Granado Espada at the e-Games Domination IV

The Experience

 Photo by: Reimaru

The much awaited 4^th installment of the e-Games annual event “Domination” happened on 04.10.10. Of course, all e-Games titles have their own booths, and Granado Espada (also known as “GE”) was no exception. I went with my cousin Abie (a RAN Online player known as chiiyuuna), her boyfriend, and my own boyfriend (who’s also a GE player in the Rembrandt server known as Yttria). I was a volunteer for the GE booth, and I was anticipating a very long line on the way there. When we got there, I was right! There were multiple lines going to the entrance, and we were a bit confused where to go. We met our friends in front of the SMX Convention Center (in Pasay City) and they thought I could help them get in faster. I felt bad, shrugged and said, “the fastest way to get in is through pre-registration, sorry."

Photo by: Reimaru

My cousin and I prepared our re-registration barcodes 2 days before the event, so we were ready. I waved goodbye to my friends (they’re waiting for more members of their faction), asked a marshal where the line for the pre-registered attendees was, and he pointed me to the right side of SMX. Remember, we were in front of SMX, in the middle part. The side of it was a long hot walk from where we were. So anyway, we headed to that direction, evading curious looks from the people in line, and we kind of expected to have a shorter line. Most people, including me, have the impression of a faster and shorter line when you’re pre-registered, since, they’d just have to scan the barcode and everything. But when we got there, it was like half of the normal line that you stand in if you did not pre-register. It was still a very long line! However, when we got there, there was an empty line with a marshal. He said it was the VIP line for those with Axe. I was like, “Huh? What do you mean?” Then we realized he was talking about Axe, the male body spray.

The Axe Police Model, photo by wardonthenet.com

So, anxious to get in and escape the hot rays of the sun, we decided to buy an Axe Twist each (except for me, since I’m volunteering), which cost them PHP 75/ea. Then we scurried over to the VIP lane and got to an even shorter line to our relief. My companions had to buy an EP card at the counter too, since we forgot to bring an unscratched EP card that would serve as your “ticket” to the event. At that time, it was already 11am, the 20 EP card was already out of stock. So they agreed to buy the 50 EP card instead.

Counting the individual cost of getting in faster, each of them paid PHP 75 + 50 = PHP  125. Haha, at least we didn’t have to stay longer outside, which could have saved us PHP 75. All-in-all, it was worth it. Good thing there is now an option to get in faster. Convenience over practicality. ^_^

When we got in, the booths were already bustling with gamers, cosplayers, spectators, and e-Games staff. I went in from a different entrance, but we all met at the GE booth.  The booths had their own events, and again, GE is no exception.

In the GE booth, the events (both offline and online) were posted on the table where the registration was held. CC Desmond was already there handling the registration, while CC Maki was roaming around.

  
The Events, Offline and Online

Where’s the fun in the GE booth without the events? There were two offline events scheduled namely: “Hellena’s Cards of Fate” and the “Arsene Circus Trivia Show”. The only online event was the 2-on-2 PVP Tournament. I will be discussing them in order of the events. The mechanics were discussed in the e-Games GE blog here.

Hellena’s Cards of Fate

As I have mentioned earlier, the registration for the three events were posted on the registration table so that players can easily join the events. For this event, only 4 teams were able to join, with 3 people each. So, out of the 6 cards, only 4 were drawn: Mario, Emily, Hellena, Frost. 

Mario’s team had to build a strong tower as tall as their smallest member of the team using their things or anything around them. It shouldn’t be just any tower, it should remain standing when the facilitator tests its “strength”.

Emily’s team had to take pictures of whatever was indicated in the card (I did not see), so they had to go around taking pictures before they can go back and show it to the facilitator.

  

Hellena’s team had to answer half easy and half hard questions from Hellena. They can only win once the facilitator corrects all their answers.

Lastly, Frost’s team had to find hidden letters in the pictures included with his card, and unscramble the hidden message to be able to finish. 

