EPTThis was the beginning. It all started in a LAN center in Dover, NH called Galaxy Gaming. Here we experienced the very first official qualifying tournament for a newly formed league with high hopes and an amazing turnout right after a snow storm that rocked New England. We also started to experience the technical difficulties that would haunt us. coLRyan was the first to take the top position with tGensulitor coming in a close second and the NY zerg machine HPtheGreat coming in third.
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The second qualifier was held in Standish, ME at a great place called Culture Crew Gaming. The owner's Tony and Laura are extremely supportive of the e-sports scene and were more than happy to have a LAN featured in their store. But once more, we discovered that technical difficulties would arrive. Myself and Force ended up having to FRAPS every game instead of streaming commentary which ended up giving us some fun and glitchy youtube videos. All in all it was a very successful tournament with tGRanger (the green, not toxic gaming) coming in first place followed closely by his terran teammate Recon with DamnCats rounding out the pack in third.
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The third qualifier, well, that really exemplified the phrase posed by m155g33k, "It wouldn't be a New England event if something didn't go wrong." And multiple things did. First off, the LAN center in Haverhill, MA that the event was scheduled at, never got the PCs they promised, so we ended up moving it hastily to Dover, NH and Galaxy Gaming (these guys love us!). The second problem was my PC kept crashing while trying to stream and we were forced to only utilize Forces computer and studio mic. In the end it worked out good and we got a good amount of VODs. The day ended with GGLastShadow taking first place, Oso in second, and a surprising third place finish by BronzeKnee.
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Now we end up coming to the tournament this past weekend. The season 1 Grand Finals. This was a 2 day event that involved a Last Chance tournament on Saturday and the Grand Finals on Sunday. Saturday saw 17 players come to bring the hurt for the last 7 spots in Sunday's tournament. And Sunday, well let's just say there was some drama and great matches. We also had to deal with the XSplit forcing an update, which is really visible from the Saturday stream videos. We ended up having our top 3 players: GGLastShadow, coLRyan, and tgRanger finish 1st through 3rd it what almost seemed like a destined match-up for the league. I have no doubt m155g33k will have a full write-up on that soon.
So, with that final tournament, the end of season 1 ended and we look forward to June for some expected changes. First off, we will be adding Frinedly Fire Gaming Center in Storrs-Mansfield, CT to our tournament rotation. So hopefully some of our NY/NJ brethren will venture out to compete for glory. Secondly, the locations have rotated in the schedule so that Maine will be the first and last tournament location this season. And finally, but more importantly, we our having a changing of the guard with our sponsorship. For season 1, Mana Potions, MegaHertz Computers, and Left-Tees has sponsored us. Mana Potions, has been dropped from our sponsorship due to a lack of involvement. I can proudly say that we have acquired Kingston, NZXT, and especially Cooler Master as sponsors for season 2. These are all product sponsors, and you can look to have a free chance of winning some free gear from any of these companies at each event... just for showing up. So season 2 is looking to be a big improvement in the live LAN quality aspect and a lot of us are super excited to see what happens opening day.
In the future, it looks like our ladder program is almost ready to be beta tested, a new chic looking website is being designed, and more lower ranking tournaments look to be arranged for expansive online play with pro-gamer lessons as prizes. Everything is still in development, but the last one may be moved onto a larger scale, it's all a matter of priorities. I wish everyone reading this good luck with all of your SC2 endeavors and I will see you all in June!
