Prizes go west after event fails

By PETER GRIFFIN

New Zealand's best online gamers have missed out on $18,000 of prizes after an Auckland gaming tournament failed to pay up.

Gamers skilled in the multiplayer game Counterstrike converged on Newmarket internet cafe Sivatec early last month to take part in a three-day tournament pitting teams from around the country against each other.

Lan (local area network) gaming events are held most weekends at cyber cafes, but the prize pool rarely exceeds a few hundred dollars.

However, the Sivatec event had a generous prize pool - too generous, it turned out.

Advertisements for the event exclaimed: "So you better get your clan together and sort yourselves out. Why? Because there's $50,000 in prizes to be given away. That's why!"

Thirteen teams of five entered the competition, each member paying the $80 entry fee.

Originally expected to be held at the North Shore Events Centre, the tournament was moved to Sivatec when it appeared numbers would not be as good as expected.

The smaller venue took its toll on the event, with power problems plaguing the game play. But Don Roberts, who with his Anzac.egen team-mates finished second, was willing to put up with that to claim the prize money.

His team had flown in three hot-shot players from Australia to bolster their chances.

"We were going to take the cost of doing that out of the winnings, which we still haven't got," said Roberts.

A prizegiving was held at the competition's end, and a trophy in the shape of an AK-47 was given to the winning team. The three teams were given forms on which they wrote their bank account details before returning them to the organiser.

Tournament winner Parallax was to receive $10,000, Anzac.egen $5000 and Manticore $3000. None of the teams received the money and signs are not encouraging that they will, despite organiser Randy McCarthy's claims that the winnings would be paid out "within 12 working weeks".

Spot prizes worth thousands of dollars more will never be paid out.

McCarthy said the event had not gone to plan and sponsorship lined up with networking company Cisco Systems was never secured.

"My business partner stuffed everything up," he said. "There was a lot of conflict over how the competition should be run."

Power problems at Sivatec also left McCarthy $10,000 out of pocket.

"We blew our budget on the day, We blew the Sivatec powerboard. We had to get generators in, which cost us $3000 a day."

Many of the gamers, aged from 16 to 26, had forgone Wellington gaming competition I-Play to compete at Sivatec. I-Play had a top prize of $5000, which was paid out.

Parallax member Brad Stevens, who helped his team scoop the I-Play prize, said he had little hope of picking up his share of the winnings from the Auckland tournament.

After cleaning up all the major Counterstrike tournaments nationally, his team was now preparing to compete at the Esports World Cup, to be held in France in July. Overseas tournaments offer up to $150,000 in prizes.

Stevens said practice and teamwork made Parallax successful. He played 20 to 25 hours of Counterstrike a week preparing for Esports.

The team commands admiration in the Counterstrike community.

"They're freaky at every game they play," said Roberts, 26 and a hardcore Counterstrike player. "They've just got wicked aim. They kill you before you can kill them basically."

The teams that took part in the Auckland event can do nothing but wait for McCarthy to pay out. McCarthy said he planned to hold similar events in future.

"But we'll probably do it differently. We'll pay the money straight away."