YOU, yes you. We saw you taking photos of epic.THREE! We have something special for you - our Capture the LAN competiton. Submit your best 5 photos to us and we'll put them up for people to vote on! We'll also dig out a prize for the winner and show off the best entries in our gallery.

To submit your entry, create a folder on our FTP and upload your photos. You have until Sunday evening!

• Capture the LAN FTP Server
  

Sorry for the delay, it's been quite hectic for the team since packing down from epic.THREE, but you can now view the scores for the epic.THREE pub quiz which was won by team "Murray, why did you leave us?!" in the last minute thanks to a successful final bonus round question.

Congratulations to everybody who took part, a total of 65 players entered the quiz, so about 3/4 of the event, that's what we call a big game!

Also a well done to most of those people in the boat race!

While there were some questionable levels of performance, with far too much spillage, there were some truely epic displays of drinking skill.

Both the pub quiz and boat race will be back for epic.FOUR in July!

The last gamer has left the building and packdown has begun, we'd like to thank everyone for coming to epic.THREE.

We published a survey on the intranet at the event for you to fill in and tell us what you thought. The same survey is now available online! It's only accessible to people who went to epic.THREE and if you already answered it at the event, we have your answers already!

• epic.THREE Feedback Survey

There's also a feedback thread on the forums for more in-depth feedback. Tell us the good, the bad and the ugly about epic.THREE!

• epic.THREE Feedback Forum Thread

Tell us your thoughts on what we did right, what we did wrong and what we can improve; and together we can make epic.FOUR our best event yet!

Get your wooly hats and mittens out as nuclear winter is coming. Millions are set to die at Uttoxeter Racecourse as independent British game developers Introversion hands over the keys to the World's nuclear arsenals with a Turn Up and Play DEFCON tournament at epic.THREE; with the winners walking away with one of 8 full game keys.

Judgement Day is set for 25th - 28th Feburay 2010. Book your seat for the end of the world!

It's Global Thermonuclear War, and nobody wins.
But maybe - just maybe - you can lose the least.

Read More

Don't forget while you're packing all the rest of your kit for epic.THREE to grab a print out (or screenshot for mobile phone) of your Booking Pass for the event.

To get to your Booking Pass go to My Account > Event Bookings > epic.THREE > Print Your Booking

The more people that bring their booking pass, the quicker we can get people processed at reception and the sooner you can get setup ready for an epic weekend of gaming (or to the bar, whichever!)

And remember, when you check-in to the event, you will be given a fabric wristband which you need to wear throughout the event, it will be checked by the bar staff if you wish to get served, and every time you enter the venue by the epic.LAN team and the external security company who will be on duty with us in the evenings.

Dust-Off®, the official PC and console cleaning product of the World Cyber Games, is the go-to-source for PC and console maintenance and care. Dust-Off products supply gamers with a well-rounded system to keep their expensive PCs clean and running at the highest level of performance. The Dust-Off family of consumer electronics and gaming products includes compressed-gas dusters, micro-fibre cloths, assorted cleaning wipes and the renowned Keyboard Quiver, the official bag to WCG Team USA.

“Professional gamers count on a clean gaming system to help give them a competitive edge in head-to-head competitions and tournaments,” said Ken Newman, Director of Marketing for Dust-Off. “But amateurs and casual gamers alike can also benefit from keeping their gear clean. Whether using a Wii, XBox, PS3, PC or laptop computer, this is a must have accessory for gamers of all skill levels, one that will help them effectively keep all of their components clean and ready."

Jon Winkle, Managing Director of epic gaming Ltd. added, "We're extremely pleased to be working with Dust-Off for epic.THREE but also hopefully as part of a long-term relationship not only to provide the opportunity to try &  buy cleaning & maintenance accessories at our events, but also to help educate our community on the benefits and techniques of maintaining a clean and efficient gaming system."

Participants at epic.THREE will have the opportunity to lay their hands on some 100ml Gaming Dusters and Monitor Wipes as part of a series of random giveaways and competitions. In addition, everyone who completes a brief survey about PC cleaning/maintenance at the event will be entered into a prize draw to win a Keyboard Quiver (RRP £61.99) to protect your prized peripherals.

And with epic.THREE officially just mere days away now, there are now even more reasons to book your place straight away!

