I arrived home late last night so please excuse me if I miss replying to any concerns raised while I was away, I will try and go through all posts etc when I can this week, but for now without having time to read aoczone etc I want to add my own comments on the event. This is in no way a complete response, which would just turn into a tl;dr post.
Firstly Katsuni & Memb:-
Facts:
My personal feelings:
It was confirmed to me that Katsuni and Memb were not coming on Tuesday at approx 3:30am from a WSVG person while I was still working , 2 hrs later while preparing and then travelling for the speedboat to go back to the resort once again, it all hit me hard and I was totally deflated, I personally didn't want to do any more and I wanted to come home.
That Tuesday was extremely hard for me to get through, up until that point I had taken control of not only the AOE2 event but also the SC2, Hearthstone and FIFA15 players / formats / scheduling and organizing among many other organisational tasks, none of which I had expected. I continued with the SC2 as those players had already started to play, but Hearthstone and FIFA15 were taken over by another admin, I had no involvement with those two games.
My communication during the event was almost non existent other than in person to everyone involved at the event. A Whats app group was created for all players / admins, I think I sent one message on a Monday @7 am ( I am swimming with sharks ) and everyone was concerned as to why I wasn't replying, BacT for example had real problems with his flights and Visa to travel to India and Nili was the guy that dealt with all of that for me. My 3 children left at home had NO communication from me at all, my wife came with me and spent a grand total of 2 hrs on Thursday with me. My youngest daughter came and only had time with me when I made her a staff member and my runner. I am not proud of any of these facts.
Wednesday was my first opportunity to be able to contact Katsuni and Memb personally, using other peoples pc's. After initially speaking with Katsuni and finding out that not only had they not had any flights, but also had no communication back to confirm no flights or the reasons for this, I was at first extremely upset for them both and then extremely angry with the entire thing. My anger was vented within minutes of ending my chat with Katsuni and directed to the persons responsible, in no uncertain terms I had my say. I am also not ashamed to admit, that night my anger and upset brought me to tears, with my wife having to take me away from the event. It took me a long long time to be able to walk back in, things were not the same after that for me.
I completely understand both Katsuni and Membs pov in this whole affair, I respect them and I consider them friends more than community colleagues.
The event itself:
For my part I want to sincerely apologize for not making the AOE2 production and community involvement so much better. I had such high hopes for this and being able to create so many things while there to keep our community excited. In reality I watched no more than maybe 15 mins of streams the entire week.
While it was justified to see the guy's efforts somewhat rewarded with new stream viewer records. Both Nelson and Nilpferd did an exceptional job using what resources we had available, with Genette saving the day so many times with his tech ability and work ethic, none of us could have asked for or expected more from those three. We would be fools ( me certainly ) if we were satisfied with that. This should have been so much bigger, with 10's of thousands , even six figures being able to watch AOE2 and not on the VooblyOfficial stream ( was only meant to stream the non main stage games, in the end we did them all ). The technical failings of the LIVE production feed team, and the inability to fix these technical problems in time meant the event lost all of it's exposure. WSVG will now need to create professional post event videos with all the material the production team were able to record locally. Something at least.
All other media TV crews present were directly sending feeds back to the respective stations, so the event still had to follow one game at a time, which meant we had huge delays. I re wrote the entire event schedule 7 times from Monday - Thursday for all 4 games and non game events, this I had to send to all the media partners around the world. Even then we still faced daily delays for certain games, this meant even live at the event we had no real certainty of when we could next stream live. Friday alone the Hearthstone and FIFA15 competitions lost 4.5 hrs, with AOE2 and SC2 not able to start until they were completed. It is impossible to synchronize with the likes of Twitch and douyu when they require 7 day's notice to book events, almost every timed slot came and went.
