Gods of Boom competitions attract the best people from around the globe. Today, we have an interview with two French gunslingers who have been organizing their own Challengermode tournaments for some time - meet Z0oLand3r and el daron!
You’ve been in the game for three years already – you’re real Gods of Boom veterans. How did you start playing?
el daron: I started playing in October 2017, so we can consider that I am an old player. I started the game solo and I quickly made friends with whom to play. I created the FR clan, which lasted 2 years and which was considered as one of the best, and 1 year ago I wanted to join my friends in the clan where I am currently, the Jugg clan. A lot of people know me because I try to help people, advise them.
I discovered the game a bit by chance. I was browsing the playstore because I was looking for an FPS, and I came across GOB and immediately fell in love with the game because of its simplicity of play and general design
Z0oLand3r: I'm now 38 and started FPS with Counter-Strike 1.3. With age and family life, I quit playing console and PC games and started playing mobile games. For me, a mobile game should be able to be learned quickly, due to the small screen size, and be playable for 5 minutes as well as 5 hours. It was a friend who introduced me to Gods of Boom and I fell in love with it, as it met most of my criteria for mobile games. I had the chance and the pleasure to join the moderation team, which I had to leave because of lack of time. I hope I have an opportunity to join it again soon and why not Game Insight? I am very demanding and very critical (in a good way I hope). I've obviously tried a lot of other first person shooters, but it’s Gods Of Boom that I keep coming back to. Even other big games fail to captivate me as much. I hope Game Insight will invest even more resources in this game, which in my opinion has amazing and still under-exploited potential.
How did you two meet?
Z0oLand3r: The French community is quite small on GOB. I met el daron because he's quite simply a staple GOB character. He always has an open ear to listen and always has advice to give, despite his damn character. He is one of the few people with whom I chat with privately on the internet, on any subject, even other than GOB. I am now in the Jugg clan with him and we both share a lot of things, including our love of GOB and our desire for it to evolve in the right direction.
el daron: We met on FR Discord a little more than 2 years ago, and we immediately got along. We have the same vision of things, the same way of thinking, and for me, we have become real friends. We chat every day, and Zoolander joined me in the clan where I am now.
Tell us a little more about the French Gods of Boom community: what’s special about it?
Z0oLand3r: The French community is not necessarily different from the others but it is smaller and has a worse character :D
On a more serious note, it still contains very beautiful people who see the game positively through the good times and the bad, even during the periods of instability or irritating bugs.
Some players are very good and others have great potential, so we continue to change attitudes and unite the community.
Let's talk about your tournament activities. Who came up with the idea to organize tournaments, and how did you do it?
el daron: Before Challengermode, we were doing tournaments and training between us. We had fun without the stress of the regs. Then we saw conflicts between clans about consumables and their abuse, so we decided that we had to go to the Pro Play mode with the limitations of consumables, and it all started from there. Zoolander contacted GI esports team to gain access to the Challengermode, and we made our first tournament for the French community. Then, we started chatting with friends and clans who were interested in participating in tournaments, so we created our own Discord server and started organizing Sunday tournaments. In the beginning, we made the community vote for the best days and the best time, with the majority voting for Sundays. The most annoying thing is that some people register but forget the time of their tournament. We therefore send reminders on the day of the tournaments.
Who plays in your tournaments? (level, age, sex, community recognition)
el daron: The majority of players in our tournaments are level 50+, they are mainly adults between 20 and 40 years old, and we have clans known as BTOB, NWFC and many others. We have players like Apex who have played in the qualification for old ESL competitions. From week to week, we have more players and teams forming, and people train during the week to come and play on Sunday in our tournaments. On April 4, we had our first tournaments with cash prizes, with streams and live commentary on the Shouri channel. I would also like to thank community manager tigrch and GOB who offer us cases with consumables as rewards, and who gave access to shouri as a spectator.
