Napy: The Excelsis Story

Excelsis has been one of those underdog clans that have been around forever. Think of v300 only slightly worse at counter-strike.

In this exclusive, we’ll be talking to Napy of excelsis where he spills the beans about some of the excelsis members, how excelsis came about, and why they aren’t at the top of the world CS rankings [GotFrag].

Hi Napy! Excelsis have been around for a LONG time. How did you guys come about as a team?

The rendition of tears ( excelsis ) started at a swimming carnival back in high school. Dypa asked me (napy): “Tony come and play some games and sip some bubble tea”.

I couldn’t resist his charms so I came along… Waiting to see what this LAN thing is about. I was only young and didn’t know what was going to happen but it changed my life… Our lives… THE EXCELSIS LIFE.

Anyhow we started to play counterstrike, it was fking awesome. I remember shooting and killing people in the game and after months of just killing asian kids in the Springvale store we finally formed a clan. There were 2 definite groups / CS clans in our school - DootKrew and Excelsis. We battled day in day out for bets of chicken strips, and after killing asian kids online now we found out about MGL.

How did MGL go for you guys?

We were KEEN to win but we lost all 30 games in the league. BUT we still went to every game - WAS FKING SHIT I HATE RAS [sprbeast]. We also lost to a girls clan in the league as well, that was shit too. And now 2007 nothing has changed except we got some other new people in the clan. As I know we’re the only clan still going with the same name since MGL. We’re awesome. We seen every clan from blanx to fate to iM.

That’s quite some beating you took at MGL. Did you guys continue to LAN after losing 30 games straight at LAN?

Oh hell no we kept tooting man. We went to iBisq, ezone and all that and it went OK - till people started getting WOW

Someone has informed me that there was some sort of arguement between yourself and Ras during LAN about eco rounds? Could you explain the situation further?

Well it was me and ras and every round he would go “ECO TONY ECO TONY FKING ECO” when I had like a lot of money so I didn’t talk to him for 2 weeks at school.. he’s a dickhead. I buy when I want to buy. I watched my demos.

Oh and we learnt how to eco properly from corona in the MGL war rooms no joke.

So you guys didn’t have as much success as you hoped for at LAN, did you guys do better in online wars?

Fking randy shit. Anyone whos anyone will know how shit it is compared to lan. I got a laptop and thats it to cs yet people can still call me shit. WE excelsis have once use to beat people online now we can’t even beat pub randies because everyone talks about what they did in the morning instead of strats.

Ugh..

Man this is good vent.

Being friends with some of the other excelsis guys as well, they asked me to ask you about the time you turned into a ghost. Could you elaborate further?

ROFL true I quit CS to play Wow during the school holidays. BEST DAYS OF MY LIFE. Didn’t EVER go out in the sun and turned pale white. It was fun. NOW THAT’S DEDICATION!

HEY WTF THIS ISN’T ABOUT EXCELSIS

HAHA yeah this ain’t no interview about excelsis anymore. So now that all the excelsis boys have finished school for a couple of years now, are you guys still friends IRL?

Yeah we were friends before CS, CS just made us more angry at each other and sometimes I hate them coz they’re shit at CS except me cause I’m actually good at the game. Like a gang banger.

Man if we hadn’t been friends I reckon I would be overseas now playing for some pros.. No joke.

Yep I can definately see you repping Australia and more importantly the Springvale community overseas I’ve just included a photo of you just in case someone like fnatic or pentagram do pick you up in their starting 5.

Yeah bad I might look like I’m 10 but I’m major.

This isn’t what I thought the interview was going to be but awesomeeee.

mmm… I got one [picture] of me naked holding a stick, ask andeh [iceman/nameci]

No it’s ok I don’t want to see that. Andeh told me all about it already - how you were young and we could see EVERYTHING.

WAIT WTF WHO SEND U MY PHOTOS?

THE NAKED ONES?

ON THE DRUMS?

We’ll just move on.. Since your team has provided us with your provocative pictures would you like to share any of them with us (to get back at them of course).

Omg.. epic. Wait I got a pic of united even tho his not in Melbourne but his mums hot.

lol @ his face.

