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Divisions | Quake WarCraft III: The Frozen Throne Counter-Strike 1.6 Painkiller Call of Duty 2 Defense of the Ancients |
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Founded | 2004 |
Location | Amsterdam, Netherlands |
Manager | Sebastiaan Peeperkorn |
Partners | Razer USA |
Website | www |
Serious Gaming is a professional gaming team based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. It was founded in 2004 by entrepreneur Bas Peeperkorn. [1] Serious Gaming is known for their achievements in first-person shooter Deathmatch tournaments, most notably those by Quake series players Maciej "av3k" Krzykowski and Cypher.
Serious Gaming was founded in 2004 by Bas Peeperkorn, the team's first signing was Painkiller player Niels van Tilborg. Painkiller was the game used for the US$1,000,000 2005 CPL World Tour and following van Tilborg the following players were signed and represented Serious Gaming throughout the tour: Fredrik Edesater and Stefan Timmermans. Highlights for the team included a ninth-place finish at the Chile stop and two players being among the 32 players in the world tour finals. [2]
In 2005 Serious Gaming also competed in televised competition at the World eSport Games in Seoul, Korea, being represented at the second edition of the event by a Counter-Strike division consisting of Finnish players. [3] This division would disband shortly after their stay in Seoul.
Following the 2005 World Tour the main focus of the first-person shooter Deatmatch scene switched from Painkiller to the newly released Quake IV and Serious Gaming followed. Contracts with van Tilborg and Edesater ended, Timmermans would take a management position and help guide two newly signed players in the professional gaming scene: Markus Andersen and Maciej Krzykowski. Andersen would develop into a champion player at the national level but never take the step to international competition. Kryzkowski quickly established himself as a major contender in international competition, being recognized as the newcomer of the year in all of eSports in 2006. Kryzkowski ended up winning the Quake competition at ESWC 2007 without losing a map, becoming the youngest Quake and ESWC world champion in history. [4]
2006 was also the year Serious Gaming established a Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne division, originally signing Oskar Rudberg and Jos Buijvoets. Rudberg would retire shortly after joining and Buijvoets transitioned into a managerial role. The team signed and released a variety of players including (now) professional gamers Benjamin Baker [5] and Daniel Spenst. [6] Eventually a stable line-up of players would emerge that represented the team for several years including Kevin van der Kooi, Nikolaus Cassidy and Hjalmar Högberg.
Serious Gaming also signed two separate European champion Call of Duty 2 teams, the first of which disbanded several months after joining and the second of which disbanded after unsuccessfully trying to transition to Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare . [7]
Following the collapse of the World Series of Video Games the focus of the Deathmatch scene switched back to Quake III in 2008. Serious Gaming signed Alexey Yanushevsky [8] in July 2008. Yanushevsky would win the 2008 Electronic Sports World Cup with Kryzkowski being unable to defend his title due to his visa being rejected. [9] Yanushevsky would later also win the professional tournament at QuakeCon 2008 which was the first time QuakeLive was used at a major professional gaming event, this game would quickly become the standard for professional Deathmatch competition and remains to be until today. The two would compete in various Quake competitions throughout 2008, 2009 and 2010 and in Tek-9 Network's inaugural QuakeLive ranking (February 2010) Yanushevsky was ranked the world's number one QuakeLive player with Kryzkowski taking a third place. [10] Also signed 1 November 2009 was Adrien Denis "in full harmony with the teams philosophy of converting young talented players into tournament winners". [11]
Individual Serious Gaming players won tournaments at the national and continental level. [1] After signing Kim Dong Hwan the team also competed at the highest levels of team leagues, culminating in a third place at the Warcraft 3 Champions League season XVI. Kim was recognized as one of the most impressive newcomers in Warcraft III. [12] In 2010 Cassidy and Buijvoets would transition to form a StarCraft II squad competing in the newly released StarCraft II beta while both still filling a role in the WarCraft III division. This year van der Kooi would leave Serious Gaming to lead a Heroes of Newerth division for professional gaming team fnatic. [13] Added in 2010 would be Lennart Roest in order to ensure the team's viability in team competitions. [14] On 21 May 2010, van der Kooi re-joined the real-time strategy roster as part of the StarCraft II squad. [15] He would be joined by Dlovan van den Bosch on 14 June 2010 [16] and Alexander Hein on 11 August 2010. [17]
Serious Gaming also signed a French Defense of the Ancients division in 2008. [18] Several months after announcing the team the Electronic Sports World Cup announced the inclusion of Defense of the Ancients at their main event. [19] Serious Gaming Defense of the Ancients ended up winning the French championship and qualify for the 2008 Electronic Sports World Cup where they would take 7th place. [20] Following this tournament the Serious Gaming organisation and its Defense of the Ancients division parted amicably.
