This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page . (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
Fragapalooza | |
---|---|
Status | Active |
Genre | Video Gaming |
Venue | Leduc Recreation Centre |
Location(s) | Leduc |
Country | Canada |
Inaugurated | 1997 |
Filing status | Non-For-Profit |
Website | http://www.fragapalooza.com/ |
Fragapalooza (also referred to as Frag or Fraga by participants) is an annual video game festival/LAN party that takes place in Leduc, Alberta, Canada. The name Fragapalooza was derived from the Military Slang "Frag" and "palooza" which is the suffix for any type of named festival or gathering, such as Lollapalooza. Traditionally held in the summer, Fragapalooza runs over a period of four days. In 2008, it was Canada's largest LAN party event, having reached approximately 900 attendees at its peak. [1] [2]
Fragapalooza started in Edmonton, Alberta in 1997 by Gil "StraT" Amores., [3] David Chan, Derek French, Scott Beuker, and Poh Tan. The first event consisted primarily of the first-person shooter game Quake and was held in a hangar at the Edmonton Municipal Airport. It has since evolved into a larger annual gathering, occasionally drawing attendees from across Canada and the United States. [4]
Fragapalooza is a nonprofit event, where proceeds from seat sales and sponsorship are rolled into the event itself to cover prizing, rentals, and various other event costs. Fragapalooza is volunteer-run.
The event requires participants to supply their consoles or computers (sometimes referred to as BYOC).
Fragapalooza has had notable sponsors in the past including Intel and NVIDIA have both previously sponsored the gaming convention. In 2004, NVIDIA sponsored Fragapalooza offering 20 GeForce FX 5950 Ultra graphics cards to winners and runners-up of the official LAN game tournaments. [5] In late 2002, companies such as Sympatico, Intel, Cisco Systems, ATI, Microsoft, E-Compuvison, and Digital Extremes sponsored the 3 day gaming festival billed as Fragapalooza East. [6] In 2007, a professional gaming store, Razer, was invited to sponsor Fragapalooza, the company offered numerous products as prizes worth around $600. [7]
Additionally, sponsors may make presentations to the attendees to promote their new products or technologies as well as sell their products directly.
Besides the opportunity to win prizes in the events official tournaments, gamers are given the chance to win "impromptu" competitions. In 2006, for example, on Fragapalooza's 10th anniversary, a dodgeball tournament was arranged. The organizers attempted to break the record for the largest dodgeball game ever at a LAN party. The record, at the time, was held by an event that occurred in Portland that had 200 participants. Crucial technology, a sponsor of the 2006 Fragapalooza event, attempted to break the record with 300 gamers taking part. Bad weather, specifically rain, caused the withdrawal of most of the participants resulting in the record not being broken. Nevertheless, the match went ahead, and three winners were selected and each given 2GB of Crucial DDR2 RAM. [1]
Another non-video game competition organized at the Fragapalooza 2006 event was a "crab walk" race across the west side of the Mayfield convention centre. The participants were instructed to crab walk across the centre floor and all the way back again. The three selected winners of the race received free computer hardware from Cooler Master and Memory Express. [8]
Other official competitions may include:
Attendees and sponsors will occasionally organize their own unofficial competitions ranging from standard tournaments to marathons where competitors are disqualified in the event they leave their chair, fall asleep, disconnect from the game or otherwise stop playing. These competitions usually have smaller prizes funded by the organizer or a participant pool.
Staff will frequently issue challenges or tasks to all attendees over the intercom and prizes awarded to the first person to accomplish the task. The goals of the challenges vary significantly, and they are almost always unique from year to year. Attendees have in the past been asked to blue-screen their computer, bring an attendant's pendant from a previous year, buy the staff dinner, find an item hidden inside the venue, and obtain a valid product code for an obscure out-of-print video game. These challenges are usually held at night when larger competitions and events cannot take place due to lighting and noise constraints.