Oh wait I sent the wrong one. This is the right one.

I feel like I’m dissing his mum even though I don’t know him (Sorry buddy! You can blame napy). Do you have any dirt on the excelsis members in Melbourne?

Andeh talks like a robot on the mic, he has a gangster brother that does weights LOL

Um..

United likes piss porn, dypa has dirty long toenails, sprbeast goes red like a tomato when Bizzare told him he couldn’t change comps LOL.

HAHAHAHA. I guess I’ll wrap this up now by asking where you see excelsis in another.. year? Better or the same level?

No way are we ever going to the top. Been way to many years of losing.. it hurts. Dagger to the heart

But we’re still a fun clan, should be back soon.

EPIC BACKTURE.

Just one more final question, do you see yourself moving to greener pastures then? I remember you slutting around for a few clans.

Oh man.. I’ve been in many clans.

But I went -2 against xgh no joke LOL.

Any final words?

YEH be well to every single onf of you guys. It’s an epic game and we will one day make ice of this water. Solid it up and ram it into the pro overseas scene.

Love u beedee

xoxoxo

I couldn’t find a appropriate place to ninja this image into the interview so here it is anyway. Thanks goes out to andeh for sending it in!

5 Minutes With Dice (c0ke)

It’s time for the next segment of 5 minutes with DICE. This is where we hope to be chatting 1 on 1 with the players and people that make up the Australian E-Sports Community. This time around we were lucky enough to have a chat with someone who has been overseas to represent Australia in the game of Counter-Strike. This is none other than Michael ‘c0ke’ Troung, team Immunity’s in game captain.

He has been at the top of the game for quite some time now with numerous national CS titles with his team-mates they are a force to be feared of at every competition. The following is the interview with Michael.

// Michael ‘c0ke’ Troung

dice: Hello and thank-you for participating, please introduce yourself and tell us a bit about what do you do for a living?
c0ke: Yo im Michael ‘c0ke’ Truong and i play counter-strike for a living (yes its true money + women)

dice: What game(s) do you play and what is your all time favourite?
c0ke: Mainly CS dont really bother playing any other games cause my comp probably wont run it, would like to play tf2 but too poor/lazy to buy it. oh and i enjoy the occasionaly dota and more recently TD! gem + sprout TD is the way to go

dice: Favourite thing to do away from games?
c0ke: Clubbing/Poker

dice: What would be your funniest or most memorable moment throughout your eSports career?
c0ke: Funniest would probably be playing with mattyB or watch Dong just struggle to frag an enemy from behind. Most memorable would be winning ESWC and heading off to paris

dice: Being dubbed as one of the best if not the best player in Australia, how does that make you feel?
c0ke: Nothing cause im an ][CEMAN
ACTUALLY DONT SAY THAT
I’m not andeh

dice: If you were to be removed from the Immunity line up what team would you try to swindle in to? If none, what line up of players would you try to make a team with?
c0ke: Hmm if i was removed from iM i would probably just play for fun, probably become like bdn and live for online CS

dice: Is the talks of Mark ‘Kram’ Pierce being emo true? What has he done to prove this?
c0ke: This indeed is true, the evidence i have to back this up are found on his ipod, every now and then he would force his earphones into my ears and play some emo song or just randomly play it via vent. His favourite saying is “FUCK LIFE”. goes to some shit emo club “BANG”. oh and theres slit marks all over his wrist true story

dice: Will mini-Kram (bl4nk) ever be seen with a Immunity shirt on?
c0ke: Will be unlikely too see the 2 brothers play under the same team im afraid… too much anger involved

// Quick Fire Questions

dice: PC or Console?
c0ke: PC

dice: Favourite Pizza topping?
c0ke: Mexicana

dice: Water or Soft drink?
c0ke: Waterrrr

dice: Favourite Song at the moment?
c0ke: One Republic - Apologize

dice: Do you own a pink shirt?
c0ke: Yep and a pink skirt

dice: MySpace URL?
c0ke: Don’t have myspace

dice: Your celebrity girlfriend’s name?
c0ke: Jessica Alba

// Final Questions

dice: If you could invent something what would it be?
c0ke: A game where theres Terriost and Counter-Terriost and you have to plant bomb to win etc

dice: If you were in a fight with Chuck Norris what would you bring and how would you defeat him?
c0ke: Probably just accept a fly kick to the head and take it like a man

dice: So you wouldn’t try to defeat him? lol
c0ke: Chuck Norris is invincible!

dice: Thank-you for your time :D, Any shoutouts?
c0ke: Stay in school?

