Highlights of Day 1:- The Skoar event that was organized is probably the closest to E3 in our country because never have I seen anything on such a scale being undertaken in Delhi or anywhere across the country, there was not a single soul present on the streets on the account of Republic Day, but there were a dozen of roadblocks which required skillful maneuvering, little did the cops at the barricade known that occupants in the car had taken on the role of “Terrorists” numerous times, the journey was quite an interesting one with the participants discussing the various teams that were going to arrive and were calculating their chances of winning, I arrived at 11.00 sharp, I frankly never expected in my wildest of dreams that anyone would actually turn up for the show because A) It was a national holiday B) It was a gaming exhibition C) Ghosts of the 360 launch still haunted me, but was I proven wrong and I hang my head in shame for being a pessimist.
I whisked past the guards with a sense of authority (I had my GameGuru.in badge which says am a journo) and entered the hall, I could smell the fresh paint off the billboards that were yet to be put up on stalls, the first booth that came under my scrutiny was the Microsoft booth which had a significant amount of 360s attached to the Samsung Bordeaux televisions”¦they hadn’t been switched on as yet, but there were huge banners of the latest 360 games up on display, I got really pumped up after seeing a poster of dear’ol Marcus Fenix with his smirk on ready to take on the Locust(ahhh.. the thought is still driving me crazy), I browsed through all the stalls before they were jam packed in a couple of hours(hard to believe”¦but true) and finally landed up at the “Gamebox championship 2007” event, five games, four zones, lot of blood spilled onscreen is the best way to describe the entire competition.
The eager gamers started to pour in around 1 p.m. (I guess kids had egged on their parents to ruin their peaceful holiday) within minutes the entire hall was full with everyone scrambling off to the various stalls. I returned to the Gamebox arena to find out all the competitors had arrived and “Fnatic” was scheduled to arrive around 3 p.m. and play one of the teams. The Championship kicked off with practice rounds of CS 1.6 between various clans Revolution (north) Vs Makeway (south), the battle was pretty intense, with MW winning as terrorists in the first half [2 Rev-3 Mk] and Rev winning the second round again as “terrorists” drawing the match [3 Rev-2 Mk], the next match was between ATE (Accuracy, teamwork, experience), the best CS clan in India Vs Invictus (east) where ATE lived up to their name sending the east zone to rethink their strategy over again, as they were wrapping up their kits Fnatic arrived and were greeted with a lot of cheer, after a brief introduction they got down to their business of exterminating Terrorists and counter terrorists, ATE won the knife round and everyone witnessing the match burst into a loud cheer for the clan, however this victory was to be short-lived after leading for a brief period of time the Swede clan finally got down to business inflicting injury to the Indian clan, the final score stood 16(Fnatic)-9(ATE),after a brief pause the event was to resume.
I joined up with Rev and jokingly talked about ATE’s defeat I got the look as if I had said something really offensive and got this remark to shut me up “It’s Fnatic what else did you expect”¦”, during the break I browsed on through the other stalls and guess what caught my discerning eye “Gears of War” running on the 360 in all its split screen glory. All the games in their booth had really long lines but I guess no one turns a blind eye to beauty and the game had the longest line ever (reminds me exactly of how editor’s of gaming sites describe lines to play a highly coveted game) well it was a deathmatch game and I lost the first round to a young surd (the shame..) But then I recuperated and won the remaining rounds.
I returned to the event around four and the “Warcraft” tourney had already started this game had two pros and two newbs, there were no underdogs. It was clear that the pros would face each other in the finals, so Day 2 would see Nickunj (South zone) take on Sagar (west zone) in the nation of Azeroth, next we had the “Half life 2 DM” contenders go at each other North Vs South, and West Vs East where Northern and western zones beat their competition out of City 17. The guys were fast but there seemed something lacking in all their strategies the players did not look as experienced as the CS clans that had arrived. The need for speed underground matches was overshadowed by the might of their Fps and strategy brethren”¦ It all ended with the north zone (Arjit) taking on the West (Sat Mayekar) in the finals. The Age of Mythology finalists included Ashish (west) & Rajat (north)
The day ended on a positive note, I heard quite an interesting comment on games in the event that I think I shall remember for quite some time”¦ A gamer remarked “I got fired from 3 jobs, my parents have threatened to throw me out of the house and my sister is fed up with me”¦all thanks to Dr. Gordon Freeman and his little disaster at black mesa””¦for a second I felt I was not alone in the world.
Highlights of Day 2:- I hurried out of my college gates to reach the venue, thinking of the tough battles that would ensue in the virtual battlefield. The competition had already started with Rev taking on MK and winning with a score of 13-7, and then they took on their favorite rivals ATE now this match was a really tense one with both clans fighting it out on the four maps like a pack of rabid dogs the end result a 12 all draw and Rev was mighty pleased with their match, along came Fnatic once again to take on Rev who were bustling with pride after their recent conquest, they seemed to gain an upper hand in the first two rounds and then started losing, came back once again only to fade away the final score was 16 Fnatic-3 Rev but they regained their glory by defeating the eastern clan Invictus to reach the finals [13 Rev-7 Invictus], ATE strapped on their gear to take on MW to taste victory all over again [13 ATE-5 Mw], and then added insult to injury to the eastern clan [13 ATE -5 Ivictus] and reached the finals as well.
