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Hi there Steven, for the people that don't know you, could you please tell us a bit about yourself?
Hi there, my name is Steven Leunens, 23 years old and currently CEO of Gamevibes. People might know me from my old gaming days (team royalty & TEK9) but I don’t have any time to game nowadays. Working at Gamevibes takes up all the time I have! |
What do you do outside gaming and how does a normal day look like for you?
| Outside gaming and I’ll include my job at Gamevibes here too I tend to play a little recreational soccer or I go out to parties or organize them myself – I organise around 10 parties each year from a couple hundred people to a couple thousand people attending. A lot of my spare time also goes to hanging out with friends and most importantly my girlfriend. |
So, what got you into the gaming scene, what is the magical point that turned you to use your computer or console for videogames and eSports?
| I started using the computer we had back at home for videogames back from day one. We had a 386 at home and I remember playing Wolfenstein, Simcity or Pacman on a floppy disk and a PC with 16 Mb of hard disk space. It actually took me a while to get an internet connection but when I did the first game I played was the demo of Medal of Honor Allied Assault. I was instantly hooked and turned out to be an above average player which only boosted my motivation to play more. |
Not to long ago you announced that there would be no new edition of the famous OOF series, but a new event for the Call of Duty scene, namely the Antwerpen eSports Festival, could you explain us a bit about the event?
The event is turning the concept of gaming around completely, at least for us here in the Benelux. In the Benelux you haven’t seen that much competitive tournaments and those that you did see were the traditional LAN parties where people are gaming 24/7, sleeping behind their PC’s etc. When gaming was in the media, it always portrayed this negative image of a gamer being just that, someone sitting behind their PC’s 24/7, not showering and so on.
We want to turn the image of the gamer around 180 degrees by putting him in an exclusive hotel (the Hilton) and letting him play for a prize pool of 30 000 € and more. We also give people tournament PC’s and they are not required to play more than a couple of hours a day.
Toss a little entertainment on the side with sponsor booths, stand up comedy, music and more and you have an entertainment show. I’m also very excited to announce that we will have a media and communication plan worth over 300 000 € with advertisements on TV, newspapers, magazines and radio. This is a big step in mainstream acceptance of gaming since we will be able to determine what is portrayed in the media. |
You recently announced the new logo, the venue and some more details, when can we expect the full version website for the event?
| You can expect the website and a lot of information in the first week of May. |
You announced the Hilton Hotel as official hotel for the event, are there any other hotels you could advice for when the Hilton is full?
| So far we can only advice the Hilton hotel for players and teams. The rates we have negotiated offer a once in a lifetime experience at a low cost. Normally you would be paying around 120-160 € per person for a night in the hotel and we got that down to 50 €, breakfast included. If teams or players want to stay at a different hotel they are free to do so but they will be missing some of the fun! |
Is it possible for you to give some more details about the 30,000€ prizemoney? How much for first, second and third?
| Right now there is no breakdown structure for the prize money yet because this isn’t the finalized prize money. Stay tuned for our website launch and announcement early May. |
Will there be more AEF versions after this one?
| We are planning to hold an AEF every year at the last weekend of July. |
You must be very busy with organizing the event, do you still have the time to focus on your other organization, the famous gaming team, TEK9 Networks?
| If it was just me I wouldn’t be able to cope, but I have one of the best crews a person could imagine for all my projects so I’m really happy I can rely on them all the time. Kudos to all of them! |
Could you tell us a bit more about TEK9 Networks, which games do you play and who in the team that work behind the scenes?
We currently boost a COD4 team, a FIFA team, CS 1.6 and Yannick our race player. Behind the scenes we have a big news crew and TEK9 Cinema crew and also management and website crew. Again kudos to all of them for their continued effort throughout the year! |
As you said in the last question, you have a Counter-Strike 1.6 team. You've recently added this squad, do they perform as expected and how is it to work with vgas, the former digitalMind manager?
| Nick (vgas) is just a great person and it’s a pleasure working with them. All of the CS players for that matter are really great and have an attitude you won’t easily find in the CS scene. The performances are right on the money with what we were aiming for (top 3 Benelux) but they are working hard on improving this. |
Recently there have been some changes in the Counter-Strike 1.6, sFx left due to lack of motivation, might the move to TEK9 have anything to do with this?
| I don’t think it had anything to do with it. sFx decided to quit because he wasn’t overly motivated anymore and to be quite honest he was the person who least fitted into the team personality wise. By all means I’m not trying to say he was a bad guy, if anything he was a great guy but it just didn’t really click anymore. Then there is only one thing you can do to move forward in life. |
What are your final goals with TEK9 Networks as a clan and community website?
| I want to build TEK9 Networks into a brand that has the top spot in the Benelux both as a community and as a team and its performances. Furthermore I would like to develop it into the first truly professional gaming team of the Benelux and by doing so I also want players that are capable of challenging the top in the world. |
Seeing you are doing some great stuff to improve gaming in the Belgium, do you see e-Sports grow into a real sport in Belgium and Europe, like in countries such as Korea and China, or will it never become that large? Is there anything the gamers could help with this?
| I don’t see it growing like in other countries but on the positive side there has been a lot of attention going towards gaming from the companies, government and media which I can only applaud. We are moving in the right direction but it’s going extremely slow. Let’s hope for the best! |
You recently started a company called 'Gamevibes', could you explain what it is?
| Gamevibes is a BVBA (company form in Belgium) that I started to further expand the professionalism at which all operations of the various brands are done. We now have an accountant working with us as well as a lawyer and access to various resources we didn’t have before. It allowed us to put all the brands we have (TEK9, AEF, …) under one name and we will be adding new brands and activities shortly. |
What inspired you to start Gamevibes?
| Gamevibes is bringing your dreams to life. When I started doing eSports management long ago I had the ambition to do this fulltime and with Gamevibes that dream has become reality. It has opened so many doors for us and being able to work fulltime on something is a great plus. |
And what are your future goals with Gamevibes?
| We recently started with the marketing and distribution of Fucapo in Belgium and we have another trick or two up our sleeves for the very near future. If you include an announcement we are planning for Antwerp eSports Festival and another project we are working on for AEF you could say we have four tricks up our sleeves! |
Thank you for your time, Steven! Any last words, shoutouts, comments or thank you's you want to give?
| Shoutouts to all the crew in TEK9 and Gamevibes and all our various partners and sponsors making our various labels happen! |
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nice job roy! really well done :)
nice read=D
very nice interview and interesting infos:P
dfb is getting rewarded by the hard work he did put into TEK9 in the past, great guy :D
nice work roychez!
Credits to dfb, nice guy and doing great stuff! Keep it up!!!
Belgium Hell Yeah !
tek 9 is legendary in belgium :p
amazing guy :)
dfb is dfb :]
great iview!
As I already said, that guy is amazing
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