World Cup 6

Final interviews: 10. nick-o-matic

Posted: 13/02/2014 07:12 GMT+3 by Kopaka

nick-o-matic finished 10th in the final standings with 524 points.

1. What was the most fun level to play, and the most memorable?
Well, in a way my own level was of course the most memorable in many ways (making it, watching the results etc) but if we leave that one out as a special case, the most memorable and/or fun ones were 601 (all the stokedness and sickness in results), 603 (when only the top 2 was yet to be announced I had quite insane heart rate due to waiting for possible win for adi) and 608 (was sick fun lev and played it clearly most out of all events and was cool to reach so high position).

2. what did you think was the best replay in the World Cup?
Hard to say. There were so many great recs. Most people seem to choose Kazan's 606 or Bjรถrn's 610 but I think there were much more possibly best recs - 601, 602, 609, 613 and 615 for starters.

3. What results and/or styles were the most surprising or interesting?
Many surprising styles were either in levels that I didn't play much (606 spectrum of routes, 607 top 3 styles, Bjenn's 610 and dat's 615) or in levels where I knew the styles already before the results (adi's 603 tricks, 606 Callisto route (I'm still baffled how K+a were able to hoyl that) and of course those 613 tricks that I knew already beforehands). So in a way those weren't that surprising and Kaz's 602 (mainly the brutal and the time with the route), SPEED's 603 moves, Zweq's 608 and dat's 613 head first start surprised me the most I believe. All in all there were maybe surprisingly little really mindblowing and innovative styles in the levels.

Also the overall quality of the results surprised me in 601 (few with u15 time were left out of top50 even though some didn't send in), 613 (really nice top20 or even top 30) and 615 (I thought everyone had quit playing the cup already).

4. What was your overall opinion of the levels, how did they compare to older World Cups if you played those?
The level quality was mostly ok. But let's say there are quite often levels balled in EOL that I would choose to a WCup over about 50% of the WC6 levels.

Huge extra bonus for Ramone for getting Csaba to make a level to the cup even though it unfortunately sucked. It still was one of the most memorable things in the cup.

5. Who was the player that surprised you the most?
Maybe Munkki. He had quite cool results in some levels.

6. How tough did you feel the competition was?
In the beginning (particularly in the first two levels) it was immense. However, it quickly began to weaken. The winning recs were of high quality throughout the cup, but below them the competition got all the time worse.

What I could say about competition from my own point of view is that in the beginning I no way was thinking of finishing 10th. But so many players did quit that it became possible. It was quite fun to battle against some players in the total standings and the ending where I lost with 0.5 points to Tm in the final level and barely kept Munkki behind was quite memorable. I would have hoped to be able to play more so that I could maybe (a big maybe) have scored a podium and fought against J-sim in total standings. xd

7. If you played older World Cups, how was it different this time?
Hadn't played WCups before. My WCup knowledge was mostly based on the WC4 and WC5 videos.

8. How did playing this World Cup affect your life outside elma?
Actually the WC6 was really intense and stressful time in my life as besides playing I had to keep constructing 613 and making my graduation thesis and other school stuff as well. Also during WCup I moved together with my girlfriend and even had a surgery. But at all times I tried my best in trying to keep up with others in total standings and finish making of 613 as satisfyingly as possible in time. Anyway all in all without WC6 and 613 I think would have graduated now. Now I still have things to do. I must thank my extraordinary girlfriend for understanding me with my priorities. :P

9. How happy are you with your own result? What were your expectations for results and did you meet them?
In pretty much every single level I wasn't really satisfied on my final run. Very often I felt I missed a good opportunity to get into the top 10 or even higher. Maybe only in 601 I felt that I couldn't have improved easily (got a lucky run and never really was even close to getting any better).

10. Did you cooperate with other players and how important was that for your results?

We had pretty major cooperation going on in our team and I think it was the main reason for us having in general good results by many players (not only by adi and Kazan but in some levels also by roope, Koopa and me). We had and have our own team IRC channel and we gathered recs and trainlevs and such to a Google Docs document. Kazan joined our team for this teamwork and I think he didn't have to regret his choise. We of course got much help from him as well.

This all was rather important especially for my results since, as I have told, I had pretty limited time to play so being able to leech from teamstyles helped a lot. Luckily also I managed to contribute in some levels.