Infinity Seven is pleased to officially welcome two new members to its family today! On the player front iS is incredibly happy to announce the signing of Terran Tim “Tbeezy” Gandionco, while on the staff front we have signed Jared “Zoia” Eggleston as a Content Producer.
Tbeezy is a promising American Grandmaster Terran from California most known for his involvement with University of California-Davis’ Collegiate Starleague team and overall esports scene. As a 21 year old Mechanical Engineering major Tim has led UCD to some incredibly solid results in the CSL, including having them qualified for the final 8 teams in CSL’s current March Madness tournament. As president of UCD’s starcraft club he’s been heavily involved in both running the CSL team itself, featuring players like Spanishiwa, as well as events and get-togethers of a more casual club variety.
Tim has made it clear that he wants to drive UCD to even greater heights in the CSL than ‘merely’ top 8 and qualifying through the first qualifier along with University of California Berkeley is a great first step, expect to see Tim featured on CSL streams during Davis’ matches as the tournament continues. In fact his impressive performances in the CSL was a large influence in iS’ scouting of him. He becomes the second player on the team scouted largely through CSL involvement, joining Rutger’s Mike on the roster as collegiate stars.
The team has been very happy and excited at Tim’s joining and have thoroughly enjoyed his company during his trial period, with glowing recommendations from several players and managers he was an easy choice to add to the team.
“First off I want to thank Infinity Seven for giving me this opportunity to compete for their professional Starcraft II Team. My main goal as a member of Infinity Seven is to not only win a major tournament but also improve as a player. I’ve gotten this far practicing and improving by myself, working with Infinity Seven can only promise bigger and better outcomes. I’m looking forward to showing everybody what I’ve got!” - Tim “Tbeezy” Gandionco
You can watch Tim’s games soon during UCD matches in the CSL and also during major tournament events that will be announced as they happen, but as that is not nearly often enough to be exposed to someone with Tim’s personality you can also catch his stream at www.twitch.tv/ucdtbeezy! Please do tune in, you won’t be disappointed!
As exciting as Tim’s signing is to everyone involved in the organization we would be remiss to not mention Zoia in more detail. Jared “Zoia” Eggleston has joined as a content producer to help our players grow both as players and presences in the StarCraft scene. He also produces content of his own on his stream at www.twitch.tv/starcraftsquad!
Jared felt is was very important that people hear his words on his plans for the team and so I will leave his section to him.
“POODLE FIGHTING!” – Jared “Zoia” Eggleston
Oh I am terribly sorry that’s the wrong quote.
“I am very excited to be apart of the Infinity Seven family! I have several friends on this team so I know joining it will be a blast. What you can expect over the next several months from myself and the rest of the team is loads and loads of content. Much more will be done than casting. Expect lots of great things from this team!” -Jared “Zoia” Eggleston
On the topic of great things from the team, the first big content project is our brand new YouTube channel! Featuring a game from our brand new player casted by our brand new content producer!
Keep checking Infinity Seven’s website for updates on all this new content as well as all of our players results!
BONUS CONTENT!- Before I’m totally forgotten by everyone, Infinity Seven has also brought a new writer on board to bring you guys all of the epic news and outstanding updates that you can imagine! You can expect to see lots of articles from… well from me! Yay! I will also be using my insight to start a series of articles exploring some of the more theoretical or abstract areas of Starcraft play that you can expect on www.infinityseven.net starting soon(tm)*! You can find my name on this post if you’re that curious!
*Disclaimer: Soon is the intellectual property of Blizzard and the use of the word in this article is not endorsed by Blizzard in any way which hopefully means I am free to actually release the content at a point in time that actually exists.
**Special thanks to itsjustatank for use of his photo of Zoia, and to callsignViper for the last minute help with the banner!
Infinity Seven’s owner Zhang “zemotion” Jingna was brought on as a guest for this week’s episode of ChanmanV’s ‘Climbing The Ladder’ to discuss photography in eSports. She was joined by Kevin “Silverfire” Chang (Team Liquid photographer), Helena Kristiansson (DreamHack photographer), and Carlton Beener (ESFI photographer) to discuss an array of topics ranging from how they got started in the industry, the problems they’re faced with, and what their end goals are.
For those unfamiliar with Climbing The Ladder, it is a weekly eSports show hosted by Chris Chan and John Clark that discusses the ins and outs of competitive gaming. You can find more info and previous VoDs on their Team Liquid thread.
After iS.Temp0 released “So Mad You Rage” 5 months ago, it has been unusually quiet around this East Coast star. While all of his parody songs are insta-classics, it still couldn’t hurt to get more awesome content from our musical hero. So when he asked for memorable 2012 moments to create a new masterpiece, we were thrilled.
