Interview with a Korean 1.6 Legend Geun-Chul 'solo' Kang

As more Asian teams are rising into the CS:GO scene, we interviewed a 1.6 legend Geun-Chul ‘solo’ Kang from WeMade FOX and project_kr, to remind us the potential threat the Asian teams could have. solo has been considered one of the best individual players in the world back in the 1.6 era and probably the best in Asia, even with difficult conditions such as lack of teams to practice against, the lack of popularity of CS due to RTS games like Starcraft, and the lack of teammates who could be capable of competing against the elites.

solo was very flexible with his plays, he was capable of filling almost every, or even every single role for his team. He could adapt his play style to the role he was filling, switching his level of aggressiveness to fit his new placed role. He was unique in this way as other top players like GeT_RiGhT and neo have the team to adapt to them.

He retired from CS due to required military duties in Korea, but he went out with a top place in World eSports Masters 2010, beating SK 2:0.

His accomplishments are 

- 1st in World eSports Masters 2010
- 3rd in IEM Global Challenge Chengdu (2009)
- 5-6th in Intel Extreme Masters III (2009)
- 3rd in World Cyber Games 2008
- 3rd in World eSports Masters 2008
- 2nd in Electronic Sports World Championship 2008
- 2nd in Intel Extreme Masters II (2008)
- 6th in 2006 CPL Winter
- 3rd in World eSports Masters 2006
- 2nd in World eSports Masters 2005 S03

The interview was done in Korean and translated into English, contact me for the Korean version.

You quit CS after the military duties, what happened? If military wasn’t mandatory, would you have continued playing CS?

solo: I didn’t quit CS after my duties, I just went to Korean CS:Online events instead of CS 1.6 or Global Offensive. CS:Online is pretty similar to 1.6 and I’ve won all tournaments I attended. If military wasn’t mandatory, I would have been playing in the tournaments with players I was close to like f0rest, GeT_RiGhT, neo and Taz. I wouldn’t have stopped playing CS.

 

Do you play and follow CSGO?

solo: I’ve been playing a lot since a month ago, I’m using the Chinese auto-matching making program (5ewin) to play.

 

The popularity of CS:GO is getting higher pretty quickly, could you be coming back to CS? 1.6 players like ave, minet, sunde from mTw are coming back to CS and the numbers of Korean teams are increasing, unlike the 1.6 era when you had barely any team to practice against, and you have been recognised by numerous amount of people, and even considered top 15 players in the world back in the day. So any chance you might come back to the CS scene?

solo: Currently I am working as a Game System Designer and I’m also making a FPS game. If there were CS:GO tournaments in Korea, I am willing to try my best, but at the moment I’m just having fun with the game.

 

There are rumours of Bail and glow coming back to the CS scene, do you know anything about it?

solo: Glow is having fun with the game, playing it very often. Bali is now married and has a son, he doesn’t game anymore.

 

The most asked questions about Asian CS is why isn’t the Asian scene as big as the Europeans and the North Americans? 

solo: In Asia, Counter-Strike isn’t very popular. Especially in Korea, the gamers aren’t very fond with Steam or Origin as they would have to pay for the games. They mostly play online fps games, they prefer more simpler and easier online games. In Asia, online FPS games are pretty common so I think that’s the reason why many doesn’t play CS:GO. For China, it’s mainly CrossFire.

 

What is the most memorable memory from your CS career?

solo: It was when I won the World eSports Masters 2010.

 

Who did you like to fight against the most?

solo: I had the most fun playing against Swedish teams.

 

Have you ever thought of a comeback?

solo: No, I haven’t thought of a comeback. 

 

Last question, do you eat cereal with a teaspoon or a table spoon?

solo: Hahaha, it’s a funny question. Who asked this question? Maybe we should do a 1 vs 1 game haha. I use a table spoon, gotta eat more.

 

Thank you for allowing me to interview you!

solo: No problem, haha.

These are a couple of highlight videos of solo back in 1.6.