One of the most exciting lans to watch in recent memory.

Also, I haven't tuned in to many streams lately and I don't know if the logo is old, but whoever made that animation of the TF2 logo breaking into logs is great.

Honestly, I just want to shout out the entire NA TF2 scene in general.

I attended this LAN knowing practically nobody, and feel like I was welcomed with open arms. I had a fantastic time meeting and hanging out with everyone, from spectators and players to Fireside staff themselves.

LAN blues already kicking in as more and more people start their trips home, and I realise that in a few hours I will fly across the Atlantic far away in both distance and time zone from my new friends. Incredibly keen to come over again should a similar event run in the future. Missing everyone so much already.

ps: would love to have some intercontinental representation in Poland next year

I think I’m gonna miss some shoutouts but here I go

Amazing lan, thank you to everyone in production and organization who put this on.
It was amazing watching the invite bracket and especially grands, shoutout g6 and wgeu for putting on a show.
Shoutout my team (erik sale fireball gabby and Donnie danko) for being a blast to play with and seriously cool people to hangout with.
Shoutout Donnie danko for renting an Airbnb with me last second and being a dope ass person to be around.
Shoutout ghad for driving me to the Apple Store when my phone bricked and giving me a ride to the airport.
Shoutout to everyone I got the chance to talk to and the just general good vibes of the lan. Everyone seemed to be in high spirits and just there for a good time, which was very refreshing.
And finally, shoutout to everyone who showed up. If it weren’t for the high attendance it wouldn’t have been nearly as fun!

siyo and all of fireside for making this event happen (and for confusing me for reyylin)
wrander for driving me and mild around
erik and sale for calling me an emo freak

and a bunch of other people i was too shy to say hi to :D (esp blt and the aussies)

shout outs ninjago + gotten for planning everything out and getting everything neatly organized (and throne driving us around every day)

shout outs to the lower div players and pubbers I talked to at lan. all of you are the meatiest portion of the community and getting involved and supporting events like physgun is what the scene needs.

and lastly, shout outs siyo, resin, lacy, beth, lou, antlers, everyone else on production and event admin for not only putting on the event but also bringing in last-minute talent (even u benpl <3). I was happy to help just a bit leading up and during setup.

it's remarkable that an org as young as fireside was able to pull something like this off and its thanks to the fireside & production crew and all the work they put in leading up to and during the event
everyone i talked to and everyone who came up to me were really pleasant to speak with
shoutouts to the aussies and euros for making the journey and playing so well
i already knew I'd enjoy meeting people I've known or talked with before but i didn't know benpl at all and he was great to meet and also make production a lot better with his knowledge of the european scene

LANs are really tough to pull off, especially first-time events with all the complexity of international teams and venue constraints. The Fireside team did an amazing job making this tournament happen. The format worked great, and despite some production hiccups (which were pretty much unforeseeable), the LAN was a huge success. Props to everyone who made it work!

wait i forgot shoutouts to the guy who showed up as the spy on day 2 that was hilarious

Shout out to the poor projection screen at the venue.

Shout out to dubs/abby and plum the photographers of the lan without them the B-Rolls of the venue wouldn’t be as good as it was.

Shout out to my fireside crew from siyo to antlers to underscore to lacy to Connie and louster, they worked hella hard to made it as enjoyable even through the rough times at the venue and matches.

Shout out to everyone that came to the event, hope to see you guys again, everyone was so nice and fun to talk to, just nerding out about TF2 all day was so much fun

And uhh shoutout to ROME ghadilli #ALLROADS

Gonna get this out of the way now before reality hits me like another wave

First and foremost, huge thanks to Fireside and its staff, both on and offline, for making this event possible. Between the constant back and forth with tournament staff, venue staff, and helping us with merch, I don't think it could have gone any better for setting up things to get both European and Australian teams into NA.

My largest thanks go to my players on wG, current and past. I started Witness Gaming WAY back in Season 4 because I wanted to be the best positive manager I could be for the scene. I wanted to help people in the scene. 4 years and nearly $15,000 later, I could have never dreamed of providing long-time life memories for people who were experiencing America and 3-continent-TF2 for the first time. That itself is priceless, and is something I'll hold onto with fondness for the rest of my life. To wG EU and AU, I love you guys. Thank you for putting trust into me and allowing me to help you. I'm proud of you.

I'd like to shout out Maryville University Esports for providing us with 4 headsets and spare equipment for LAN.

Huge thank you to anyone supportive of wG as a fan or donor, a large amount of what we've done wouldn't be possible without people who support and believe in what we're doing.

Thanks to Louster for being my co-pilot for my 14 hour drives to and from Denver and then back to St.Louis

Thanks to Ma3laa, a LOT of what I do for wG was inspired by Ascent. I wanted to be just as good as Ascent with the start of this project, and I really hope I did a good enough job to inspire and support others in the scene.

Quick plug of the Liquipedia page that has everyone who worked on the event because there were so many people and I'm def going to miss some in this post: https://liquipedia.net/teamfortress/Fireside/Physgun/Denver/2025

Some names I can think of not on the Liquipedia event page include DubThink and Bethnicz, who did a ton of videography and photography for the LAN. Their work will start showing up more and more as we start getting everything edited, finalized, and posted.

