Incredible gamers lose out

By Candice Jones, ITWeb online telecoms editor

Johannesburg, 10 Aug 2007

The six Incredible Connection staff members who competed in the final of Packard Bell's gaming event, in Portugal, returned this week after having faced some of the world's toughest competition.

"We came stone last," says Justin Robinson, one of the six team members, and organiser of a knockout competition that helped decide the gamers who would represent SA in the international event. "But we met a lot of excellent gamers and had great fun."

Most of the team selected to represent SA had never been outside of the country before and Robinson says they did not expect the high level of competition they faced in the tournament.

"Many of the players selected for the other teams were professional gamers from their countries and not having seen this kind of competition, we were stunned."

Robinson says the elegance of the professional players was unmatched. "I have learned a lot about how we can improve."

Geoff Nienaber, another of the team members, says: "We were at a disadvantage when it came down to it. Many of the other teams practised with each other over broadband connections, which we just don't have in SA."

Incredible congeniality

However, he says the SA team made a really good personal impression at the competition. "We may not have won, but we were definitely the most popular. Our team had a good sense of sportsmanship and we were always cheerful and friendly, which the other teams appreciated despite the fact that we did not do that well."

However, Robinson says if the structure of the competition had been a little different, they may have done better. "We were set to play in Group B, which meant that we had two of the overall winners playing against us."

He says if the team had been able to play against some of the lower ranked teams, they would have come out with more points.

"It's like playing against Tiger Woods when you are an amateur golfer," he says.

The team scored a total of four points for a win in one of its Supreme Commander rounds.

However, the team agreed that at the very least they now have an idea of what the international competition is like, and are preparing to take them on with better practice at next year's event, which is expected to take place in Germany.

Robinson says the gamers came back to SA with important contacts. He is trying to organise more professional gaming events in SA through QUADV, who streamed the Lisbon tournament live on the Web.