We had a great time LANning after FoulBreed's bachelor party last night. We had 5v5 at our peak. First, we cycled through the Halo 3 maps playing team slayer. Next, we tried some objective games such as CTF, oddball, and territories. We were all pretty lost in the beginning, as none of us had extensive experience in the multiplayer maps yet. We were able to play each map at least once and many maps twice before hanging it up. I think we're all better prepared for next week's birthday LAN after this experience. Furthermore, it introduced me to exactly how nice BYOS LANs can be. Here's some bullets on how the BYOS LAN differs from the traditional

-Everyone's setup and tear down responsibilities are intuitively obvious (your own gaming rig and station). The host just has to show each participant where to plug in to the network.

-Tear down goes quickly because of this. I think less than 10 minutes transpired from when everyone hung it up to when my house was back to normal.

-Making teams no longer involves figuring out seating. Someone hosts a game, everyone joins up, and we figure out teams in the lobby.

-Not much shifting around to change players equals more playing time.

-Having your profile and settings on a memory unit will save you a couple minutes at each box creating a guest profile.

-Power strips are a huge concern. If a gamer is bringing an LCD monitor and speakers then he needs 3 electrical outlets. That means that a single dual wall outlet cannot support a single gamer! Everyone that brings a 360 should bring a powerstrip for best results.

-It's a blast!

Here are some pictures from the event.