I’d duck if I were you, because all the free stuff being thrown at your from the PCGamer Weekender is becoming a bit overwhelming. Who doesn’t want a free copy of Mount and Blade with their ticket purchase? Who doesn’t want the chance to win a £1,200 PC? As well as hosting Counter Strike: Global Offensive LAN tournaments, old-school style, there’s a ridiculous amount to keep you occupied for every minute of the event.
Buy tickets: Day passes available for as low as £12.99! Use code LIME for 20% off
As if playing Overwatch and Little Nightmares isn’t enough for you, you’re probably asking what else can you expect to see at this wondrous event (whose unofficial soundtrack is the sound of mouses clicking along to Ride of the Valkyries). I’ll tell you.
Win an Alienware 13 PC worth over £1,200
Yes, you read that right: £1,200. This OLED laptop makes me blush whenever I look at it: crisp, clean lines and bold colours make games practically jump out of the screen. With a Nvidia GTX 1060 GPU nestled inside, you’ll be able to use it for VR too and wave goodbye to the sun for even longer. Who needs vitamin D, amirite?
Free Mount and Blade worth £7.99
Assuming you win the Alienware 13 PC, what better gift to have than a free copy of Mount and Blade to play on it? Even if you don’t get your hands on the PC, you’ll still be able to play the action RPG on your very own laptop with the steam code you’ll get with your ticket. Ride through hordes of enemies and cast them down with your spear, or roam across the world and make a name for yourself.
VR Zone
A super special Alienware Aurora booth will be around during the event, which you can step into and try VR for yourself. Five HTC headsets will mean you’re not waiting around forever to give it a go either. On offer are a ton of games to try: Fantastic Contraption, the famed building/machine sim; Job Simulator, where you can throw coffee mugs around your office; The Gallery, the immersive puzzle-exploration experience; CosmoTrip, for you real-time strategy fans; The American Dream, ‘a samurai punk virtual reality game’; and Raw Data, a FPS filled with guns (astonished gasp!), set in weird and wonderful locations.
CS:GO LAN matches
Take a trip down memory lane by trying your hand at playing using a LAN connection. The legendary online multiplayer FPS Counterstrike: Global Offensive will be all set up so you can duel it out with other PCGamer Weekenders! No new-fangled WiFi will be used either, as it’s all LAN-centric so you can feel like you’re back in a humid little room with your friends, maybe sneaking glimpses at their screen to try and get an advantage. Maybe. Or was that just me?
PC Gamer workshops
Run by hardware experts, the workshops on offer during the day will help you get the best out of your PC. No matter what level of experience you have with modding your tower, every tier of skill is accounted for so you won’t be left floundering in talks littered with high-level jargon. Workshop stations let you build along with the experts so there’s someone by your side to perfect your technique, so you can practise swapping out hard drives, graphics cards, power supplies, and RAM.
For Honor and Rocket League tournaments
Unsheathe your virtual sword and practise your war cry, as you’ll get to try the newly-released For Honor! Choose whether you’re a samurai, knight, or viking, and take to the battlefield to use all manner of swords, axes, and spears to prove your faction’s courage. Or if that isn’t quite your thing, why not grab a steering wheel and try your best to score goals using a boosted, chaotically fun car? Rocket League is sure to provide a couple of memorable (definitely not full of whoops and cheers) matches, plus if you work you way up to the top just think of the glory and honor!
