StarCraft II player MorroW signs to Western Wolves
20-year-old Swedish player Stefan Andersson signs one-year contract, officials tell GameSpot.
Swedish StarCraft II player Stefan "MorroW" Andersson has signed a new one-year contract with the competitive gaming team Western Wolves, officials from the organization told GameSpot.
The 20-year-old Swedish Terran and Zerg player has been searching for a new home since parting ways with Mousesports on June 27. While in Mousesports, Andersson was approached by several teams with offers, which he was to consider when becoming a free agent.
Initially after leaving Mousesports, though, those plans did not pan out and left him to start from scratch. Andersson, along with several other players from South Korea, took a leap of faith with the ApeX eSports organization, who had wanted to open up a StarCraft II division. The experience was quite rough, and not more than two months later, the organization shut down due to owing payments to players and staff.
Andersson and Western Wolves have been speaking with each other over the past two months and were able to agree on terms in the last few weeks. Andersson has developed a trust with Western Wolves, something that he is not able to have with many organizations. His trust for the business of eSports is quite low due to teams and tournaments not paying out or fulfilling promises. He feels things will be different his time.
"We believe that MorroW will be able to bring in more stability in our roster as well as a lot of experience," a Western Wolves representative told GameSpot. "All of our current players are unexperienced when it comes to offline events. When it comes to the skill level, we believe that they have a good practice routine and are all making progress, but we've seen them having a problem with nerves at events."
Andersson joins a Western Wolves roster with several Swedish countrymates, including Rickard "SortOf" Bergman, Daniel "StarNaN" Ohlsson, and Viktor "Mini" Malmberg. These players are friends to Andersson, and their recommendation to him was one of the biggest reasons he has decided to join the team.
Western Wolves had been in negotiations with Swedish superstar Johan "Naniwa" Luchessi to join the team as well, but talks broke down last week with issues for accommodation of Luchessi while in South Korea. Western Wolves say that not signing Luchessi is unrelated to the signing of Andersson.
Andersson will play his first event under the Western Wolves banner at the Esport SM qualifier event in Umeå, Sweden.
An interview with Andersson will be conducted on GameSpot in the following days.
233 comments
I'm sure as any new professional "sport" emerged there were countless people saying.. Can you believe they pay that guy to hit a ball with a stick? Can you believe that people will actually pay to watch a bunch of guys kick a ball around with their feet?
Professional gamers are to professional bowlers as professional bowlers are to gold medal olympians.
Although I do understand this is an important area of gaming world since it's professional gaming, I can't take it serious a game webpage like gamstop start posting news about what they do. I mean I find extremelly annoying seeing magazines and newspapers saying that "brad pitt signed for role in a movie "new or "justin bieber didn't go through his entire show" news, and honestly, that sounds exactly like it, but in the geek world.
I'm just amazed that this crap actually happens.. Fair play to the guy making a living.. but..
WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD!?!
Signing a contract to competitive gaming team Western Wolves.. That sentence right there is all kinds of geek its actually awesome :P
Guy makes his living playing computer games. GTFOver it losers. Jealous much.
You don't have to read about him, you don't have to care. It's like listening to the idiots complain about the crap on TV.
DON'T WATCH IT THEN.
1 Like This will look great on his resume in the real world, glad for him in the cyber world.
Gamespot is giving ESPN a run for their money these days...
So much energy hating on others. Whether someone is trolling, joking or serious the words still entered your mind. Haters the lot of you.
4 Like Another geek nobody with a buzzword name to pull in the ad revenue.
The gaming equivelent of Justin Bieber.
If it wasn't for crap Gamespot posts like this I would have never known he even existed, because nothing he does is important, anywhere, apart from in the shareholders pockets.
1 Like @PinchySkree Funny you should say that, since at least has a name in the world, as small as it is.
You, on the other hand, are a nobody.
So please, stop being an ignorant prick.
3 Like as a gamer who only gets around 1-2 hours play a night due to working construction and having two kids under 4, i say hats off to anyone who gets to play full time and get paid.
5 Like So what do you do 9am to 5pm? Stack some boxes for dirt pay at retail? Sit all day crunching data entry for some temp job which you're gonna be out of work next Friday? Sit in college course all day, losing money and time, in which there's no guarantee for your future?
The next time you want to talk smack about someone's career and life, understand that this guy gets up knowing he gets to play video games for a comfortable living and people recognize his face. He sets his alarm WANTING TO GET UP THE NEXT MORNING TO GO TO WORK while you and I are like "wtf...it's Monday. Here we go again."
And unless you look like Johnny Depp, LL Cool J, or whatever guy is handsome to your standards, look at yourself in the mirror. You're just as ugly as every other guy from the street.
In conclusion, you are nobody. stfu
@MachShot Well since you asked, I manage two multi-million dollar functions at my place of work and am responsible for more money in a single day than you'll see in a calendar year. In my spare time, I write for gaming blogs and also run my own business, setting up fundraising poker tournaments.
And I still manage to spend a ton of time with my two kids, including coaching their youth sports teams. Did I mention I also like gaming?
Leave your hyperbole at the door.
1 Like @MachShot Wrong, his career is short-lived and his CV saying he played professional video games means nothing in the real world. The real money isn't in those kind of paychecks, that's just kiddie mentally.
@MachShot Good comment. Jealousy and ignorance are the biggest opponents to e-sports from this community.