If we remain introverted and think of AOE2 alone, then we could have done this so much better, booked Twitch and douyu weeks in advance and 100% stuck entirely to those exact times, our event and players were completely organised. Most likely received those 10's or 100's of thousands of viewers ( not keep them of course, but give them an opportunity to see AOE2 again ). This event was not about AOE2 though, infact many people questioned why AOE2 was even there, and most certainly why AOE2 even with it's reduced format took the huge majority of the events time. We are small fry in the world of esports, and our tournament formats are not conducive at all. If AOE2 really wants to try and get back in the spotlight after 15 years away, then we most certainly must change to fit in.
I must also thank the dozens of WSVG volunteer staff, all Maldivian youth, they were absolutely fantastic and I made some great new friends while working with them.
WSVG must also take some credit, through all the failings, for a first event they actually made it happen to the degree they did. We were able to witness first hand how difficult even the most simplest of things were to make a reality, with not only having to organize / pay for something once but sometimes up to 4 times, multiply that by the thousands of tasks needed to make the event happen. It gives you a small idea of how hard it actually was.
Learning from this one, I am certain they have a huge list.
It was a real pleasure to be able to meet the players, all of whom were fantastic, I hope they had a great time and experience. Shame we never all had more time to spend with each other and socialize, everything was so rushed
I literally cannot thank Genette, Nilpferd and Nelson enough. Words cannot do them justice, I felt privileged, honored and extremely relieved to be able to work with them. My post would be 3 times it's length if I added all the things they did.
Firstly Katsuni & Memb:-
Facts:
- I had absolutely zero input with regards to arranging any flight tickets, hotel rooms or any other logistical matter regarding the Maldives event.
- My role with Genette and Nelson was to organize the AOE2 side of the event from qualification through to the Live event itself.
- When I was allowed to take admins/organisers, Genette and Nelson were added, when I was asked to provide one casters name for AOE2 ( all other games were allowed 1 caster only ) - that name instantly was Katsuni , when I was then allowed to take another caster Memb was the next on the list. Voobly streaming/casting would not exist without all of those guys.
- WSVG wanted to bring Paladin to represent Voobly China and douyu.tv , which in "addition" to the others was a great idea.
- Nilpferd asked me months ago "if I pay my own flights and hotels could I help and also spectate the event", the same was allowed to anyone that wanted to pay themselves to come.
- WSVG had huge logistical/time problems with flights, for many reasons and I hope they explain all of these issues post event.
- I chased daily, over several months, for all of the AOE2 tickets, and not just players. I was assured last thing on Thursday night/Friday that all AOE2 players had tickets and that Katsuni and Memb would be purchased either Friday or Sunday / Monday.
- Those assurances, that I took in good faith, were also sent to Katuni and Memb on Friday with us all expecting them to have flights on Sunday or Monday.
- The same issues/delays with flights had also effected myself, Genette and Nelson. All 3 of us paid for our own flights ( and family ) on Thursday/Friday ( Thursday night I bought my flights and I flew on Friday ) or none of us would have been there either.
- Katsuni and Memb had the room booked and paid for, the same Hotel as us, and were also on the speedboat transfer lists each day. Made it worse for me personally to see those 2 names crossed off each day as not present.
My personal feelings:
It was confirmed to me that Katsuni and Memb were not coming on Tuesday at approx 3:30am from a WSVG person while I was still working , 2 hrs later while preparing and then travelling for the speedboat to go back to the resort once again, it all hit me hard and I was totally deflated, I personally didn't want to do any more and I wanted to come home.
That Tuesday was extremely hard for me to get through, up until that point I had taken control of not only the AOE2 event but also the SC2, Hearthstone and FIFA15 players / formats / scheduling and organizing among many other organisational tasks, none of which I had expected. I continued with the SC2 as those players had already started to play, but Hearthstone and FIFA15 were taken over by another admin, I had no involvement with those two games.
My communication during the event was almost non existent other than in person to everyone involved at the event. A Whats app group was created for all players / admins, I think I sent one message on a Monday @7 am ( I am swimming with sharks ) and everyone was concerned as to why I wasn't replying, BacT for example had real problems with his flights and Visa to travel to India and Nili was the guy that dealt with all of that for me. My 3 children left at home had NO communication from me at all, my wife came with me and spent a grand total of 2 hrs on Thursday with me. My youngest daughter came and only had time with me when I made her a staff member and my runner. I am not proud of any of these facts.
