From the Hardcore Side There are people who play Quake, and then there are people who live and breathe it. In "From the Hardcore Side", a new semi-regular feature at PQ, Pappy-R brings all his hardcore gaming experience to you and talks about what's going on in the hardcore scene today.   — by Pappy-R Fragtopia! LAN's are life kids. Well to a hardcore gamer anyway. The gathering of gamers for the ultimate low ping battle for prizes and bragging rights is fundamental. Since I now attend these fragathons as Pappy from the "big fuzzy", my bragging rights are restricted to saying I went. Those that have been to recent events that I have been to can attest to my lack of playtime. Pity me not though, because this is my job, and like so many have said, it's a dream job. The one question I get at events is, "how do I get a job like yours?" Well, first you'd have to kill me. Now let's get into the smack-by-smack of one of my recent adventures, Fragtopia. Best use of a hard drive we've ever seen. A mere three days before the event, I finalized my plans to attend the event in Orangeville, Ontario, just an hour outside Toronto. The organizers assured me that I would have the needed Internet feed from the event so that my faithful news mongers in the PQ community could still get their daily dose. An old clan mate from my Q2 clan offered, nay, insisted, on being my transport to the event. Cheers to you J0sh of the new clan [f8]. So off we went on Friday, the night before the event. That meant an extra night's stay at the Nor-Peel Motel, which was just plain bad news. Sorry but the thing was shoddy, and I couldn't even call home to say g'night to the little one. Normally I sleep on pillows, but at the Nor-Peel it was wafer thin slabs of something about as soft as Hellchick's heart in a 1 on 1. No comfort there. Event day was a treat for a few reasons, and one was being able to leave the motel for a couple dozen hours. Up I got like a shot, and went to wake the [F8] boys in the next hole...errr room. Bang, bang, they were up like shot from guns, and had their comps packed up from the little LAN they had setup in their rooms. We even managed to get to the curling arena early, which is something considering the 9 am starting time for this festival of frags. The aftermath. The first clue that you're in the right spot for a LAN event is when you see a door helped open by way of an old hard drive jammed in as a doorstop so you could load your equipment easily. A line of players had already gathered with comps scattered around the lobby while people waited to register, so I settled in to wait my turn. Here's a tip: whenever possible, wear your PlanetQuake jacket. As I sat quietly waiting, whispers reached the guys at the registration desk and I noticed I was being pointed at until one of the organizers walked up to me with a cheery "Pappy?" That's it, and I was whisked past the players and into an area at the front of the huge curling rink. No ice here, just a long line of tables, cables and cords for the players to hook up and get nasty. My comp was brought in and connected to the Internet with a cable modem and the LAN network. I then met some of the guys behind the event. I sat beside and got to enjoy the company of Kingpin, the Fragtopia President. I then got into the morning PQ news while players filled seats and cranked up their comps. I never stop being amazed at what you see for comps at a big LAN event, and FonFon has to win the prize for freakiest comp. His weapon of choice (and I really wish I had a pic for ya) was a pile of parts on the table. Wires connected this piece and that piece, and when it was kickin', so was he. The staff made their way to me for introductions and I got to meet some very dedicated gamers. These guys just wanted to help people have fun - now that's a LAN staff. These guys showed me what Tribes was all about. I saw some players I knew and got to meet plenty more as they all dropped by to say hello. By the way, this was NOT a Quake only crowd. There were some intense UT, Half-Life Counterstrike and Tribes players all playing their choice of shooters. As a matter of fact, a good number of the Tribes clan, Team Canada, showed up to lay it down. This was a treat for me having not had the time to check out Tribes to this point. This was like seeing any Quake for the first time and seeing it being played by a Thresh or Fatality class player. These guys were hot. I later bought a copy of Tribes to feel the expansive play style for myself. Next: hot gaming action