Well I have just returned from i31, the largest LAN that takes place in the UK, and had a whale of a time. Taking place at Newbury race course, the LAN run by multiplay.co.uk hosts 1300 people.

This was my first i-series. I had never been interested in the i-series previously as getting my desktop and monitor up to Newbury would be a pain in the backside. But with my recent Asus G1S laptop purchase my gaming is now mobile. Upon reflection I really come to appreciate having a laptop that can play the latest games at good settings. Setting up my rig takes all of 1 minute, giving me time to kick back and chuckle at the people lugging in their ridiculously sized cases and monitors.

I went to i31 with 10 other friends from uni and clans I had played with in the past and managed to meet many more people I had played with online in various games (mainly DotA and CSS). We were sat in the World of Warcraft section. Now don't get me wrong, I played WoW for all of 28 days 2 years ago before realising that, if I spent as much time working on my company as I did on WoW, I'd be making a hellova-lotta money!

My friends said the MMO folks seem to wash more than the CSS folks, so we were smack bang in the middle of the WoW section. My most noteable meeting was a quick chat with HenryG, probably one of the best CSS players in the UK, who plays for Four Kings, one of the only professional CSS clans in the UK. I have played DotA with HenryG a few times and always chuckle at my ordering him around in our DotA games. 4K were sat just one row ahead of us, in the WoW section. I was told this was because their decision to come was last minute, but I'm sure it was so they could keep their playing tactics away from the other CSS clans. I watched quite a few of their clan games. They are very entertaining to watch and I've no doubt the recent Sky Extra license to show CSS clan matches will grow, over time, to be a big hit here. It's exciting stuff. 4Kings lost to Fnatic, a Dutch clan, in the final. They walk away with a cool £1000. Not much in the e-sports world, but now they know they need to train harder ready for the CPL finals.

Apart from CSS and WoW, people really bit their teeth into the Enemy Territory: Quake Wars beta, which is absolutely awesome. Splash Damage (the devs) played Team Dignitas (dubbed Team SuckAss by myself) in a special show case in the main theatre, which was extremely fun to watch. Quake Wars is going to turn into an awesome clan game. Guild Wars, Warcraft 3, CS 1.6, TFC, HL2:Deathmatch, Quake 3, Quake 4, Supreme Commander, Stalker and C&C3 were also played regularly. I didn't see one game of Oblivion or Morrowind however. There's no point going to a LAN to play a single-player game. But then again, why would you go to a LAN to play World of Warcraft? Seriously? Wait. Why would you play World of Warcraft at all? I almost got sucker punched into signing up for Eve Online, but that's a totally different story...

sounds fun - if you want a really big LAN style party check this out:http://www.quakecon.org/

(I agree on WOW btw, been there and done that just like you were hehe)

badass, LAN parties rule ^_^

but you gotta give credit to the dudes that bring big rigs to parties, i mean i have (imo) a pretty pimped out rig, oh snap, but its a beast to take anywhere. tight cases rock,

Happy to hear you had soo much fun! LAN parties do that to people
And the last thing that goes through your head after one is: "Damn... I can't wait for next year!"