Serral - The story of how one player defeated the entire South Korean StarCraft II...

Joona Sotala, better known by his nickname Serral, told the world his success story. Serral was not as talented a player as Lee Shin "Life" Hyun. He wasn't as charismatic and epathetic as commentator Vyacheslav "MEDOED" Medoed. The guy just persisted in bending his line. And unlike the two characters presented above, the story of Serral is not a story of dizzying success with a tragic ending, where the protagonist allegedly consorted with evil forces and signed a contract with an evil genie. Serral's story is devoid of vivid emotional swings. It is a simple, one might say, bookish story about climbing the cybersport Olympus in pursuit of a dream...

The Early Years

Joona Sotala was born on March 22, 1998, in the Finnish province of Pornainen, where fewer than 5,000 people lived.

Joona grew up in a small but close-knit family. Joona's childhood was not filled with tragedy or, on the contrary, with lavish celebrations on a grand scale. As a child, Joona had his local idol, an older brother named Joone. Ironically, the brothers turned out to be similar not only in names, but also mentally.

Pornainen is a small town, so finding yourself, let alone a life's work, has been a daunting task for many. The same dilemma faced the Sotal brothers.

The town had no developed infrastructure, which had not changed even after 20 years. Joona preferred hiking in the snow-covered forests, hunting wild animals with his father, biking and other childhood joys of life. The future Serral grew up in a quiet atmosphere, loving quiet and not particularly fond of noisy company.

Fortunately, Joon and Joone's parents were conscientious people, believed in their children, but did not overburden them with exorbitant ambitions. Parents were looking for hobbies for their boys. For Joon, that hobby was golf, which he plays in his spare time to this day.

That all changed in 2010 when StarCraft II came out. Back then, StarCraft II was a huge media boon, and the tournament prizes at the time were exorbitant. In South Korea, the game had already achieved cult status with tournaments televised.

The older Yoone was the first to become interested in the second StarCraft. He nicknamed himself "Protosser," chose the Zerg as his signature race, and began training in earnest. The older brother wanted to play in a Global StarCraft II League (GSL) tournament against the best South Korean players who were unbeatable at the time.

The First Steps

The brothers began to train hard. They devoted all of their free time to StarCraft II. As they delved into the strategic intricacies, Joona and Joone sought to learn the game like the back of their hand. They both played as Zerg. Here the younger brother peeked at the older one, but cheated so the teacher wouldn't notice...

When Joona was just ten years old, he went to a tournament called "Do You Want to be a Progamer?" but he couldn't compete because he was so young. After returning home upset, Jonah told his father about his unfulfilled hopes. The father of the future cyber-sportsperson did not let his son's words pass his lips, but decided to stand up for his child. That's when Markku Sotala - the father of the future Serral - laid the first brick in the foundation of the European StarCraft II tournament. He went to the tournament organizers and asked them to let Joon participate in the tournament with his guardian's permission. And the organizers agreed...

The Clockwork Cybersportman

Five years later, at the age of 15, Joona has already gained weight and a name in the eSports arena. The young talent did not go unnoticed, and Serral was called to the strongest ENCE eSports team at that time. Serral performed under the banner of this team at DreamHack in Bucharest, managed to win one confident victory, but lost in the group stage losing to the Korean players. The loss was to be expected, because at that time StarCraft II had already become almost iconic in South Korea: IT companies were investing in eSports, so young talents were given every opportunity to play comfortably. Even back then, South Korea got to the point where their eSports players played on a schedule, were paid and trained at Teamhouse (Not to be confused with Killhouse. Koreans didn't learn from the SAS Special Forces, wear flak jackets, and shoot targets with MP5s with silencers. South Korea is a peaceful nation).

In 2016, Yohn's career went up one notch again. He began regularly making the playoffs of major tournaments on the scale of the same DreamHack and StarCraft II World Championship Series. Joona saw his first prize money. That might seem like a laughing matter now, but back then, making $4,000 seemed like manna from heaven.

At the same time, an important change appeared in the tournament rules, according to which South Korean players could not participate in American and European tournaments. The South Korean monopoly cracked, which boosted Western StarCraft II.

In 2017, Serral began with the 2017 Intel Extreme Masters tournament. This tournament was a momentous one for Yohn, for he was the only non-Korean player to reach the quarterfinals. There were other European StarCraft II successes before that event, but it was Serral who showed what many players lacked before, he showed consistent play.

After only three months, Serral becomes WCS tournament vice-champion, just 1 card away from becoming the champion of the entire non-Korean world. Serral will play the rest of the tourney with very mediocre results, not even making the playoffs.

