OnLive Blog

Winner's Arena

Hello Everyone!

By way of introduction, my name is Matt Jensen, the Community Manager here at OnLive. I would first like to thank everyone who participated in last weekend’s July 4th Holiday Sale when all PlayPasses in the OnLive Game Service were featured at 30% off their regular prices. It was exciting to see so many of you take advantage of the holiday discounts to purchase the Full PlayPasses you’d been eyeing for some time.

I’d also like to congratulate our LEGO® Harry Potter™: Years 1-4 Contest winners. Several of our winners took advantage of OnLive’s instant play functionality to get started on the quest to collect 200 gold bricks before retail stores across America even opened the following morning.

Grand Prize Winner: Alex Schlee from Seattle, WA (Player Tag: Rantis)

While not his first all-night gaming expedition, Alex informed me that the contest made the intensity of play “pretty extreme” and did not hesitate to give credit where credit was due. To that effect, a nod of gratitude goes out to his friends at Mountain Dew and various energy drink companies. During a couple moments of assured haziness, they even took pause to break for a bite to eat.

Playing Robin to his Batman, Alex’s roommate was persuaded to stay up through the night and play this best-selling, new release title in co-op mode. While Alex’s intent is to “share” his new iPad prize with his gaming cohort, all bets are off once that killer new device arrives on his doorstep in the coming days.

This gaming “Ponch and John” duo set out to collect all 200 gold bricks in one play session but eventually hit a brain-malfunction as they slammed into a metaphorical “brick wall” at 2AM the next day having collected all but 1 of the remaining bricks. They were getting loopy and couldn’t muster the combined concentration to find that last gold brick. Nevertheless, they did shatter the OnLive Game Service continuous session mark with over 24 hours of continuous play.

The tag-team duo from Seattle played with 2 wired controllers and a Sony Vaio laptop which they rigged via VGA cable into a 50” television to maximize their game space. Alex commented that this setup was “just like a console experience”. Alex’s roommate also has an OnLive account, so they occasionally would fire up a second laptop and log in to the Game Service to see how many spectators they had (not realizing you could see this via the Dashboard/Overlay). Word that Rantis—and the runner-up winners listed below—were on fire spread quickly through the OnLive community (and certainly captivated our entire office).

To prove his achievement, Alex took a Brag Clip™ video upon finding the 200th golden brick around 1PM on Thursday with the official entry emailed into my team immediately thereafter at 1:02PM. Congrats Alex!

I’d also like to extend warm congratulations to our runner-up prize winners.

Kenneth Dailey, Jr. from Toledo, OH (Player Tag: Seiki Sands)
Florent Allain from Worcester, MA (Player Tag: Fiflo)
Richard Rivera from Yakima, WA (Player Tag: Wolfboy)
Christopher Murphy from Abbeville, AL (Player Tag: The Murfin Man)
Anthony Boscoe from Los Angeles, CA (Player Tag: Boscosticks)

Thank you all who entered! As a special shout out to all of you who had a valid entry in the contest, we’ll be sending out new E3 2010 custom OnLive T-shirts as a token of our appreciation. The LEGO® Harry Potter™: Years 1-4 contest ended up being a great kickoff event for our “Minute One” new release feature.

I’ve listed a few of my favorite quotes, feedback and stories sent in by our winners below. It really sounds like they had a great time:

Florent Allain:
“It took me around 35 hours in-game to complete it, but I had to sleep 4 hours after the first 25 hours straight (not easy starting at 3AM when you’re on the east coast!). I actually did kind of fall asleep while playing, and realized that I had found crests in the level I was in, without being aware of anything I was doing. Some kind of automatisms I guess… That’s actually when I decided I had to go to sleep, after seeing the empty coke bottle and coffee pot. ”

Anthony Bosco:
“I heard about the contest via email from OnLive. I woke up that day around 6PM. When I heard that the contest started at midnight I knew I could place somewhere in this contest. I was in the lead for hours as I stayed up for two days straight playing this game. I didn’t eat for 20 hours. Finally, I ordered a pizza about half way through the game. I had a bunch of spectators that were cheering me during the first 8 hours. Friend requests started pouring in once people saw I was up for two days straight. I met a lot of cool people. Speaking of spectators, I want to give a shout out to my buddy DJ. He stayed with me for four hours straight before having to leave to attend to his other life. Thanks again dude! I really enjoy the OnLive Game Service. The UI is simply amazing. I will be using it for some time.”

Chris Murphy:
“When I decided to give the Lego Harry Potter contest a shot, I had no snacks or drinks. I took off to a nearby city (mine is fairly rural here in Alabama and has nothing open past 10pm) and bought some supplies. A friend of mine who was really excited for me actually met up with me there to tell me everything he knew about Lego games as I never had played one prior to this contest.

I started the game when I got back at 2:01AM on the dot. I played my heart out and absolutely loved it. I didn’t really think I would win anything, but I had a lot of people who were genuinely very supportive and excited throughout my campaign.

It also helped that people in the OnLive community were supportive and excited. One other contestant spectated me playing, friended me, and messaged me in the 4AM to 10AM window. Easily, OnLive’s community is a huge factor when it comes to excitement in this sort of thing. I think I added ten friends just from people watching my live gameplay. It wasn’t quite like playing live on stage, but it certainly gave me that feeling at times.

I went all night twice. I hadn’t had any sleep which eventually caught up to me. I made it to about 1PM that afternoon (the 47 hour mark) and I absolutely had to sleep. I was running the bonus levels at the time, and my focus was so off that they seemed completely foreign to me. I mean, I literally couldn’t comprehend what I had to do to solve them, so I called a friend and put him in charge of being my human alarm clock. I napped until about 3:30PM and had easily 15 missed calls from him. Thankfully one made it through to me and I got up and got back on the game. I absolutely destroyed the bonus levels when I got back, which reinvigorated me and gave me the second (probably fourth) wind I really needed to at least try to finish out.”

What great fun!

I also wanted to mention that we’re rapidly working through the Founding Members waiting list as quickly as possible. If you’re still on the waiting list, we appreciate your patience and will be getting to you very soon. When signing up be sure to use a valid zip code. The OnLive Game Service is presently only available in the contiguous US states. If you haven’t signed up yet for the Founding Members Program presented by AT&T, you should give it a go soon!

As we continue to build out the OnLive Community we’re interested in collecting your thoughts and opinions on the Game Service. Please direct your feedback and first impressions to community@onlive.com. Also, if you’re having any issues with the Game Service, remember you can visit our Support Portal for assistance at www.onlive.com/support.

Stay tuned for future contests, promotions and events brought to you by the community team here at OnLive. We’ve got all kinds of exciting events planned for the weeks and months ahead. I look forward to seeing all of you in the OnLive community!

—Matt Jensen, Community Manager
Player Tag: OnLive MJ
community@onlive.com