WCS Europe Season 2 coverage hub. Click on it, man, it's fine and all

It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say StarCraft 2 hasn’t been all too kind to Mr. Park Ji Soo. Coming into the scene as a former MSL champion, ForGG brought along his BroodWar legacy, intending to develop it into a fruitful StarCraft 2 career. His name and the tales about him beating fellow progamers so hard that they chose the military before switching to StarCraft 2 daunted even the strongest of the day. Being part of renowned BroodWar brands like Lecaf OZ and KT Rolster further added to his formidable profile and signing with oGs in September 2011 helped with the transition of said profile into the new game.

Weirdly enough, ForGG’s results onto StarCraft 2 soil were not to community’s expectations, at least not at the start. All the months spent with oGs brought him nothing better than two Ro32 Code S finishes, an embarrassing performance for the scary BroodWar Terran that he was.

It was only after the signing with the French-based Millenium that ForGG started living up to his former glory. Playing in Europe allowed the Korean talent to learn from a vibrant (and less competitive than the Korean) eSports scene and it was not long before achievements started pouring in. ForGG viciously attacks every possible brand of tournament in Europe and in the second half of 2012 alone he would grab medals from three different franchises, placing third at Assembly Summer, second at DreamHack Valencia and second at ESWC. A gold medal was still missing but life was good for ForGG or at least way better than during his oGs days.

The start of 2013 saw ForGG disappearing from the scene until the release of Heart of the Swarm. With the new expansion, the dreaded Millenium Terran returned even scarier, revolutionizing the TvT match-up while pinning a 47-3 record between March and May. Consequently, the question that always accompanied ForGG at that time was “When will he win a major tournament?”


?Photo: ESL

With momentum on his side, ForGG enters WCS Europe Season 1 and is automatically labeled a circuit favorite alongside Mvp, Naniwa and Stephano. His group stage run is a shaky one but after two second place spots, ForGG does make it to playoffs. There, Lucifron gives him a hard time and almost eliminates him 3:0 but the Korean stabilizes and orchestrates a dramatic comeback. With 3:2, he advances to the semi finals, looking to punish Europe’s finest in Stephano. The gold medal is really close. Just two more games. First the Frenchman and his somewhat unconvincing HotS record and then Mvp in match-up where ForGG is unbeatable. Just two more games.

But it’s not meant to be and on May 26th, ForGG has his claim for a grand final spot denied as Stephano crushes him 3:1. No gold medal again, the Korean remains a “former champion”.

After unsatisfying top eight finishes at the Season 1 finals and DreamHack Bucharest, ForGG now returns to take another shot at the European crown and put an end to his struggles to conquer the scene that has been his home for a whole year. Beating ToD and Naniwa in the Ro32 gave him a good start but his Ro16 group might be tougher. He’s opening against Showtime who otherwise be considered an underdog but as of September 5th is the player to eliminate Europe’s former champion Mvp from the tournament. Next on the line are Genius, who is undefeated in his four PvTs in HotS against Lucifron, Bomber and Hack and Nerchio who generally loves to kill Terrans and is looking forward to making his return on the scene.

Having to play his two worse match-ups against players with proven vT records will no doubt be a tough job for the Millenium ace. Even if he manages to secure a playoffs spot, names like StarDust, Vortix and MC are already there, making for one very difficult bracket even before its completion. Reaching for the European crown is getting more difficult by the second and before Season 3 is over, ForGG might just wish that he had conquered those 2012 tournaments.

More WCS Europe S3 coverage:
 

  • The Ro8 man: Happy in WCS Europe (Ro16 Group A preview)
  • The $400,000 man: MC in WCS Europe (Ro16 Group B preview)
  • Kaelaris: "This younger talent coming through WCS Europe shows the scene has such good depth"