And as it turned out we had all reason to be! Temp0 released A.L.I.V.E (a remix of Asher Roth’s G.R.I.N.D)and it surpassed all of his previous work.
Using an enormous string of cuts from the SC2 scene over the last year, Temp0 uses the new song to send a clear message: lay down the pitchforks and celebrate the awesomeness that is Starcraft 2 together. Whether it is the tears in the eyes of Liquid’Hero losing or Ganzi’s Gangnam Style live performance, the game has so much to give that we would be fools for doing anything but enjoying it immensely.
Watch Temp0′s new song along with his older work on his YouTube channel.
As November progressed the world has seen a lot of StarCraft 2 action. And with great competition come great players: for InfinitySeven it was our own Sky “Insur” Xu who showed his skills. First there was MLG Dallas, where he signed up for the notoriously hard open bracket. Our Protoss star made it to the finals of the winner bracket by beating EG’s DeMuslim in the semi’s. After a loss to DeMu’s teammate Thorzain he found himself fighting Liquid’Sheth for a spot in the championship bracket, where he beat the North American Zerg 2-0. On Championship Sunday he had the bad fortune to be matched up against the Korean pro LG-IM First, and his glorious run ended.
The pinnacle of all the StarCraft 2 action came halfway through the month however, with the Blizzard World Championships being played out in Shanghai, China. By being top 6 at the North American Continental Finals Insur had ensured himself of a spot among the 32 best players worldwide to go to China. Accompanied by Nick “Axslav” Ranish who would be doing some casting action, Insur travelled to the Far East to compete with the best of the best. He faced tough competition in FXO Lowely, against whom he lost his first series. He then had the chance to go up against the Brazilian Protoss player Levin, where he won in an easy 2-0 fashion. Then the deciding match came down to a rematch versus the European Zerg Lowely.
In this nailbiting best of three the games were very close indeed. During the first game on Daybreak, Insur was ahead for most of the game, but in the eventual Broodlord/Infestor vs Mothership engagement Lowely was able to neural the Protoss’ main weapon. Quickly dropping two vortexes meant the end of the first game. Insur would rally and win the second game convincingly with some early aggression, but then lose the third game and therefore the series. He still walked away with a top 24 placement at the WORLD Finals, and a cool $3,500.
Many congratulations to Sky for doing so well this last month!
Jonathan “Pyre” Topielski will be departing from Infinity Seven today as a mutual agreement between both parties. A very solid player with numerous achievements for such a young player, Pyre will be continuing his Starcraft 2 career. We wish him nothing but the best of luck in his future interests. Below is a statement regarding his leave.
I’d like to thank everyone at Infinity Seven for allowing me to develop into the strong North American player that I am today. The players, staff, and sponsors have helped me to grow not only as a player, but also as a person. Nonetheless, I feel that it is in my best interest to change directions at this time, as my goals and intentions shift. I am sad to leave, but I wish all of you the best of luck in your future endeavors.
Achievements:
Power Overwhelming 5 — 1st
Place Power Overwhelming 6 — 1st Place
MLG Raleigh 2012 — LB Round 5
MLG Columbus 2012 — LB Round 7 (losing to GSL player Polt)
A wonderful day here at Infinity Seven as we kick off the autumn months this year with two awesome additions to the family – Kwame “Temp0″ Mensah and Andrew ”Kibbelz” Dunne! We’ve been searching far and wide for the best additions possible to the team and both of these fellow e-sport fans are the choices to play the part. Temp0 is a highly respected figure in the music and entertainment side of Starcraft 2 having made his fame through parodies of songs using references from the game while Kibbelz has been recognized as the primary Playhem caster for their daily events which have recently become increasingly popular with the community, but has also casted for MLG, Dreamhack among smaller tournaments on top of recently working with IPL as a Starcraft 2 caster.
Temp0 will be doing some live streaming as well as casting here and there while he also creates music videos as he’s been known to do. Kibbelz will also be doing his thing, casting our players’ replays and analyzing what others can learn from them. We look forward to working with them and will push forward the organization with interesting content in the very near future as promised. Please help us in welcoming both Temp0 and Kibbelz!
A statement from Temp0:
Becoming someone who could bring the community fun, good vibes and entertainment has been a love of mine for the past few years. I’ve always felt that I could expand my skills, knowledge and grasp of the game, but lacked any structured way to do so. When Jingna asked if I would be interested in being a part of the iS family, I was really excited! It’s funny because I first ran into Jingna about a year ago at NASL1, and we ended up randomly getting dinner at Denny’s with a few others. This is definitely a great opportunity to grow as a person, help grow the team, and represent something bigger than just myself. I can’t wait to see what the future holds for me, iS, and eSports!
