Indiagames is looking for cyber gaming pros

agencyfaqs! news bureau

NEW DELHI

Cyber gaming will never be the same again.

Unveiling the first-of-its-kind competitive cyber gaming in the country, Pepsi's popular brand Mirinda, and India's first dedicated games company Indiagames have announced the "Indian Preliminary Mirinda Gaming Championship" - which will determine India's delegation to the 1st World Cyber Games (WCG) to be held in Korea. The Indian Preliminary Mirinda Gaming Championship is co-sponsored by Microsoft Games fest.

The 1st WCG is being jointly organised by International Cyber Marketing, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Korea, the Korean Game Promotion Centre. As many as 400 top game players from 25 countries from across the world will participate in the 1st WCG - to be held between December 5 and 9, 2001, in Seoul. Each of these countries would be conducting their own preliminary rounds and selecting their contingents.

The elimination round for the Mirinda Gaming Challenge is underway. Participants across the country can go to any Dishnet DSL Hub and register to participate in the tournament. The elimination round will be on till October 31. Participants selected from each zone will then be invited to play at the All-India event, which will take place between November 8 and 11, 2001, at Hakone Entertainment Centre, Hiranandani Gardens, Mumbai. The details of the event are available on the web site www.wcgindia.com.

The World Cyber Game Challenge was organised as a warm up event last year in France and it had great success with players from 17 countries participating in the tournament and fighting it out for supremacy. No wonder the India leg sponsors are upbeat. Vishal Gondal, CEO, Indiagames, hopes that this initiative will spark overall public interest in PC gaming in the country. "In turn, this would help contribute to our rapidly expanding IT and the gaming industry."

With the sponsorship Pepsico hopes to tap into the fast growing cyber gaming community in India. Vibha Rishi, executive director (marketing), Pepsi Foods, says, "In the last two years, the Mirinda Video Gaming promotion has succeeded in making Video Gaming a hot leisure property among the youth in the country. So it is only natural that Mirinda brings the first ever competitive gaming championship to India. Everything about cyber gaming is part of Mirinda personality - it is challenging, hi tech, fun, hip, versatile and cuts across age and gender."

Though gaming is a big thing among the cyber community worldwide, in India it is a relatively recent phenomenon. The reason is simple. The bandwidth being limited and access being comparatively expensive, Internet gaming is yet to pick up. But gamers are gamers and they have their way to play, thus the concept of LAN games where people can play against human players has come up and is spreading through the country like wildfire. The idea is to have a network of computers over which these bandwidth hungry games can be played. Groups of young guys throng the nearest cybercafe where the LAN exists and spend hours playing games.

The 1st World Cyber Games is probably the culmination of all such ideas. With the Korean Government giving it full support, cyber gaming could now be recognised not just as a hobby, but a professional sport.

© agencyfaqs! 2001