Last week El33tonline gave 5 lucky readers the chance to be the first in South Africa to get some hands-on time with PES 2010.

Well, if you want to find out a bit more about what happened at the event (which was held in Johannesburg this past weekend at the Ster-Kinekor Head Office), what prizes the readers walked away with and how epic the day was, read below for Jarred Milner’s round-up of the PES 2010 event.

PES 2010 event = Awesome

“El33tonline recently had a competition offering the chance to win tickets to the PES 2010 launch event in South Africa. Let me tell you, if you are a football fan, you did not want to miss out on this opportunity. I am glad to say that I was one of the lucky winners and what ensued, was quite possibly the greatest day of gaming, ever. Here is a small review of my day at the event.

I received notification that I had won tickets on Friday and would be contacted regarding the details during the day. Eventually I received an email with the details, saying that I would be amongst the first in South Africa to play the new game. The event was to take place on Saturday 24 October from 10:00 to 16:00. On seeing this I was really excited, although I did wonder if I would be able to play the game for so long, and thought that I would probably leave earlier (you will find out very quickly why I didn’t).

Free goodies

So Saturday morning comes and I arrive at the Ster-Kinekor offices, park the car and go to the entrance. It was really well promoted with synthetic grass at the entrance and posters of the game everywhere. I get to the entrance, give my name and was greeted by all the really friendly staff. Then they give me a packet of goodies, which I really was not expecting, I genuinely thought I was just coming to play the game. What was in the packet you ask…well there was a PES 2010 T-shirt with Messi on the front (cool), a small Nike football (very cool), a PS3 cup holder (pretty damn cool), and a copy of the game for PS3 (absolutely awesome). I quickly put my shirt on, put my goodies bag in the car and went back in (all the while, my mind is thinking, home time is going to be even earlier now that I can go home and play the game).

So I go back in and through the entrance, and there are just HDTVs everywhere with the new PES game on every screen. I sat down with my mate and we immediately got into the game. We played a couple of games and were totally addicted. All our matches were pretty close and exciting and we had a good rivalry going. We played a couple of games before being interrupted by the staff who told us all drinks and food were free for the day and if they can get us anything we must just ask (no one can complain about this, surely?), the awesomeness continues. So back to the gaming, a while later we decided to see what else was in the game after playing quite a few exhibition matches. Lots of cool features and options in the new game, and anyone unsure of PES is going to be won over really quickly. I must point out at this stage I was loving the game and the day, but was still wondering what I was going to do until 16:00. Well, that was quickly answered…

Competition time

The one guy came and told us there was a competition running the whole day. Effectively what one had to do was win six games in a row without losing, if you lost, you went back to zero. This system worked brilliantly as everyone, even after losing, had a chance to win something. We were told that there were four main hampers to be won, so there was a pretty good chance of winning something, and I was not going home empty handed. The competition started and I got to play against quite a few players, some really good, some pretty awful, but all nice people and lots of fun to play against. I eventually got to 4 wins, but lost (to a little kid, though he was pretty good) and was back on zero.

That’s fine, I just started again a while later and I was back to 3 wins, played the kid again and beat him. Eventually moved on to 5 wins and needed 1 more for the win, who was I to play? That’s right the kid again, in the final. I was pretty tense but excited. I quickly went 1-0 down, but maintained composure and came back to win 2-1 with mighty Kun Aguero getting the winner for me in the second half. Awesome, I won, had lots of photos for the media there and was told that my prize would be sent at some stage during the week. I was now on a huge high and was going nowhere, in fact the time had so quickly disappeared, it was already 14:30 and I couldn’t get enough of the game. I was told I couldn’t win again so just played some more friendlies, ate a bit, drank a bit and waited to watch the other finals, which lasted until around 3pm. I was still not prepared and I have saved the best part for last…

Big screen gaming

I didn’t mention it earlier, because it deserves its’ own mention, but I got the chance to play PES on a cinema screen. That’s right, at the Ster-Kinekor offices they have their own cinema there, and they had hooked a PS3 up to the screen using an HDTV projector. This was incredible and one of the coolest things I have ever experienced. The sound was pumped up also, which made one feel as though you were in the stadium. So all the finals were played on the Big Screen and were just too much fun. We were also able to play some friendlies there, and towards the end we managed to hook up four controllers and play two-on-two on the cinema screen. Nothing can possibly beat this, PES 2010, two-on-two on the massive screen is surely the equivalent to football-gaming heaven.

That was how the day ended, after a couple of games, we decided at 16:45 (and I was worried I was going to leave early) that it was finally time to go home. I can honestly say that I have never had more fun in my life, it was superbly organised and just lots of fun. I can only say a huge thank you to El33tonline and Ster-Kinekor for the awesome opportunity to attend the day. I have undoubtedly left out plenty of things about the day, but to write about all of it would probably take me a full week, it was that great.

Thanks again to El33tonline, Ster-Kinekor and all the others at the event. Now to find out what my hamper includes and I will be able to have some closure on what was a fantastic day.”