Moving on from pretend DJ'ing with this to the real thing.

So you're booked for epic.THREE and you will have seen that we have not one but two guest DJ's playing live sets at the event! Wondering what you can expect from them? To settle your nerves I have personally hunted down the elusive DJ Haden. I say elusive, all you have to do is create a new facebook group and Haden will join!

Anyway back on topic, hit the Read More link below to read our interview with the first of our DJs for epic.THREE.

Read More

After a number of applications and interviews. We're proud to announce the arrival of Hg to the team.

Hg will be joining us ready to help out with epic.THREE, particularly working on some of the big games, fun tournaments and event content, as well as helping out with the online community activities, such as our regular games nights.

On joining the team, Tim said, "I'm sure I will enjoy the role and enjoy working with the current epic.team as they are already friends."

"I applied for this role as I have made some great friends in the epic.community and I have enjoyed myself at all the epic events and lately online during epic.Tuesdays and of course in IRC.
As such I wanted to make sure this is same for all members of the community, ensuring they enjoy epic and what it has to offer!"

We all look forward to working with Hg for epic.THREE and beyond.

Time to announce the rounds that will be taking place in the epic.THREE pub quiz!

Our pub quiz takes place on the Saturday at around 8pm in the bar area of our new venue, Uttoxeter Racecourse.

It's £1 per person to enter, and all entry fees are distributed to the winning teams as 75% - 1st Place, 25% - 2nd Place.

So the rounds for the quiz this event:

• General Knowledge
• Gaming Music
• Film & TV News
• Movie Themes
• Current Affairs
• Photochop
• General Music
• Drinks
• Gaming News

Still some spaces left for epic.THREE so head over to our booking page now to grab yourself a place.

An opportunity has arisen for a member of the community to join the epic.LAN team in time for our next event, epic.THREE at the end of the month.

We're looking for a keen member of the epic.LAN community (you must have attended our events previously) to join in helping out both at our events and with our online activities.

The work is all voluntary, but there are plenty of other benefits, including being a part of a great team and a fast-growing exciting community, not to mention the benefits for your CV for both the voluntary and technical aspects of taking part in the events.

So we're looking for applications from people with suitable skills to be a part of that team. A good gaming knowledge and a basic technical knowledge for diagnosis of simple networking problems is required and of course you need to be able to work as part of a team. Creative skills inolving sound/video/photography or graphic design are always beneficial to the team, but not essential.

To apply, send an email to winbar@epiclan.co.uk detailing why you think you would be suitable for the role. Your email can be text based, or you could show off your skills in some other way such as an image or short video clip if you want to be a bit more creative. As the next is event is closing in quickly, the deadline for applications is 12noon, Saturday 13th February, with shortlisting and online interviews taking place Sunday 14th & Monday 15th in the evening. Obviously you will need to be available for epic.THREE to apply.

Good luck!

Now it's your chance to have a try at spinning the decks with our DJ Hero Fun Tournament at epic.THREE in February.

For some late night random fun, we're going to be hosting a DJ Hero competition at the event so you too can learn how to be a top DJ...well, almost!

And don't forget as part of the event entertainment we have a number of live sets from our very own DJs Haden & Superchief and a bit of random musical Armagetron fun from Graeme (Kustom).

The exact competition format is yet to be determined, but it's likely to be the highest average score over a number of sets.

But again, to take part you need to be there!

Find out more about epic.THREE and book your place now!

The first draft of our epic.THREE timetable has been released giving you an idea of some of the organised activities we'll be running over the weekend.

You'll also see on there our three fun-tournaments which we can now confirm will be:

• 5v5 Team Fortress 2
• 1on1 CSS Rifle Trifle Cup
• Trackmania

The timetable just shows our big games and mini tournaments (hence mainly showing FPS games), but of course you're free to play whatever you want whenever you want throughout the weekend. Just shout up if you want a game of anything, and people will join in! We'll be randomly putting on some mini-games for other genres too.

So start having a think about your teams ready for the TF2! Both the CSS and Trackmania will just be individual fun events.

As you can see, there's loads going on at epic.THREE, book now if you don't want to miss out on the fun!

Neptune's Pride is a browser based strategy game played in real time against multiple opponents and epic.THREE participants will have a unique opportunity to try out the beta in a special speed version.

