Gamers shared routers and plugged in their monitors at CUE 202 on Saturday afternoon for the Winter WonderLAN esports event. With crates of electronic gadgets and tangled up wires, gamers from the Palouse came together to play video games among their peers.

The all-day event saw headset-wearing players take to their mice and controllers to engage in digital competition.

“My favorite thing is you get to meet the person you’ve been talking to over the internet for however long,” WSU Esports Club President Bobby Belter said. “It’s a completely different feel than being at home and playing in your room … here you’re playing games with people and that’s the focus, it’s more of a social setting.”

This event was the successor to the Fall Fest local-area network, or LAN, event held this September where participants paid to play, earning prizes and sometimes working together to win. That LAN event was the first one of the fall semester. Plans after the first event resulted in Winter WonderLAN, an open event for gamers of all levels and game types to participate in cooperative and tournament-style play.

The WonderLAN event hosted a multitude of popular games such as League of Legends, Overwatch, Smash Bros, Fortnite and Rocket League.

Belter said he and the Linux Users’ Group are planning a consistent gaming event schedule that would have different activities held weekly.

There is no official news as to when this will start, but the esports weekly schedule is expected to start before the end of this year and possibly before the end of this semester.

“We want to get a pool of ideas together before we jump into this event,” Belter said. “Hopefully we can integrate with the Super Smash group that runs weekly because then we can have a crowd of people we can play off with each other and not start off as this small event.”

WSUCon, which follows Winter WonderLAN, will be held Feb. 15 and 16 in the CUB Senior Ballroom, also hosted by the Linux and esports groups.