If you click the image and see it in its original size, you'll notice a staple at lan parties... a bunch of Mountain Dews residing next to a gamer's computer. :) The party was packed and it appeared everyone was having a good time.
Team FNG was represented by the following:
Dan Wetzel (Tsam), back-row left; Jeff Litster (That One Guy), back-row right; Nick Gold (d60dfath3r), front-row left; Jarin Blackham (Thundr), front-row right.
Most of us arrived at the party around 11:00am and jumped right into the TrackMania Nations Forever Tournament practice server to try to feel out what we were up against (both track-wise and competitor-wise.)
The competition was good. There were some good racers on the practice servers. Team FNG took turns being on the podium (sometimes sharing) and by the time we went to get lunch around 2:00pm, we felt confident at least one of us would come home being one of the tournaments victors.
We knew we wouldn't win first place because WAT_Fallout was there, and well, some of have been served by him before online. That guy has got some seriously "mad foo" TrackMania skills; the kind that push you to be a better racer.
There was a near tragic scene when TrackMania ceased working correctly for Fallout's computer around lunchtime; but fortunately after some system configuration tweaks minutes before the competition started, the game began working correctly again.
The tournament started a little after 4:00pm with 30 racers rearing to race to success (and a free video card.) Fallout took first on all but two races, of which Tsam and myself were first. The rest of the time, many of the racers were taking turns in 2nd or 3rd place. Some racers gave up during the tourney; and by the time we finished, the count was half of what we started with.
Points were given for first through third place each round... first place earning 3 points; second place earning 2 points and third place earning 1 point.
Tsam and I were elated to find that we were in the top 3 when the tournament ended. Here are the stats: (laugh hard because Fallout got more points than Tsam and mine combined!)
- WAT_Fallout - 31 points
- FNG_tsam - 11 points
- FNG_ThatOneGuy - 10 points
We each won a new ATi Radeon 4870 ... which, from what I hear, is the best model ATi card on the market today. We're pretty stoked.
In the mayhem of another tournament that started at the same time being conducted on the stage; they quickly interrupted the shoutcasting of the match to announce the winners of our TrackMania tournament... and rushed us up for some pictures before they excused us back to the lan party. Thundr was kind enough to snag my camera and try to take a picture while the other guy was trying to take his second shot. So, we may look a little dorky and disoriented; but we were stoked to be taking the podium in such a fun tournament.
(Left-to-Right: FNG_tsam, FNG_ThatOneGuy, WAT_Fallout)
We again want to thank Media One, Protocol 42, Palit Multimedia and all the other excellent sponsors that made GEEX such a great experience.
Rumor has it that plans are already underway for a GEEX 09. We're looking forward to it if it materializes.
We're also looking forward to Protocol 42's annual shindig in November where another TrackMania Nations Forever tournament will be held; and maybe this time we can learn some of Fallout's moves and give him a better run for his money. :) Congrats Fallout for taking us all to the cleaners.
See you all at the next GEEX!
1 comment:
Thanks for coming guys! I'm glad you all had a great time. It's teams like you that made GEEX such a great experience for everyone involved. It was good finally meeting you guys and I enjoyed talking to you. Enjoy you're new video cards.
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