The Big Brother effect

Ok, we just moved into a gaming house. Now what?!

But I set fire, to the house (Picture courtesy of IGN)

It's all Korean to me

Chaulift (Picture courtesy of SotL)

I can't even imagine how much time it would take to list the players that moved to another team to get into a gaming house or the teams that left their organisation and joined another just because the second could provide them a gaming house. But the fact that you just have a gaming house matters? Or the way you use it makes the difference? Feel free to join me in the hard trip to analyze the different aspects of an important chapter of the game we all love.One of the main dangers of having a gaming house is that living with four other people for an extended period of time without certain rules that exist, for example, in a family creates a lot of tension and tension results to conflicts. If you've ever watched the Big Brother TV show you know what I am talking about. These conflicts can only hurt team's overall performance and the team captain will have a hard time dealing with those for sure. I am not trying to say that 100% team members will start fighting but the chances are higher than they were when there was no gaming house.Imagine yourself moving into a house with four other young people that happen to have the same hobby as you. Nothing productive will ever come out of it if you don't learn to be professional where needed, right? Well, the teams that choose to live in a gaming house face exactly the same problem. This is the point where the team manager/coach should do anything possible to ensure that the team will stick to the schedule.And that's the right time to say something that I strongly believe. Being a team manager is not easy, contrary to popular belief. A team manager has the hard responsibility to keep the balance between the team members and take care of eveything non - related to the game so players can stay 100% focused. Take Team Solomid as an example. When they started living together, without any coach or manager and Reginald was doing all the dirty work, they were losing in almost every tournament. When Jonas moved in, things changed. The team started to follow a certain schedule, they were practicing more and Reginald focused completely on gaming. Baylife Bros started dominating every NA and international tournament they were playing and the team is now in the Top 3 of the world for sure.The origins of a gaming house like the one I described above comes from Korea where Brood War professional players were moving into gaming houses and they were practicing 12 - 16 hours a day which is insane in my western gaming mind. For them it's just another job. To be honest gaming is not "just another job" in Korea. You can get so famous by gaming there that we can compare it with a rockstar or a football player in USA. That's why we are jealous of the Koreans in matters of gaming. They have a different point of view on it. While, in western countries some people still have the horrible stereotype of "the chubby guy in his parent's basement", Koreans are watching Starcraft II games on TV the same way we watch a football match. And their society's point of view reflects to the way they use gaming houses.As i stated above, i believe that the problem with gaming houses is not the money. The problem is that it's hard to find a formula that makes sure you are using it right. Feel free to disagree with me in the comments below. And don't forget to be here in two weeks for the second article of my series!