What A Wonderful Viewpoint Worlds It Was

With drama, intrigue and plenty of heroes, the Mega Games Viewpoint World Championships for 2010 was a major success. There were several titles up for grabs on the day, including Viewpoint World Champion, Player of the Year and State of Origin Champions. The title event tossed up a few surprises with some unseeded players knocking over Viewpoint state champions. There was much on offer for all attendees, many of whom did not go home empty-handed.

VIEWPOINT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS

The World Champion title race was whittled down to the final 16 players who entered the quarter finals. Three rounds of 1-on-1 matches were held to test the mettle of players as they battled each opponent and demonstrated their skill with the deck. Former tournament winners and even NSW State Champion Nissa Waddell succumbed to other top flight players and two previously unseeded players - Will Yung and Nathan Raunjak. This left the top 9 to race for the ultimate prize.

The 3-player semi-final matches required players to be the first to win two games to advance to the grand final. The groupings pitted the likes of Nathan 'Gigantor' Anderson against Ken 'Ren' Swindail and Alex 'The Dominator' Done against Will 'The Newcomer' Yung. Surprisingly, Alex Done who had been leading the Player of the Year race for most of the year was taken to the wire and ultimately defeated in straight sets by Will Yung. On the obverse side of the coin, Nathan Anderson quickly dispatched his two opponents. The third semi-final match between Alex Fleig, Nathan Raunjak and Shawn Stamatakis went all the way to the fourth game with Alex Fleig taking out the last game to secure his position in the grand final.

There was quiet tension in the air as the top 3 contenders - Nathan Anderson, Alex Fleig and Will Yung - sat down for the last games of the 2010 season. Cameras and judges encircled the 3 players as they got underway. Will won the toss and elected to take the first turn. Alex went next and played a Visionary for early card drawing power and followed up in his next turn with a See Into The Future to already gain 3 extra cards from the Visionary. Alex then hit Will with a Mirage, which was followed up by an Eye Spy from Nathan. Will retaliated by swapping cards to get the Visionary. Alex quickly Miraged it and then Nathan sent a Mirage Alex's way. Players settled into conservative mode by forcing several discards and steals. Nathan then played a break-away move by Seeing Into The Future and trading cards with Peripheral Vision. Will played two of his own Peripheral Visions in an attempt to balance the ledger. The action heated up further as Mirages flew across the table. Nathan then made the most strategic play of the match by returning a Persistence of Vision to his hand using All-Seeing Eye. This allowed him to survive one round of standard board disruption and provided him with the opportunity to pull off a Shadow / See Into The Future / Peripheral Vision combo on his next turn, which won him game 1.
Nathan 1 - Alex 0 - Will 0

As Nathan won the first game, Will took the first turn again. The first few turns were largely uneventful and hadn't separated the players much. However, Nathan was laying a trap for his opponents by playing relatively innocuous but high value cards to put the pressure on them to find some answers before it was too late. But there would be no resistance as Nathan swept through Alex and Will in under 6 minutes. In doing so he proved his dominance in the 1-on-1 and 3-player formats as he became the Viewpoint World Champion for 2010.
Nathan 2 - Alex 0 - Will 0

Nathan was awarded the Viewpoint World Champion trophy and received $1000 in cash. Will and Alex received $250 each and were awarded the Good Games and LXG runner-up trophies, respectively.

VIEWPOINT PLAYER OF THE YEAR

At the start of the day only two players were able to win the Player of the Year trophy - Alex Done (46 points) and Nathan Anderson (42 points) - with 12 points on offer for the winning the World Championships, 6 points for being a runner-up, 3 points for 4th to 9th place and 2 points for 10th to 16th place. As Alex had played in fewer tournaments than Nathan, the only way for Nathan to win was for him to win the tournament and for Alex to not make the top 3. As history would have it, Alex Done strove valiantly (even achieving a rare lock-out game in the quarter finals against hardened veteran Barry Wonson) but fell at the final hurdle. Nathan went on to clinch the World Champion title and thus became Viewpoint Player of the Year. Nathan was awarded the Viewpoint Player of the Year trophy.