Manuel Schenkhuizen, better known as Grubby, is a Dutch real-time strategy gamer and former professional esports player. He competed in the RTS games Warcraft III (WC3), Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne and Starcraft II. Grubby is the most successful WC3 player of all time, as an Orc player, having won more than 38 LAN tournaments, of which six were World Championships. His command over the Horde placed him early enough among the elite of the WC3 players, while his clash with Jang "Spirit Moon" Jae-ho rewarded him with a legendary status among the fans of the game. Grubby has been known for being part of one of the most successful WC3 teams in history, namely the British 4Kings. Later teams include the Danish MeetYourMakers and the North American Evil Geniuses. Grubby is widely regarded as one of the greatest Orc players of all time. Grubby is now a popular full-time streamer on Twitch.
SK Gaming is a professional esports organization based in Germany that has teams across the world competing in different titles. SK is particularly known for their success in Counter-Strike (CS) tournaments. SK's Brazilian CS team won the ESL One Cologne 2016 Major. SK currently has players and teams competing in League of Legends and Hearthstone. SK Gaming was founded in 1997 by a small group of Quake players in Oberhausen, making it the oldest esports organization in the world.
Defense of the Ancients (DotA) is a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) mod for the video game Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos (2002) and its expansion, The Frozen Throne. The objective of the game is for each team to destroy their opponents' Ancient, a heavily guarded structure at the opposing corner of the map. Players use powerful units known as heroes, and are assisted by allied teammates and AI-controlled fighters. As in role-playing games, players level up their heroes and use gold to buy equipment during the game.
The Electronic Sports World Convention (ESWC) is an international professional gaming championship. Every year, winners of national qualifier events around the world earn the right to represent their country in the ESWC Finals. The event has been praised for its organisation and ability to put on a good show for spectators.
Sander Kaasjager, who plays under the pseudonym Vo0, is a Dutch professional player of the first-person shooter games Painkiller, Quake II, Quake III , Quake 4, Quake Live and Quake Champions, and also World of Warcraft. He has won more titles and prize money—over US$250,000—at professional Painkiller tournaments than any other player.
Jang Jae-ho is a South Korean professional gamer of the popular Blizzard real-time strategy games Warcraft III and StarCraft II. He is seen by many as the best Night Elf player in the world. Jang Jae-ho is a five time world champion and has won three televised national Korean WarCraft III Championships as well as four seasons of MBCGame's World War. He is particularly known for his excellent micromanagement and innovative strategies. He is often seen using strategies that later set the benchmark for many Night Elf players and was nicknamed the "5th Race" by Gametv.com. He has played and won more televised WarCraft III games than any other Warcraft III players. Jang Jae-ho is featured in the documentary film Beyond the Game. Moon transitioned to StarCraft II and was without a team for a while, before retiring from professional gaming in order to fulfill South Korean military service requirements. After completing his military service, Moon returned to Warcraft 3 and is currently active.
This article lists the top four teams or players in each of the various eSports world championships of the 2006 season.
