CANEX Gaming Series generates online buzz

Left to right: Benoit Chartrand,CANEX District Manager (East); Matt Hogue, civilian employee; Corporal Mark Osbourne; Leading Seaman Chris Hanratty; Base Commander CFB Halifax, Captain(N) Paul W. Forget; Corporal Shaun Beals; Corporal Mitch Mancini; CANEX CFB Halifax Store Manager, Glenn Banfield, and team player, not pictured, Aviator Tre Upshaw, show their winnings after scooping the champion gaming title.

Peter Mallett, Staff Writer ~

CFB Halifax retained its #1 Champion title for the CANEX Championship Gaming Series online tournament organized by Canada’s Military Store.

The second annual online gaming series took place Aug. 18 to 20. The competition featured 16 six-player teams from military bases across the country competing for over $7,000 in prizes, while testing their skills in the popular military combat action video game Overwatch.

This year’s first place team, Desktop Support of CFB Halifax, edged out its closest competitor Chair Force of CFB Petawawa to retain the title won last year by Halifax’s Base Logistics’ Five Guys and Fries, which competed in the game Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.

CANEX, Canada’s Military Store, also notched its own victory with the second annual gaming competition says Vivian Ngai, Segment Marketing Manager for CANEX, A division of Canadian Forces Morale and Welfare Services (CFMWS). That’s because benchmarks for participation and web traffic indicators increased markedly over last year’s inaugural gaming series.

A total of 109 registered players took part in this year’s competition representing an increase of 33 percent from 2016. This year’s gaming tournament generated over 21,000 online engagements through the Twitch live stream chat and CANEX’s social media posts, an increase of 49 percent unique viewers and an 82 percent increase in chat activities compared to last year.

Ngai says market surveys conducted for CANEX reveal that a significant number of customers are gamers and strongly indicated a high degree of satisfaction at peer-to-peer competition.

“Based on our findings the top three motivators for CAF gamers to play these video games are because it serves as a form of entertainment and fun, provides stress relief, and because they are challenging,” said Ngai.

This year’s event was sponsored by MSI, Asus, Acer, Couger and NVIDIA, who all contributed to the prize pool, and have their brand of gaming products available for purchase at CANEX stores.

First and second place teams received prize packages from these official sponsors including a selection of gaming accessories from gold sponsor MSI. Additional random prize draws, including Asus gaming laptop, Acer gaming monitor, NVIDIA and Cougar gaming accessories, were also awarded to players and viewers who entered the live-stream contests.

CANEX would like to thank all players and viewers for participating in this year’s online gaming tournament and hope to see everyone again next year.