During the GameGune 2010 tournament, HLTV.org reported that the GameGune organization did not care about the spectators, as they allowed matches to be started up to a half an hour earlier than scheduled, making it hard for spectators to watch their favorite teams play.

Today, GameGune has released a statement in which they defended their response, but clarified their initial intention. The whole statement can be found below.

First of all, the title misquotes blatantly our words. Nobody from the organization said that and the only thing you will get writing this is making people think that GameGune is a tournament that does not give a damn about spectators, and that´s not even close to the truth.

The article is not sincere about what really happened. The schedule that ORG people sent to the press before the tournament is approximate and everybody knows that. If everything goes better than expected (which is what happened), and a match can start earlier, so it will. For us, the most important thing is to take care of players. Our goal is that when the tournament is over they are happy with the organization and the facilities, so they will repeat next year and tell everyone about us. If we were such a bad organization as the article seems to imply, teams would never come to our tournament year after year. You can ask every single team of the tournament if they have had any problem with org people, computers or schedules.

We´ve always asked every participant about their opinion in order to improve and that made us what we are now.  I know that advancing matches is not good for spectators and I want to apologise for the inconvenience we may have caused. But, as I said, it´s not true that we don’t care about spectators. From the very first match of the first group, HLTVs are up and running. We have every demo of every match recorded. We have all POV demos recorded. We also have server logs to do statistics with your website program. So, happily I can say that, the only problem in the tournament has been this 30 minutes of advancing the match. This could have been fixed if HLTV.org people had talked to ORG people right after the previous match and had asked when the next match was going to start rather than just writing down what the approximate schedule said.

To sum up, GameGune ORG is sorry for the inconvenience we may have caused, and we invite everyone to come to Bilbao and see how things are run here and how teams feel about the organization. Players would rather have an earlier start. We care about them because they are the single most important part of the tournament, because without them, there is no GameGune.

Nix0n from HLTV.org commented on the situation via the comments section of their website:

I would like to be the first to comment on the matter, as it was me who brought the post in the first place.

First of all I’d like to underline that GameGune for years I’ve been in HLTV.org, has always been very cooperative, with this year being no exception. MIRAA and I got picked up in the airport, dropped off at our hotel and generally served with the best conditions press could pray for. The GameGune organizers, especially zoR, made it really easy for us, in terms helping us getting HLTV setup, gathering POV demos and so forth.

Turning over to what was said to us, when we were confronted with the fact that a match in the lower-bracket would start 30mins earlier, I stressed that it is a really bad idea to pre-pone matches. As stated by zoR, matches could start earlier than schedule, where to I responded that they should not, drawing parallels to football, where this would never happen. I noticed that several users had complained about matches starting before time earlier in the tournament, which made me fight hard for the matches to begin at the “scheduled” time.

What I quoted zoR for (We don’t care about spectators, it is better for us and for the players), was his words and not something we fabricated. As nothing was recorded, it will come down to our word against his.

On a personal level, I can totally understand how zoR reacted to this. Had I been in his shoes, I would most likely have reacted the exact same way. Together with many of the other guys in the crew, I am a good friend of zoR for the past many years, which made it even harder to bring the post, as I knew it would do damage. I do however feel as a reporter, that we are obligated to report such situations, that it will damage a long-time friendship is simply the downside about getting close with the people who’s tournaments we cover.

As mentioned, I can totally understand that zoR feels offended and disappointed in a friend. I do however still think of zoR as a friend, if it’s likewise only zoR can decide.

The whole post can be found here

During Comic-Con today, the Capcom team introduced a trailer for one of their future games. That trailer pitted characters from both Street Fighter and Tekken against each other in a duel to the death.

Rumors are circulating that there will be two different versions of the game, produced by both Capcom and Namco that will play like either version that they are representing. For example, one version will play similarly to Street Fighter, while another will play just like Tekken.

Some videos of the trailer can be found below:

Source: 1Up

Coming from the Lower Bracket and having sent home Arbalet Dallas winners Na`Vi, Fnatic has managed to win the GameGune 2010 event.

Taking on the Frag eXecutors team, Fnatic came out strong, taking the first half of de_train by the score of 13-2. Unfortunately for them, FX showed why they belonged in the finals by coming back and equalizing the match, sending it to an unexpected overtime. With both teams at the top of their game, the first overtime resulted in a tie. However, in the second overtime, Fnatic managed to pull ahead and take the map, and moving the finals to 1 more map.

On de_nuke, Fnatic pulled ahead for the second time in as many matches but once again FX proved that they wouldn’t go down easily. With the score at 13-13, Fnatic finally made their push to the finish and took the map and the championship by the score of 16-13.

With this win, Fnatic will take home €12,000, while FX will take home €6,000.

Image courtesy of HLTV.org

In a report from HLTV.org, it has been discovered that GameGune officials are not sticking to the official schedule. Instead, the players are given the ability to determine when they play. Matches are starting 30-45 minutes earlier than scheduled, making it impossible for spectators to successfully watch a match.

When approached about this situation, GameGune officials had the following to say (taken via HLTV.org excerpt):

When confronted with HLTV.org’s opinion once again, GameGune organizers responded “We don’t care about spectators, it is better for us and for the players”.

