| Event: Digital Destruction VIII Event Date: 6/01/02 Written By: Warhawk Date Written: 01/23/2026 |
|
This would be the biggest LANs that we had at this house. We even had a visitor who drove all the way up from Long Beach. I originally met him in a strange way - I had a college speech class and one of the girls that sat near me found out I was into PC gaming and immediately insisted that I contact her boyfriend, because he also was into PC gaming, and ths we should be friends. She connectyed us via AOL Instant Messanger (AIM) and we ended up chatting now and then. Turned out he went by the callsign Nightmare and went to college in Long Beach. He was involved with a Counterstrike based Clan, that even had thier own server (apparently hosted on the extremely fast college internet connection). I believe he was coming back to the bay area for some family reason and agreed to come by the LAN on his way up.
At this LAN we were also about to get some girls involved, who were part of our usual friend/ hangout group and who also enjoyed gaming. One of them, who went by "PinkFury" at the LAN would later end up marrying another LAN attendee (not because of the LAN, but because of the afore mentioned friend group connection).
Attendees included:
Warhawk (of course)
QueMine
Manticore
Wipeout
Nerfherder
Skynet/Modoc
Psychosomatic
Nightmare
Crewman No 5
PinkFury
also another guy, whos name I cant remember and who can be seen hiding in the back of some of the group pics
I also wrote another ridiculous LAN announcement for this, which was themed after the movie Fight Club... probably because I had recently seen it for the first time. In this announcement I included seating charts that, based on the pictures, were only loosly adhered to:
______Begin message_____
MISCHEIF, MAYHEM, LAN PARTY
The first rule about Digital Destruction VIII is you don't talk about Digital Destruction VIII.
The second rule about Digital Destruction VIII is you don't talk about Digital Destruction VIII.
You don't say anything because Digital Destruction VIII exists only in the hours between when Digital Destruction VIII starts and when Digital Destruction VIII ends. (10 am to 11pm)
We ask that everyone contribute to the event, a few dollars is all we ask. By a "few" dollars we mean anywhere between two dollars, up to and including your entire life savings. How do we come to this number? Well its really quite simple.
You take the population of computers at the party (A) and multiply it by the probable rate of power consumption (B), then multiply the result by the average cost of electricity plus the cost of snacks that an adolecent consumes in the timeframe of 12 hours (C).
A times B times C equals X. This is what it will cost for you to come to the party.
If X is greater than the amount of money in your wallet, you stay home.
If X is less than the amount of money in your wallet, then you give us said amount and enjoy yourself at the party.
If you can contribute equipment to the party such as, tables, or chairs, then you do not have to pay said fee.
If you can contribute food such as, snacks, or soda, then you need only pay 2 dollars.
Now lets examine the floor plan for the party.
Here we see the bedroom. This room is compete with 4 gaming machines provided by me, the party coordinator, out of the goodness of my heart, for the benefit of those who are not fortunate enough to own their own computers.
 Bedroom layout |
Here is the garage. This is where everyone who is fortunate enough to own their own computers will set up their rigs. One problem with this plan is that, aside from one party table and one card table (capable of holding 4 computers together) I do not actually posses the tables and chairs pictured in this diagram. Somone… and this is very important… needs to volunteer to bring a table or two or else there is going to be a lot of people sitting on the floor.
|
Be prepared to hear the sound of gunfire, rock music and voices taunting eachother, all day long. Be prepared to get smacked down and shown no mercy. You are not a beautiful, unique snowflake... This is your life, and it's ending one frag at a time. Tyler says, Don't be a single serving friend, come to Digital Destruction VIII.
NOTE:
Offical party games list. These are the games the will be played at the party. Make sure you have them installed and updated before you come. Otherwise you will be spending a lot of time sitting around watching the install screen while everyone else gets to play.
Other games are welcome at the party, but it is usually hard to get new games going unless people have them installed and ready to go before the party.
Games that WILL be played are:
Jedi Knight 2 Version 1.03
Return to Castle Wolfenstien Version 1.32
Counterstrike Version 1.4
Games that will probably be played:
Medal Of Honor Version 1.0
Dungeon Siege
_____ END MESSAGE______
Having the correct games, and the correct versions of these games became a very important thing to have sorted out beforehand. This was because we were increasingly finding out that we were wasting a loot of prime gaming time by helping people install their games, or helping them find and install the correct patch to bring the games up to their latest versions. Also, some of the names on the seating chart were of people who didnt actually show up, namely "(MacCS) Gnome" who I have absolutely no memory of whatsoever.
I fondly remember playing Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Jedi Knight 2 at these parties. Some of the best LAN games of all time.
Setting these events up became a lot of work and coordination. This involved trying to get parental signoff for these events, as well as gathering up the required resources in terms of chairs and tables, networking gear, and not to mention trying to make sure enough people can actually bring their own PCs to make the whole thing worthwhile.
