On November 3rd – 9th in Cologne, Germany, gamers from all over the world will convene to compete for pride, and more importantly for a nice pay day, as they do battle in a dozen different games. This is the ninth iteration of the World Cyber Games. It all started in 2000 with four games, 17 countries and $200,000 worth of cash prizes. This year's edition will have players from 80 countries competing for $470,000 worth of cash prizes.
Command & Conquer makes its second consecutive appearance, this year's offering being the expansion pack for Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, Kane's Wrath. 27 players representing 19 different countries will do battle to crown the 2008 World Cyber Games Command & Conquer Champion. Last year's champion, Shaun Clark (Apollo), is back to defend his crown. The field looks like this:
The Early FavoritesXeon: Hailing from Germany, he is a solid Scrin player who has had fairly good tournament success, taking second place at WCG 2007 Grand Finals. Xeon is grouped with Apollo and Khufu in the very difficult Group A, so advancing out of this group will be very difficult.
Sharp: An old school player from Tiberium Wars, he has just started attending LAN tournaments where he has met with success. Taking second place in this year's U.S. Nationals, he is on his way to Cologne where he will be fighting Dragonfood, Brossea, and Ravana in Group D, making it one of the more challenging groups.
Technique: Living in the Netherlands, he has been recognized as a top C&C3 player and is expected to dominant his group, which includes notable players LeOwNzAll and Heckenheinrich. He has had some success at events like "The Gathering 2008" and "Digital Life 2007" and is actively seeking his first major victory.
Khufu: Khufu, of the U.S.A., has met with fairly good success in Tiberium Wars, and is planning on his highly aggressive playing style to earn a gold medal in Germany. He will have to knock out either Apollo or Xeon to move out of groups, where the competition will only get harder.
Dragonfood: This Austrian guy is an all around package when it comes to cnc3. He will be going into grand finals trying to win a gold medal for Austria. If he survives his the very difficult group D, he will have an even harder time making it through the next 3 rounds.
Apollo: Last year's WCG winner and a die hard Scrin player, he is currently playing poker full-time and is reportedly not practicing for WCG. Regardless, he will be a strong contender and should not be underestimated.
Dackel: The best German player as C&C3 history clearly portrays; Dackel takes first place in the majority of German-only tournaments he enters, and took third place at last year's WCG. He is a loyal GDI player and is expected to relatively easily emerge from Group B.
That wraps up your pre-WCG Grand Finals update. Years of preparation will culminate in seven days' worth of gaming in a few short weeks, and GameReplays.org's own
TDA will be in Cologne bringing you all the news and updates. Be sure and check back right here for the scoop on the 2008 WCG Finals!
Special thanks to David Lathrop (Khufu) and Pascal Pfefferle (Dackel) for their significant contributions to this article.