I also had a brief chat with the members of the clan Fnatic, and got this info about them they had been in this business for 3 years and practiced on an average 6 hours a day, the name of the members and positions are as follows
Oscar “Archi” Torgersen- RIFLE
Patrik “cArn” Sattermon – TEAM LEADER
Harley “dsn” Orwall – CAPTAIN/SNIPER
Patrik “f0rest” Lindberg- RIFLE
Oskar “ins” Holm-RIFLE
Their thoughts about Indian Competition: “Players have potential and are motivated but lack confidence (isn’t that everywhere), but one thing that they said was true was the fact that we get upset too easy over a loss which makes us nervous, for the rest of the rounds and hence we end up losing without a solid fight.”
Games besides CS – They had a perplexed look for a while but they love playing Starcraft and Quake.
Upcoming games they really wanted to get their hands on ”“ Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess {gaming cannot be complete with out Blizzard Id and Miyamoto”¦ period}
Next up were the Warcraft finals the classic battle between Humans Vs Undead, Nickunj from the south zone won the first round and started grinning away to glory, Sagar and his army from the Netherworld burnt the Humans down to ashes in the remaining two rounds to pick up the victory, Nickunj claimed not to be disappointed from the loss but his dazed look gave it all away and he’s vowed to win all his tourney’s henceforth, guess lady luck was just in favor of Sagar. After the match I went hopping to the Microsoft booth to taste some blood playing as a member of Third street saints (Saint’s Row) and amused myself by looking at dancers at the Airtel Booth Dancing to “Mortal Kombat” holding placards saying “This is gaming”, our country cannot do without the song and dance routines can they, all the individual stalls were holding matches of their own with goodies as prizes(unsold stock of magazines to be precise),and then there was the Yahoo stall with their yodel”¦this is what it went like (told you now I can do this in my sleep)”Welcome YA-HU stall”¦anyone who can YOUDEL (yodel) like Ya-huuuuuu, wins exciting prizes” (A really cool bag , I got one and I DID not Yodel For it) the other stalls had CS, UT 2004, Serious Sam, Road rash gaming tourneys of their own.
The Need for Speed finals took pace pitting Arjit and Sat Mayekar in a beat of three rounds, Mayekar made Arjit taste gravel in the last round making him the king of the road in the game of street racing. Thus ended day two the final day would decide whose reflexes would triumph in both HL2: DM and counter strike.
Highlights of Day 3:- I really enjoyed myself thoroughly on the third day with a camera in my hand I went clicking pictures of the entire event, started off with the 360 stall once again, they now had the Gears of War campaign mode, I played it for a couple of minutes dreadfully wishing someone would sponsor a 360 for poor little me, slowly I returned to the event to find out the finals for the HL2: DM had already begun the finalists were deadlocked with each of them showing of their tactics which they had learnt over the last couple of days, eventually the north zone chap Garavjeet won against Ajrri from the west, the runners up also had a match to decide on the 3rd and 4th positions, it was the same story with CS the South zone (MW) would take on the East zone(Invictus) to decide the order. MW won 16-11 to take home a bunch of lovely mouse pads. It was then time for the AOM finals to take place Ashish (west) & Rajat (north) battled it out for sometime with Ashish emerging as the winner.
I strayed onto the K2 stall which had their games on display I particularly liked their MMORPG Knight online on display their other game War rock both games have received acclaim globally and seemed quite fun to play wish I could spend a little more time with those games maybe would have gotten to taste some of the action.
Finally it was time for the finals to take place the first time these two teams [ATE Vs Rev] had faced each other they had left the battleground without any result, the match started “ATE” wrecked their competition apart in the first half of the match with them leading on for a really long time “Rev” only managed to win a 4 rounds in total 3 as terrorists and 1 as counter terrorists so the score of the first half was 16-4,but this was not the end as they changed maps new horrors awaited Rev they would taste defeat once again with the same score of 16-4 in the second half, so a victor had emerged and it can be said that ATE ate their competition away(I know that was a real lame joke), so they played once again with Fnatic who had been busy giving interviews to clueless media about gaming, Cyrus Saukar (MTV VJ”¦tries real hard to be funny) and Ramona had arrived to witness the grand finale and crowds thronged the Gamebox arena making it difficult for everyone to breathe”¦(nasty memories of the 360 launch were coming back to me), the match was once again a one sided affair with Fnatic leading the way.
It was soon time for the prize distribution ceremony to start all the winners were huge replicas of checks (the amount was huge as well) by the heads of the main sponsors of the event, Fnatic gave prizes to the runners up, and then took on MW to defeat them back age of dinosaurs. This was the way the entire event ended looking at the popularity the event received I doubt this is the last of its kind, in Mr. Raoul’s words “2007 shall be the year of gaming in India”
–Neelesh Mukherjee