Wednesday was my first opportunity to be able to contact Katsuni and Memb personally, using other peoples pc's. After initially speaking with Katsuni and finding out that not only had they not had any flights, but also had no communication back to confirm no flights or the reasons for this, I was at first extremely upset for them both and then extremely angry with the entire thing. My anger was vented within minutes of ending my chat with Katsuni and directed to the persons responsible, in no uncertain terms I had my say. I am also not ashamed to admit, that night my anger and upset brought me to tears, with my wife having to take me away from the event. It took me a long long time to be able to walk back in, things were not the same after that for me.
I completely understand both Katsuni and Membs pov in this whole affair, I respect them and I consider them friends more than community colleagues.
The event itself:
For my part I want to sincerely apologize for not making the AOE2 production and community involvement so much better. I had such high hopes for this and being able to create so many things while there to keep our community excited. In reality I watched no more than maybe 15 mins of streams the entire week.
While it was justified to see the guy's efforts somewhat rewarded with new stream viewer records. Both Nelson and Nilpferd did an exceptional job using what resources we had available, with Genette saving the day so many times with his tech ability and work ethic, none of us could have asked for or expected more from those three. We would be fools ( me certainly ) if we were satisfied with that. This should have been so much bigger, with 10's of thousands , even six figures being able to watch AOE2 and not on the VooblyOfficial stream ( was only meant to stream the non main stage games, in the end we did them all ). The technical failings of the LIVE production feed team, and the inability to fix these technical problems in time meant the event lost all of it's exposure. WSVG will now need to create professional post event videos with all the material the production team were able to record locally. Something at least.
All other media TV crews present were directly sending feeds back to the respective stations, so the event still had to follow one game at a time, which meant we had huge delays. I re wrote the entire event schedule 7 times from Monday - Thursday for all 4 games and non game events, this I had to send to all the media partners around the world. Even then we still faced daily delays for certain games, this meant even live at the event we had no real certainty of when we could next stream live. Friday alone the Hearthstone and FIFA15 competitions lost 4.5 hrs, with AOE2 and SC2 not able to start until they were completed. It is impossible to synchronize with the likes of Twitch and douyu when they require 7 day's notice to book events, almost every timed slot came and went.
If we remain introverted and think of AOE2 alone, then we could have done this so much better, booked Twitch and douyu weeks in advance and 100% stuck entirely to those exact times, our event and players were completely organised. Most likely received those 10's or 100's of thousands of viewers ( not keep them of course, but give them an opportunity to see AOE2 again ). This event was not about AOE2 though, infact many people questioned why AOE2 was even there, and most certainly why AOE2 even with it's reduced format took the huge majority of the events time. We are small fry in the world of esports, and our tournament formats are not conducive at all. If AOE2 really wants to try and get back in the spotlight after 15 years away, then we most certainly must change to fit in.
I must also thank the dozens of WSVG volunteer staff, all Maldivian youth, they were absolutely fantastic and I made some great new friends while working with them.
WSVG must also take some credit, through all the failings, for a first event they actually made it happen to the degree they did. We were able to witness first hand how difficult even the most simplest of things were to make a reality, with not only having to organize / pay for something once but sometimes up to 4 times, multiply that by the thousands of tasks needed to make the event happen. It gives you a small idea of how hard it actually was.
Learning from this one, I am certain they have a huge list.
It was a real pleasure to be able to meet the players, all of whom were fantastic, I hope they had a great time and experience. Shame we never all had more time to spend with each other and socialize, everything was so rushed
I literally cannot thank Genette, Nilpferd and Nelson enough. Words cannot do them justice, I felt privileged, honored and extremely relieved to be able to work with them. My post would be 3 times it's length if I added all the things they did.