The aim is to capture enough planets to have ultimate control using a mixture of diplomacy and acts of aggression. While the interface and controls are simple, with only 4 research strands of Weapons, Range, Speed and Scanning, the game focuses attention on strategy. You can upgrade your fleet's range to beyond your scanning distance so you never know what you might find on the other side.

Unlike the internet version, we will have access to a special speed version so instead of days to complete actions it will be hours instead!

Read More

Because we're nice and helpful, here is our list of games that will be appearing in our Big Game Timetable during epic.THREE to give you plenty of time to get them installed before the event, rather than installing and patching when they're announced on the PA system and only joining the server just as people are finishing!

Now don't forget, the list isn't exhaustive, so just because a game doesn't appear in the list, doesn't mean it wont be played at all and the list only covers what we class as Big Games where we aim to fill a server with as many people as possible, so things like RTS style don't appear here, but they'll still get played!

Full timetable for the event is coming soon, watch this space!

Read More

In addition to our "Decorate Your Desk" mini competition, we're pleased to announce the return of "Capture the LAN" and this one is for all of the budding photographers out there!

This one is quite simple, all you have to do is take a photograph and submit it to a folder on the FTP at the LAN. The photograph has to be something that captures the atmosphere of an epic.LAN and sums it up in one single image. Each entrant will be allowed to submit up to 5 images.

So this one wont be judged on who has the biggest camera lens, but more about who snaps the moment that just captures what epic.LAN is all about! Once again, we'll find a prize for the winner and show off some of the best entries in our gallery. Closing will be 12noon on the Sunday of epic.THREE.

Yes, you heard correctly!

We've been able to lay our hands on a very limited stock of Jolt for epic.THREE which will probably and sadly be the last time we're able to get hold of any reasonable quantities for the events after the announcement of the manufacturer's filing for Chapter 11.

We'll have some cans available for sale at the staff area, but we'd like to give you the opportunity to secure an entire crate of caffeine to be on your desk ready for when you arrive!

In addition, if you pre-order before the event, you will get 12 cans for the price of 11!

To secure your pre-order go to your epic.THREE Event Booking select Services and add the required flavour. Note that your order will need to be paid for in advance and this offer does not apply at the event.

It's clearly time to announce some of the more important details about epic.THREE (25th-28th February), the bar times & prices and breakfast times!

For epic.THREE we will be using a large bar in the main hall with a huge space set aside for socialising, drinking, eating, playing card/board games and consoles. The bar will be open at the following times:

• Thursday - 5pm - 12.30am
• Friday - 1pm - 12.30am
• Saturday - 1pm - 12.30am

In addition, we'll also have breakfast being served every morning from 9am - 11am in the main hall, so you can get your morning nom without even having to leave the venue!

Read More

After DJ Superchief's live set at epic.TWO in July, we've decided to line up not one, but two live sets to take place at epic.THREE in February.

One of the things we aim to create at our events, is a great atmosphere. Through lighting and background music, we give you a LAN like no other in the UK!

So at 11pm for one hour on both Thursday and Friday nights, you'll get to hear a set from our very own DJs Superchief and Haden!

Yet another great reason to come to epic.THREE on 25th-28th February at Uttoxeter Racecourse, Staffordshire.

With 47 people currently booked, it's looking to be yet another fantastic event!

See you there!

Following on from epic.TWO, we made the commitment to improve the scheduling and communications at the events. After a number of staff discussions, and some inspiration from other events, we've decided to look at the big screen as a better communications method, as well as clearing up the sound from the speaker system.

Our current big screen used simple PowerPoint to display messages. While it did the job for static announcements, it made it difficult to include any dynamic content and was also a bit clunky to update.

Read More

Our good friends at Crucial have confirmed that they will be sending their support to epic.THREE with a great selection of goodies, including a top prize of a 4GB DDR2 Ballistix RAM kit and of course plenty Memory Hawg pigs!

Take a look at the Crucial range of products at www.crucial.com/uk or you can follow them at twitter.com/crucialmemory

There's plenty more yet to announce about epic.THREE, to get involved make sure you've signed up and booked your ticket!

If you're a fan of the Crucial Memory Hawg then grab a look at the Memory Hawg Song on Youtube.