VIEWPOINT STATE OF ORIGIN

The final trophy on offer for the season was the Viewpoint State of Origin shield, which would be awarded to the state team - NSW or QLD - that won the best-of-three 3-on-3 series of games. Team NSW boasted 9 players - Geoff Turner, Barry Wonson and Shawn Stamatakis (NSW A), Ken Swindail, Jason Cleal and Nathan Anderson (NSW B) and Morgan Carty, Nissa Waddell and Will Yung (NSW C). QLD were limited to 3 players with Viewpoint game designer Sean Carroll, QLD State Champion Alex Done and LXG's Keith Done pulling on the Maroon jersey.

NSW absolutely dominated QLD in game 1 with Shawn scoring multiple plays using his early Shadow and Geoff and Barry locking down Alex, the only threatening QLD player, with several keenly-directed and undefended Blindsides and Skewed Views. QLD finally removed Shawn's Shadow just to see it replaced by a Shadow from Geoff on the following turn. The game ended quickly after that.
NSW 1 - QLD 0

As NSW sat back and basked in their win, QLD leaned into a concerned huddle to discuss tactics. Their objective for game 2 was to target a single player to make their score irrelevant, theoretically making the game a 3-on-2 affair.

As the teams got underway, game 2 looked like it was going the way of the first. Nathan Anderson was beginning to prepare his hand for an onslaught of Hindsight and See Into The Future cards. Fortunately a well-placed QLD Eye Spy ripped two key 20/20 cards from his hand. Just as QLD thought their trap had been set with their target Ken looking vulnerable and ready to have his view skewed, he revealed a hat trick of Persistence of Vision cards. QLD were stunned and left on the brink of defeat. The referee was counting them out... 6, 7, 8, 9... But no, wait! The expertly-timed top-decking abilities of Sean came to the fore as he ripped a Shadow from the top of the Draw Pile. Game 2 was QLD's as Sean used the 2 previously stolen Hindsights and a Mirror Image in hand to rail off multiple turns in a row.
NSW 1 - QLD 1

After their shock defeat in game 2, NSW scrambled to find a team capable of securing victory. NSW players were fighting for seats in the do-or-die game. Over in the QLD corner, the team refined their tactics further to designate 2 players as score-builders and 1 player as the aggressor.

Game 3 was finely-balanced with both sides trading between 150 and 170 points for several turns (Note that the objective for State of Origin is for the team to reach a composite total of 200 View-points). Then with Morgan all ready to place his final two cards down with Shadow, Sean had a choice between blindsiding him or skewing his view (both of which can be countered with the right cards). Sean chose the former option to take away any chance for Morgan to play a card. The Blindside stuck and the turn skipped to Alex who sent a Mirage Morgan's way leaving the scores at NSW 150 - QLD 170. Nissa then Blindspotted her own player to take the scores to NSW 170-all. It was all up to Keith to save the game and the series for QLD. Then with the prowess of a champion darts player, Keith dropped a Blindsided card on the table and pointed to Will. Will had no defence and the turn skipped to Sean who placed a 20-point card to seal an amazing come-from-behind win typical of all great QLD teams.
NSW 1 - QLD 2

The NSW fans and team were inconsolable as QLD raised the State of Origin shield aloft whilst chanting 'Queenslander! Queenslander!'

CONGRATULATIONS & THANK YOU

Congratulations to Nathan Anderson for becoming the newly-crowned Viewpoint World Champion and Player of the Year. Nathan also won the Viewpoint Trivia Challenge, which proves he doesn't just have talents as a card player but also takes time to study and take note of the elements of the game.

Congratulations also goes to World Championships runners-up Alex Fleig and Will Yung and the player who narrowly finished second in the Player of the Year race - Alex Done.

Well done to QLD for winning the State of Origin and showing that QLD is still the only team that has the heart to 'play for the full 80 minutes'.

93 Made Games would like to thank everyone involved with the immensely enjoyable and successful Viewpoint World Championships. This includes the sponsors and supporters (Mega Games, Good Games, Ace Comics & Games, Boardacious Games & Puzzles and League of Extraordinary Gamers), the players (without you this day would not have happened), the stores and clubs who ran tournaments throughout the year and friends and family who assisted us producing and promoting Viewpoint. We look forward to the next Viewpoint World Championships, where new skills will be required with the adoption of Viewpoint Reflections into the standard format. In the meantime, keep your eye on the prize!

Stay tuned to the 93 Made Games YouTube channel for footage and highlights from the day, including the launch of the Viewpoint Hustle cartoon.

Viewpoint is a fun-packed and easy to learn card game for 2 or more players aged 7 and up. Be the first player to reach 100 points by looking into the future, spying on other players and blindsiding your buddies!