft decided to sponsor and 50 people suddenly showed up to compete. From there it became a tournament event and we've just tried to make it bigger and better over time. We started streaming the event in hopes of getting more people and more sponsors.
Eventually the size of the event causes problems. With the ammount of people who show up we run short on computers. Cybercrafts internet/bandwidth was no longer enough and they've had to upgrade. Its become difficult to manage time while still having high level games streamed so viewers/spectators have something to watch.
With experience and the help of people in the community the events have turned out pretty amazing.
btway: The biggest problem we had was smoothing out the live casting process. At first, we used microphones right in front of the big screen TV, which caused a really loud echo. Then we tried casting from two designated computers, which worked fine in terms of the audio, but we still needed someone to be less disorganized with the camera view. Finally, we did what the GSL did and designated a person to be the observer while the two casters looked at their own screen. Currently, we're working on making the stream higher quality and switching to justin.tv. Our internet connection constantly maxes out in bandwidth usage, but we think it'll just be able to handle the a 720p quality stream.
Is there anything you would advise to someone who would like to create something similar for their hometown?
Certified: Don't do it alone. It takes a community to have something like this turn out well. Being super organized and prepared helps but it really comes down to the community being helpful and cooperative. Day[9] is telling the truth when he says the Starcraft Community is the best community around.
btway: Definitely try organizing it, whether or not it'll be popular. The experience of having a gathering where everyone theorycrafts all day and knows exactly what you're talking about all the time is incredible.
You've already had several events sponsored, tell us a bit about who your sponsors were and what it meant for you?
Certified: First sponsor is Cybercraft. They've always chipped in for the prize pool and they're super awesome and helpful.
Then Das Keyboard offered a Keyboard for one event and though it wasn't really much, it meant that our events were at least good enough to be recognized.
Our most recent sponsor was TteSports and they sent a bunch of goodies which was just very awesome.
btway: We started off asking Das Keyboard for sponsorship because we know how much everyone loves mechanical keyboards. Das didn't sponsor gaming tournaments much back then, and I sent out the sponsorship proposal via a helpdesk ticket. We were extremely excited when we got an email back only a day later. However, since then, Das has gotten much more sponsorship requests and have declined a followup sponsorship. We also had Ttesports sponsor us and were able to give away awesome prizes like gaming gloves and headsets. It's really great knowing that large companies are willing to sponsor relatively small tournaments like ours.
Was it hard to land sponsors? Any tricks of the trade to it?
Certified: We're always looking for more and bigger sponsors but one of the problems with running monthly events is that companies require more time to get back to us about sponsorships. So by the time we'd be notified if they're willing it would be too late.
The issue is that we use TL Threads as the main page for the events so we can't start a thread for a future event while a thread exists for an event that hasnt finished yet. So we have nothing to show to sponsors for future events.
Hopefully our consistency to have an event monthly will land us something, but in the meantime I've been pushing Cybercraft to get up an official website which would likely help in getting sponsors for the events.
btway: It's fairly hard to land sponsors. Every other month, we will get no responses at all and rely completely on player donations, buy-ins, and money from our own pockets. The most you can do is send out as many sponsorship requests as possible and write a very good proposal.
What about the LANs that arent run by you? Which LAN events do you most aspire to be like?
Certified: There are a lot of LAN event threads on TL but the one that usually catches my attention is the DC LAN. Theyre also very consistant and they seem to have just as awesome as a turn out as ours if not better.
Lisa and I have had ideas about perhaps doing a DC + NYC tournament/LAN thing where our winners would play against their winners from respective locations during the LANs.
Nothing official or planned yet though. The only thing we've done for that so far is mention the idea to LuckyFool on Bnet.
btway: The DC LANs run by LuckyFool get as much attention as ours. They run on a different bracket system and have been basically running side by side with our LANs every month. The only difference between our LANs is that they work with the netcafe. Although we do work with the people who run Cybercraft, we don't work for them and do not represent them in any way. We hope to eventually collaborate with the DC LANs and hold a huge intercity event.
Do you ever try to read up on smaller LANs such as the one in Texas to perhaps scavenge for some new ideas?
Certified: I do read the OPs for LAN threads on TL looking for new ideas or ways to improve our events. Only thing I've really wanted to try is different formats like Group play, but with the limited time and number of players its not likely to happen anytime soon.
btway: Most of our real life setup ideas are brainstormed, but I scour the different LAN threads to find ideas that I like. One of the ideas that I stole from another LAN thread is the Google Spreadsheet signup. It's been extremely convenient for our players and keeps things very organized.
Which LAN do you consider to be the harshest competition in US and abroad?
Certified:I don't know. Does GSL, MLG, etc count? They're technically LANs, lol.
btway: I would assume that any LAN held in California would be harsh competition. After all, Blizzard headquarters is in California and most of the professional casters live there too.
What upcoming LAN are you most looking forward to?
Certified:If MLG counts, that'd be it. As for smaller events, WCG is having a small event in the city with a big prize pool. I'm really looking forward to that. I might even play in the side event since I don't have to run it.
btway: WCG event at Columbus Circle on July 18th. I know it's not a WCG qualifier, but it's still very exciting.
What are you plans for the nearest future?
Certified: Get the next event to run as smoothly as possible and have fun.
Trying to get Cybercraft to get a website up so we can get more sponsors. I've been fiddling with stream settings trying to get a better stream for the events.
btway: Hold a tournament where everybody is forced to play random.
Allright then, big picture. Where do you see CyberCraft New York Championship in 2 years?
Certified: One of the brainstorming ideas that the Cybercraft owner and I (and Lisa) have discussed is perhaps something more than just Cybercraft Tournament #N. We thought about having something like a big championship event and use the monthly events as a qualifier for that.
Perhaps with some sponsors and time that might actually be possible and then we could have our own local miniature league which would be awesome. (and then poke will win it, lol)
btway: I'm not quite sure. Our venue is still too small to hold anything major and our players have been pushing to have online qualifiers so we can have over 64 people sign up and still be able to hold the event in real life. There's also been a struggle between the competitive side of the tournament and the community side of it. Personally, I'd like to keep it as friendly competition where everyone can just come and hang out.
Since the interview, the next CyberCraft New York Championship has been announced to be held on July 23rd. So if you live or plan to be in New York around the 23rd, do not hesitate to sign up here. In the meantime here's a list of past results:
| CyberCraft New York Championships | |||
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | |
| October '10 |  Pokebunny |  FreshShock |  Fundipper |
| November '10 | Pokebunny | Yen | MikeD |
| January '11 | mOoNaN | Pokebunny | SloG |
| February '11 | IGy | Yen | Fiddlestix |
| March '11 | Pokebunny | IGy | Fundipper / Zeroes |
| April '11 | Pokebunny | Dhalism | Yen |
| May '11 | Pokebunny | SloG | reveNge |
