Australian Gamer Feature :: Fury Launch Party

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Fury Launch Party - Melbourne

Samo, Anna and Cav attends the Melbourne media launch for the game FURY.

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Apprehension is a great word to describe my state of emotion at approximately 6.28pm on Tuesday evening. See, I was a bit nervous. I was nervous about meeting Cav because on the forums as ‘the_twisted_one’ he’d given me the impression that he was a bit of a tool. I was also nervous about attending the Fury game launch. I’d never done anything like this before so I didn’t know what to expect and attending as a respectable (*ahem) member of the Australian gaming press no less. Well technically I’m not part of the press because we don’t actually print anything but whatever you could call online publishing; I’m part of that industry group. Maybe the Australian posters of drivel on the internets. But that doesn’t have the same ring to it so I’m going with press.

See how I’m adding filler here? I’m certain some of you would have picked it out by now. That’s because I’ve already read Starks’ article which is pretty damn good and he’s already said pretty much everything for me. Except I had an interview with Siobhan Parekh, 2004 FHM Girl Next Door and the face of Fury. Oh yeah, did I explain that I was a tad nervous? Yikes.

So I roll into the carpark out the back and after disembarking from my vehicle, begin to make my way through Fed Square. I’m useless at navigating Fed Square, I don’t know why. Damn modern architecture.

After about 5 minutes of wandering and wondering, I give up and called Anna. ‘Oh yeah, we’re right downstairs by the escalators.’ This made things a might bit easier and a couple of wrong turns later I found the escalators and made my way along them in a downward fashion.

The AG and Auran crew: Ashwin Segkar (Auran PR), Anna, Cav, Samo, Tony Hilliam (Auran CEO)

After greeting Anna, I turned to a bespectacled man with a carrot beard who I was fairly certain was Cav. A quick shake of the hand and introduction which helped me ascertain that this man was indeed Cav, a joke about my profession, (yes, I’m a car salesman) Cav tells me he loves his Ford Territory (win for me) and we’re all getting along like old mates. Ripper.

Samo isn't telling you this but he *was* a little late. But in the meantime I, being the kind hearted Samaritan that I am, had volunteered my welcoming skills to assist Cav from Flinders St Station to Federation Square.

What is it with men and being late? Without a phone number, I was eyeing off one particular gentleman in the crowd, yet getting even stranger looks back. This went on for about ten minutes before we both gave up looking like stalkers and tentatively called the others' name. Ah, the wonders of the internet! Photos don't do him justice, I'll say that much. Heading off, we ended up turning up half an hour early and had Ashwin politely intimating to us to head off for a 'bite to eat'. Returning on the dot, we ended up getting into the event half an hour late because of, as Samo puts it, "wagged chin". Hehe. Wagged.

The night progressed as Samo has already described - I found that Nathan's cheeky additions to Tony's introduction to Fury put a nice spin on things and with the announcement of the September Challenge I couldn't help but look at Samo in horror. It was going to be over Grand Final Weekend! Oh dear. That's putting a dampener on my calendar. Samo gave me the equivalent of a pat on the head in response. Gamers can be sports fans too! What is it with this stereotyping, huh?

Meeting Siobhan was a delight. She's a really sweet girl (and I'm not just saying that because I was taller than her... I was, wasn't I?) and was enthusiastic about her role in Fury. Interesting to note that she didn't have any qualms about entering the gaming arena - hopefully a sign of times to come where gaming isn't so male-dominated, in development as well as in it's audience.

So after what was nearly half an hour of getting along well, we figured we’d best make our way towards and through the door to the Fury launch party, because it was nearly 7:00 and the event had started about half an hour earlier. After making our way past a security guard that looked like she wanted to rip my limbs off, we moved into the party room which was nicely darkened and adorned with a couple of big screens, plenty of Fury posters and dim red light. In a fairly similar setup to the Sydney launch described by Sparky *ahem, Starks, there was a row of computers set up for the sampling of the evening’s subject matter. Faced with trying out the latest build of Fury or continuing the frivolity, I opted to furnish myself with a refreshing amber beverage and continued to wag chin.

It wasn’t long before Ashwin spotted us and joined our small AustralianGamer sub soiree along with Tony Hilliam, CEO of Auran, who was clearly enthused about the impending launch of his new title which draws on the Player vs Player aspect of World of Warcraft, improves it and focuses it into a game of its own. Tony was also very quick to point out that the people who were playing Fury on the computers were über gamers Team Sequential, current national Counter Strike champions. This made me look at my beer and breathe a sigh of relief, decision well made. My multiplayer skills are amateurish at best, for me to take on Team Sequential would be like Peter Helliar taking on Michael Schumacher at soccer. Sure it’s not Schuey’s chosen game but it’s really just going to turn into an embarrassing mess.

