Gamer Gear: Meet the folks of SteelSeries!
by Jordan "Doomhammer" Kahn"
As I make preparations for my annual pilgrimage to San Diego for Comic-Con International, the good folks of vVv Gaming have provided us with a video feature on a local company that helps make gear for competitive gamers. The company is called SteelSeries and I had the pleasure of meeting them last year, going so far as recording a video interview with some of their folks, only to lose all the video footage when my external drive bricked. Today, a great wrong is made right, ;-) :
One of the coolest things about working with an organization like vVv Gaming is the fact that
I get to be involved in all kinds of awesome events. These can be gaming tournaments, where
dozens of vVv members show up and we get to cheer and support players and teams in three or four different titles. These can be podcast recordings where four or five people, scattered across the United States (and sometimes the world!), meet on Skype and talk about various gaming news and updates. And sometimes these can be the coming together of great minds, where all I can do is sit back and watch and be impressed.
Read more after the jump!
vVv Gaming recently had the opportunity to visit the SteelSeries headquarters here in Chicago in order to interview the company's Chief Marketing Officer, Kim Rom, about their new upcoming Spectrum headsets and other pieces of hardware. But even after we were finished discussing the SteelSeries products the conversation continued, ranging from Kim Rom's gaming history to SteelSeries' vision of Competitive Gaming. It was clear to see that Kim and Jerry (vVv LordJerith, president and owner of vVv Gaming) had a very strong rapport together, with similar opinions on a number of subjects. While the film crew was setting up you could hear these two representatives of accomplished organizations talking like old friends about good sushi and the best restaurants in Chicago. Even with all of his travels around the world, Kim Rom admitted that since first visiting Chicago it was his favorite city in the world. A sentiment I appreciated, as I have also fallen in love with this city since moving here a few years ago.
(I want to give out a shout out to Mike Stanowski. Mike was the SteelSeries employee who helped things run smoothly for the shoot itself, setting up parking for the crew (no easy thing in downtown, as any Chicagoan knows), helping get gear lugged upstairs and assisting in a number of small ways. I later learned that before working with SteelSeries Mike had played Counter-Strike competitively. While the video speaks for itself, I was struck by the epic parallels I see between SteelSeries and vVv Gaming. A community of passionate gamers working on something larger than themselves to improve Competitive Gaming is a powerful thing!)
Here is part one of our 3-part video feature on SteelSeries!:
http://www.playwire.com/videos/27232
