insomnia40: Good LAN / Bad LAN

With i40 done and dusted, we see gamers across the UK come home to a proper meal, and more sleep in the next few days than they had all event in Newbury. It didn't exactly go as planned. If you've been reading our coverage you will no doubt have heard about the controversial admin decisions, the setbacks and s on and so forth. We all know who won the event, but that never tells you who the real winners and losers are. Luckily, the CoD4 edition of Good LAN / Bad LAN is here to help! And now we're all owned by the same people, it doesn't count as plagiarism! Yay!



This one you could have guessed. Despite the initial setbacks, it is fair to say that the boys from Team Dignitas have had an excellent LAN. They started off perilously close to earning themselves a bad LAN award with the loss of Mark "Phantasy" Pinney. Blackmane was having PC problems, leaving the rest of the team to play some group games with only 3 players. Yet somehow they triumphed, topping their group and storming through the playoff brackets to the Upperbracket final. After a loss to waL, it seemed the Dignitas dream was over, but they pulled through to earn themselves a rematch in the Grand Final. The Dignitas lads showed why they are considered to be among the best players in the world as they 4v5ed their way to the top prize.

The dedication and confidence these 4 showed in the face of adversity was admirable. So much so, the crowd couldn't decide whom to support. On paper, one would have expected the throng of underdog-loving Brits to come out in favour of waL, but even their hearts of stone seemed to warm to the eventual winners.



You would think that, given the number of people attending, MPUK would have a reasonable number of showers on site. You would think that, but you'd be wrong. The gamer to shower ratio was so high that, unless you showered at 3 in the morning (I'm looking at you ptER) you would be facing a reasonable queue time. Okay so maybe it wasn't as bad as Thorpe Park on a Saturday afternoon, but it was unnecessary. On top of this, we had some incontinent joker deciding to void his (or indeed her) bowels into one of the showers. It was not pretty. While most of the floors had decent enough ventilation, over the course of the event the TF2 arena (essentially a big tent) festered to the point where walking into it was like being punched in the face by a boxer with BO problems. It wasn’t nice.


As the second seed for this event, fragmasters were supposed to do well. Add to that the individual talent of their roster and the fact that the only team who (on paper) should have been able to beat them was Team Dignitas, and you really should have had (at the least) a podium finish. If it wasn't for the lack of real competition this could have gone down as one of the biggest LAN crumbles of our times, but as it was they scraped a 4th place finish by the skin of their teeth. Time and time again their teamwork let themselves down, with holes in their defence the size of Madagascar. Especially troubling when, reading their post i40 interview, it becomes apparent that the "mix" team present at insomnia40 is likely to become their main lineup in the coming weeks. After 2 poor performances in a row, the fragmasters' managerial staff may be thinking again about their venture into uncharted territory.

With Pizza Today's "Chain of the Year 2010" award 2010 secured, (yes, we do actually do some research for these things), Domino’s Pizza turned up at insomnia40 with only one competitor. Their rival? Stonebake. If I was really pushed for ideas I might have given them their own bad LAN award, such was the service of this appalling Pizza Chain. Not only were their pizzas expensive, but they were also extremely slow to deliver. Their big selling point was that they delivered to your seat, but it wasn't worth it when you could just walk to the front gate and pick up some far far tastier Domino’s.

Add to that the special offer Domino’s had on offer - any pizza, any size for £10 and it was practically a no brainer. They must have made an absolute killing. Especially as you could order a "Half and Half" Pizza with a mate and just pay £5 for a ridiculously large semicircle of fat and salt. I, for one, quickly concluded that they were the best value meal provider at the event and ate an alarmingly large amount of pizza.




Maybe I'm being stereotypical, but the soft and gooey insides of us gamers don't tend to get treated all that nicely at the best of times. LAN, however, takes malnutrition to a whole new level. The selection of foods available to purchase was narrow, and all of it horribly unhealthy. I'm not a health freak, I mean, I had pizza for breakfast on the second day of LAN, but by Sunday it felt like I hadn't had a vitamin pass my lips in aeons. It was a choice between pizza, fish and chips, biscuits, or pot noodle. The fact that the healthiest thing on sale was probably pot noodle is testament to Multiplay's attitude toward your everyday gamer. All I wanted was just, a sandwich. A simple, honest sandwich. Was that too much to ask? Evidently...

In addition, the food on sale was expensive. The only way to get cheap food was to go to Sainsbury’s, and even then it was to get copious amounts of cookies and doughnuts. By the time I was home I was surprised my heart was still beating...



Robin has always been a talented gamer, but this event he seemed to take it to a whole new level. Eyebrows were raised when Chris "Blackmane" Kinnair dropped the scope on mp_strike for Robin, despite having played exceptionally well on mp_citystreets. 24 rounds and 37 frags later, no one could doubt the Dutchman’s prowess now. When his scope wasn't popping heads left right and centre, his deagle was. His nades hit home time and time again, which was crucial in preventing his opponents capitalising on Dignitas' man disadvantage.

He played consistently throughout the event, reiterating his place as one of Europe’s finest. And if that isn't enough for you, take a look at the plague of robyYE cfg threads on our forums. An honour for the Dutchman, I'm sure.



With CoD4 initially set to start at 14:00 BST on Friday, it looked all set to be a comfortable tournament. The hideous Internet and network cut-outs on Thursday were supposedly resolved, the daisies were blooming and the sun was shining. Or so we thought. As Friday dragged on, it became apparent not much was really happening. It became impossible to get updates and newsposts up with the Internet down, and so the general populace had literally no idea what the hell was going on inside Newbury racecourse. Eventually we got started at 10am on Saturday, 20 hours later than planned.

What made it all the more painful was that, in order to regain time, the MPUK admins made the executive decision to keep the tournament running non-stop until 1am in the morning. This had a clear effect on the teams, and I could single out a few matches that were lost that should have been won, if it weren't gone midnight and the players hadn't been playing for 14 hours straight. At least at 1am they got a braek. Our poor resident journalist remained up until gone 3 writing match previews and reviews...



With his team floundering around him, unable to get any rhythm or momentum going, it was Leonidas "killzx" Kyrkos who took the bull by the horns and dragged fragmasters, kicking and screaming, through a number of tough games. Leo is an excellent scope, but what really stood out was his talent for using the desert eagle. One notable round saw Leo clutch against FORIN BEGGARS in the lowerbracket final, which they ended up losing anyway. As by far the most consistent player for Fragmasters this event, if he had not been on form then they would have finished a lot lower than 4th.


Do see what I did there? Oh I'm devilishly witty. But you get the point. It is always good to have new people helping out the community, but seriously guys? Yes, we understand the players were right in front of you. Yes, we understand you can't give any information away. But couldn't you at least have done some preparation? Maybe a bit of research on the teams and the players. The occasional little titbit of information about the current player onscreen would have gone a long way to livening up an hour of "Oh and it's a 1v3 situation", "they're taking really keen positions here" and so on. I hope we do see a return of the dynamic duo, and that this experience proves valuable to them. But next time, please please please expand your vocabulary, so it isn't so repetitive. Repetitive.


Perhaps this a bit personal, but nonetheless relevant. For the second, yes SECOND, Steven "dumb fucking Belgian" Leunens managed to not book my press pass. I was assured that it would be sorted this time, and not to worry etc etc. But when I finally turned up at the desk to collect my pass, lo and behold! It was nowhere to be seen. Luckily my roguish charm secured me a pass (that and the check-in lady clearly couldn't be bothered to get in an argument) and from there on it was free tea and coffee all the way. Steven gets one more chance at i41, but after that I might just have to kill him...