Sup Hadsi?

Dice caught up with Paul ‘hadsi’, one of the original members of dice, at 3am on a Tuesday morning, all the way in South Yarra, while eating kebabs! We’re k33n :)~
Official attendees:
- bui
- peki
- beedee
- hadsi

dice: So how are you hadsi? What do you get up to these days?

hadsi: Going really good. I’m currently working at Coles Head office. Been doing a lot of sport and business planning.

dice: Going back to the end of 2006 when you decided to leave the “competitive” cs scene, what were your reasons behind it?

hadsi: The main reason was that God told me to do something else. First was a church mission trip with an organisation called THEOS and then things started to blossom from there. Also I had not time in the end with work, karate and other church missions that I am currently involved in. If I was at Uni, I’d probably still be playing.

dice: At the end of 2006 was also the year NJ went downhill, or at least didn’t maintain any decent results. Do you think you were part of the reason by leaving?

hadsi: Holy shit, lol!! Well, maybe!! Maybe not! I think you should ask the people within NJ about that.

dice: Being a very religious person, do you think people discriminate against it within the gaming community?

hadsi: I haven’t had any discriminations towards me and ex NJ member Jezza, didn’t have any discrimination from what I know of. I can’t speak for the whole community, but from what I experienced, the CS community will respect your beliefs as long as you back it up with your actions.

dice: Enough serious questions, onto the more juicy ones! Many people know you from your loud laughter and different sense of humor, do you do it on purpose or does it come naturally?

hadsi: LOL oh man, my laughing!! People still recognise me by the way I laugh!! anyway, sadly, this is my personality. Always one to push the boundaries in humor and an extrovert by nature.

dice: Speaking of pushing things to the boundary, being part of the original No Jnsie No Justice crew, I distinctly remember one time when we had finished our matches for the day and we headed across the road for Maccas. On the way there you said something very unsual, do you remember what you said and who you were talking about?

hadsi: HAHAHAHA!! Oh man I remember that cleary! It was to piss tnyvo off really. To make this interview more juicy, I’ll tell you what I said to Tony: “Don’t you think Tony’s cute?”. He turned around and said: “WTF??” and the sexual tension began from there!

dice: Even though the sexual tension between you and tnyvo blossomed (at least you towards tony - that shits illegal right?), you still convinced tnyvo to stay over for the night. Tony bought the “there’s no public transports that early” bait argument and agreed to stay the night. Just between you and me, what really happened that night?

hadsi: I watched him sleep the whole night, it was beautiful. ROFL AHAHAH!! Nothing happened you chow hai!! Nah he stayed over as the next game was at 9:00am Sunday or something obsurd and public transport wasn’t available.

dice: Is there anyone you know from CS who you’re keen to catch up with?

hadsi: Basically all the NJ people, but especially Jezza. He’s in Sydney and doing ministry work there! But really, just want to see how everyone is progressing in their life. Kendall, George, Tony, Liam and Jezza really.

dice: During CS competitions, yourself and I often carpooled together and usually parked at Crown Casino because it was free for us. I recall you playing a bit of blackjack from time to time when the day ended. Could you explain your “system” to me?

hadsi: Screw you. I lost a lot of money that night! Actually did I? I really can’t remember. But my system was, “the dealer can’t win 5 times in a row!” so I slapped more and more money on the table. Was that it? Or was it “the odds of that happening is too low”? It was something along those lines..

dice: Your gambling future looks bright hadsi. Any final shoutouts?

hadsi: Thanks to all who supported NJ and now support clubdice! I wish all the best for you guys in both CS and careers/personal life!

Some pictures of the outing!

