OG TIs from Former War3 Champion Perspective

Home » OG TIs from Former War3 Champion Perspective

If you are a War3 or Starcraft veteran that was waking up in the middle of the night to stream War3 tournaments, chances are the name Grubby needs no introduction.

If you don’t know who Grubby is, let’s just say that he was (and arguably still is) the King of Orcs, a race from the game Warcraft 3, The Frozen Throne.

Manuel Schenkhuizen “Grubby” is the most successful Warcraft 3 player of all time, having won more than 38 LAN tournaments, including six WC3 World Championships.

After he retired, he started streaming his ladder matches and became one of the most successful War3 streamers thanks to his intelligent commentary, kind personality, and love toward the somewhat forgotten game.

Recently, Grubby started playing Dota 2 and is in love with the game. A large part of this love is thanks to the OG players and their incredible results from two consecutive TI wins.

The funny thing is – Grubby is considered as one of the War3 goats, yet his name isn’t as famous as some of the Dota 2 players that didn’t even win any major, much less a TI.

Who’s fault might this be? How can we learn to appreciate real champions instead of streamers or mediocre players that are famous only because of their personalities or esports trends?

We take a look at the anatomy of professional esports beginnings and try to answer why former esports champions don’t get the fame they deserve.

The Scale of Modern Esports Tournaments

Every Dota 2 player eagerly awaits the True Sight videos after a TI finishes. True Sight is a montage of a previous TI grand final in which you get a glimpse of what happened on and off the screens.

These action-packed, hour-long movies are so popular in the Dota 2 community that some players even film their reactions to them.

I always enjoyed the idea of former contestants commenting on their TI experiences.

However, when one of my favorite streamers, Grubby, reacted to the OG’s two-time consecutive success in 2018 and 2019 TI, I couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed with emotions once again, yet underwhelmed by something else.

This “something else” is the fact Grubby, just like any other veteran and former RTS pro, isn’t recognized the way he should.

Don’t forget that Grubby also achieved similar, if not greater, success in the War3 community when he was an active pro, while the game was still played competitively.

However, the popularity of Grubby is not even close to one of the OG players. But this doesn’t mean that Grubby was salty. On the contrary – Grubby was amazed.

But why do some players receive more recognition than other, equally successful esports pros?

Is the sheer popularity of the game the single reason for recognition or are there some other factors at stake?

The Shortcomings of War3 Era

Of course, we can’t ignore the fact that Warcraft 3 games Reign of Chaos and The Frozen Throne launched at a time when esports competitions weren’t as organized or recognized as today.

There were way fewer players and consumers that were a part of this esports community. You could professionally enjoy Counter-Strike underground tournaments and a few Blizzard games that became popular, mostly thanks to the South Korean communities.

In other words, if you were a “big” esports pro, you either played Counter-Strike or Starcraft. Then came Warcraft 3 games.

This Blizzard’s RTS addition changed the Starcraft scene to a more quality-driven strategic management as opposed to Starcraft’s quantitative approach.

Warcraft 3 focused on your heroes’ development, while Starcraft focused on amassing your economy and armies.

Why we find this interesting is because Dota 2 and League of Legends are what War3 brought to the RTS scene in the first place.

In fact, the Defense of the Ancient was first created as a War3 mod by IceFrog, the man that is behind the idea of Dota 2 of today.

However, despite War3 being the foreground of modern 5v5 action RTS games, the War3 veterans aren’t as recognized as they deserve.

Grubby’s View on True Sight

When one of the War3 legends like Grubby took an interest in Dota 2 years after his career ended, I was immediately interested in how he’d react to the sheer scale of TIs.

I was more than pleased. The way Grubby understood all the parts of a big tournament was when I realized that this person went through all this, yet his career earnings aren’t a fraction of what some of Dota 2 players get in TIs.

What struck me the most is that in his reaction videos, Grubby provided even more fascinating information regarding life on tour.

If you take a look at an average RTS pro career at the time, as Grubby described, you could easily imagine how difficult it was to handle all the emotions and stress given you were always competing solo.

In other words, there were no teammates to cheer or lift you up when things went south in the booth. You would, ultimately, solo-carry the moment you would sit in front of the screen.

Imagine losing in whatever brackets you were and needing to face all the consequences all by yourself.

But perhaps the most bizarre thing is that if you were the best, you wouldn’t get the ridiculous prize money that is available in today’s esports tournaments.

During his 8-year-long professional career, he earned around $300.000. However, when you take into consideration Gubby won all the major War3 tournaments ever, then you get the idea he should’ve ended his career with more savings.

The moment Grubby shed tears of joy and excitement when OG lifted the Aegis I suddenly realized he was reliving all the emotions he went through in his career.

Yet, you won’t find True Sight production videos about his finals. What was there for Grubby to do more?

Wrong Time at the Right Place?

One might argue that the fault of former esports champions is only theirs, as they didn’t adjust to modern esports trends.

However, if you take into consideration years of practicing and learning complex games and loyalty and love toward a game, you’ll soon find out that it’s not an easy job to transfer your skills to a different game just for the trend.

Another thing to take in mind is that being an esports pro still isn’t a profession that is well regarded outside the esports community. Now imagine how the situation was in the beginning of the 2000s.

On the other hand, If you were to commit your practice to an upcoming viral game and trend, you would risk a lot.

Take a look at Dota’s beginnings. The game was extremely popular among players when it was played on the War3 engine.

However, soon enough, when the Heroes of Newerth launched with its dota-like philosophy on an advanced engine, things got interesting.

When HoN showed up, the War3 and Dota community was divided. Not all players enjoyed it as they thought it was a game that lacked originality.

Nevertheless, some Dota players like Puppey took part in tournaments and had more or less success.

However, when Dota 2 and LoL got released, HoN tournaments ceased and it was time for action RTS players to migrate once again.

Now, if you take a look at these hectic times, it just shows how difficult it was for RTS players to adjust to the climate.

Throw the launch of Starcraft 2 into consideration, and you get an RTS pros stressing out on all fronts.

It looks like even the best of the best like Grubby didn’t get the chance to be appreciated enough because of these unfortunate times.

Today, the eSports community is so advanced, recognized, and loved that you can even place bets on Dota 2, LoL, CS-GO, Valorant, Overwatch, PUBG, or even some other niche games like Rainbow Six Siege and Rocket League tournaments.

Sure, former pros still can earn money from streams and commentaries, but this just isn’t the fate a grand champion should embrace.

Luckily for Grubby, he started learning Dota 2 from the beginning. In fact he started an A to Z Challenge in which he tests all Dota 2 available heroes in game.

This is also a great way to get into the game even if you feel you are an RTS veteran. In fact, Grubby even streamed his lessons with the Dota 2 legends like Ceb and Dendi.

Who knows, maybe this is the beginning of Grubby’s Dota 2 professional career even though he is 36 years old?

Maybe we’ll see Grubby reaching in a Dota 2 tournament next year, grabbing a couple of kills for his team?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

eSportsBFF.com
eSportsbff is an independent source of information unrelated to any sportsbook. Our autonomous expert team creates all of our reviews honestly, according to their best judgement and knowledge. However, our reviews are written solely for informative purposes.