SPNW’s big Christmas Event 05/12/2015

With our different venue of “The Menai” in Upper Bangor, we were unsure of what to expect, even though we had trialled the venue a few months back for a smaller event. The weather was absolutely awful, with howling gales and pouring rain, so it was little surprise that we turned up at 10am to find buckets by the front door to catch the indoor leak! Nevertheless, the kind owners still let us hold our event, as long as we used the side door for access.

On we went with the setup. The big projector started off with freeplay Smash Wii U, as we needed people to test the screen for quality and playability. We had a second screen on a table, where people could either play N64 Mario Tennis; or something from the main Wii U. (Originally planned to be Warioware, but people ended up playing all sorts of games!)
We also had a Pokémon corner, which also welcomed card games, run by Tristan of BUMPS. 

Most people arrived before 11am, or almost right on time, despite the weather! We weren’t expecting a huge number of people, but we were also hoping for a good turnout, since it was the Final of the SPGL Smash, and also Basingstoke’s Jeremy had brought up his unique amiibo music box for people to hear!

Sign ups started, with a main tournament of Mario Tennis and a Mario Kart 7 session. The SPGL  Final was by invite only, and was for the top 8 on the table that had been built up throughout the year.

12pm saw the first tournament kick off. This was the first tournament organised where the actual hosts did not own the game! One of the regulars stepped up and provided the game, but also oversaw the running of the matches to make sure people knew how to play, as many had never tried the most recent Wii U version before. All rounds were done on the big projector for the Wii U version, until the final which was played out on the N64. John took 1^st, Rhys was 2^nd and Derwen was 3^rd; winning £20 of eShop, £10 of eShop and an amiibo of choice repspectively.

After the tennis had finished, we served two traybakes, to mark what would have been Iwata’s birthday the following day. People could choose between chocolate or vanilla.

We quickly got on to the SPGL final. The Top Cut of 8 players were eligible. With one not being able to attend, and another unfortunately being disqualified, it meant that two of our other more regular members were able to squeeze in on the day! The brackets were single elimination, best of 3. The first round used random characters, smash ball and a random “alpha” stage. The other 2 rounds were For Glory. There were three slightly more “hardcore” regulars who were favourites to win, alas two of them got pitted against each other in the first round, so unfortunately The Mole got knocked out earlier on. It wasn’t until the final that the other two met though, where Ben took 1^st and Drn took 2^nd. The surprise was the 3^rd place play-off, where Cat and Chan fought it out for the 3^rd trophy. Chan came away (or Mega Yoshi did!) in the end, after a very explosive first round, and then seeing a 1-1 draw. It was all on the last game, but Chan just about got away with it!

The final was very tense, but Ben came out top. The main thing was that despite all the rivalries, everyone was smiling by the end!

Not long after that we got straight on to Mario Kart 7. This was a mini tribute back to last year’s league; so we had 3 grand prix and points based scoring. Top three prizes were the same as the Tennis tournament. Rhys came 1^st, Drn came 2^nd, and The Mole came 3^rd. The Grand Prix were 150cc Flower cup, Mirror Leaf cup, 150cc Special Cup. We had to have a two way tiebreaker though, so the final race was Mirror SNES Rainbow Road.

Prize Giving was extra special as we had the custom made trophies made by DragonCraft of Amlwch. We presented them after the smaller prizes, and then as usual, rounded off with the raffle.

It has been another fantastic year for SPNW, and we hope you have enjoyed the events you’ve been able to make it to! :D

Thanks to all our members for their continued support, and particular thanks to anyone who’s provided equipment and/or prizes over the year. Thanks also to anyone who’s taken photos for us, it’s great to be able to have a record of all the different events we’ve had!

Thanks to the Menai for their hospitality, Bar Uno staff for helping us in the summer, and the cleaners in Academi for helping us out when we needed it!

Thanks to the Retro Rewind guys for letting us be part of something so awesome, thanks to BUMPS for being part of things, and also thanks to any fellow Founders of the SPUK community for any support or contributions you’ve given us over the year :D

We hope you all have an amazing Christmas and New Year, and see you in 2016!