Auguste ”Semmler” Massonnat. Photo: Helena Kristiansson / DreamHack

MLG:s CS:GO tournament during X-Games in Aspen is done, and LDLC beat Ninjas in Pyjamas in an epic finals. And RoomOnFire caster Auguste ”Semmler” Massonnat praises the organizers for the event – and believes it will help the North American community to grow. – The North American scene is gonna be huge after this event, he says.

For the first time in CS:GO history, MLG arranged a tournament and pulled it off more or less without a hickup. One of the profiles impressed with what he saw is RoomOnFires Auguste ”Semmler” Massonnat.

– The venue looked great, the timeline is perfect and it seems everything has gone well. I’m just glad MLG get to start with a bang since CS is new to them. It’s the perfect way to start the year and they’ve already set the bar with the production.

– And the games have been pretty damn good with a four way tie in both groups. I was just sitting at home going ”ok”. It’s good to get a different format than the GSL elimination brackets. It worked out well and usually only DreamHack has this luck when it comes to the groups.

”So much action around the NA scene”

He especially mentions the fact that lesser known teams like Kabum manage to show some impressive plays.

– They had underdog teams taking out favorites and it went back and forth. Eventually the favorites came through but you still had a show before that. It wasn’t just a wasted day where everything went according to plan, it was actually entertaining with good storylines.

– The North American scene is gonna be huge after this event. All these top organizations trying to find a CS:GO team. With this crazy melee going on and an event like this. There’s just so much action around the scene right now.

”Gonna start getting real interesting”

Even though the North American teams couldn’t make it to the finals, he thinks that the scene will take a big step forward after the event.

– The scene has the potential and have hungry players but they don’t have the infrastructure yet to compete with the European teams on a consistent basis. It’s like when you compare the western scene to Korea when it comes to League of Legends and StarCraft 2. They have the support for the players and North America is starting to get there. Now you have teams like CLG and Liquid getting into it, it’s gonna start getting real interesting.

”We would’ve had to rework our catchphrases”

Right before the finals between Ninjas in Pyjamas and LDLC, he talks about the game on Saturday, which was dubbed ”the best CS:GO game ever” by none other than Duncan ”Thorin” Shields. The now infamous semifinals between Fnatic and NiP.

– It’s so sick to see. Obviously it’s the countrymen fight and they know each other so well so the fights are gonna be good. It was everything you could hope for. If we’d casted it, I might not have had a voice afterwards. Me and Anders would’ve had to rework our catchphrases.

”DDK had his opportunity to shine”

He also sends praise to his colleagues at the MLG casting desk, Daniel ”ddk” Kapadia and Matthew ”Sadokist” Trivett.

– I was excited to see that DDK had his opportunity to shine, he’s one of the hardest working guys I know, coming up with new content and improving himself. He’s been around for ages and I’m really glad he’s actually got this big event. He’s done really well.

– Sadokist I was less familiar with, but it’s great to see another NA commentator, because variety is good. People will be annoyed if it’s just me and Anders ’cause its gonna be more than enough tournaments this year.