University Star

Gamers gathered at George’s Tuesday night for a Halo Tournament sponsored by SACA. 

SACA coordinator Breck Robinson said he developed the idea for a video game tournament over the summer and was excited to see it put into action this semester. Robinson said his original idea consisted of a multi-day tournament with hundreds of participants. He scaled down the idea for practical purposes. 

Robinson said more than 20 gamers were preregistered. The tournament began 30 minutes later than scheduled because coordinators wanted to maximize participation.

Lockhart resident Alex Pegg was one participant who made the last minute decision to test his gaming skills. Pegg does not attend Texas State but said he heard about the tournament through friends.

“I just decided to tag along,” Pegg said. “I don’t usually do stuff like this, but I’ve played the game before and like to think I’m pretty decent.”

Pegg said he has no plans to become a professional gamer. 

Others, like Adrian Montoya, marketing senior, did not consider themselves novice gamers. Montoya said he began playing in video game tournaments about six years ago. Montoya said he hoped the experience would pay off.

“There’s a lot of strategy involved in these games,” Montoya said. “I played college baseball and like to compare gaming to that. All you need is practice and some hand-eye coordination.”

The tournament was interrupted by a fire alarm at LBJ approximately 30 minutes after it began. Malaurie Hammell, English junior, said she was worried about leaving the game system equipment unsupervised and called the alarm inconvenient. 

Once the building was declared safe, students were allowed to return to the contest. The tournament continued and players were given the opportunity to restart the match.

The tournament was set up in brackets with four game systems running simultaneously. Players were given 10-minute-long campaigns to try their luck at Halo: Reach, the latest game in the series. 

Winners of each campaign continued to compete against one another until the brackets narrowed. The winner of the tournament received a brand new Xbox 360, and second place was awarded a video game. 

Robinson said he was proud of the turnout and hopes to make gaming tournaments biannual affairs.