CGS dies, TF2 cries

That’s too bad.

CGS was largely under the radar for me. I only found out today that it was the reason for the geographical names of the some top tier CS:S teams (i.e. LA Complexity, SF Optx). The more I look into it, the more ambitious this whole endeavor becomes, and the more uncomfortable it becomes. I really don’t think, at least in North America, that we’re ready to treat competitive game play like any other professional sports league, with franchises, drafts, and player pools.

But this is a site about TF2, so let’s focus on that. In short, they were like a shot in the arm for competitive TF2 in North America. This is also something that I only realized just today, but the signs were there. Money helps, and from out of the woodwork came some serious talent, Apoplexy Industries in particular, who went on to shake up the established order some.

We got a hint at what could have been with the streaming broadcast of the CGS Pro-Am TF2 finals. Let’s be honest, pwnage.tv sucked. It was really the only place that had regular NA TF2 streams, but consider: shoddy low-bitrate WMV and a commentator that was frequently incoherent, reused tired one-liners, and liked to use “Hm” as if asked some riddle.

A commentator, for any kind of sport, that kept saying “Hm,” should be a sacked commentator.

Now that pwnage.tv is dead, Gamefire has taken its place, but guess who moved there to do TF2 commentary? Coupled with even lower resolution, and probably even lower bitrate WMV judging by the huge amount of blocking artifacts, and TF2 casting in North America is a losing proposition.

I also am miffed about how they tend to bitch about players being late and bandwidth costing money. Protips: 1) Get a content delivery network like real streamers do, and 2) Don’t start streaming until everyone is in the bloody server! Does anyone want to see a stream with two people in the server? Probably very few, if any.

In Europe, you have QuadV, who have Flash-based H.264 video, and some of the best commentators for competitive gaming that I’ve heard. These guys know how to excite an audience, and best of all, they’re coherent.

CGS gas Flash H.264 video, albeit at lower resolution, and competent, coherent, commentators. They’re not They could have really ratcheted up interest in TF2 over here, could have been like a QuadV, and who knows what might happen if they put regular TF2 matches on TV? With the global economy tanking, we probably won’t know for a good couple of years, if ever.

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