General: Multiplay MFestival (i34)

Last week, Samsung was nice enough to fund me heading down to the much talked about mFestival. The iSeries events have really gone from strength to strength over the last few years, helped in part by the tremendous growth in online gaming.

Not too many years ago, I was somewhat involved in a project called eFestival, that was going to be run at Stoneleigh Park near Coventry. So to hear about an mFestival in the same venue, with a lot of similar aspirations made me a little annoyed, but intrigued to see if they actually did a decent job.

The iSeries events have been traditionally focussed on LAN gaming, and they do an amazing job of this. This very reason is why they can turn a warehouse into a bustling hub of 2000 sweaty, smelly geeks. Personally, I don't see the appeal. I used to LAN game a little when I was younger and we'd have 4 or 5 people in close proximity and it was a really social event. These guys are glued to their machines, playing people they don't know and can't see. Most of them didn't leave their seats, let along wander around the rest of the show and leave their PC unattended. Many of them were playing WoW. Forgive my ignorance, but what is the point of traipsing half way across the country to play an online game? They may as well still be in their bedroom.

Hell, who am I to judge what people enjoy doing - and if they want to sit on a chair surrounded by Jolt cola and fast food, so be it. Looking around, a lot of people were having a great time - even the small few shouting profanity half way across the room to "1337gamer69" for camping. Much love.

In the main hall is where most of the fun was happening. Foxconn, MSI, QuietPC, CoolerMaster, Antec, Samsung, Crucial and more were showing off their latest products and getting the audience involved as much as possible. I was surprised, nay impressed, to see both Foxconn, MSI and Intel all dabbling with Liquid Nitrogen in full view for everyone to see.

But more impressively (purely because I've played with LN2 before) is the Fluorinert submersed machine that Armari was showing off on the Intel stand. I'm sure we've all seen oil submersion before and usually it's done in plastic tubs and reeks of science project, but this was one of the most polished systems I've ever seen - truly something else.

There was a strong Guitar Hero / Rock Band theme throughout the show, with pretty much every stall having at least one of these on demand for people to use. I'm a big Guitar Hero fan so I couldn't help but have a go. My tiredness wasn't helping at all as I wasn't doing all that well. This aside, I will put my hands up and say that Skippy @ Quiet PC is amazing. How he pulled off Disturbed's Stricken in "Expert" mode without his eye balls bleeding is incredible. Doing this, on the Zalman 3D monitors made it even more fun to take part in.

The Rock Band competition was unfortunately a pre-registered affair, otherwise I would have warmed up and done my best Chris Cornell impression. Taking part aside, it was actually quite entertaining to watch - especially with it all up on the big screen. Intel took a slightly different approach by having real instruments to hand, but I didn't actually see anything happen on this stage. Perhaps this was saved for the evening.

There were a few Xbox booths around, and Samsung was allowing everyone to try out their range of monitors. But the problem with the event, is that it was aimed entirely at the people sitting in the LAN chambers - but they just stayed in there playing games. The people wandering around were pretty ordinary consumers, a lot of them friends who had tagged along. They aren't interested in ultra extreme enthusiast overclocking, and that's why most of them were queuing up to play guitar hero.

However, generally speaking there was "something for everyone", so I don't question it's worth to the consumer. But I certainly question its worth to the manufacturers who turned up. The booth price best be cheap!

Outside, we had a huge array of outdoor activities, that I have been told is a bolt-on extra for an extra £5. I took part in some Quad Biking and archery and had a great time. But despite the glorious weather, very few people were outside catching rays or taking advantage of any of the activities that would usually cost a small fortune to take part in. Modern Geeks, they are not.

I went down on the Friday, so granted, I imagine is not going to be the biggest day (although I've been informed it didn't get hugely busier). I certainly didn't feel I would have wanted to spend more than a day there - although the reasonably priced and top quality ice cream did make that tempting.

For the money they are asking (£10 for a day ticket, £25 for a weekend) I think that's great value and it's probably worth it for this, if only for the Pink Pig that Crucial was giving away, but I'm not sure I'd travel all that way north for it again - unless Samsung decides to pay for me again. I would certainly give them some thought on your next monitor purchase, they really are hard to fault for quality!

mFestival? Unless it reaches critical mass, I worry for its appeal.

The 3D was superb - but I question my need for it

If it's like any of the previous things I've played around with - it will only work in 3D rendering?

Hmmm. Go and make it