Yes, once again, it is review time!

And this one certainly deserves a great review! We have been working hard to bring you this on and the gallery too! Of course, all captions are brought to you by Ze Skull, so send flames to him! Anyway, without further ado, over to Ze Jarra!

Ze Baron

Roweb The Gathering Review - By Ze Jarra

Yet another late review, sorry to keep you all waiting.

One advantage of letting the dust settle before doing the review, was that it gave us a chance to soak in some of the responses from all attendees. On the whole, the event was a great success, and we wish to thank all those who gave us some valuable feedback on how to make the next one even better

Anyway, back to this event; On the weekend of June 8th 2001, Swindon FC played host to our biggest event yet, with over 100 people in attendance. The whole theme, called the Gathering, was lightly based around Highlander, though there wasn't a McLeod or a Kurgen in sight and most of the other immortals were just too busy to make it. We did however manage to acquire a replica of Connor Mcleod's katana which was to be THE PRIZE for the greatest all-round player in the coming tournaments. The idea was that the champion(s) of each game genre, Quake3 , Counterstrike (team of 5), Cossacks (team of 2) would compete head to head in a finale (Rally Masters) in order to determine the uber champion. Many Thanks to Intel who kindly sponsored the prizes and brought loads and loads of network gear, servers and PC's! ! Click on the right to see prizes! ---->

We were amazed at the extent to which people would travel just to share a room with a bunch of sweaty, beer drenched gamers, but hey they still came. Ranging from Southampton all the way to Chesterfield, the call of the LAN stretched far and wide. Kinetic, still waiting for the engine to be invented in Wales, left a couple of days earlier so that he could guarantee arriving on time by horse and cart ;we got all sorts here!!!!
The London Krew as usual, comprising of Ze Clan, ULLA, Shotgun and this time Slaine & Dirt from UC_UK clan, were all huddled into a coach and force fed beer for the 2 hour trip ,poor guys.

Not only did we have a large clan turn -up but we also had some fellow Lan organizers who were obviously looking for a break.
Izz, DJ Arcas and Doc Fear of FlashLan (The chill n' chomp curry LAN), joined in the Roweb revelry, as well as Creature from ArenaLans, Putty_Thing and Ripper from the Big game.
And of course how could we forget the man with a 1000 vocal chords, Shotgun's Pete Ze Hair and his fellows, Kulgan and Mid_Gen (who borrows his T-Shirts from the Village People Foundation)

We were also pleased to welcome more females of the species to the LAN, the now regulars [UC_UK] uberChicks, Medusa (She can deal as much 0wnage as she can smile), Sofalou (LimpMisfit's CS mentor makes her appearance at last!) and then we had the [Vets] vixens, Stardust and Soley who could probably teach us all a few lessons on how to play CS like a man (er, that was meant to sound like a compliment by the way)

Anyway, back to the layout, we also had a mini cinema area, for those who wanted to grab a seat and watch DJ Arcas dance the hell out of Skyler at Dance-Dance revolution ,catch a film or watch Thumb Wars if anyone was lucky enough to see this absurdly funny pastiche of Star Wars.
Then of course at the far end of the room we were flanked by the bar and various tables for those to chill out with a fellow Roweber over pint or a bottle of Bacardi Breezer if your into chick drinks like myself and Pheo, ( I had my first Pineapple Breezer there, and i approve)

Swiftly moving on then, Roweb events are not just about drinking, we do also play some games as well. We had the usual games of CS going round, the Ze VS UC_UK 10 on 10 was a real laugh, especially the finale involving daggers only, it was like a battle scene out of Braveheart with both sides clashing, stabbing and poking each other; we really have to do that again. Strategy goons, DJ Arcas and Doc fear could be seen discussing 18th century field tactics whilst playing Cossacks, Phleb managed to muster a group of Worm fanatics for an intense game of point and click Worms World Party.

Like all Saturdays at Roweb, this one was no different in terms of atmosphere. In the evening people were settling by the bar, clans were mingling (as well as the beer no doubt), BB guns were a'firing but most people probably feared Pete Ze Hair's elastic band propelling guns I think. Besides playing games and drinking a little, people were huddled around PC's watchng a DVD of some sort. I camped by Orcas' PC in order to catch one of my favourites, from Dusk til Dawn, that film always got me in the mood for Doom, unfortunately no-one is up for playing that game anymore, let me know if there's anyone out there who is, and I will be more than happy to pack a double barrel into their kidneys!

Sunday played host to the main tournament day, as usual the tourneys were a little rushed because people were just too relaxed to even think of competition. Despite trying out CrimsonHaze's new tourney software to iron out some of the admin, we were still running round like headless chickens making sure the final was going to happen. So the champions from each game genre, Cossacks (DJ Arcas & Doc Fear), Quake 3 (Smooth) and CS ([Vets]) all played head to head in a finale of Rally Masters which was eventually shown on the big screen as well.
Even though the final was over pretty quickly, the races were pretty exciting to watch and some of them were close. But there can be only one, and that proved to be Scope of [Vets] clan who managed to win the day and the Connor Mcleod Katana sword. 2nd prize, a full box copy of CDV's Sudden Strike went to [Vets] Cola. Looks like the [Vets] 0wned Roweb tourneys, however i am sure they will come against stiffer competition at the Terrorist LAN on the 27th of July. So [Vets] beware! (and watch out for your banner as well, could be up for grabs from the likes of [DoA]).

We would like to thank Intel staff, Flemming, Stinky Lizard Nose (You know who u r!), Pav, Mark "Demolition Man" Mutch and Ute and Anne (behind the scenes), for your sterling efforts as usual!
Our Roweb staff who put aside a lot of playing time to help others have a good time. We'd also like to welcome new staff members Creature (who's help at the last LAN was well appreciated); old roweb veterans, Army, Chief and Skack, who have always had positive commitment to the Roweb events
A big shout goes out to the usual Roweb hardcore who were there from the beginning, Phatt, Toastie, Doggers and whoever else I missed out.
Of course it was great to see people who have now become Roweb regulars like UC_UK clan & ULLA's Spey, Sherbot Lemon, Skyler and Body_Count, [SWB] and [CIX] clan.
Then we would also like to welcome new friends at Roweb like the [Vets] and [DoA] clan, I also include many individuals who were new to Roweb but I have not mentioned!

Thats all for now folks, till the next one. 27th to 29th July 2001, a real deactivated AK47 is up for grabs! Go here for info!

Ze Jarra

(/mumbles something about ridiculous looking picture of himself)