Newegg Hybrid Center
On February 27, Newegg celebrated the launch of the AORUS 17.3” SLI Gaming Laptop X7 at the Los Angeles-based Newegg Hybrid Center. In the competitive market of mobile gaming, the X7 distinguishes itself as being the “thinnest, lightest” high-performance laptop on the market. It will also be sold exclusively through Newegg.com. To mark the occasion, Newegg held a special public event at the Newegg Hybrid Center in City of Industry, Calif. where guests could come and experience this hot item for themselves. Also at the event were professional gamers from the eSports team CompLexity, and refreshments were provided by The Grilled Cheese Truck. Guests and Newegg customers were invited to talk with the pro-gamers, chow down on gooey cheese sandwiches and compete in tournament competition in the popular fighting game Divekick.
Anyone who is serious about mobile gaming should definitely give the AORUS X7 gaming laptop a look. Not only does this laptop offer an Intel Core i7 processor, but it also comes equipped with two GeForce GTX 765M GPUs in SLI configuration, allowing even the most demanding games to be rendered beautifully with high framerates. It also comes with two 128GB SSDs in RAID 0 for quick load times, and it has a 1TB mechanical HDD for ample storage. If that weren’t enough, the machine comes with 16GB of memory as well.
“Everybody is looking for performance,” said Gordon Kao, a representative of AORUS, “but we don’t want them to have to sacrifice in the weight and the size of the machine itself. So that’s why we brought out all of our advantages in the [X7], so you can see that the machine is very sleek and light, but we didn’t compromise in the performance…. It actually performs better than the 780.” AORUS wants to send a message to customers that settling is a thing of the past, and this may be the first machine to deliver on that claim.
Team CompLexity: (L to R) Jonathan “Westrice” Nguyen, Royce “Bubbadub” Newcomb and Robert “ROBERTxLEE” Lee
The event quickly filled up as soon as it started, with eager competitors signing up for the tournament, curious onlookers who wanted to watch the professional gamers in the heat of battle, and Newegg customers who decided to stick around after picking up their purchases from will-call. The AORUS X7 laptops were displayed in the main area of the Newegg Hybrid Center for everyone to interact with. Additionally, to show off its gaming chops, the X7 was the game machine for each of the CompLexity pro-gamers as they competed live and on-site in League of Legends.
“We just went in cold with the laptop,” laughed CompLexity eSports athlete Robert Lee, who goes by ROBERTxLEE. “We just got there, changed our settings and then played on it. Surprisingly, it was comfortable.”
“Same for me,” added Royce Newcomb, another CompLexity athlete, who goes by Bubbadub. “We basically walked in, had to get all our settings for our game and then went into the game. We didn’t have any problems (with) any technical issues with the computer or the software on it.”
Jonathan “Westrice” Nguyen, the final Complexity pro-gamer at the event agreed. “I just opened up the game and it went pretty smooth.” As professionals, these competitors usually game on full-tower PC rigs, so to experience the high performance of the AORUS X7 was refreshing.
“I actually have a laptop, but it sucks compared to these laptops,” Lee said, “because there’s no way on my laptop at home is it ever going to go over 60 [frames per second]”. Using the AORUS X7, the CompLexity team ended up winning their on-site live competition. Afterward, they stepped outside for a break and to dine on some grilled cheese sandwich creations at The Grilled Cheese Truck.
Meanwhile, inside the Newegg Hybrid Center, longtime customers and newcomers were enjoying all of the products on display, including a wide array of laptops, tablets, gaming consoles and more. “I think this is awesome,” said Newegg customer Colleen Jordan, commenting on the Hybrid Center and how much it had evolved from simply being a will-call center. She was accompanied by her son Patrick, who signed up for the tournament scheduled for later in the evening.
For the uninitiated, Divekick is a fighting game similar to popular titles like Streetfighter IV, but distilled down to the bare essentials. There are only two buttons involved: jump and kick. And one hit means knockout and a round won. Rounds only last 20 seconds. To extend the gameplay, bouts are best of 9 rather than the typical best of 3. Nevertheless, the intrinsic strategies of spacing, timing and position are still vital for victory, but because of Divekick’s simplicity, it was the perfect game for l33t and n00b players to enjoy and compete on relatively equal levels.
By the time the competition was ready to begin, there were 19 gamers vying for the top spot, which came with a $750 Newegg gift card. Bouts moved briskly after the instructions were given and players acclimated to the simple controls. Onlookers were quickly engrossed in the tournament and reacted audibly whenever a successful divekick was landed. But in the end, there could only be one, and, after one grueling hour, a victor was announced and applause and congratulations swelled inside the room.
Those who were eliminated left dejectedly, no doubt wondering where their strategy had failed them, and planning a triumphant return at the next Newegg Hybrid Center event.
Learn more about the AORUS AORUS 17.3” SLI Gaming Laptop X7 exclusively sold at Newegg.com!
Missed this event? Follow us on Twitter and Like us on Facebook to make sure you’re always in the know!
Special thanks to CompLexity. Learn more about them at www.complexitygaming.com.
Find out where The Grilled Cheese Truck will be next at www.thegrilledcheesetruck.com.
Get your kicks with Divekick at www.divekick.com.
