Bootcamp

As some of you will know, we from dfiance.cs have been on a bootcamp at the outpost bootcamp center for the past 3 days. At the end of this memorable training-and-having-fun-kinda-camp we decided to write a little blog about it :)

It all began @ day 1 (no not day 2, we begin with day 1).

Senne, Manuel, Wouter and me all met at the central station in Antwerp around 13.30pm. From there on out we marched towards outpost where Felix and Tim were already waiting for us. We sat down and had a chat for like 30mins, waiting for Kenny (Nipstar) to arrive so we could start setting up the computers downstairs. Once that was done, the gaming could finally begin. At least we hoped so. But after searching for an opponent for more then an hour we got kinda hungry so we went out to grab something to eat. Guess what, we choose to eat something super-mega-healthy, french friesss !!

When we got back to outpost, the evening had arrived so finding an opponent got a lot easier.. We played 'till 12 o'clock or something when we got hungry for some more healthy food. Once that was done, we played untill around 4am and decided to call it a day.

Day 2 started around 10am. U will be thinking, 6 hours of sleep, not bad on a bootcamp. Wrong. Sleeping on the floor with nothing else between u and the stonecold floor but a sleeping bag while zeh mosquitos are flying around ur head.. No sleep, no fun. One of us succeeded in getting a couple hours of sleep, making it harded for the other ones cuz this one particular person started snoring like a lunatic.

So during the day everyone was getting tired and even more tired and then a little more tired followed by some tiredness.. Hard to concentrate during a pcw but
we made the best of it.. Eating some healthy food always helps.. That evening the tek9 bois also arrived at outpost. We were happy to c them cuz this ment we
had a good opponent to play against during the night. After a short chat we started playing the 5 maps that will be played at the AEF, having some laughs along
the way. At the end of the pracc, around 2-3am, the tek9 guys went home with michiel to get some sleep while we found a better place to sleep as well: felix's dads
atelier in Berchem. We had to go by foot cuz the above-ground-metro-kinda-train wouldn't take us there before 6am :p After an hour of walking we finally got there.
In the end it was all worth it becuz we all got like 9 hours of sleep, making up a lot of damage done by the first night :)

Day 3 started with a breakfast consisting of a turkish pizza. Felix said it was sooo goooddd while we found it to be soooo shitt. After finishing this durum-lookalike-pizza we got on the above-ground-metro towards outpost. We arrived around 3pm with the tek9 crew already waiting for us. Since the 2 teams couldnt play online at the same time due to some ping problems, we arranged an agreement of playing doing tax. After all that we played eachother again on the 5 different maps which made it 4am. Tek9 went to michiel's place to sleep while we stayed @ outpost till 5.40am cuz we had to take the train at 6.15 and 6.45am.

Looking back we are happy we went on this bootcamp cuz it really cranked up the team spirit, motivation and hope to win AEF.




This guy

There was this guy who always wanted to write a blog about counter-strike and the duality it brought into his life. The reason he didn't write it consisted of the fact that it would sound ridiculous to many people and that he would be looked at differently, like a nerd. Well this guy... he told his story to me and well, I kinda liked it.

Why he wanted to write on this subject ? So it could be used by people who are struggling with the integration of playing cs on a competitive level into his life. He knew how hard it was to explain to a non-gamer just how important gaming can be in someone's life.

First of all he made sure the person who needed explanation realised that cs isn't "just a game". You don't play "just a game" several hours a day if it's not more than that. It should be looked at like a true sport. Every single day (except weekends) you play togheter with 4 other friends, training, becoming better at what you do best, trying to achieve as much as you can. Now tell me, does that sound like "just a game" ? Didn't think so :).

Now this person will be thinking something like: but still, it's a silly game on a silly computer.. go get a life in stead of spending so many hours sitting indoors, doing what you do. See, I would like to make the comparison with snooker. People who play snooker at a high level don't play once a week.. they train as much as they can, practising every shot until perfection is reached. Well what's the difference ? Snooker is played indoors.. Snooker isn't physically tiring.. Snooker is viewed by many people.. Snooker makes u get in contact with other people.. It's all the same with cs, even that last one. The only difference is that there aren't any couloured, shiny balls in cs.. Oh and don't forget that snooker is publically accepted as a sport.. That's a difference too, right ?

Now the person who needs to be explained will try to find another argument why cs isn't that normal as it is to you. Maybe he/she will try the addiction-card ? Well I can't argue with that.. people can get addicted to cs, but trust me, it wears of after a while :). I think 95% of the addicted cs'ers are -15 years old.. Haven't seen any cs'ers that are 16 or older who can't imagine their lives without the game.

Next card, hmmmm, it's too violent ! If you play cs you will become a sociopath who takes a gun to his school and starts shooting at everything that moves ! Please .. this stuff really makes me laugh.. If there is one reason why these kids even think of doing something like that it would be because something went wrong somewhere along the road of education, upbringing. Games like cs don't tell kids to get violent in their real lifes.. But on the news you hear things like: again, "the kid who did this" played many violent video games in his spare time... Well my opinion ( I mean, the opinion of this guy who told me this story ), these kids try to find something to channel their anger in, first they try video games, but when they get the feeling it isn't enough they pass on to the next possible solution, and the next, until they have nothing else left but that merciless act of murder/suicide.

Can't imagine a next card tbh :/

Mmmmm after writing this blog it really doesn't seem that good of a story anymore as it was when this guy told it to me :(
It isn't even about any duality in somebody's life :s it's just an explanation sigh
maybe next time it will be

Oh well, at least now my blog thingy on sk is green in stead of orange, SO COOL !!!!

http://www.sk-gaming.com/rss/blog/Sentinel_

• All
• July 2008 (1)
• May 2008 (1)