Hatching a Protatomonster

Some monsters live in dreams, summoned into the ordinary world by an errant wish or a stray lightning blast. Others spawn in dark, malevolent pits or Hollywood producers’ imaginations. It’s safe to say that far fewer come together at family weddings.

Protatomonster, known then as Parviz Soleymani and Brandon Wilks, met when one’s brother married the other’s sister and all sorts of hijinks ensued. Except this isn’t a plot of a ‘50s sitcom, so that last part should probably be rephrased as “were both extremely into video games and became close friends.”

The genesis of their YouTube channel shares one similarity with classic horror tropes: Protatomonster came to life after a series of storms. Soleymani and Wilks focused their brainstorming sessions around their own favorite videos to end up with the concept of a high-production value videogame content channel centered on weekly top 5 plays in League of Legends.

From the beginning, their goal has always been “to provide the highest possible quality videos for the community and to showcase other sick plays from around the world.” They’ve pumped up their production quality and listened exhaustively to community feedback “to make the shows we have better.”

Inspiration for the Teamwork series of videos came when they realized they received an “unbelievable amount of teamwork-oriented plays on a weekly basis.” They have “so many teamwork plays that didn’t quite fit and would be awkwardly placed if forced in.”

Knowing they wanted a new segment to show off the best of the best, Protatomonster worked with their VFX guy to build a series that would be analytical and focused on the team instead of specific players. This lead to “analyze mode”—a fully detailed explanation of what a League team does to make a play happen—using special effects built in Maya and other programs to get inside the game. Check it out in the video at the top of the page.

Thanks to fans and sponsors, Protatomonster keeps finding new ways to dig deeper into League of Legends. They’ve been buried in their lab over the last few months working on their next step. Whatever is coming, we can be fairly sure it isn’t a series of wedding videos—however well it worked out the last time these guys were at one.

Bite into the behind the scenes of “analyze mode” and see how Protatomonster whips up each batch of incisive critique. Or visit the YouTube channel to catch all of the Protatomonster videos you might’ve missed. Whatever else you do, don’t forget to leave your comments and feedback below, and we’ll see you in game!