After 7 years of playing, Serral still hasn't shown enviable results. As the player himself later admits, he didn't really start playing until 2017. His competitors, on the other hand, weren't stagnating and continued to progress. But even here, as once in his first tournament, Serral performs a miracle...

Joona had already graduated high school at the time, and was faced with the choice of continuing his studies or dedicating himself full-time to StarCraft II. His older brother, Joone, chose his college education over computer games, while his younger brother, Serral, put his all on eSports and decided to achieve the goal he and his brother had dreamed of so many years before...

...and Serral was right. In the short span of the offseason, Joon's skill level skyrocketed to unprecedented heights. It seemed that Serral had completely merged with his race and controlled the Zerg with his mind alone.

In the meantime, 2018 had already begun, and Serral had burst into the year with flying colors. Joona won WCS 2018. Serral closed the first victory march with a score of 17-4 on the cards. Serral went on to become the WCS 2018 Austin champion, losing by just 3 cards. At the same tournament in Valencia, the rampaging Finn repeated his success, and then in Montreal. Serral has won every season of the WCS tournament!

Next stop was the GSL vs World tournament in the same 2018. At this tournament there were already South Korean players, the best of the best, and it was Serral who was entrusted with the chance to fight with them. And that's where Yoona got into his groove. So much so, that he defeated the strongest Korean player, Stats, in the final. Serral has already made history by being the second non-Korean player to win the world title in South Korea, the cradle of StarCraft II skill.

How did he do it and what was Serral's phenomenon? At the time, the player had already shown wonders of poise and composure. Playing as Zerg, Serral nipped all attempts at early aggression, dragging games into the late stages. In the later stages, however, Joon's opponents had no chance of winning. The Finnish player controlled all aspects of the game, from economy to troop stacks. Joona showed good micro-control, and most importantly, he never made a mistake. Because of his style, adjusted to every detail, Serral was jokingly nicknamed "the robot", because mechanically the player was objectively the best. At the same time, Joona did not play anything out of the box, all of his strategies had long been known, he did not come up with any very experimental tactics, Joona simply honed the standard game to perfection.

Serral ended 2018 with another win in the main tournament, Serral takes part in the WCS Global Finals 2018:first he straightened out the 2016 vice-champion "Dark", then he defeated the reigning world champion 2017 "Rouge" and reached the "final boss" he met before, Serral faced "Stats" again. That time "Stats" played for the Protoss.

On the first map, Serral chose a strategy through "roeviks" - they are able to let free units into battle, which live and fight for a short period of time. The strategy is risky, but...it works. Serral pulls out his first victory...

On the second map, Joona played a trick, distracted the Stats and landed units on the enemy base, which turned off all of his logistics.

Sudden rush strategy gives a crack, but Serral was able to take control of the situation and wins the second card.

The score is already 2-0.

In the third map, the players met in a large location, which is good for Serral's race - the Zerg. Joona takes advantage of the race and easily wins.

The score is already 3-0!

One more victory and the hegemony of South Korean StarCraft II would have come to an end, but Stats picks himself up in time, analyzes his mistakes and already in the next match does not let

Serral to unlock the potential of the Zerg. First loss!

3-1.

On the next map, Serral steps on the same rake again, Stats again breaks his opponent's plans with early aggression.

3-2! - One more match and the power is equalized. For the final victory, Serral needs one more card, just one!

Next Match. Once again Serral is lucky with the map, the location is huge. On large maps Serral has an advantage a priori and de facto, but Stats plays without mistakes, and for the first 20 minutes the players go head to head. Serral manages to somehow overtake Stats in economy, but the game has already entered deep leit. Stats, on the other hand, managed to build the best army for the Protoss - a fleet of spaceships consisting of aircraft carriers. Even a Zerg army like that would be next to impossible to deal with, but Serral is in no hurry to meet such a formidable army. Serral begins to catch his opponent off-guard: somewhere he kills a couple of workers, or targets one of the enemy's many ships.

Drop by drop, Serral drains the Stats until the enemy loses control of the situation, until he makes a mistake, and... It worked! Serral smashes the once indestructible Stats army to pieces, handles single targets with ease, and then attacks the exhausted Protoss fleet.

Stats "puts everything on zero", one by one demolishes the Zerg bases, but his forces are running out. Serral destroys the opponent's mazership, Serral strikes again... goes all the way... Victory!

Serral. First. Non-Korean. Champion. World. By. StarCraft II.