Play N Trade holding national Guitar Hero III competition March 15

by Alexander Sliwinski { Mar 12th 2008 at 5:00AM }

This Saturday, video game retailer Play N Trade is holding a Guitar Hero III tournament with a national grand prize of $2000 (in store credit). Competitors should check if their local store is participating in the tournament and confirm the time matches start. Entry fee is $10 beforehand or $15 on the day of the event.

Players will compete by single elimination in best 2 out of 3 matches. The top player from each store then plays Through the Fire and Flames on Expert and their score is sent in to determine a national champion on March 17 for the aforementioned $2000. Second place national winner receives a PS3, GH3 bundle and $500 in store credit; third place receives a GH3 bundle and $200 in store credit. Depending on how confident players feel in their TtFaF skills, this could either be a sure bet or an exercise in futility.

Tags: ghIII, play-n-trade, playntrade, tournament

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Willozap @ Mar 12th 2008 5:52AM

So they can win a copy of a game that they're already really good at? And they have to pay $25 to enter? Sounds like a freaking rip off to me.

Nate @ Mar 12th 2008 7:40AM

Yeah, gotta agree, why would you give the winner of a HG3 tournament the very game they've been practicing forever. It would be like giving the HotDog Eating Contest winner a hot dog.

In other news, getting $2000, $500 and a PS3, or $200 ain't bad.

MarkHawk @ Mar 12th 2008 8:04AM

The store is called play and trade. If you win... you trade in or share it with someone. You have 500+ dollars, who cares.

Also never heard of play and trade till now. I'll be on the lookout but 25 is a lot for a gamer. That's half a game.

Matt B @ Mar 12th 2008 9:06AM

I love the game and play it for fun. But there is no way I could compete with some of these people. Shit, I can't even beat Raining blood on medium and I've played real guitar for 15 years. I thought the skills would translate... but they don't.

Rock band guitar on medium is way easier than GH on medium.

h8rain @ Mar 12th 2008 9:38AM

I have to agree with the others, but why would you want to pay to attempt to win a game that if you are good enough to win, then you probably already have the game. I mean the store credit is nice, but seems like a half thought out idea for a prize.

Katsu @ Mar 12th 2008 9:44AM

The entry fee is $10 if you register BEFORE the date of the tourney and $15 if you register THE DAY OF the tourney. It's not $25.

There's a Play N Trade by my house that opened up last Novemeber-ish. It's OK. Seems like a family-run Gamestop. If you can imagine that...

They have a few 8/16-bit items, and you can try pretty much any game before buying. Reminds me a lot of Funcoland before it got eaten up by Babbages/Gamestop.

Same guy (owner) is *always* there. I think every time I've gone in he's chatting away with the customers. He's a friendly, helpful guy. But, unfortunately, he always seems to bring up that they're 'the little guy' and the hardships of being so: How he can't match a price or can't take defective consoles back because they have to go to the manufacturer. How they're not Best Buy or Gamestop. And my favorite, how they had to eat a lot of loss on limited edition Halo 3's, etc.

They're selling prices are comparable to gamestop for new and used. Although, I did find it rather peculiar that almost every new game is like 20 cents off MSRP. I never trade stuff in so I don't know how they're trade-ins prices compare to others. Nice looking store though.

Too bad the contest is not Rock Band. That would be 10x more fun. Then again, the 'company truck' that's always parked outside has a huge GH3 graphics all over it. They look permenent too. Maybe Activision invested? ;)

Ryan @ Mar 12th 2008 10:42AM

I watched the Guitar Hero II contest from Play N Trade last year. The winner at the Lexington, KY store was the national winner. The participants in the store did 1 vs 1 on hard and the overall winner played Free Bird on Expert to compare scores with other store winners.

Play N Trade is set up in that you buy the franchise and run it yourself. They do have a lot more systems from the PS3 to the Atari 2600. The best policy they have is that you can try out any game before you buy.

Grant @ Mar 12th 2008 11:49AM

the graphic on the left is correct, but then they list two 2nd places, instead of second and third. guess they got too excited about their own tournament.

Bob @ Mar 12th 2008 12:29PM

I actually work in the corporate offices of Play N Trade in CA, and one of the earlier posts kind of hit it dead on. We are a growing franchise trying to get in video game market and it is tough for the owners to compete with the big GameStops and Best Buy's cause we don't have the recognition yet. And our stores do have to eat all those limited edition Halo's because basically whatever they buy, they own. So imagine their surprise when they're stuck with 3 copies of Fantastic Four no one wants to buy. And yea we try to be a gamer's haven by carrying games back to the SNES and further. And our used prices tend to be better than GameStop's (ie. RE4-Wii 24 vs 27 at GameStop). So yea, stop by check it out, see what you think.

Desert Eagle @ Mar 12th 2008 2:11PM

I can think PriestMLH will go to that tournament just for the cash and to sweep the entire tournament with those GH skills of his. No one can stop him.

JROD333 @ Mar 12th 2008 11:37PM

I am competing in this i was scouted into it. The guy had me play the devil went down to Georgia on expert, i did it no problem. Then he had me play through the fire and flames on expert, i didi that good. So we paid money and he expects me to come for sure. He said I was the next Jimi Hendrix