Regional gamers laud LG Cyber Cup

Regional and global digital leader LG Electronics and electronic gaming industry experts, Game Frontier said the tournament would provide a foundation for positive growth in the Middle East's gaming community.

"After the success of the first LG Cyber Cup last year, we spent a great deal of time assessing what we needed to achieve to be able to provide the perfect gaming platform for this year's event," said Mr. P. C. Choi, President, LG Electronics Gulf FZE.

"We appointed industry leader Game Frontier to provide the link between LG and the gaming community. They spoke to gamers, visited gaming centres and surveyed online players to give their comments on what they wanted to see in the 2003 Cyber Cup competition.

"As a result, the LG Cyber Cup 2003 is going to be the foremost gaming tournament in the Middle East."

The LG Cyber Cup Championship 2003 follows a highly successful inaugural event staged in the UAE last year.

"Last year's tournament was oversubscribed and a tremendous success amongst the gaming community," explained Choi. "This influenced our decision to make the championship an annual event.

"The re-staging of the tournament also reflects LG's desire to be known as a leader in the I.T. products field, particularly in light of the recent introduction into the Middle East of LG PCs and notebooks.

"Gamers demand the very highest specification products and LG can meet their needs with its range of Flatron monitors and desktop PCs."

Experts at Game Frontier analysed the new information together with data from the first LG Cyber Cup, to assist in designing an environment that would constitute the perfect gaming event.

"Many comments were about online gaming being used as pre-qualifying in tournaments, which is an issue the LG Cyber Cup avoids," said Jaffer Mir, Managing Director, Game Frontier.

At present, online gaming in the Middle East provides tournament organisers with some major challenges.

"Technically, there differing standards of PC equipment and connection speeds that online players can use and it is logistically impossible for tournament organisers to monitor online games directly and ensure players are abiding by the rules," explained Mir.

"For the LG Cyber Cup, we have constructed a gaming arena with LG Electronics that provides a high standard of playing environment for every entrant, thus allowing skill to be the deciding factor in winning or losing.

"The LG Cyber Cup tournament will provide a level playing-field for all gamers that enter. They will all use the same high-specification PC equipment and will be governed by concise rules the international gaming community adheres to."

The LG Cyber Cup gaming arena has been designed so that game-administrators can monitor every game to make sure the rules are being followed and no-one is taking advantage of any game-manipulation techniques they might have.

"A key issue in competitive gaming is the ability to use 'cheats' during matches and as with other sports, there is an opportunity for gamers to take advantage of these manipulations, explained Mir.

"The LG Cyber Cup rules do not allow the use of 'cheats' or any undue shortcuts. The tournament will allow fair competition and skill level to be the deciding factors."

A specially designed arena has been built in the Grand Hyatt ballroom for this year's LG Cyber Cup, and is intended to give spectators the best platform to view the entertainment in progress.

"There is large screen relay of games underway, a digital scoreboard and running commentary, so spectators can follow all the action - just like any major sporting event," said Mir.

"In addition, a selected 'play-of-the-day' will be featured on the Game Frontier website at the end of each day's play and all the games played will be available for review after the tournament concludes on the 28th August."

Whilst the tournament has drawn the interest of a number of professional teams from Europe and the US, LG decided to restricted entries to Middle East based teams and players only.

"We've had a lot of online enquiries from experienced, professional international teams about entering the competition," said Choi.

"But the tournament is predominantly to find the Middle East's best gaming team for Sierra's Half Life - Counter Strike, the best individual gamer in Microsoft's 'Age Of Mythology' and to nurture further growth in the region's gaming community.

"LG Electronics and Game Frontier will bring together the best gamers in the UAE in a showcase competition. Over the last 12 months we have seen UAE demand for electronic gaming events increase remarkably and for the LG Cyber Cup 2003, we have provided a gaming interaction concept that is technically and visually superior to anything seen here before."

The Age of Mythology qualifiers will take place on August 25 and Counter Strike qualifiers will be held on August 26 and 27. The LG Cyber Cup finals are scheduled for August 28.