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Posts tagged Tournaments
1st INFOLINK Lib Cup Gaming Tournament
11 year ago
Wii favorite Super Smash Bros. Brawl was the focus of a regional library gaming tournament in eastern New Jersey recently. On April 17, 2010, INFOLINK (The Eastern New Jersey Regional Library Cooperative) sponsored a video game tournament at the Elizabeth Public Library. Total attendance was 50, including parents, siblings, and random competitive gaming enthusiasts. The Brawl competitors consisted of 19 teens and tweens, representing six different area public libraries: Cranbury, Hillside, Piscataway, Sayreville, Scotch Plains, and Summit.
Teens from the INFOLINK Lib Cup Gaming Tournament
The broadest competition was in League 1 (the middle school bracket, grades 6-8) which featured a draw of 16 blood-thirsty tween combatants. League 1 began with four seeding matches, each consisting of four players all brawling at the same time, to determine ranking seeds. The final bracket was set up NCAA basketball March Madness-style with east, west, north, and south divisions, each with players ranked 1-4. Once seeding was determined, the tournament entered the bracket mode and featured one-on-one, single elimination competition. This bracket featured upsets-galore and ended with just four players remaining by noon.
After lunch was served, the afternoon began with League 2 (the high school bracket, grades 9-12). Though not as deep as the tweens, with only 3 participants making the trek to Elizabeth, League 2 featured competition that was just as fierce. This bracket featured a 3-brawler seeding round, with all three teens competing simultaneously. Once seeding was determined, League 2 moved straight to the bracket competition with a 2 v. 3 match, followed by the winner competing against the 1 seed in the final. Seeds held true in this bracket with Demetrius Pettway (Cranbury Public Library) defeating Anthony Sasso (Sayreville Public Library) in the finals.
Fueled by a chocolate brownie inspired sugar rush and pure middle school gaming blood lust, the afternoon session culminated with the final four playoff from League 1. When the dust settled, it was Kyle Bolton standing atop the tournament bracket with a victory over fellow-Piscataway Public Library gamer Matthew Buys. Testing was not done for performance-enhancers, but there must be something in the water in Piscataway, NJ.
This tournament was the culmination of the Lib Cup 2009-2010 gaming season, which featured 13 participating libraries. In addition to Lib Cup, INFOLINK is also responsible for a Gaming Service that loans video game equipment to central NJ libraries. This service began in March 2009, and is scheduled to end May 28, 2010 after fulfilling its projected goals.
Submitted by Allen McGinley, Piscataway Public Library
3,2,1…Mario Kart tourney!
21 year ago
Eli Neuberger, Ann Arbor District librarian and author of Gamers? In the Library?, suggested using GT System for the hardest part of running gaming tournaments, the ‘heavy lifting’ of creating brackets, points, matches. You create brackets online without the frantic scribbling on paper or on an spreadsheet. There hasn’t been a 2010 announcement of events, but contact information is found on the wiki to find out more.
GT System is a framework and a set of web tools for producing videogame tournaments of any size for players of any age or experience level. It gives you everything you need to promote and run a videogame tournament at your institution, and it allows all GT system players to see where how they stack up on local, regional and national leaderboards!
Patrons drop and add on-site to tournaments, so all the pre-game work can get blasted by surprises.
One experience:
I ran a Mario Kart tournament without this system – our library had an Under 12 years and Over 12 tournament. The children’s librarians did not fully get across to some kids/parents that they were wait listed, so all showed! Had to work quick on my blank ppt to change the brackets and matches I worked on.
Also, there were going to be 4 adults working the tourney, and two couldn’t come. Left a lot of work setting up controllers, announcing brackets for one while the other worked the room, helped sign in kids, talked with parents, took photos…
I was fielding calls from college students about using cheats and their own controllers. Having played Mario Kart, I was familiar…but not the endless hours these kids had! You might just have to make decisions on the spot– just stick to them!
Eli told us that if you have elementary kids, someone will cry. I think at least three kids cried. It’s hard when their parents are there, and you want them to have fun. But competition is a fact of life, and not everyone gets the blue ribbon.
Siblings bring their own twist; I had a set of triplet boys, and two made it to the finals of 3. The great thing was the parent who told me the triplet who won was not athletic or academic, so it was a win on a big stage for him, a first.
I created certificates for the top three winners, and a gave a gift card for GameStop to the winners in each age group.
The library I’m at now has weekly teen gaming, monthly elem. level gaming, and many tournaments. I’ve offered to try a MK tourney again- loved the cheering and laughing a whole room of parents and siblings made.