All events within Edmonton, Alberta unless otherwise specified
Year | Location | Approximate Attendance | Official Tournaments | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
1997 | Hangar at the Municipal Airport | 70 | Quake | |
July 16-19, 1998 [9] | Hangar at the Municipal Airport | 150 | Quake | |
1999 | Hangar at the Municipal Airport | 300 | Quake 2 | |
2000 | Hangar at the Municipal Airport | 400 | Counter-Strike , Quake 3 | |
2001 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 700 | Counter-Strike , Quake 3 | |
2002 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 750 | Counter-Strike | |
2002 (East) | International Center, Mississauga, ON | 350 | Unreal Tournament 2004 | One time east event |
2003 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 800 | Counter-Strike | |
2004 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 800 | Counter-Strike 1.6 , Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne , Unreal Tournament 2004 | |
2005 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 800 | Counter-Strike 1.6 , Counter Strike: Source , Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne | |
2006 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 800 | Counter-Strike 1.6 , Counter Strike: Source , Warcraft III , Quake 4 | |
2007 | Mayfield Inn and Convention Centre | 800 | Counter Strike: Source , Halo 2 , Supreme Commander , Unreal Tournament 2004 | |
2008 | Northlands Sportex | 500 | Call of Duty 4 , Counter Strike: Source , Defense of the Ancients , Team Fortress 2 , Unreal Tournament 2004 | |
2009 (Winter) | Holiday Inn, Grand Prairie, Alberta | 100 | Call of Duty 4 | Smaller regional LAN, format slightly different than main event. |
2009 (Summer) | DOW Centennial Center, Fort Saskatchewan | 450 | Counter-Strike 1.6 , Call of Duty 4 , Unreal Tournament 2004 , StarCraft , Rock Band 2 | Fort Saskatchewan is a suburb of Edmonton. |
2010 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 320 | Call of Duty 4 , StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty , Rock Band 2 | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2011 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 270 | StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2012 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 300 | StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty , Team Fortress 2 , League of Legends | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2013 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 320 | Counter-Strike: Global Offensive , Team Fortress 2 , League of Legends , TrackMania | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2014 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 325 | Call of Duty , StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty , League of Legends , TrackMania | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2015 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 260 | Counter-Strike: Global Offensive , Super Smash Bros. , Battlefield 4 , Left 4 Dead 2 , StarCraft 2 | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2016 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 345 | League of Legends , Super Smash Bros. | 20th Year Event |
2017 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 326 | League of Legends , StarCraft 2 | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2018 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 377 | Team Fortress 2 , StarCraft 2 | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2019 | Leduc Recreation Center, Leduc, Alberta | 386 | Counter-Strike: Global Offensive , Overwatch , Super Smash Bros. , and more | Leduc, Alberta is a suburb city in the Edmonton Proper |
2020 | Streamed Live on Twitch.tv/FPevents | Peak Viewership Online: 138 | Assetto Corsa , Super Smash Bros. | Virtual Only due to Covid |
2021 | Streamed Live on Twitch.tv/FPevents | Peak Viewership Online: 123 | Super Smash Bros. | Virtual Only due to Covid |
2022 | Fulton Place Community League Streamed Live on Twitch.tv/FPevents | In-person: 50 Peak Viewership Online: 130 | Super Smash Bros. | Limited in-person due to Covid |
A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses:
Dodgeball is a team sport in which players on two opposing teams try to throw balls and hit opponents while avoiding being hit themselves. The objective of each team is to eliminate all members of the opposing team by hitting them with thrown balls, catching a ball thrown by an opponent, or inducing an opponent to commit a violation, such as stepping outside the court.
The World Cyber Games (WCG) is an international esports competition with multi-game titles in which hundreds of esports athletes from around the world participate in a variety of competitions also known as Esports Olympics. WCG events attempt to emulate a traditional sporting tournament, such as the Olympic Games; events included an official opening ceremony, and players from various countries competing for gold, silver, and bronze medals. WCG are held every year in other cities around the world. The WCG 2020 competition received nearly 650 million views worldwide.
