The clicking of mechanical keyboards fills the room as the esports casters’ voices blast out of the speakers.
The sound cuts for a moment. The room stands still.
The players jump out of their chairs as the giant soccer ball rolls into the goal. A high school Rocket League esports team from East Helena has taken down Sandpoint. They walk away with a $1,000 prize and smiles on their faces.
The Vandal Gaming Convention is an annual event, typically run by the Office of Information Technology at the University of Idaho. This event brings people together who play board games, video games and participate in fandom-related topics, like cosplaying.
Wayne Ebenroth, esports director for UI, explained that the Office of Information Technology had run this event for the community for ages and was ready to be done with it.
“I felt like this has enough of a tradition in the community that it’s something that needed to continue,” he said.
In the position of esports director, he saw the esports program as a clear new direction for running and managing the event.
Through the change in leadership, Ebenroth wanted to slightly change the direction of the event. This year, there was more emphasis on community tournaments.
During the high school competition, winners walked away with prizes as large as $1,000.
When describing what makes in-person tournaments different from online, Ebenroth said, “It’s a very different atmosphere than playing an opponent that’s online… when you’re cheering the [other] team is hearing you cheer. So, there’s a lot more emotion involved.”
The convention also featured guest speakers, including former Rocket League pro, Lyle Taylor, known as Mizu. Mizu ran a panel discussion where he talked about the steps to building a successful YouTube channel and becoming a professional gamer.
Throughout the weekend, he worked with the university’s Rocket League team, where he coached them through the Big Sky Conference tournament they played that weekend.
During the VGC, he got on stage and played against some of the high school teams. When talking about how people reacted to Mizu, Ebenroth said, “They loved it… he got out into the community more than anybody has in the past.”
One panel featured students from national championship-winning esports teams talking about what they did to win and build a successful team environment.
Edward Sims-Johnson, a player for the university’s Counter-Strike Two team and a member of the Tabletop Games Club, said, “One of the really great opportunities about esports is that it allows students to fail with stakes, but also with very clear room to grow and develop and learn from those mistakes.”
During the panel, he talked about how he was able to balance not being as good as the two best players on the CS2 team.
“I still need to have the confidence that I can contribute, that I can perform my roles… what I’m doing is going to matter as part of the larger plan for the round, for the match, for that game, for the season, for the team,” he said. “Being able to contribute and be part of something greater than myself is, I think, my single favorite part of being in esports.”
Toby Minik, former president of Tabletop Gaming Club, talked about his experience hanging out in the boardgame room.
“It’s really cool to see basically all the other organizations that do similar stuff [to] Tabletop Gaming Club connecting with people, chatting up, playing games with them,” he said.
People attending the tabletop games section ranged from experienced players to families introducing their children to tabletop games.
Minik said, “I see folks from the community, with their kids come and paint miniatures, which is great to see… I think especially the tabletop side of things, we see a lot of those, like families and non-students connect.”
Sims-Johnson brought his interest in a tabletop game known as BattleTech to the VGC. He set up the game so that it was basically him versus whoever wanted to show up and beat him.
Through making the game cooperative, he was able to make the game more interesting and enjoyable for the people who attended the event. He designed the scenario in a way that it was impossible to win.
“My objective is to cause pretty and exciting explosions, not to win because you don’t want to win. You want to make it so people can have fun,” he said.
“So, everybody’s going to walk away going, ‘Yes, we achieved a victory.’”
Edward thinks that the university does a really good job of representing various different communities.
“VGC represents that opportunity for a lot of the classic nerd groups who don’t necessarily feel represented or even wanted at a lot of those environments,” he said. “I am personally very grateful that VGC has been around and hope it will be around and continue to provide that recognition, that opportunity and that welcome for years to come.”
As the event came to an end people laughed and smiled left with satisfaction and excitement for next year.
Dominic Dorigo can be reached at [email protected].