Manuel “Grubby” Schenkhuizen is a former e-sports player from the Netherlands who has made a name for himself primarily with the strategy game Warcraft III. He is now 39 and streams on Twitch. He has currently joined the German WoW project Sauercrowd.
Who is it about? Grubby is a former strategy pro who has been considered one of the best players in Warcraft 3 since 2004. With his former clan 4Kings, he set a record for the most wins in the WC3L, the most important team league of the strategy game. He is also among the top players in the player statistics there.
His most significant victories include the World Cyber Games 2004 and 2008, the Electronic Sports World Cup 2005, and the World Series of Video Games 2006. In total, Grubby earned more than $363,500 in prize money, of which about $58,000 was from Starcraft 2.
Since 2014, the Dutchman has been regularly streaming on Twitch, where he mainly shows Warcraft 3 but has also put in several thousand hours in Heroes of the Storm and Dota 2. In Valve’s MOBA, he even reached the second highest rank in a short time.
Currently, however, Grubby is showcasing another Blizzard game: He has joined the German WoW project Sauercrowd, organized by the streamers HandOfBlood, Metashi12, and Papaplatte.
Twitch streamer is “naturalized” by HandOfBlood
How did it come about? Grubby came to Sauercrowd via sunglitters, a German Twitch streamer who appears as a potato and streams in English. sunglitters and Grubby had already participated together in OnlyFangs, the American counterpart of the WoW project.
To participate, Grubby had to go through a strict application process, including a “naturalization test” with HandOfBlood. The Dutchman was also required to install the WoW client in German to promote immersion.
You can see a snippet from the test here:
Speak German you…
This is how it is going for him now: So far, Grubby is doing quite well, both in terms of WoW and playing in German. Even if some subtleties may be lost in translation, like in this clip on Twitch.
Grubby is even better at translating German clips for his English-speaking audience, such as his interpretation of the death of Twitch streamer Mowky.
Moreover, the Dutchman has already expanded his vocabulary with important phrases, such as “Order is half of life” and of course “Speak German you…” (Source: Twitch).
In contrast to many other participants, Grubby has considerable experience with WoW, as many of the Twitch streamers are attempting the MMORPG for the first time.
At least the Dutchman looks most of the time as if he could vaguely remember having seen all this before. However, Grubby not only has to remember how it works, but also explain his knowledge to his clueless companions in German, as in this Twitch clip.
Grubby has also already experienced his first death. He lost his priest at level 12 and reacted, as always, with a heartfelt “Oh shit.” The clip has received over 36,000 views, and you can watch it here:
For the event, Grubby, with his charming personality and sympathetic grammar blunders, is a real asset. But it could also turn out to be a success for him to participate. For with OnlyFangs, the Dutchman had already succeeded in attracting a much larger audience on Twitch than with his usual streams. Now it remains to be seen whether he can repeat that.