A LAN party is a social gathering of participants with personal computers or compatible game consoles, where a local area network (LAN) connection is established between the devices using a router or switch, primarily for the purpose of playing multiplayer video games together. LAN party events differ significantly from LAN gaming centers and Internet cafes in that LAN parties generally require participants to bring your own computer (BYOC) and are not permanent installations, often taking place in general-use venues or residences.
Esports, short for electronic sports, is a form of competition using video games. Esports often takes the form of organized, multiplayer video game competitions, particularly between professional players, individually or as teams.
The Churchill Cup was an annual rugby union tournament, held in June, contested by representative men's teams from Canada, England, the United States, and other invited teams from a wide array of countries.
QuakeCon is a yearly convention held by ZeniMax Media to celebrate and promote the major franchises of id Software and other studios owned by ZeniMax. It includes a large, paid, bring-your-own-computer (BYOC) LAN party event with a competitive tournament held every year in Dallas, Texas, USA. The event, which is named after id Software's game Quake, sees thousands of gamers from all over the world attend every year to celebrate the company's gaming dynasty.
The Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) was a professional sports tournament organization specializing in computer and console video game competitions. It was founded by Angel Munoz on June 27, 1997, in Dallas, Texas. The CPL is considered the pioneer in professional video game tournaments, which have been held worldwide. The CPL's tournaments are open to all registrants, but due to the ESRB content rating of some video games, CPL competitions are restricted to participants age 17 or older. The CPL has distributed more than US$3 million in cash prizes.
The Electronic Sports World Convention (ESWC) is an international professional gaming championship. Every year, winners of national qualifier events around the world earn the right to represent their country in the ESWC Finals. The event has been praised for its organisation and ability to put on a good show for spectators.
The Pittsburgh LAN Coalition, Inc. (Pittco) is a video gaming organization which holds LAN parties in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA.
The World e-Sports Masters (WEM) was an international competitive gaming event organized by the Hangzhou eSport Culture & Sport Communication Company, Ltd. Prize money are awarded to winning individuals and teams. It was first held in 2005 under the World e-Sports Games.
World Series of Video Games (WSVG) was an international professional electronic sports competition. It held its first season in 2006, with competitions in six different games and six events held around the world including the finals of the event. The total prize purse of the season was US$750,000 which includes the $240,000 prize purse that was winnable at the finals. The WSVG was operated by Games Media Properties, an American gaming company founded in 2002 with the BYOC Lan section subcontracted out to Lanwar Inc.
Campus Party (CP) is a conference and hackathon.
A chess tournament is a series of chess games played competitively to determine a winning individual or team. Since the first international chess tournament in London, 1851, chess tournaments have become the standard form of chess competition among serious players.
The Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference (I/ITSEC) is an annual conference in Orlando, Florida organized by the National Training and Simulation Association held at the Orange County Convention Centre, a large conference and exhibition centre located on Exhibition Drive on the south side of Orlando.
Organised Chaos, was a monthly LAN Party held in Cape Town, South Africa at the Sunningdale Sports Complex as well as other venues in both Bloemfontein and Port Elizabeth. The LAN has a current capacity of 540 after moving away from the Bellville Velodrome in April 2012. The largest LAN Party held by Organised Chaos was in December 2010 at the Bellville Velodrome with a total of 1263 attendees. Its main organizers are Dietmar Rheeder-Kleist, Lance Aylward and Kyra Rheeder-Kleist. It is currently the largest monthly gaming event and LAN party in Africa
RootsTech is a family history and technology conference and trade show held annually in the Salt Palace Convention Center, Salt Lake City, Utah. It first debuted in 2011 having been created from the ground up through a team at FamilySearch. In 2017 it claimed to be the world's largest family-history technology conference. Over the years, RootsTech has welcomed a number of celebrities, television personalities, and actors as keynote speakers.
Lan ETS is a yearly LAN party event held by a student club of the same name from the École de technologie supérieure university in Montreal. It is currently the largest LAN party in Canada and on North America East Coast. In 2013, approximately 1094 gamers attended the event for a chance to win over $18,000 in money and over $25,000 in prizes.
The 2022 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships were the 46th edition of the IIHF World Junior Championship, played from August 9–20, 2022 at Rogers Place in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.