Is there anything you would like to add to the Challengermode system?
el daron: For the creation of tournaments, the only thing I would like is to be able to add new maps. The maps recur too often, meaning they are often the same in tournaments, and I would like to see maps like Farm or Night Farm, and Halloween Harvest for example. The Farm is authorized but we never see it. Adding KoTH maps would be awesome. Europe Halloween and Asia Waterfront for example
Z0oLand3r: el daron summed it up pretty well. I'll just say (if it hasn't already been done) that I find it interesting to adjust the "old" Pro Play mode to the same weapon and perk variables as Challengermode. This will allow teams to train and strategize outside of tournaments, in good conditions, ideally being able to use the esport tab for loadouts.
In an ideal world, I would love to have the possibility of making a championship within Challengermode. Why? Because I think a lot of players don't come to tournaments because of direct elimination. They say to themselves that it is useless since they will not win, and may, due to bad luck, come across a big line up in the first round.
By the way, are you competitive? Do you have teams you play with at tournaments?
el daron: I do not play the tournaments because for me, an organizer should not play in his own tournaments for ethical reasons, and so that players do not make remarks on the fact that I organize, play, and that I handle brackets for example. It is to avoid conflict. On the other hand, I play in pro training mode with the teams, and my clan has a team which competes in all the tournaments. I did participate in seasons 1 and 2 ESL qualifying
Speaking about loadouts, what loadouts and perks do you use? And what game modes do you prefer?
Z0oLand3r: Personally, my loadouts are not very original. The game currently requires 2 loadouts to play. 1 for rusher and one for sniper. The scout with a meta shotgun is probably the most played loadout. Perks are one aspect of the game that I would have done well without. I like the possibility that GOB offers to play directly without having to think too much. The perks are not in this logic. I simply put in those that seemed to make the most sense to me. I know that some players go much further by optimizing perks with loadouts and weapons. Personally speaking, It bothers me. The perk in classic mode annoys me because they offer a significant advantage to those who have spent a lot of money or have benefited without being punished by certain bugs ... skill is not enough anymore and I find that a pity. It seems that some players are known to have abused bugs and maybe even cheap gold but are still strutting around. I hope the big spenders don't get special treatment when they "slip".
About the game modes, I like everything because it brings diversity.
I regret, on the other hand, that superb maps are withdrawn. I also regret that some game modes, such as some brawls, are not available; either longer or at more regular intervals (even without any reward to be won). Alternative modes do not influence the statistics and relax our spirits. They may need to evolve a bit for renewal, and sometimes slightly redesigned (but that's only my opinion) to make them more fun. For example the Gunslinger brawl. I think we should all have an identical pistol (like the cs_deagle5 map in Counter-Strike), an awp_map map, or conversely a non-sniper mode, very dynamic and brutal.
el daron: I like all the modes in GOB except the object capture mode...loool. Otherwise I use 2 Loadouts, 1 loadout Sniper, and 1 loadout Recon, with Scout. For perks, I analyze them a lot and I change the perks depending on my team or my duo. Perks are complicated to understand, but once understood, they can change the game. The perks I could talk about for hours, explain their advantages, disadvantages, when to play them, and with which weapons. The perks are very complex and very few people care about them, but they are very important. None of the machine guns are played at a high level and I would find it great to integrate them into the loadout with their perks, a game with 3 weapons including 1 machine gun! And 6 perks, 2 with machine guns.
My favorite loadout and perks for regs:
What do you do in real life and do you have hobbies besides Gods of Boom?
Z0oLand3r: I personally am unemployed, and with the coronavirus it is not always easy but it will end one day. My hobbies are quite limited as well. Evenings and weekends are more dedicated to family. I play when the house is asleep.
Сan we expect to see new videos on your YouTube channels? Are there any plans to develop your channels?
Z0oLand3r: I have a YouTube channel that I no longer feed at the moment. I would like to play more and expand my channel, but since that's not what fills the fridge I was forced to calm down.
el daron: I just want to give a little advertisement of my YouTube.
What do your families think about your devotion to the game? Are they jealous that you spend time on an online game?
Z0oLand3r: My wife hates watching me play. She thinks it is a waste of time :D
Will you introduce your kids to Gods of Boom when they’re old enough?
Z0oLand3r: Regarding my son, I will try to teach him how to manage his screen time properly but I am not against him playing.
Thank you both for the nice conversation, it was a pleasure! Please share the links to your Challengermode Spaces and your Discord servers, so players can join your competitive community.
