Over the weekend of 6-8 November 2020, rAge Digital Edition brought the rAge Expo to an online audience for the first time in its 18 year history. Over 6,300 fans booked tickets to get their fix of gaming, tech, esports and geek content. rAge Digital Edition took to its home on the web, the rAge event hub, Twitch, YouTube and Facebook, and delivered a whole new kind of awesome including esports, cosplay, a variety of streaming content and panels, competitions, educational content, community interaction, and the Africa Games and Esports Careers Day.
The biggest names in South Africa’s gaming community were all on-hand, including Sam “Tech Girl” Wright, Grant Hinds, Samplayze, Haylstorm_SA, ChaniZA, Pacman10154 and ThendoPlays. And the Streamer Zone, powered by Mettlestate, brought some of the country’s best content creators in to fans’ homes, with streams about everything from esports to art/design and gaming.
“Moving rAge to a digital-only expo was a huge risk and yet it worked,” says Sam Wright, “Offering up a platform to tell the stories of South African gamers and share their journeys in a beautifully produced sequence of videos and live streams was something special to watch and enjoy. I think the rAge team has set the bar for online live content and digital expos in the South African geek and gaming industry”.
Major esports tournaments from ACGL, Mettlestate and UGCZA – with major prize money to match – also took centre stage. ACGL’s Nick Holden says, “Gamers around South Africa breathed a sigh of disappointment when it was made known that rAge would not be taking place this year due to the worldwide pandemic. rAge could have simply thrown in the towel and chalked off the event for 2020. But instead, rAge went digital and pleasantly surprised us all.
“rAge DigitaL Edition managed to recreate the feeling of previous expos by empowering players, organisations and ultimately gamers. By doing so, they managed to open themselves to more ideas, creativity, and opportunity for participants. I feel that rAge showcased exactly why they have been so successful over the years, because they care about their role in growing the ecosystem of gaming in South Africa.”
With a total of 3,821 hours of content streamed over the weekend of rAge Digital Edition, there was something on offer for everyone. And as the world continues to change the way it interacts during the pandemic and beyond, perhaps the success of rAge Digital Edition is a taste of things to come, in a future that is connecting more people online and breaking the barriers of lockdown through interactive tech.
Michael James, Project Director at rAge comments, “We’ve never seen an expo like this and it was very much an experiment for us when we launched the concept. But thanks to our amazing fan base and all the contributors to the event, the rAge Digital experiment was a great success. Even as an online event, rAge is still a place where people come together to celebrate their mutual love of gaming, tech and and fantasy. In many ways, going digital made the event even more inclusive and there is definitely potential to incorporate the digital element into future editions”.
If you missed rAge Digital Edition, all the VOD’s and live streams are available to view via YouTube.
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