By Matthew Henry

SYDNEY: Samsung hosted around 100 of Australia’s elite gamers over the weekend for the national finals of the World Cyber Games, which were held under the Big Top at Sydney’s Luna Park.

As the final of the Australian leg of the WCG, the competition was held to determine the 10 national champions who will represent Australia at the grand final of the WCG, which will be held in Seattle, USA, in early October.

On Sunday, teams were steadily knocked out during the day and the finals were held after lunch to determine the winning teams.

Samsung has not yet announced the winners of the Gears of War and Warcraft events, but has confirmed that South Australian team Sequential Gaming took out the Counter Strike event and will head to Seattle in late September.

According to Samsung, competitors and consumers were able to preview games Halo 3 and Project Gotham Racing 4 and anyone could sign up to compete in Command And Conquer: The Siberian Wars.

Celebrity attendees included Sydney Roosters star Anthony Minnicello, V8 Supercars reigning champion Rick Kelly and Channel 10’s Cyber Shack host, Erin McNaught, who were challenged to a few games of Xbox 360 title Shadow Run.

Kelly, who won the showdown, donated the Xbox 360 to charity after having it signed by his fellow celebrities.

Samsung showcased its SyncMaster 275T LCD monitor at the event, which is the official monitor of the WCG. The 27-inch 275T features 1920×1200 resolution, 3000:1 contrast ratio and a 6ms gray-to-gray response time ideal for quick moving images associated with gaming.