Interview: The second part of the interview with the Dutchman 02.02.2014, 14:30

How did the first few days of practice go for your team? With cadiaN you have a new IGL now to whom you have to get used as well. Where did you apply the focus?

Chris 'chrisJ' De Jong: I guess the same as any team that is aspiring to compete with the top teams; we talk a lot about possible situations in-game and prepare a variation of tactics or moves that we can apply when we play together.



EPS Finals - December 2013 EPS Finals - December 2013

In March there will be the first major tournament of the new year, where the teams play for 250.000 US-Dollar. You are once again one of the favorites to qualify for the main tournament. Do you think that you can keep up with the top-tier teams there, or is the focus rather placed on future events?

Our first focus will be qualifying for the event in Katowice, right now I find it really hard to say if we can even think of actually competing with the top teams there. We are just trying to establish a stable line-up, try and qualify for the tournament and we will look from there. I hope we can finally create a line-up that will hold on for a few months, and then the results will come for sure.

In the first German qualifier of the EMS One Katowice 2014 you were already able to qualify for the National Final. Were you satisfied with your performance, when you consider that these were the first official matches with the new lineup?

Well in the end only winning counts, of course we hoped to beat the teams we faced more convincingly. On the other hand I found it quite a good test of our teamspirit, we made some really big mistakes (individually and as a team) but we didn’t give up and kept playing for the win. In that sense, I'm certainly content with how events turned out.

In offline events there is always a pressure on you since you often open the round with the first-frag. Are you confident to be the player who gets all the attention from outside or would you like to see another player from your team in the spotlight?

This pressure doesn’t mean much to me anymore. I am used to this role and actually like it a bit too much sometimes, I often try to be the deciding factor in nearly every round and this can work against us if I’m not having a good day or the opponent knows my moves too well. Getting the first frag all the time is of course a good thing but the opposite happens too sometimes.

There were many critical statements about you being a so-called ‘onliner’ because you don’t perform well at LAN-events. Do you read these comments about you, and how do you react to them? Is it more motivation or is it depressing reading such comments?



chrisJ in his usual look chrisJ in his usual look

Of course I read those comments, but since I have been getting such comments since the start of my “career” in 1.6 I have gotten used to it. I have already proved in 1.6 that I can play really well at LAN. I still feel that one of my best matches ever was played at LAN (in 1.6), so these “flames” about me being an "onliner" really just make me laugh. I don’t play well in every match, but I play A LOT more online, so is it really that strange to see me have more good matches online? I guess the comments still motivate me a bit, I still feel I have a lot to more to show at LAN than I have done untill now. Lets hope 2014 will be a good LAN year.

How do you see the development of CS:GO over the last few months? What needs to be done in your opinion, and how do you judge the work of VALVE overall?

CS:GO has really turned into a fun game to play, especially comparing it to how it was when it got released. For me the most important changes that I would like to see would be, in order of importance:



1. AWP needs to be 100% accurate when zoomed in, right now I can aim at someone behind the barrels on bombspot A from the long pit and the bullet can just hit the barrel and do no damage. AWP should just be pinpoint accurate.



2. Wallbang damage needs to be increased.



3. Air movement needs to be increased to allow for a bit better movement, which would help to dodge AWP shots.



4. Some maps needs to be made bigger, especially 'Inferno' is still too small and cramped, 'Cache' should also be added to the tournament map pool.

Thank you for the interview.

After we talked to Chris 'chrisJ' de Jong primarily about the past in the first part of the interview, we will now take a look at current things. Besides the latest performances of the new lineup and his improvement suggestions for CS:GO, his person was the big topic in the second part of the interview.