Further details are still being revealed, but it includes teams accused of intentionally losing matches and even leaking their own team’s replay files to illegal gambling syndicates. It is believed to have started in 2006 and peaked in 2008.
A lot of people are involved, including pro gaming coaches and even Ma Jae-Yoon . . . one of the most famous StarCraft players. During the 2007 and 2008 season, Ma Jae-Yoon underperformed and lost several important matches, posting the worst record of his playing career. At the time, it was thought that he never quite recovered from a big loss to a rival player.
The eSports organizers are also accused of knowing all about it, too, and tried to rectify the issue themselves by co-existing with the illegal betting sites. The dirty teams are purging themselves by naming names. Some of the most serious offenders are even being forced to retire. Americans are primarily drawing parallels to the massive Black Sox Scandal back in 1919.
Finding those further details sent me chasing a series of trackbacks and hat-tips, but for starters you'll find a little more on Kotaku and GamePron. The English-language source looks to be a post on a StarCraft community messageboard with links to Korean-language sources.
1 comments:
Not exactly anything new to Korea. This has been happening as far back as '98, when the newly-crowned (Korean) World Champion was found to have padded his win-loss record by playing bots and friends who would purposely lose to him, so he could qualify for the Championship tournament.
And this was WAY before StarCraft became such a cash cow for players and sponsors and cable providers. Now that they can make serious coin, this is a surprise?
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