"So what do you say, are you excited to meet the best players in the world right now?" "There they are." "Let's get this match started." "At the Cybergames Grand Finals, let's meet our players in this round of Warcraft III." "In the red corner, all the way from the Netherlands, is Grubby." "Since his 2004 world championship, one of the world's best cybergame players." "We're excited to see what he can do at the finals." "Put your hands together for Grubby." "All right, and now, in the blue corner... for the worldwide Cybergames grand finals... please put your hands together for Sky from China." "He is the defending champion." "Is he going to be able to win 3 consecutive grand finals?" "Sky!" "Come on out here!" "Grubby versus Sky." "We're watching 2 of the top contenders." "2 fantastic main stage players take on each other in this match." "I am Sky, a player of the Human Tribe." "In this game, there are the Human Tribe, the Night-Elfs, the Undead and the Orcs." "The Human Tribe is more or less like us in real life." "They are similar to the primitive human tribes on this earth." "Grubby plays the Orcs." "The Orcs are very strong." "They ride wolves and leopards." "They are created based on beastly elements." "I don't think I am very smart." "I think Grubby is a really clever player." "I don't think he is better than me or that I am not as good as him." "But he's a very difficult opponent to deal with." "Warcraft is a strategic game." "It is something like chess or go." "At the beginning of the game, we have the same resources." "Players must utilize the resources the best they can to win the game." "The mind thinks of strategies and your hands type in the commands." "The winner beats the opponent by maximising the use of the resources." "I don't think I am that clever." "I am quite slow." "To overcome this I must work harder than others." "Others may practice for 3 hours a day but I will spend 12 hours." "It's so messy here." "Don't know where to start." "It's OK." " It's messy." "If I was your mother..." "Our allies are under siege!" "According to Chinese traditions, people should be... diligent and work hard to make a living." "To earn money by playing games... just doesn't sound right, not a proper career path." "Parents should arrange for their child." "Children should follow their parents' wishes." "If the child doesn't listen... they are considered to be rebels and disrespectful." "As parents we would ask "Why don't you listen to us?"" "We wanted him to be a doctor." "He didn't listen." "Our kid, Li Xiaofeng, had his own opinions." "I taught my son the same way my mother taught me." "I would discipline my son using my mother's methods." "Sometimes I beat him with sticks... but he still carried on playing games." "He remained silent and just bore the punishment." "He has a strong will to rebel." "He was a stubborn child." "Sometimes when we got extremely angry, we beat him violently." "I decided to go to Beijing and be a professional player." "I had great ambitions at that time." "I dreamed to be the number one in China." "I wanted... to represent China in the world finals in Korea." "By winning the championship..." "I would be able to sustain myself and carry on playing." "I've never been scared." "Nowadays, young people are not afraid of anything." "When we've set our goals, we are determined to accomplish it." "We may not understand why we are doing it but we do our best... before we understand." "First we go for the photo shoot." "Welcome to the stage, Grubby." "OK, one more." "I had to come a long way to get here." "First because of the money, the flight was very expensive." "This was the first time I left Venezuela alone." "The flight went first to Paris, to continue to London." "So I went to London..." "No sorry, to Paris and London and from there to Eindhoven." "I took the train in Eindhoven, and after one and a half hour..." "I finally reached Rotterdam." "Then I walked about 40 kilometers, crossed the city." "Then another 2 kilometers to get here... and I'm here for one reason only." "To meet a great player." "Grubby, or "4K-Grubby"." "You win." " I win." "Kind of close at the end." " Yeah." "I thought you show him closer to expansion." "But the army is inferior." "The Raiders they kill the buildings... and they're nice and fast and they have ensnare... but as far as fighting goes against level 4-4-2 heroes... they're kind of shit." "Maybe I should sometimes give up an expand to kill his main base." "But he always staffed his heroes home quite well." "So he could defend at least a little." "And then if he kills my ex..." "Because it's just one Demon Hunter against your whole army." "But Orb of Venom, he's standing next to his Moon Wells shop, Tree of Eternity..." "You know how Ancients swap down the Raiders." "I think it's boring to play the Human Race." "I prefer playing the villain." "Plundering." "Hit and run in other words." "A bit of guerrilla tactics." "I bet everybody knows the quotation from Sun Tzu's Art of War." ""Attack where you are not expected."" ""If your opponent is arrogant..."" ""compliment him to make him overconfident."" "That's a cool way of playing." "It takes a lifetime to master." "Do you think she's still coming?" " Maybe I go alone with her." "You lot aren't coming