It was a bit difficult for both Emily’s team and Hellena’s team to do the task faster because the tasks took time and tested their physical (Emily) and mental (Hellena) skills. As for the teams of Frost and Mario, they did their best on stage and ended quite fast as well. Mario’s team used Piknik cans (sponsored? ^_^) as foundation for their tower, and the smallest member of their team was Vashal of Rembrandt.

I did not get all the team names, but I did get the winners:

1st Place Winners: Team Random People (Gryphen, Houtten, Vashal) 

 

 2nd Place Winners: Team Pachupet (Santillere, Pheyn, juuken)

Both teams won:

• 1x GE Laptop Skin each
• 1x Symbol of Aquarius each
• 50x Adelina’s Booty Search each

PVP Tournament

The next event was the long awaited PVP Tourney hosted by our very own GM Edward. It was supposed to start at 3pm, but due to some unforeseen circumstances, it started around 4:30pm. There were 6 duos competing, but only 5 were able to join (one team cannot be found).

The teams were as follows:

• ¤AS 1¤ : juuken & Aviella
• ¤AS 2¤ : Basconian & Akiira
• Unknown : Relements & Asthens (wasn’t able to join)
• Random Duo : Gryphen & Houtten
• ¤AS 3¤ : muchasgracias & Ordrosso
• Athena : Pyxiss & KungHumirit
• ¤AS Boss¤ : Santillere & Einjel
• Asa Kami! : Esteveste & Sayrune Hwang

The elimination round were as follows: 

Round 1: ¤AS 1¤ vs ¤AS 2¤ (¤AS 1¤ won)
Round 2: Unknown vs Random Duo (Random Duo won by Default)
Round 3: ¤AS 3¤ vs Athena (¤AS 3¤ won)
Round 4: ¤AS Boss¤ vs Asa Kami! (¤AS Boss¤ won)

The semi-finals was even better with the following matches:

Round 1: ¤AS 1¤ vs Random Duo (¤AS 1¤ won)
Round 2: ¤AS 3¤ vs ¤AS Boss¤ (¤AS Boss¤ won)

And the winner for the DOMI IV PVP Tormamem (the funny room name, hehe) was the team of ¤AS Boss¤ consisiting of Santillere and Einjel of the ¤ ALL ¤ STAR ¤ Faction of Rembrandt. Congratulations! 

Arsene Circus Trivia Show

This was the next favorite event, as it has been done before in the past events for Granado Espada. There were 6 teams who joined in, 3 members each. The participants were all having fun, but unfortunately, the event had to be cut short due to the lack of time remaining for the booths to finish the events. Only 1 team was declared as the winner and that was the team of Santoss, Llavore, and joverwock.

Photo by: Santillere

They won the following prizes:

• 50x Adelina’s Booty Search License each
• 1x GE Laptop Skin each
• 1x GE Keychain each

Overall

It was so much fun for the Granado Espada Pioneers who attended the Domination IV event, especially those with friends around. Though the events were few, the friendship and freeplay made up for the rest of the day. I, myself, had fun taking pictures and joining the chit chats here and there. Though I can’t join the events, it was already fun just watching them happen. It was very tiring though, standing up for long hours, but it was worth it.

Photos by: Dropshot (top), Vertumnus (Middle) and Santillere (bottom)

Also, the whole event itself was a lot of fun, not just the GE booth. There were lots of artists, bands, groups, and sponsors who helped make the event a success. But it wouldn’t have been complete without the gamers, who this event was for.

The Granado Espada Community needs a lot more participation from the members so that more events in our region will be held. Events is not only a venue for freeplay, freebies, and prizes… but also for making friends, getting to know your co-players of the game, and having fun outside your computer screen. A storm is also made up of tiny droplets. If we all contribute something to the community, then we can make something like an Elementalist’s thunderstorm in GE. ^_^

That's me~!