CyberJocks: Launch and Year One (2002-2003)
The original CyberJocks had closed down in 1998 when Parkside Computing moved locations. The new location was not conducive to video gaming, and network services was really starting to take off at that time due to the Adelphia contract. However, it has always been in the back of our minds that we really wanted to do it again, but on a really large scale.
For the years between 1998-2001, all of the Parkside employees, and employees from another local technology company got together and played games at our office. The nights were filled with games such as Total Annihilation, Command and Conquer, Rainbow Six, and Quake. We were all into games, and it was many peoples dreams to build another LAN gaming center. When the bottom dropped out of Adelphia in 2002 Scott decided to go after his dreams for the second time. He had signed the lease on a 7000 square foot facility in Amherst, more than 6x larger than the original CyberJocks location.
This was in October, and I immediately moved back to Buffalo to help work on it. I left Debbie in Florida to finish up her semester of school while I began working with Aaron on developing management software for the facility. I was finally able to put all of my PHP and development experience to good use. I was also able to use my UNIX and hardware skills for something other than corporate garbage. Between the months of October and December, we developed the first version of the CyberJocks Facility Management System (FMS).
From mid-December until February 2003, we were in full on construction mode. Aaron had developed a floor plan, electrical plan, network plan, lighting plan, and literally everything that you would see in CyberJocks when it opened. While it was fun for a few months, I am glad that I work with my mind as terminating electrical outlets and sanding drywall gets pretty old. In late February, we were finally to the point where construction was done, and it was time to get back to the IT infrastructure work.
Late February and early March was pretty hard on everyone. Funds had depleted down to nothing, and there were still a lot of loose ends to tie up before we could open. We spent weeks of 18 hour days preparing the machines, and the software for opening. While we were able to write all of the software prior to opening, we were unable to test it on a large scale. We had learned from the early years of tracking time on index cards that automation was key, and we sure as hell pulled it off. I will never forget waking up in one of our “VIP” rooms after sleeping on the floor while the machines were imaged with the OS and games.
Finally, we had gotten as prepared as we could given the situation, and we held our first beta night. This was on approximately March 1st, 2003. We had people lined up across the building waiting to come in and visit the center. In fact, people were lined up as the last few gigabytes copied to all of the machines. We had setup a website months before, and had started to build a community of local gamers, and they were ready to play. The night was hell, but we opened one week later.
While there were some problems with the first version of FMS, we quickly adapted and molded our next version. Within six months, I had completely re-written FMS and built in some great new features. The most interesting feature was the ability to change how long a credit (a block of time) would last depending on various factors, including the game, user, time of day, and more. This allowed us to create some awesome promotions that were beneficial to the users and the business.
After only a few months in business, many of the people who helped us build the facility had moved on. We all took major pay cuts to try and make the facility successful, and not everyone could do it. In 2003, Business First of Buffalo did an article on CyberJocks, which featured Aaron and myself. I was amazed when our faces were on the cover of the local business section and the large article that transpired. The only downfall of that was that our pictures were labeled with the wrong names.
Between 2004 and 2005, we worked extremely hard to make something out of CyberJocks. We quickly grew the business on a local scale, and even on a national scale by holding large tournaments. We had worked hard with parents to create a safe place for the youth of WNY to hang out and game. We overcame many challenges as far as violence in video games is concerned. Our first two years had a lot of Counter-Strike play, and we hosted numerous tournaments and LAN parties. It was during this time that I realized I was a pretty good MC and could handle public speaking without throwing up.
We hosted events like the World Cyber Games, and finally we received some major national attention. In late 2004, we were paid a visit by a guy Darren. Darren was no normal guy - he was an editor for Tom’s Hardware guide - one of the largest computer hardware enthusiast sites in the world. Darren was from Western New York, and was impressed with what we had accomplished, as his job was to attend LAN parties across the US. He wrote an article about CyberJocks that was read by tens of thousands of people across the world.
A few days after the article was published, we got an Email from a gentleman down in Austin, Texas by the name of Gunnar.