Li Xiaofeng, who also goes by the pseudonym "Sky" or "WE.Sky", is a Chinese former professional gamer of the popular Blizzard Entertainment real-time strategy game Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne. He played for the China-based World Elite team. He is considered one of the best Human players in the game's history by World Cyber Games In the past few years he has been heavily involved with coaching Team WE's League of Legends team.
Mouz, formerly mousesports, is a professional esports organisation based in Germany. It fields teams in several games but is particularly known for its CS:GO team. MOUZ was one of the founding members of the G7 Teams. MOUZ's League of Legends team currently competes in the ESL Pro Series, having formerly competed in the European Challenger Series.
Maciej Krzykowski, who goes by the pseudonym Av3k, is a professional Quake and ShootMania player. He has Polish nationality and resides in Ostróda. He actively competes in international Quake competitions and was signed to Razer and Dutch electronic sports team Serious Gaming and French organization Millenium, but is now signed to British organisation Endpoint. On July 8, 2007, at age 16, he became the youngest Quake champion ever after winning the Electronic Sports World Cup 2007 in Paris without losing a single map.
Shane Hendrixson, also known by his pseudonym rapha, is an American professional esports Quake Live, Quake III Arena, ShootMania, Overwatch, and Quake Champions player for Team Liquid. Since he appeared in 2008, he has won sixteen major Quake duel tournaments and has placed top three in nearly every other participating tournament. Due to Hendrixson's consistent career performance and calculated style of play, he is considered to be one of the greatest Quake players of all time.
Dennis Gehlen, also known as TaKe, is a German professional StarCraft II commentator and works as a freelancer for Turtle Entertainment which hosts ESL-TV as well as the Electronic Sports League.
Natus Vincere, commonly referred as abbreviated name NAVI, is a Ukrainian esports organization based in Kyiv. Founded in 2009, the organization has teams and players competing in various games, such as Counter-Strike 2, Dota 2, FIFA, Brawl Stars, World of Tanks, Paladins, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, Clash of Clans, Apex Legends, Rainbow Six Siege, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, Fortnite, and VALORANT.
Lu Weiliang, who also goes by the pseudonym Fly100%, is a Chinese professional esports player of the real-time strategy game Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne. He previously been a member of Team Hacker, EHOME and Mousesports. He is considered one of the best Orc players. He had one of the longest playing careers of professional players of Warcraft III.
Wang Xuwen, who goes by the pseudonym Infi, is a Chinese professional esports player of the real-time strategy games Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne and Starcraft II. He previously served in team World Elite, Tyloo and VICI GAMING. He is considered one of the best Human players in the world. In 2008, World Elite was the best team of the year and Wang Xuwen was the core member. In 2009, Wang Xuwen helped World Elite obtain the champion of Warcraft III Champions League Season XIV. Additionally, Wang Xuwen also has many individual champion titles from various Premier Tournaments such as World Cyber Games and World e-Sports Games. From 2008 to 2011, the Chinese competitive scene for Warcraft III was dominated by 4 players, Lu "Fly100%" Weiliang, Li "Sky" Xiaofeng, Wang "Infi" Xuwen and Huang "TH000"Xiang. Wang "Infi" Xuwen and the other three were considered the four kings in Chinese Warcraft III. He played Starcraft II for a few years before retiring from competitive gaming.
Alexey Yanushevsky, who also goes by the pseudonym "Cypher", resides in Minsk, and is a Belarusian professional player of the first person shooter series Quake. He has been actively competing in international Quake competitions since February 24, 2006. Cypher was most notably the first one to win the QuakeCon 1v1 tournament four times. He has been a champion of many other tournaments, including Electronic Sports World Cup, Intel Extreme Masters, Dreamhack and Asus Cups.
Fabien Fiey, better known by his in-game name kioShiMa, is a French professional Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and former Counter-Strike 1.6 player.
Pedro Moreno Durán, also known as LucifroN, is a Spanish professional gamer. He started his career in Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne and later competed in both StarCraft II and Heroes of the Storm.
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