We’ve been a little mum about our plans for 2015 – mainly because we haven’t quite reached the position we’d like to be in to confirm things. That being said, there is absolutely no reason we can’t start revealing the concepts, confirmed plans and the (slightly) controversial decisions we’ve made for the year ahead.
Let us introduce you to a slightly new look Zombiegamer from 2015… subject to some fine-tuning.
Zombiegamer
Since that day in May 2009 when a new bunch of crazy invaded the zombie bunker, we’ve been Zombiegamer – a gaming website from South Africa. That remains unchanged. We’ll continue to shamble our way through posting articles in our own way about international news, while continuing to focus (and expand) on the local scene more.
This little patch of the worldwide web is home to regular contributors and those that fleetingly join us only to become one of the missing when they can’t embrace the glamorous side of being just a ‘reporter’ anymore…
ZG Events
This is the social animal of the bunch. The part of us that goes out and plays in public, and the one many of you tasty humans have supported for around three years. ZGE (Zombiegamer Events – or even eSports depending on the mood) is both the community driven gaming events part of the Zombiegamer name, and one that going forward will be available for equipment rental and brains rental – also known to humans as manpower.
The Events part of Zombiegamer will appear in its private capacity hosting both social and competitive events with both free and paid for entry. You might also see us at other people’s events hosting a portion of the activities or lurking behind the scenes and pushing arbitrary buttons. We’ve been know to do both before, so that’s not really a change at all.
What we do want to emphasise however is that we are also available for private events, birthday parties and corporate events and will happily quote and advise you to ensure a unique experience for your attendees.
To help subsidise our community driven events, we will be implementing a number of new ideas and structures to fund our operations and ensure a better experience for attendees. Some of the changes will include:
- A wider variety of titles. We are also considering an expansion of platforms.
- A wider variety of event types. Not everyone is competitive and we need to get the balance between the social and casual animals, and the competitive beasts.
- Where applicable, a discounted ‘Early Bird’ registration fee will be offered.
- A variety of giveaways and competitions with a small entry fee will be operated in regular cycles. For a fraction of the cost of buying something, you could stand a chance to win it, and help us keep what we do going. Some may call it a raffle, we won’t.
- Sale of branded merchandise…
ZG Shop
Yes, you asked (or you were just being nice), so we have decided to listen and offer you some of our Zombiegamer branded merchandise. We’ll start with the t-shirts, get some mugs, maybe do some console skins and take it from there. The sky is the limit and who doesn’t want to show their love for a zombie?
The shop – as with everything – will take a short while to roll out, but we hope that with your support, we will be able to grow the idea to amazing things like toilet paper, canned brains and other awesome daily items. Or maybe not.
ZAGL
We’ve been promising it, and we’re pretty much ready to deliver it. ZAGL will be the online competitive home of Zombiegamer. We will be starting things with console Call of Duty, adding FIFA and then looking at a wider expansion from next year.
Rather than jump straight into the league we will roll out with cups, and as pace is generated, we will kick off the league.
We plan to utilise our online tournaments as a seeding system for our LANs which means points will be assigned to teams (and players in FIFA eventually). Yes, p…p… points. Details of the points will be revealed soon, as will an affiliation that will hopefully set things in motion for a major shift in the local scene.
ZoMG
Of course, we promised some controversy, and this is it.
The Zombiegamer Mind Sports Gaming Club. ZoMG Club. Yes, this is an MSSA affiliated club. Yes, Zombie Dredd (or Clint O’Shea in the real world) has accepted the post of City of Cape Town Regional Director. And yes, many will ask “why?”
After going to (and speaking to) various schools in 2014 to host a variety of gaming events as a private individual/organisation, it became pretty clear that for school kids, the idea of getting colours is an appealing one. It was also a surprise to find that many school goers were not really aware of competitive gaming, gaming events and the various possibilities it presented.
Therefore, if hosting events at schools and offering talented school players colours means finding the next SA eSports star, then I accept that and volunteer my time.
Under the MSSA affiliation, a number of Regional tournaments will be hosted over a variety of titles, but the schools (and the yet to be revealed schools program) will be the main focus.
Conclusion
Think of all these little parts as severed limbs of the same zombie. They are all off doing their own thing but all have the same objection.
While you can expect changes to the site, a few new faces and new announcements, we’re still the same grumpy old zombies we’ve always been… we’ll just be more. And everywhere.
We would like to end by thanking everyone who has supported us over the years, as without your (hopefully ongoing) support, we would not be able to continue. However, it is starting to become crucial that the community events cover their own costs as sponsorship has not been a luxury to us. Generally all income at the events has been pushed right back into the prizes on offer.
It is also not unusual for costs to exceed income, so without the assistance of a number of awesome humans volunteering their time, you -as an attendee – would not have an event. So the biggest thanks goes out to anyone that has ever assisted a Zombiegamer event. Thank you.
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact us. You can also find us on Facebook and Twitter, and of course, right here.