5 Minutes With Dice (Cokester)

Welcome to a new segment within the site called 5 minutes with DICE. We will hopefully be chatting 1 on 1 with the players and people that make up the Australian E-Sports Community and what better way to kick things off then with the one and only Dave ‘cokester’ Thomas aka giraffe to many.

People who know Dave would believe he is the backbone and driving force of Victorian Counter-Strike(CS). Without his devotion to the scene, Victorian CS wouldn’t be where it is today. The countless hours he has put in to administrate over-timed matches is beyond belief, yet I don’t feel sorry for him because we all know he just sits on his ass and plays WoW all day.

So without further to do here is the the first of many player interviews to come.

// Dave ‘cokester’ Thomas

dice: Hello and thank-you for participating, please introduce yourself and tell us a bit about what do you do for a living?
cokester: Hello - My name is Dave, i like to spend most of my time defeating peki in coin tosses

dice: What game(s) do you play and what is your all time favourite?
cokester: At the moment i’m still playing a bit of WoW, and finishing off portal…all time favorite would have to be CS

dice: What would be your funniest or most memorable moment throughout your eSports career?
cokester: Skills deciding to pass out in his own spew on the starcity floor

dice: Favourite thing to do away from games?
cokester: Nightlife & Basketball

dice: If you could invent something what would it be?
cokester: Something that’d block me from being capped every month

// Quick Fire Questions

dice: PC or Console?
cokester: PC

dice: Favourite Pizza topping?
cokester: Salami

dice: Water or Soft drink?
cokester: Soft drink

dice: Favourite Song at the moment?
cokester: Motion City Soundtrack - point of extinction

dice: Do you own a pink shirt?
cokester: Never!

dice: MySpace URL?
cokester: www.myspace.com/davegiraffe

dice: Your celebrity girlfriend’s name?
cokester: Vicky Amos

// Final Question

dice: If you were in a fight with Chuck Norris what would you bring and how would you defeat him?
cokester: I’d bring peki to sit on him

dice: Thanks for your time, any shout outs?
cokester: No worries mate, no shout outs

ZAM Renovates

I headed over to Zone Adrenalan Melbourne today to check out the renovations Russell(Rustyboy) had done. Needless to say it looks pretty impressive however you probably won’t be able to tell much from the bad images I took in the Gallery sections.

Had a brief chat with rustyboy and this is what he had to say:

dice: So what made you want to change ZAM?

rusty: We renovated ZAM because we have stopped doing retail which meant we really didn’t need the middle room. There’s still a small section on the wall we’ve kept which can be used for retail but just basically wanted to open it up a bit.

dice: Did the opening of Virtual Arena (VA) have anything to do with the renovations?

rusty: Haha, no it had nothing to do with VA opening up at all. It was more to do with the fact that we’re purely designing the place for a more lan focus. The walls previously were mainly built for the retail section, and once we didn’t have the retail it didn’t make sense to keep the walls.

dice: What do you plan on putting in the middle of the room now?

rusty: At first we’ll probably put a couple of couches and a table or something like that. Maybe some black vynal stuff. I think potentially, obviously down the track sometime maybe next year sometime we might have more pc’s but I don’t think its going to be anytime soon.

dice: Do you see any Counter-Strike nationals being held here now?

rusty: Ah no I don’t. The main reason why is because firstly even if we did have computers in the middle we still wouldn’t have the layout for a national. You need 40 pc’s minimum and 5 in a row and even if we did have that, we couldn’t have the people in the middle playing the people over there [either side]. It could be done but at the moment no.
I’ve worked out that we can do a nationals but the only way to do a national is over 3 days and I dont think many people are going to want a 3 day nationals.

dice: Thanks for your time russ, can we have sponsorship now?

rusty: *shakes head and continues playing wow*

Melbourne Summer Preview

With Team Immunity taking the first ACNC autobirth with relative ease and with Melbourne’s second qualifier fast approaching (November 3rd - 4th), dice sits down with some local teams within the community to check their status. Unfortunately, due to the fact that there’s an increase in mix teams we only managed to get a hold of some teams - if we missed you, sorry in advance! These local updates have been long overdue as it creates a competitive hype prior to the match and provides some light reading for those bored at work/study.

Read more