On the 24th of February 2007, the first Brisbane Gamers Meetup was organised. Not confined to one website, gaming company, or community, this meet was designed to be an open invitation to everyone who calls themselves a gamer, to come together in a social and non-geeky environment yet still be comfortable being themselves.
Organised by Hawk, veteran GameArena (and new AustralianGamer) forum member, and myself (Yug of AustralianGamer), the event took place at my residence in Fortitude Valley. While some might question having a meetup with strangers at someone’s house, it quickly becomes apparent that the place is less of a house, and more of a pad designed for parties.
The first person to arrive for the evening was actually Usmell from AtomicMPC, who turned up around midday, unsure of what time the event actually started. Having caught me while I was cleaning up from the party the night before, and refusing to let him help, he wished me good luck and took off to work.
Everything was setup and ready mid afternoon – the ball pit, Singstar, digital projector, sound system, lighting, smoke machine, etc. Myan was the first to arrive, as I’d asked him to come along a bit early and bring his Wii so we could set it up. Just before 7pm, Hawk turned up with his new girlfriend, Joaby, Hinee, Badomen and his girl, Fury and Kyliegirl, and ZNMS, a collection of people from GameArena, AustralianGamer and PALGN. Hawk came prepared, sorting out food and dip before losing himself in the first of many Singstar matches with an already slightly inebriated Joaby.
Between the ball pit and Singstar, I did wonder whether Joaby and Hawk actually made it to the balcony upstairs at any point.
Other people started to turn up, such as Phil and Matt from PALGN, Mdobele from HalfBrick and AG, LiveWire (aka Ben from Krome), Gaute from Krome and AG ... actually there were alot of people from Krome Studios who made an appearance that night, no doubt because of Romi who convinced a fair few of them to come.
Sagacious Tien and EdgeCrusher from the AG forums turned up around the same time Matt (the other half of AustralianGamer) did, while Tim from the AG forums only stayed for a few hours (however he did have an awesome t-shirt).
The Wii setup on the balcony worked a treat, with Wii Tennis and Bowling being the clear winners of the night. The Xbox 360 didn’t even get a go unfortunately, maybe next time.
The ball pit downstairs was another matter entirely, occasionally being alot of fun, while at other times turning into a warzone. At one point there was what can only be described as a ‘ball pit battle’ between Sxio and Romello vs. Hawk, Joaby and Badomen. Those balls may be soft plastic, but it still hurts when they smack you in the head!
Eventually some people from Auran turned up, including Michael and Joseph (who definitely won the prize for best t-shirt of the night). Other latecomers included a few of more girls to even things up, Lizzy, Crystle, Maralyn, Sarah and Tenielle. Sufficiently drunk already, they got right into the Wii as well as danced up a storm in the strobe light and smoke machine.
Back downstairs, Hinee was off his tree after smoking some of Badomens wacky herbal smokes (the legal kind), and after Hawk had finished making out in the ball pit, Joaby promptly passed out in it, even with Singstar still blasting out from the lounge room.
It started to get a bit crazy as girls started dancing with motorcycle helmets on, and some guys stuffed balloons up their shirts and pretended to be women. Well, it is the valley after all. As things started to quiet down, the remaining people huddled up on the small mattress out on the balcony, to enjoy a self proclaimed ‘Mattress Party’, which went for longer than it had any right to.
Eventually of course, the night had to come to an end, with people going home or heading out, but leaving me to clean up the mess the next day. EdgeCrusher, Joaby, Gaute and Alice crashed in the complex, and the next day I enjoyed a breakfast in the mall with (a still fairly intoxicated) Joaby.
I had a great time, and I hope everyone else did as well. Don't forget to check out our videos from the event at the
Official AustralianGamer.com Youtube page here.
Hopefully enough people will see how much fun we had at this meetup and will want to come to the next one. With any luck, we will be able to do similar things in the other capital cities around Australia. Stay Tuned!