Somewhere between school and work, students find time to play video games, and the Union Programming Council gave them an opportunity to compete Wednesday night.
About 112 students gathered in the Union Ballroom to compete against teams in the annual XBox tournament.
The tournament began at 6 p.m. with open registration for teams. Each team had four members and single entries were placed into teams.
Joe Hernandez, technology chair for UPC’s Arts and Special Events Board, said about 40 students registered before the event and there were 28 teams by the end of the night.
“I would say this was more successful compared to some of the other tournaments we’ve had,” Hernandez said.
All students at the U were admitted for free, while non-students were charged $5 to compete.
The tournament featured the games “Call of Duty 4” and “Halo 3.”
The addition of a new game, “Call of Duty 4,” attracted more players, Hernandez said.
Teams competed against one another on five different video screens. Results were tracked on a white board in bracket format.
Team 12, which included Miguel Trujillo, Ian Huntsberger, Grek Torkelson and Rob Hagen, won the “Halo 3” bracket.
“We play together at home on XBox Live so we thought this would be fun,” said Huntsberger, an undecided sophomore at the U.
Huntsberger said the team saw posters around campus and decided to sign up.
At the tournament, the team knew one other team but had never played against them before, so they didn’t know what to expect, said Trujillo, a sophomore in sociology.
During the second round of play, Huntsberger’s team lost to the team that would eventually take second place.
However, they took the tournament by storm by beating the second place team twice and winning overall.
The team received candy, a free movie and a “Guitar Hero II” game.
The candy and movies will be shared between the members, but Huntsberger said the game will go to Torkelson, a senior at Skyline High School, because he broke his “Guitar Hero II” game.
Hernandez, a sophomore architecture major, helped last year’s technology chair plan the XBox tournament.
He said they will have another XBox tournament on Nov. 2.
Thien Sok28 teams of four gathered in the Union building Wednesday night for the Xbox tournament held by the Union Programming Council.