anyway." " Most probably not." "No, I thought so." "Especially if you're going to China." "We definitely want to go there." "To China." "There's nothing I have to be in Holland for after the WCG." "It only depends on other contests." " In America perhaps." "But flying to the US is just as cheap from China as from Holland." "China" " Korea will be much cheaper... but if there's a team-event in Germany it will be dearer." "When would you want to do that?" " As soon as possible." "Then you can choose the place where you want to stay." "So it will be going through." "Do you want to take sandwiches?" "I can't help doing this." "Just like when you went to school." "Don't you throw them away on the way!" "At first I tried out many Chinese names." "Such as "He Who is Lonesome Because of His Power"." "And "He Who is Hardly Defeated"." "And also "The Number One in This World"." "After thinking it over and over I remembered the 3-letter word SKY." "It has no meaning, just the sky." "The first impression I got is that the boy was like a block of wood." "Like a country boy just arrived in a big city, he didn't know very much." "Since I was the local, I felt responsible to look after him." "To be honest, when he first arrived he wasn't very skillful." "I played better than he did at the time." "I didn't know much about his family situation." "But I knew his living condition was not very good." "And when he was broke and hungry I would help him out." "I treated him as my younger brother." "I would give him financial support to compete." "He went to Xi'an for his first competition." "He lost in the first round." "He was very upset about it." "It's difficult for me to describe his mood." "You should ask himself for details." "Afterwards he told me that he had tried to commit suicide." "But by then he had recovered." "So I can't tell you any more." "There is a saying: "You will get up from where you fell down."" "I felt very bad at the time." "I was all by myself." "I have overcome that experience by myself." "Among the good Undead players, there was Madfrog in Europe." "I never met him." "He played in an era before my time." "He was a truly smart player." "Nobody could match him." "This is the... goodbye movie from China." "I don't know who made it or..." "Yeah, like when I said I would retire." "It's very good music but I don't understand what it says." "A LEGEND RETIRES" "I was the first person to go and play in Korea... from Europe." "And to stay there for a long time." "They wanted to see me lose, I think, the Koreans... 'cause the first game I played was against an opponent... that they all cheered for, so..." "I won that game as well." "I was playing Undead." "The fastest race." "When Frederick returned from Korea, he had been there for 10 or 11 months." "He had become very thin... and pale when he came home." "He had only been playing behind the computer over there... he had hardly any muscles left." "So he had changed a lot when he returned." "Changed?" "I thought he had changed dramatically." "He looked like a zombie." "I thought he was very sick." "I was kind of lost, because... if you do something very intensive for..." "I don't know, since I was... 12 or 13, when I played a lot." "Until 19, then it's really hard going back to a normal life." "You get... or at least I got very... anti-social by not being able to talk to people every day." "I think that was the hardest part." "Learning to communicate again." "Things like that." "Good luck." "I was living in Singapore." "I used to do a totally different job." "I was a model before I met him." "I never knew what I wanted to do." "I always had a love for games... but it was only a passion, like a pastime, a hobby." "I didn't expect to go into gaming." "I guess, meeting him was a turning point." "He can't live in Singapore." "In Singapore the connection to the game is not very good." "So he can't do a lot of training in Singapore." "He can only live in places where there's a good connection to the game." "He came to Xi'an for the WCG, a very important competition." "I was the commentator for the tournament... and I coincidently was the commentator for his match." "I can still remember the moment deeply in my mind." "The training conditions were bad." "And there were not much people who understood us." "I thought Sky might get... a great future." "We had nothing in the beginning." "Now we are rich and famous." "But this is a new industry, just 3 years old." "None of us knows how long the industry can last... how long the life-span is for a player... when a player can reach to his peak and when he will take a bad turn." "We have no idea about that." "Li Xiaofeng, known as SKY, and others, they are like pioneers." "The motor bike is in the way." "Shall I move it?" "No need, the driver's coming." "Watch out, dumbo." "Unbelievable." "Get out of my sight." "Just honk him." "Doesn't help with these people." "In any case, be careful." " So far, so good." "He sends all the money back home." " After he earns it, he sends it to us." "This shows his filial obedience to us." "Did he finish his studies?" " Yes." "What about his job assignment?" " He's now playing games professionally." "Professional player?" "But you tried to stop him." "Now you know what's a profession, right?" " His son