A statement from Kibbelz:
Being on Infinity Seven has been a dream of mine for some time. It began during my days with Playhem; I was watching Axslav, CrazyMoving, Pyre, Mentalist, or Honor use innovative, fun strategies to consistently place very well in the brackets. My love grew with, lest we forget to mention, the team’s excellent choice of attire… oh my do those shirts look good! As I came to know more members of iS, I realized how much their core values aligned with my own. So, in choosing a team to work with as eSports continues to grow, well.. there really was no choice. I could not be more excited to be working with Infinity Seven, and am extremely happy to be joining the team.
We’re sad to announce that today, we will be parting ways with a very talented player, Ki Soo “CrazymoviNG” Han. Having come to a mutual agreement regarding different views in career paths, we determined it was best to release him from Infinity Seven.
During his stay, CrazymoviNG has achieved a respectable 17th place finish at MLG Winter Championship this past March, numerous Playhem victories, as well as playing in the 3rd season of NASL. We would like to wish him the best with his future.
We are very excited to share the news that Axslav will be joining Axeltoss at Major League Gaming’s New York City HQ. The pair will be doing full-time in-house game analysis for Starcraft 2, providing fans with copious amounts of content regarding the game.
With a great number of positive reviews on Axslav’s MLG Arena analysis appearances, it’s no surprise that he was approached by MLG to take up the position along with Axeltoss.
Axslav will not be able to participate in MLG events as a competitor during his employment with the company, however, he will continue representing Infinity Seven in other tournaments and events, please stay tuned for his next tournament appearance and cheer him on!
Remember to follow us on Twitter and Facebook for regular news and updates!
12 September, 2012 — We are excited to welcome two new recruits to the Infinity Seven family today — Mike and Tubby.
Michael ‘Mike’ Gervits is a Zerg player that has showed a lot of potential and a great motivation to improve when the team played and spoke with him. He will be taking a year off now that he’s finished with college to pursue a career professionally in Starcraft 2. Mike has recently been competing in Playhem tournaments and notably taken out Korean players TSL_Revival and TSL_Ragnarok.
Jay ‘Tubby’ Martens, a Protoss player known by his unique alias ‘TubbyTheFat’, and for taking a series off HuK at WCS Canada, has been on our radar for a while now. We’re happy to finally have Tubby join the ranks of our players. He has an entertaining stream where he commentates on a regular basis, and most recently he competed in WCS NA and placed top 16 at the tournament.
Both new members and team owner Zhang ‘zemotion’ Jingna said a few words about the signings.
Michael ‘Mike’ Gervits:
“I’m really looking forward to joining team iS and practicing with all their players. I feel like I have a lot to improve upon and this is the perfect place for me to grow as a player. I plan to participate in several tournaments in the future, so look for me in these events. I would like to thank team iS and all its sponsors for making this possible.”
Jay ‘Tubby’ Martens:
“I am honoured to be welcomed as a member of Infinity Seven. They are a competitive team that fosters foreign talent and competes at the highest levels. I am really looking forward to learning from the great Protosses already on the team, Axslav and Insur. I’d like to thank zemotion for giving me the chance to prove myself and I will do my best to bring in results to make all my fans and supporters proud. “
Zhang ‘zemotion’ Jingna:
“With Michael and Jay joining iS we’re taking another huge step forward towards our goal of developing the most talented players in the NA scene. We’re very excited to be able to add these two high-caliber players to our roster. Happy to have you guys and welcome!”
We hope you will join us in welcoming these two new members to the Infinity Seven family. In the following months they will make themselves seen in the competitive scene, stay tuned!
Last weekend at the PAX Prime event in Seattle, we saw Axslav put on a solid performance, having been one of the two qualified players for the event. He had a close victory over RaNgeD 3-2, before falling to Evil Geniuses’ newest recruit Suppy in the semi-finals with a 3-1 score.
Axslav was interviewed at the MLG Summer Championships to let everyone know he’s still very motivated to become one of NA’s top Protoss players. Even though he lost to Suppy, we’re very proud of his performance at ESWC NA and will look forward to what results he brings us in the future. Expect to see him at IPL5.
Tbeezy is a promising American Grandmaster Terran from California most known for his involvement with University of California-Davis’ Collegiate Starleague team and overall esports scene. As a 21 year old Mechanical Engineering major Tim has led UCD to some incredibly solid results in the CSL, including having them qualified for the final 8 teams in CSL’s current March Madness tournament. As president of UCD’s starcraft club he’s been heavily involved in both running the CSL team itself, featuring players like Spanishiwa, as well as events and get-togethers of a more casual club variety.
