Ask A Jedi At DreamHack Winter 2011

Ask A Jedi was in Jönköping, Sweden recently to participate in the world biggest computer gaming festival known as DreamHack.

Over the course of 4 days, gamers from all over Sweden and all over the world gathered to take part in the numerous events inside the halls of Elmia. While the LAN is the biggest part of the event, there are many other activities. Over the years, culture similar to what you see at  music festivals has emerged. I’m not going to try to describe it as there simply aren’t any words for it, it has to be experienced!

This year, DreamHack beat its own record for most users on the same network simultaneously, the highest bandwidth (120 Gbit/s although only 23ish Gbit/s was used) and not to mention, the most bandwidth ever used over the course of the entire LAN party – over 800 TB.

Day 1

During the event, BioWare and two community managers on site for the event –  Chris Collins and Lion Martinez – arranged several live warzones at the booth where they had computers from Alienware set up for anyone to come and play. Due to the nature of the event, Star Wars: The Old Republic was only a minor part and during the first few days, the queues for playing The Old Republic were non-existent.

Day 2

On the second day of DreamHack, Chris and Lion appeared on the big stage and did a presentation of the game. It was mainly directed at people who did not know much about TOR previously, so there wasn’t much new information to be gained for hard core fans. Their presentation was a major success, and was more impressive than the introduction to DreamHack itself, which usually is a spectacular light and lasershow. After their appearance on the big stage, the activity at the SW:TOR booth was significantly higher, rivaling their neighbors showing Heroes of Newerth Tournaments plus Counter Strike live gameplay of the worlds greatest female player. During their presentation they also announced the Weekend Beta, in which everyone who participated at DreamHack received an invite for.

Star Wars: Sverige

Ask A Jedi wasn’t the only fan site at DreamHack. At the BioWare booth I had a very nice conversation with Mystics, the founder of the biggest Swedish fan site, Star Wars Sverige (Star Wars Sweden). If you haven’t checked out their site yet I recommend you do so! They also took pictures of the winners of the live Warzone gameplay and will feature them on their site in the upcoming days. We also know that Darth Hater and Star Wars Norge attended, even if we never got to speak with them.

Day 3

The third day is usually where people start to get tired, and I was no exception. This also happened to be the day where most people received their Beta Weekend access. People were playing Star Wars: The Old Republic all over the place, much to the joy of Chris and Lion!

Overall DreamHack was a wonderful experience and trust me when I say that we Europeans have nothing to worry about when it comes to their community managers! Stephen Reid and David Bass have much to live up to! =)

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