Gameboys
Professional Videogaming's Rise from the Basement to the Big Time
Michael Kane
review by Zube (zube@stat.colostate.edu)
Created:  Nov 27, 2008
Updated:  Dec 1, 2008
http://www.stat.colostate.edu/~zube/gameboys.txt

Mr. Kane tells the story of two Counter-Strike clans, 3D and
CompLexity and their rivalry.  While driving down Professional Gaming 
Boulevard, we pick up Bias, Cheap Shots, Sexism and Bullying Assertions 
as hitchhikers, thereby ruining what should have been an interesting 
if not enjoyable trip.

Let's be frank and fearless:  elite gamers in general do not make for
good copy.  To his credit Mr. Kane makes a game stab at it.  There were
times when I felt myself believing that one or two of the characters
were more than just top Counter-Strike players, but it was not
enough.  For example, on page 69 the author talks of one gamer who
speaks of needing a bag of ice for his swollen hand because "I just
fucking rocked a guy."  There are tales of illegal drug use, abuse of
prescription drugs, breathless stupidity and large egos: essentially 
young, stupid males acting as such.  I suppose if you like that sort 
of stuff, you might find it interesting.  I sure didn't.

More interesting was the rivalry between the two clans, or rather the
rivalry between the two clans' coaches.  One has made money, has
sponsors, looks forward, is a businessman;  the other has paid a lot
out-of-pocket and is nearing the time when he will have to pack it in
if his fortunes do not change.  This dynamic, along with some of the
play-by-play of the matches kept me reading to the end, but it was
touch and go for a while.

There are some seriously low points in this book.  Let's start here
(p. 45):

"Playing a Formula 1 driving game is nothing like racing a real car.
Playing a FIFA soccer game is nothing like running around a soccer 
field.  It's ridiculous to suggest that kind of correlation exists."

This is true.  Yet, as you read through the book, you'll find that most
of its pages are crammed with sports analogies and metaphors.  If you 
were to excise these and their associated hyperbole, the book would be 
shorter by several tens of pages.

Then later:

"Counter-Strike is akin to sport not because anything on screen
resembles sport or because it requires any real form of athleticism.
It's like sport in that it creates the same sensation for the
participant.  It gives the same adrenaline rush as a coordinated
give-and-go in basketball or a power-play rush at the net in hockey."

Here's where things start to crumble for me.  OK, I'll buy that there
can be an adrenaline rush in Counter-Strike, but so what?  I could get
a similar rush from playing a real sports game (FIFA soccer) or from a
non-sports game.  To this end, if I make a series of well-timed moves
in Donkey Kong and I get an adrenaline rush because I pulled them off, 
does that mean I'm an e-athlete too?  Please.

Part of the problem with _Gameboys_ is that one must believe that 
Counter-Strike is a sport, since that is taken as a given for
much of the book.  What happens if you do not believe?  Well, the 
author will get his big brother ... er, I mean Julian Hill of Fox Sports,
to come beat you up ... er, I mean tell it to you straight:

"There it is, once and for all, the answer to the question of whether
competitive gaming is a sport.  The answer?  Who the hell cares.  The
president of Fox Sports thinks it is.  'Of course it's a sport,' Hill
says.  'Anyone who doesn't consider it a sport has obviously never
played.'"

Yah, you don't mess with the author, you hear?  Oh, and don't get on
his bad side either.  Matt Ringel, head of the World Series of Video
Games must have, as he gets sucker punched and kicked again and again.
Ringel is a "Yalie," "quick-talking" and "seemingly always talking in
corporate-speak." When he tries to make money, the author doesn't like
it: "Ringel's supposedly revolutionary business model still includes
charging every kid who walks through the door $85 for a seat ...."

Finally, on page 163, the author knocks him unconscious:

"After a decade of running e-sports, Angel Munoz understood the appeal
of hard-core competitive gaming.  He just didn't want to spend any more
money on it.  After one tournament, Matt Ringel doesn't have a clue.
E-sports may now be in a worse predicament than before.  The gamers were
probably better off just getting ripped off."

Mr. Kane also uses a backhand "one can assume," just for good measure:

"Ringel reeled them in, one can assume, by pointing at pie graphs
and saying things like how WSVG has a 'broader marketing mandate' 
in its DNA."

Oooh, my turn, my turn!

"Mr Kane, one can assume, plays two-player fighting games by himself so he 
can beat the tar out of the other player without having to worry about
the other player fighting back."

While we are here, let's talk of the author's sexism and perhaps his
hypocrisy.  Here is Mr. Kane's initial reaction to Danielle Lake,
the wife of CompLexity's coach Jason Lake:

"Lake's wife, Danielle, is a statuesque, dark-haired beauty.  She's
visibly exhausted from too little sleep since Jordan arrived, but it's
not the kind of weariness a weekend spa getaway wouldn't fix."

This comment is quite funny, given that Mr. Kane later is shocked,
shocked I tell you, of the rampant sexism of a beauty contest held at
the World Series of Video Games ("at least he [Munoz] never compromised
the integrity of gaming with a beauty contest.") Of course, at the end
of the book when some gamers are invited to the Playboy Mansion, all
his sexism worries are nowhere to be found.

Cutting to the chase (I have much more to complain about, but I'll
spare us both), the book ends with the two clans facing each other in
The Big Match, DirecTV starting a professional gaming league and all
the loose ends tied up in a pretty narrative bow.  Alas, reality is
harsh:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/87566-Championship-Gaming-Series-Closes-Down

"... that profitability was too far in the future for us to sustain 
operations in the interim ...."

And the Escapist's take on it, at the bottom:

"Apparently, professional videogaming suffers from the same problem as
so many other online ventures: It looks great on paper but nobody seems
able to figure out how to actually make money with it."

So, _Gameboys_ then.  What can I say?  If you want to read a
slice-of-life book about the Counter-Strike culture from a sexist,
hypocritical, bullying perspective and pay $24.95 for the privilege,
have at it.  My take is that it may be worth a checkout from your local
library, but not much more than that.