Background: 

Theta chapter was looking for some events that we could put on that had very low overhead but could potentially raise some decent money for our philanthropies. November is usually a slow month for us so we figured that it would be time to try something new that could reach out to a different crowd than normally partakes in our events. We decided to host a video game tournament featuring Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. We charged each entrant $5 per character with a max of 2 characters per person. We formed a bracket and had each match set as a best of 3 rounds with 4 lives per person. 

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Degree of effort:

Minimal, no overhead required for the event. We did require our school’s technical department to assist us in connecting to the large televisions in our lab room but that was all. 

 

Investment:

We went out and asked for gift cards which could be donated to the 1st and 2nd place winners, and received multiple that we could use from places such as Mellow Mushroom and local tap houses.

 

Limiting Factors:

Time is a limiting factor as we had around 20 players for our first year, and since we only had 2 Wii Us it was difficult to fit all of the players in while giving them the time they needed to complete the matches. Our school let us use the lab room which had multiple flat screens for free, but location could be a limiting factor if that kind of set up is absent on your campus. 

 

Supplies:

We needed Wii U systems and copies of the game Super Smash Bros. Multiple brothers were able to step up and provide us with these so it was not an issue. We just needed an abundance of controllers.

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Rundown and Pointers:

Before: We reserved the room with the televisions over a month in advance and designed a Google survey/sign up with a cool design to draw people to the event. We posted on our class Facebook pages and made announcements in class promoting the event, making sure to mention the gift card prizes for the winners.

 

Day Of/During: We made sure to bring our cash box in case anyone wanted to pay at the last minute (there were several). We arrived 45 minutes early to set up the systems to make sure everything was in working order.

 

The bracket was made in advance so we were just in charge of assigning which television the matches would be played on and to keep track of winners and losers. Very little to manage during the event.

 

After: Make sure to award gift cards to appropriate recipients and clean up anything left behind. We did not serve food so the clean up was quite minimal.