In an industry made by spectators and fans, to say that you don’t care about them is sickening. What do you think about that statement?

The first day of GameGune has come to a close and 14 teams have made it out to the next day of action. Included in those 14 are the likes of mouz, Na`Vi, fnatic and FX.

Fnatic proved they were in perfect CS shape after taking off during Arbalet Dallas to attend a PR trip by putting up over 20 rounds in every match they played. Against dellum Fnatic managed to win by the score of 23-7. Against Antwrep Aces, the score was 21-9 and against prodigy-esc the final score was 25-5.

Na`Vi, fresh off their win at Arbalet Dallas, managed to nearly do the same, however a close call against D4Gaming stopped the streak, winning by only 4 rounds.

The action will continue tomorrow with the bracket stage of play.

Image courtesy of HLTV.org

The founder of Voodoo PC, Rahul Sood, tells the story of Microsoft’s attempt at bridging the gap between the PC and XBox platforms, making it possible for the two platforms to play in a single game, together. Unfortunately, during the tests the PC gamers were far better than their xbox counter-parts.

Rahul Sood had this to say:

I’ve heard from reliable sources that during the development they brought together the best console gamers to play mediocre PC gamers at the same game… and guess what happened? They pitted console gamers with their “console” controller, against PC gamers with their keyboard and mouse.

The console players got destroyed every time. So much so that it would be embarrassing to the XBOX team in general had Microsoft launched this initiative.

For anyone that has played on both systems, the change is drastic. Xbox gamers only wish they could have a keyboard and mouse, while the PC gamers already do. Do you think it’s possible to bridge the gap?

This weekend in Rotterdam, 7 gamers came together to shatter the pre-existing world record for non-stop gaming. Playing Red Dead Redemption on the Sony PS3, the gamers played for 51 hours straight to break the previous record of 40 hours. By the end of the play period, they walked away with €1,000 and the need for a weekend slumber.

The official press release is as follows:

July 19, 2010, Rotterdam, The Netherlands — Vogel’s www.vogels.com, the leading European market leader in Audio/Video & TV mounting solutions, announced today that the Guinness World Record for non-stop gaming has been broken by six Dutch gamers during a 50 hour gaming marathon that started on Fri, July 16th at 12:55 PM Central European Time (CET), in Dixons, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

The six gamers played Red Dead Redemption non-stop on a Sony PlayStation®3 (PS3TM)) using the TwistDock docking station to keep their controllers continuously charged. The team of six champion gamers included brothers Edward and Maykel Leest from Boxmeer and Hengelo, Sven de Vries from Lelystad, Renzo Bos from Baarlo, Robbie van Eijkeren from Middelburg and Marcel van Waardenburg from Amsterdam. The world record award was given out by an official Guinness World Records representative who was flown in from London especially for the occasion.

The previous official world record for non-stop gaming was set in September 2009 by Chirantan Patnaik from India with a time of 40 hours and 20 minutes, which was easily trumped by the six Dutch gamers. As the competition progressed, the Dutch gamers’ solidarity grew and they decided to sit and end the competition together. The gamers made the unanimous decision to end the attempt after an impressive 50 hours for a new world record title. In addition to the world record award, the new Guinness World Record winners received a cash prize of EUR 1,000 and six TwistDocks. “The contestants entered as rivals but left as friends,” said Gaz Deaves, official adjudicator of Guinness World Records

With TwistDock, the PS3 is Always Ready for Action

The Guinness World Record gaming event was an initiative created by Vogel’s to announce the new essential accessory for the PS3, Vogel’s TwistDock www.twistdock.com. With TwistDock, the PS3 is always ready for action — even when the computer is off, the controllers are always being charged. And because of TwistDock’s ingenious turning mechanism, it’s easy to stow two controllers on the back of the TwistDock and, by simply turning it around, have the controllers available at the flick of a wrist and always charged. There’s no more annoyance of losing controllers in sofa cushions!

Gerdi Vogels, CEO of Vogel’s Products BV said, “If you introduce a totally new product in the market which makes dead controllers a thing of the past, a new non-stop gaming world record is a fantastic statement underlining the core value of TwistDock.”

TwistDock will be available in the U.S. starting 4Q 2010 in time for the holiday season. For more information, see the websites: www.twistdock.com and www.vogels.com.

About Vogel’s

For over 35 years, award-winning Vogel’s has been internationally producing Audio/Video mounting solutions. The European market leader with a distribution network that spans the globe, Vogel’s is one of the most trusted and well-known experts in the mounting solutions business with many prestigious international awards, including the Red Dot Product Design Award, RetailVision Award 2010, and many more.

Vogel’s designs, develops and sells support and mounting solutions for LCD and plasma screens, audio and video equipment and projectors. In 2010, Vogel’s has begun expanding into new categories, such as the gaming market with TwistDock for the PlayStation 3, the first product in this new area. Based in The Netherlands, Vogel’s has national sales organizations located in the U.S., U.K., Italy and Spain, and is supported by a local distribution network around the world. Vogel’s stands for innovation, quality and reliability. For more information, see www.vogels.com.

Footage of them playing can be found below: