It’s that time of the year again where Belgium’s biggest lan takes place. Frag-O-Matic  is only few days away and already at it’s 27th edition. This edition will again be epic with more competition, more activities and 4000 euro cash prize to be divided over the traditional 3 main competitions.

Team Sypher attends this event with the Counter-Strike:Source team making their first LAN appearance for sypher after their comeback and SR.KOPITZ will be travelling down as well to win the WC3 compo.
Unfortunately the CS team won’t be present due to all players having private commitments the upcoming weekend.

Coverage Index

Page 1: General Information
Page 2: TEAMS / PLAYERS
Page 3: Groupstages
Page 4: Playoffs
Page 5: Final Standings
Page 6: Interviews & Media

General information
Date: February 12-14,  2009
Location: Wieze, Belgium
Attendees: 600
More information: website

Prizes

Counter-strike Source (1500 EURO)

• 1st place: 1000 EURO
• 2nd place: 350 EURO
• 3rd place: 150 EURO

Warcraft 3 (hardware)

• 1st place:
  Tritton AX 720
  Gigabyte P55A-UD3R motherboard
• 2nd place:
  Tritton XB200
  Sandberg USB Soundbox 7.1
• 3rd place: 150 EURO
  Sandberg Street Blaster

Coverage

General	Counter-strike Source	Counter-strike1.6	Call of Duty 4
Information & prizes	Groupstage	Groupstage	Groupstage
Team list	Play off’s	Play off’s	Play off’s
Final Standings	Grand Final	Grand Final	Grand Final

General information

Date: 11-13 September 2009

Location: Wieze, Belgium

Attendees: 500

More information: website

Prizes

Call of Duty 4 (2250 EURO)

• 1st place: 1500 EURO
• 2nd place: 500 EURO
• 3rd place: 250 EURO

Counter-strike Source (1500 EURO)

• 1st place: 1000 EURO
• 2nd place: 350 EURO
• 3rd place: 150 EURO

Counter-strike 1.6 (1250 EURO)

• 1st place: 850 EURO
• 2nd place: 250 EURO
• 3rd place: 150 EURO

Last weekend our Counter-Strike: Source squad attended the Opale Arena 2009, a LAN in Oye-Plage, in northern France. About 400 Attendees overall and 20 teams were competing in the CSS compo with a cash prize of 1400 euros and a classic map list : de_tuscan, de_dust2, de_train, de_nuke, de_inferno.

The favourites were the mixteam Meet The Wall, consisting of 4 members of the French national team (Shox & SmithZz from VERYGAMES, Shokkk from redLine and bistouflyy from essentiaL), who take part last week to the ENC final in Cologne against the German team. Their 5^th was Shox’s girlfriend, Amandine, member of the female CSS squad of essentiaL.

Groupstage

After a huge delay (the reason will be explained later), the tournament began on Saturday evening around 22:30. The 18 remaining teams, 2 teams whom actually left the LAN after the multiple network problems, were divided into 4 groups. As High Seed, we inherited a single block, with the following teams: Mixtape, EOS and Sodalis.
Our first game is played against Mixtape on de_dust2, a map that we generally do not really play. The match quickly folded in our favor with 16-04  . Other scores for the group stage were also score quickly made with a 16-01 on de_train versus Sodalis and 16-01 versus EOS on de_inferno.

Results:

• Team Sypher 16:04 Mixtape
• Team Sypher 16:01 Eos
• Team Sypher 16:01 Sodalis

Play-offs

Coming into the final stages, the tree was a double elimination bo1. The quarterfinals and half finals were also played the night from Saturday to Sunday, around 4:00 in the morning. As for maps, they were decided through a system of veto.
In the quarter finals, we confront Now4ll on de_nuke, a map on which we are usually comfortable. The score is dry, the game folded in a minimum time: 16-00.
In the semifinals of the winner bracket, we are opposed to the team NITROSE another team claiming a place in the top3 and playing currently EAS.fr. We expected a real first test. The map is de_nuke, and after a knife round well negotiated, we begin T and are winning the pistol round, and … all other rounds. Score a passage to terrorists: 15-00. The second side starts with a pistol round little lost and by two eco rounds. Armed in the first round, we put the round we wanted to win the match. Final score: 16-03.

After those first games that were rather easy, we went to bed around 6:30 in the morning to get up at … 9:30. After a light breakfast and some Deathmatch, the much anticipated match in the winner bracket final versus Meet The Wall was started, and this on de_inferno. We once again win the knife round and have the privilege of beginning CT. The pistol round is won after the bomb was planted in B. Shox is found in 3vs1, eliminates 2 CT before being killed by the last SYPHER living who defused the bomb. The first round was won eco and it quickly leads 2-0. Our opponents got back quickly, mostly due to mistakes on our part. Wewon nevertheless the first side, on the lowest scores of 8-7.
We turn T and again we win the pistol round and the majority of rounds that follow to conduct 7-1. Having more than 1 round to put for the win, we release the pressure, committing multiple errors and the opponent gains the attacks easier. 15-8, 15-9 … 15-15! The overtime following is a reflection of our end of T-side: bad. We no longer find our game and are destabilized by their meteoric rise. OT: 0-5 and 1-1. Final score: 16-21.

Results:

• Team Sypher 16:00 Now4ll
• Team Sypher 16:03 Nitrose
• Team Sypher 16:21 Meet the wall

Consolation Final

So we are propelled into the lower bracket final. But again big problems arrive, the games have in fact taken long delays after our match, followed by the players. We must therefore wait until 5 games are played! The wait lasted several hours, and everything being closed around the  LAN for beverages and food, we had to eat leftovers biscuits from the night before at dinner … 5 hours after our match winner bracket finals, we finally play the lower bracket final, hungry and tired…
We replay the NITROSE who just won their 2 games of the lower bracket, the map is de_dust2. First sign of fatigue, we lose our first round of the tournament knife and begin T. Starting of with the first rounds, the opposing players were motivated due to their last games, from our side communication problems were causing a bad start. The side has won in a close9-6 . Going into CT, it went a little better, and rounds are made easier: 7-3 and this making the final score 16-09.

Results:

• Team Sypher 16:09 Nitrose

Grand Final

After a ten minute break and we played the first map of the grand final once again versus Meet The Wall on de_nuke, which is our map. The French begin CT (they choose the side on our map, played in 1st). We lost the pistol round, and in the same state of fatigue we had in the previous match,  rounds were taken against us … Not much to say except that they played better on this map then we did. The match was nothing like the winner’s bracket, unable to find our game it ended with a tough 03-12. Changing to CT side hope wass gone, we are only able to get a round and resulting in a 16-04 final score.

Results:

• Team Sypher 04:16 Meet the wall

Final standings

• Meet The Wall – 700EURO
• Team Sypher – 420 EURO
• Nitrose – 280 EURO

Our Conclusion

Following this brief summary of our journey throughout the tournament, I’ll finish this review by a small explanatory note on the problems the LAN had.

We arrived on Friday evening and only receive our screens on Saturday morning-early afternoon, the switch connecting us to the main network was only in the late afternoon. Following this, the network was crashing, the tables were disconnected one after the other and admins unable to find a solution … It was a player who took things in hand, with the help of another person, also a player, after re-connecting everything, changing cables and switches, they managed to restore the network. Afterwards, with the servers still not configured correctly,they had to call RegnaM which, by telephone, told the admins how to set their servers. After the servers were resolved properly, SmithZz took the tournament in his hands and made the seeds, groups and led the tournament with his teammates as well as ours.
Basically, the LAN-admins were absent and most incompetent, if this wasen’t already enough several power cuts took place, leading to some power-switches and screens burned …
A LAN that was worth a visit for the cashprize and … that’s all

General information

Date: 11-13 September 2009

Location: Wieze, Belgium

Attendees: 500

More information: website

Prizes

Call of Duty 4 (2250 EURO)

• 1st place: 1500 EURO
• 2nd place: 500 EURO
• 3rd place: 250 EURO

Counter-strike Source (1500 EURO)

• 1st place: 1000 EURO
• 2nd place: 350 EURO
• 3rd place: 150 EURO

Counter-strike 1.6 (1250 EURO)

• 1st place: 850 EURO
• 2nd place: 250 EURO
• 3rd place: 150 EURO

Counter-strike:Source Teams

• Team Sypher (BOON – bil – FuZ – janssen & REAZONN )
• Antwerp Aces
• Rodcad gaming
  
• Team Vibes
• Cyberlegends
• 4Kings
• Snogard Dragons
  
• Alternate Attax
  

Counter-strike 1.6 Teams

• Team Sypher (hutCh – yok0- iD3Nt- Nesk & Fre3)
• Antwerp Aces
• network generation
• LowLandLions
• Getcon
• septiCore
• Insania
• 6ROTA
• more TBA

Let’s have a small recap of what the Intel Friday Night Games represents:

* A cooperation of WSquared Media with INTEL, HP and Makro
* 4 Events during the month of July! Matches on stage and no entrance fee!
* The top of professional Benelux teams and players competing for a € 4000 Prize pot!
* Outdoor stage with a big screen for the audience and Live shoutcasting!

Participants

Counter-Strike 1.6 (2000 euro)
LowLandLions
Antwerp Aces (tek9)
Team Sypher

Counter-Strike Source (750 euro)
4Kings
Amaizing

FIFA 2009 (1250 euro)
LowLandLions squad: Geenens Jeryb Bryan energy
Antwerp Aces (tek9) squad: AcKie Rollo Maxos nepstier

Week 1 – Deurne, Antwerp

The Setup
The first edition, the first big challenge!
Arriving in the early afternoon; some crew members of ESL Benelux and WSquared media had to build up the stage where they received the needed help for. After a while things started to get in their position and the first impression of what the final result should be started to get shape.