has one." "Your son never thought to play out of this town." "But his son did." "He left to play." "Then he could earn money." " Who could've expected this of this student?" "It's because he had the guts to leave this dump." ""Playing", up my ass!" " Damn right." "Mind your language." "What's the name of your son?" "Sorry, I forgot." "Li Xiaofeng." "Look, what a son he has." "What's up?" "They're getting things ready." "Should we start again?" " Not yet." "How long to go?" " 5 minutes." "Sky, is it B.O.I.?" " Yes." "We win!" "We win!" "What the fuck do they mean, we win?" "In 2005, 2004 and 2006, too, every competition I was in..." "I was the favourite." "And I delivered the goods, 'cause I won." "I consider myself a better player now, but I don't win half as often." "I can play with Korean and Chinese players now as well." "But you do get an internet delay, because... the 'ping', when your modem connects with another PC or network... that's a number of leaps from there to here... with a delay of 300 milliseconds... there and back." "So everything you do, happens half a second later over there." "That makes it meaningless." "A short amount of time makes all the difference in the world." "Hello, Yuwang." "Did you receive my message?" "I am at the internet cafe near my office." "Guess who I saw?" "I saw this guy who looks really familiar..." "The more I look, the more I think it's him." "So I went up to one of the staff and asked, Is he Grubby?"" "They said, "Yes." "He is Grubby." It's amazing." "It's the only thing I can do." " Only in this way?" "Otherwise it might be trouble if the wires wind together." "What I've got with Sky, just to draw a comparison... is that he is precisely the epitome of mass practice." "He has talent, that's obvious, but he uses it... in tandem with his practicing... to perfect only one particular style." "Sometimes I too become a victim of mindless repetition." "Repeating the same action endlessly." "That's necessary sometimes." "But I do think it is an attack on your creativity." "Where does the internet come from, where are the..." "I guess here?" "Does it come from one place, do you have to put cables through the whole house?" "Maybe you can use wireless?" "No, wireless is not good for gaming." "Where is the connection to the internet?" "I think he means... buy a router." "Yeah, a router to connect the Internet to all the computers." "Obviously, but... is one PC faster than the other." "The download and upload speed has to be good." "The ping has to be good." "If the Internet is not good there's even no point in coming here." "There's a swimming pool... a place for your children to play..." "Is there a swimming pool?" "The next round between MYM and Sky's team will begin shortly." "MYM is in the lead with 2 to 1." "Grubby and Moon are MYM's trump cards." "Between the 2, Grubby's performance here is much better." "The players are Ted vs. Grubby for this round." "I remember the first time he held my hand was in Luoyang." "Both of us blushed." "He took my hand when we were crossing the street." "The sun was shining and it was a moment to remember." "I really thought he was... a very pure and innocent boy at the time." "He started to tell me how he felt about me." "And asked me to become his girlfriend." "Jokingly I said to him:" ""When you win the world championship, I will become your girlfriend."" "In China, there's a common saying:" "A man will change when he's rich and famous." "I can't say that I am not worried." "But when it hasn't happened yet..." "I am not going to think too much about it." "I think it's better to leave the future to run its course... and not be affected by what might happen." "When Sky meets his fans... he gives a positive energy and shows a good public image." "He's different when he's with me." "I see him as he is, whether it's good or bad." "There's a great difference but..." "I am with this person and not just seeing him on a show or in a championship." "He has a life too." "Maybe he's not perfect but..." "I don't need him to be perfect all the time." "Since young, I have problems with my heart." "Every time I get sick, I go to the hospital by myself." "We quarreled about this, because I felt he didn't do enough for me." "Afterwards he said to me:" "As long as he's in this industry, he must put in 100% of his energy... to keep his ranking." "So it's hard for him too." "I thought about it and accepted the situation." "It's possible that he will become more and more famous... and I will have a very ordinary career after graduation." "The gap between us may grow wider and wider." "But I will try my best, using my heart and mind... to narrow this gap between us." "I hope he can understand and realize..." "I will always see him as Li Xiaofeng... the boy I met years ago." "I would never see him as Sky, the idol." "It would drive me crazy, living with a superstar." "It's not a life that I want." "Can you live with a fan for life?" "She will be good to you a day or 2... but how much could she do for you?" "You cannot ask someone to forgive all your weak points... without any payback." "It should be 2-way." "Attention please for the presentation of the latest memory chip by Kingston." "Now, Sky, being the world's top cyber game player... is also being sponsored