Lots of guests were keen to try out Fury for themselves

As a game, Fury looks to be shaping up really well indeed. The demonstration of the game was impressive, as is the business setup, which looks like it just might work for everyone. The Auran team are clearly very proud that Fury has been made in Australia and included a big yellow and green ‘Australian Made’ logo in their presentation. Nice. Their marketing is also very clever. Taking the piss out of the obsessive World of Warcraft brigade is always highly enjoyable. Auran’s marketing department certainly think so, the Fury ad is funny because of just how true it is. You may have seen it when Yug posted it in the news a few weeks ago. The one with the obsessive player in a world of his own, completely oblivious to life and his girlfriend which just happen to keep on going around him...

Feeling the need for another drink but mindful of my need to drive home, I excused myself and embarked on a quest to find a holy grail filled with a non-alcoholic beverage. Unable to find a grail of any type, I settled for a glass of orange juice which I was thoroughly enjoying when I was ambushed by Mark and Tristan from PALGN. The ambush was however short lived because it turned out that they were more interested in having a friendly chat about games than trying to kill the AG team for poaching Phil. Crisis averted.

We were then approached by a young lass looking for business cards from each representative, for a prize draw. Being the ‘new kid on the block’ ,(NO! I will not sing Step by Step! Um…. I have a younger sister! That’s how I know the song title, okay?) I didn’t have an AG card, neither did Samo or Anna, but….. I did have Brett’s card which came with this really cool pair of ‘DIY 3D glasses’ in the mail. I popped it in her bucket, turned to Samo and said “You can be Brett” But giving up my copy of Brett’s card was in vein.

The one thing that did grab my attention more than anything on the night, was the offer of a prize for a beta test competition. There were some big names behind this promotion. Could this be the Ace up the sleeve for Auran? Will this convert the Gnomes and the Pallies? If I was actually any good at WoW or any game like this, I be the first convert!

That was the event done and dusted and the masses started to slowly file out. Cav, having a train to catch to get back to the country joined the masses in their exodus, leaving Anna and I to fly the AG flag. But we didn’t really have a flag. Not having a flag was actually a good thing because it would have been awkward as Siobhan Parekh had just arrived. Anna and I set ourselves up with a prime position on the couch in the back corner and Ashwin escorted her over for a quick chat with AG Melbourne.

Samo: Are you excited to be involved with Fury?

Siobhan: Very excited! Yeah, I was approached through FHM a couple of months ago and I got to fly to Brisbane and everything, it’s a really exciting opportunity and I’ve had a lot of calls from overseas media, from Ireland and stuff, so it’s really exciting!

Samo: So Siobhan Parekh is going to be the next Lara Croft?

Siobhan: I don’t know about that!

Samo: What was involved when they did the initial modelling for the game?

Siobhan: I flew to Brisbane and I had a lot of photos taken of different body parts doing different actions with swords and things like that so they could best suit the character to my body type so it’s as much like me as possible.

Samo: Have you been interested in games in the past?

Siobhan: Never, I actually played Fury for the first time last night and it took me a while to get a hang of it. I was playing against some other people and I got killed quite a few times so hopefully I’ll get a bit of practice in and I’ll sharpen my game up a little bit!

Samo: Did you play as yourself?

Siobhan: I did last night! They had a computer set up as me, so I played that one.

Samo and Siobhan

Samo: Is that strange controlling a digital version of you in a game?

Siobhan: Yes. Yes, most definitely. When we did the photoshoot for FHM I was dressed up as my character and it’s the first time I’d actually seen my character on screen, it’s pretty surreal. It was weird to see myself kicking arse with swords and stuff, it’s cool! In the photoshoot they got me to do a few of the moves, which was interesting (laughs).

Samo: That would have been a bit different!

Siobhan: Yeah it was! It was different but it was good fun.

Samo: Well all the best with the launch, thank you for your time!

Siobhan: Thank you!

With that, we were all done. After moving away and checking my recording, Tony beckoned me back to the group as Team Sequential were presenting Siobhan with a one-off Team Sequential team member t-shirt, a very significant gesture from the team.

With that, all was done and we left. All that was left to do was to find my way back through the maze that is Fed Square to my car...

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