Stage preview	Wouter (WSquared) in action
The Setup

The crowd

18:00, Soccer Time with FIFA’09

Everything is ready, the stage is shining and the fifa players have arrived. It’s finally time for tonight’s first game: :fifa09: Fifa 2009.

Equal to the CS:Source match this game only features two teams, also an exception is that fifa features in the first three weeks but not on the finals day (July 24th)

Now as earlier said the FIFA Game brings us a show of Benelux’ finest players. A little side note on this game is the different prize distribution since it’s more a solo game. Each victorious match brings € 100 to the player and each defeat is good for € 40.

Now let’s go to what today’s game brought us, as in the end competition is always about winning and this spirit of fighting is something LowLandLions and Antwerp aces surely have!

:benelux: LowLandLions

The team surely the most in shape for tonight had to be the Lions. In this team we can Geenens which only a few months ago won € 1000 Cash at Frag-O-Matic 11. Having Geenens in their team; LowLandLions surely is some hard competition for the Antwerp Aces line-up.

:benelux: Antwerp Aces
After having recruited Ackie which is a former LLL Player, this team surely brought in a strong player who is still learning day by day in this competitive scene of Fifa. He ended third at Frag-O-Matic.

The results

FIFA: IFNG WEEK I
Antwerp Aces [01-02] LowLandLions
Rollo [1:3] Bryan Ackk1e [1:2] jeryb Ackk1e [3:2] Geeneens
Antwerp Aces	Ackk1e – Rollo
LowLandLions	Geeneens – Bryan – Jeryb

Here a little statement from Antwerp Aces Player Ackie about the event and his performance.

:be: Ackkie: Last friday my first Intel Friday Night game took place. I had a lot in mind about this event but when I arrived my excitement and idea about it were nothing compared to my expectations.
When we went preparing ourselves I came to the conclusion my gamepad didn’t function properly and I had to use Rollo’s Pad. Unfortunately I couldn’t get used to it very fast and it made me lose my first game vs :belgium: LLL`JeryB.

In the second game I managed to get into rythm but still the game-pad was the cause of some weird actions! But Luckily I managed to beat the top Belgian Fifa player :be: LLL`Geenens, and frankly said quite easily; I assume he had a bad day.

19:30 – Team power with CS 1.6

The FIFA matches took place and pretty much on schedule it was time for the highlight of tonight, the Benelux clash between the Flemish/Dutch :benelux: LowLandLions team and the Belgian/Walloon formation of :belgium: Team Sypher

The Teams

:be: Jules “nookbrid”Wydoodt
:nl: Dennis “seezung” Seesing
:nl: Tom “tommeh” Nijenhuis
:nl: Mike “trx” Degger
:be: Ivan “Apollo” Wuddhisukhum

After a recently announced line-up change featuring the unexpected departure of long standing member :nl: xire; the new addition of the LowLandLions is no other then :belgium: nookbrid. An experienced player who has the needed motivation, skill and history to make this team what it should be.

The Lions surely came out as favorites for this event since they’re the team dominating the Benelux scene for more then two years now. Not even a week earlier three LowLandLions players attended the ESL Pro Series Finals in Enschede, Netherlands where they took the title beating DOKGaming.

This recent attendance of an offline event should scare off Team Sypher which hasn’t played on a lan event since Last Frag-O-Matic. Of course we shouldn’t forget that having a new player in the team is a serious handicap and in a last day announcement tommeh couldn’t attend and got replaced by a retired known player: :be: David ‘Spacey‘ Mennes

:be: Matthieu “Fre3” Braquenier
:be: Renaud “NESK” Bronchart
:be: Grégoire “yokO” Debay
:be: Riccardo “hutCh” Natalizio
:be: Massimo “iDent” Cicerale

Team sypher is by some saying an outsider in this first edition of the Intel Friday Night Games. They’re also the only walloon formation and that’s always a delicate point when it comes to rivalry in Belgium. Team Sypher last’s Event attendance was the FOM 11.0 Lan where they took a second place after losing the final… yes, against LowLandLions! And here’s the challenge of tonight, again they met the team that defeated them for the last time on a Lan event and Team Sypher surely saw this as a opportunity to show they’re still as strong as a few months ago.

After the FOM Lan Team Sypher captain :belgium: hutCh: decided to take a break from his role and only 4 days before the first IFNG he announced to take up his role again. This means Team Sypher also faces a similar situation as LowLandLions and makes it exciting for both teams on what the event would bring.

The final score

COUNTER-STRIKE 1.6: IFNG WEEK I
Team Sypher [01-01] LowLandLions
de_dust2 [14:16] de_inferno [16:10]
DEMO: Here!
Team Sypher	hutCh – Fre3 – yokO – iD3Nt – nesk
LowLandLions	seezung – trx – spacey – nookbrid – apollo

Matthieu “Fre3” Braquenier (SR)	Ivan “Apollo” Wuddhisukhum (LLL)
The Counter-Strike 1.6 teams preparing for the game