by the world's first class memory chip company." "He has won 2 WCG championships and many other competitions." "Now we will invite Sky to demonstrate our device." "As we can see, Sky is now in the main frame." "When I was playing I had this feeling..." "I could see things happening before they happened." "I could see movement... the way the other player moved his units, I could... just by seeing them for a short while I knew where they were going." "Even if it was... fog on the map..." "I could calculate in my head where he was going and... what he was going to do." "And it was the same in real life when I got back." "It's a bit hard to explain and to understand but... when you're moving things so fast that you need to... understand all the consequences by your movement... then it got to be the same in real life." "It was like seeing into the future." "You could kind of see movements happen before they happened." "Because like everything happens for a reason." "It's OK." "The last bus goes at 9:30." " How do you know?" "Because yesterday we were there at 9:40." "The last bus just left." "OK, let's go." "2 minutes." "Are our bags packed?" "Grubby versus Sky." "We're bringing you the match." "And this is the match to be watching." "2 of the top contenders here, Tom." "Tell me, what are your expectations for these players for this match?" "Sky is the top player in China and a strong favorite to take this tournament." "But Grubby is absolutely at the top of the Warcraft III scene." "He's been on this pro scene so long." "He knows how to play under pressure." "The map is the largest map and it's an Orcs favored map." "Normally I go away from the bridge." "I come downstairs..." "You were thinking that..." " Towards the bridge." "Then my burrows can be close to the entrance." "And then I can snatch any incoming units." "I believe that Grubby does not know what hero Sky went with." "So he'll want to be scouting that very, very quickly." "But Grubby did find out where Sky is on the map." "A nice move there." "His harassment has been continuous inside the base." "And even though his own base was under attack for a little while... he still maintained his focus and kept his attention on that Far Seer... which is the key to his success, possibly, in this game." "The Chinese stopped playing Turtle Rock because he kept beating them." "And here comes the Mountain King back inside the base of Grubby... to try and keep this harassment going." "The Far Seer is about to pop back out." "I don't know whether the Far Seer can defend against the Mountain King." "He's almost level 4, however, to Grubby's level 3." "Yeah, he did that once against me." " Not once, he always does that." "Grubby's bringing his army dangerously close to the base of Sky." "This could be a big battle right now." "Grubby's got a lot of those Batriders and Sky's been trying to put an army together... of these Dragonhawk Riders and Gryphon Riders as well." "So Sky's trying to defend the expand that he put up by Grubby's base." "If a clever player does not work hard, I won't fear him." "But if he's also very hard, I will have no choice but fight it out with him." "Sometimes you have to trust that what you think is best will work... without being really sure." "There are hundreds of T-crossings where you make choices... and in the end the choices you make are what makes you unique." "Sky's taking a lot of damage on the Gryphons." "But Grubby's losing most of his units and he wasn't able to kill enough of those units." "Our hero has been slain!" "And there he is, ladies and gentlemen!" "And Sky will take the map in a very decisive fashion. 2-0 for Sky." "Grubby was not able to hang on." "Sky had shown that World Cyber Games is his tournament." "Every single year he comes to this very, very strong... and he will be in the final for a shot at his third straight gold medal." "It's absolute dominance by Sky at World Cyber Games." "Yep, there it is: celebration a little bit, the fist pump from Sky." "Anyway, that was Warcraft III." "Where do you think it went wrong?" "I think... maybe you could have been a bit more offensive... and try to not let him even cross the bridge." "And kill all his peasants." "I'm always one step behind." "Every time I lose to him I find out how I should have played... and then there's a new game and it goes different again." "All for nothing." "I heard you defeated Grubby." "I beat Grubby in the quarter finals." "Now I will play in the final... 'cause I beat Moon too in the half finals." "You won?" " Yes, I wiped him out." "How great you are!" " 2 to zero." "I think the final opponent will be someone from Russia." "The finals will be tomorrow." "Take care of your health." " OK." "You too." "Bye-bye, sweetheart." " Bye-bye." "Bye-bye, sweetheart." "Please give my regards to your parents." "OK, I will." "Bye-bye." "Have a good day." " OK, bye-bye." "Unbelievable, Sky does not do it." "He wins 2 golds in a row, but can't capture the third." "Creo comes out of nowhere and takes away the gold medal... in 2 maps." "Sky wins the first one... and Creo had an uphill battle." "He put on his climbing gear... and took map 2 and map 3." "An unbelievable siege and closing comment on this Warcraft III final." "Sky looks crushed to me." "He looks crushed!"