4 Like the guy:(won cash and got to touch this hot girl, loving this pro thing so far)
the girl:(smile, keep smiling, EEEW, ewwww, he's so... sweaty, those are the hands he probably jacks off with 5 times a day, whatever this is the job i chose, just have to suck it up and let it happen...please let me go, please let me go, please let me go)
9 Like I don't understand why gamers hate e-sports. You have a common interest and desire with these professional players. You both want to do well and love video games. The main difference between pro players and the average player is whether or not they get money investing time into something they love. Seems to me that jealousy is the root cause of the hatred from gamers for e-sports. Other people that don't play video games probably hate/attack it because they don't understand it (just like these politicians you see attacking violent video games).
Maybe if some of you actually spent a little bit of time to understand what e-sports is you wouldn't hate it so much. I see a common trend of people hating on it because these pro players don't have a "real job". Believe it or not but many of these pro players do indeed have a normal job and some even go to college while playing. Pro Player Victory X went to Michigan State University while he was a successful pro player in e-sports.
If you simply don't care about e-sports for whatever reason then that's fine but hating on it when you can simply just ignore it seems very immature to me.
For those of you who think that e-sports is going to hurt gaming in general: You couldn't be anymore wrong. If anything it will improve it dramatically as e-sports are growing very rapidly. With this growth comes a larger audience to gaming. Who here doesn't want to see growth in gaming? The more gaming grows the better it can be.
6 Like @YYankee its because 'pros' ruin the experience for the average player. Ever notice how people that say 'protip' are always douchebags?
You cant simply ignore it because a bunch of the communities all are full of aspiring wannabe 'pros' lol acting lik easshats and treating 'newbies' and average players like crap.
1 Like @jobber2022497 @oflow @YYankee semantics i wasnt debating the origin of the term thats irrelevant. I'm basically syaing people that think they are 'pro' are usually douchey. I know everyone that says protip isnt a pro and not all pro gamers are jackwagons, i'm talking about my experience.
@Shadowblade2584 @oflow @YYankee You could improve your skill level all sorts of ways if your desire is to win more.
3 Like @oflow @YYankee How do pros ruin the experience for the average players? Just because you have had a bad experience with a game's competitive community does not means that all the players are like that. Unfortunately there will always be some douchebags but that comes with any community.
I'm not ignoring the fact that there are a lot of immature and people who feel they are self entitled in the competitive community. I know this probably more than most people on here because I used to be heavily involved with the forums at MLG.
My point is that there are people out there in the e-sport community that aren't douchebags and don't want to ruin the experience for the average players. There are plenty of people in the e-sport community that are more then happy to help a newbie learn what e-sports is all about and help them get the best possible experience out of said community as possible whether it be spectating or competing.
I hope you and other see me as an example that not all people in the e-sport league are unwelcoming and douchebags.
2 Like @oflow @YYankee I understand where you are coming from. You have had a terrible experience playing some of your favorite games because of immature/douchebag players.
I just want to make it clear that there are some e-sport communities and people out there that genuinely want to help newbies learn about the e-sport community and how they can get the most benefit out of it. With that being said the newbie has to understand that there will be a learning curve involved and has to make the appropriate dedication of time to learn what he/she wants to learn about this e-sport side to the game.
I love being a player in a e-sport setting. It's one of my favorite things to do because I am a very competitive person and I love video games. I also enjoy watching e-sport videos from professional players because I can learn how to improve my own game and I also just find it very entertaining.
I feel like there are plenty of people out there who hate e-sports because of being treated badly by e-sport community members. The people get upset and rightfully so but when they walk away from the entire e-sport scene just because of one community treating them bad it makes me sad.
I get sad because I know that there are wonderful places out here that don't have the immaturity and disrespect for newbies or players that just lack skill. If only newbies to e-sports that are somewhat interested would be able to be introduced to the community by someone that is mature and respectful.
I know this because I experience it for years. I used to be big into competitive Halo and ran into people with similar disrespecting attitudes to the ones you mentioned. I thankfully wasn't exposed to that type of attitude before I was introduced and explained what e-sports was all about.
By chance I got into a game lobby with a semi-professional player shortly learning about MLG. I figured he would be cocky and he wouldn't let me see the light of day in my interest to ask him questions. Thankfully he was very welcoming and explained to me that professional players such as himself are just like everyday people. He put down the glorified image that some people feel entitled too as a successful competitive player (which happens in a lot of things, not just e-sports) and reached out to me. I think it has to do with just overall maturity. Jared (the x semi-pro who reached out to me) and I have been friends for years now and I look back to him as the reason why I felt so welcomed and inspired to give e-sports a shot.
Please excuse the lack of commas and improper paragraph structure.
4 Like @YYankee unfortunately guys like you are few and far between. Most people are nerdraging asshats that whine the entire match if u dont do what they tell you to do or arent as good as them. Its why I hate playing MOBA games. I like the games but the community is full of jerky wannabe pros that QQ the entire game and are so concerned with their records that they will ruin the experience for everyone else if they arent winning all the time. The type of people that constantly remake profiles just to have undefeated records etc.
Prime examples being Smite and LoL.
@strayfies these losers think they'll be the 1 /out of a million that becomes rich and famous with eSports.
lol
8 Like No need to be jealous guys, I'm sure many of you will one day have the chance to have your picture taken with a pretty girl who can't the stand the sight of you too.
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