I signed up and joined the event staff w/o going through any official onboarding, had no official role, and was ultimately let to do whatever I wanted. Lacy, siyo, antlers, connie, and resin trusted me to do whatever I thought was needed to elevate the event and I thank them for letting me do so. It was an absolute blast.

S/O to everyone I met and finally got to meet after only talking to them online for ages (special shout to the Fjord team who let me hang out with them on day -1), the aussies who I helped shuttle were incredibly kind, the b-stream team at EssentialsTF who are always awesome and so incredibly helpful with anything and everything, Dr. Happiness & Benpl for coming across the pond to work on the LAN, every caster & commentator for their work and for being so kind too, random oldheads that popped up into chat and chatted with me throughout the weekend, Tagg who casually showed up to the venue to watch the LAN and let us do an impromptu interview (he was so nice, which shouldn't be a surprise to me, but he was incredibly down for us to put him on stream and just chat with us backstage while I geeked out on meeting him), and anyone else who I may have missed who deserves a shout (this post is long already and I got 3 hours of sleep last night).

Thank YOU for your hard work and for putting up with me not understanding what you were recording & working on because my brain was fried 10x over.

Thank YOU for letting me ride shotgun for all 14 hours & helping me bring $2000 in gear to Denver. Congrats again on the win!

Time to disappear back into the ether until the next one.

ps: if anyone has any tips on getting over a cold besides drinking water and consuming 20000mg of EmergenC let me know, thanks

I wanted to shoutout a few people since this was my first lan had a blast
Shoutout to the staff and especially siyo and antlers had really nice conversations with you guys I know you put your all into making it an amazing lan can't thank the whole staff enough
Shoutout to Jt and all of thrembology for letting me stick around like a lost dog helped me feel welcome
Shoutout to Therealweiner for taking a look at my car and trying to fix the many issues I had lmao giving me advice
Shoutout to everyone I got to meet loved all you guys hope to see everyone in the coming years cheers to the next one

goated event, had a lot of fun every day :D

shoutout to my team (alyx rave finmin throne mobe), good job doing as well as expected and no better
shoutout to all the homies who came to just watch and chill (bibby chill raps gotten blu2th mari0)
shoutout to the fjord people for the fun hike and chill at their bnb
special shoutout to throne for driving everywhere

was fun meeting people, ggs and wp to EU for taking the W, wasted 7 bucks on the big ass flag tho

antishoutout to the dumbass denver person who hit and run'd Nick's car and then parked 5 mins away and got caught fucking stupid ass idiot (it was not a tf2 player dont worry)

I had a great time at this event and going to have some pride forever in playing the tiniest part of making it go.

Shoutout to:

Lacy for letting me be on the admin team and not firing me for having wrong opinions about formats and rulesets.

Drhappiness for being super chill and putting up with a geezer as his admin table partner all weekend.

Witness for bringing great teams to the event, and the EU and AU players for such a great show.

The Open event teams for coming in and having fun playing this ancient game, especially the players that stopped by to introduce themselves and chat - way too many to name.

Grape Juice and Lake Fairy Crew for playing through and being good people

That Dad that showed up on Monday with his teenage kids to watch the event

Deltamarket for sharing your uber ride to the airport at 3:30AM on Tuesday

ecchymoses for sharing a hotel room and being a great caster

whoever it was that thought I was siyo at the event.

JMaxChill, Samus and everyone at EssentialsTF for a great B stream

Dang, this is getting way too long, sorry for rambling, but one more:

Huge shoutout to Siyo, Antlers, Lacy (again) Resin and everyone at Fireside for giving this event so much and making it happen. Really appreciate what you've done for the community here.

this event was an absolute blast, and i will never forget it

not to start very corporate but shoutout to physgun and mannco.store. austin from physgun gave us endless patience in the buildup and duration of the event, always being willing to accommodate us. i hope we can work together again in the future.

shoutout to localhost for having us. josh and sarah took great care of us in the lead up to the event and throughout it, even being understanding with our scheduling issues when we went over on saturday and monday (yay for not being dreamhacked!). their team was all a delight to work with too; special s/o to spencer for being a good sport when he was stuck closing while we did teardown. appreciated you mate; josie, jorge, and isabelle too

shoutout to antlers, siyo, and resin who have been working tirelessly for over a year to put this event on, and a special shoutout to resin who had barely 3 weeks to single-handedly turn our designer's work into a reality. the 3 of you are absolute legends, and i can't thank all of you enough for bringing me onto the team to help make this event a reality.

massive shoutout to my admin team, plinko & drhappiness, who made my life 1000x easier all weekend. y'all are the goats, and i was so happy to finally meet you plinko, and to get to work with you again charlie. the two of you kept my head level throughout the weekend and especially day 1 when it felt like the schedule was actively fighting against us; certainly some lessons to be learnt there.

shoutout to connie for coming and bringing mountains of lan production experience; it's becoming a theme but genuinely this event could not have happened and been what it was wo you.

shoutout to lou for making the long-haul out to denver by car and bringing more gear than i ever imagined we could need (and going out to get even more when all of that wasn't enough). you were a rock this weekend and kept the rest of us sane and moving forward, despite whatever issues cropped up. thank you.

shoutout to everyone at etf for putting on some fantastic casts over on the b-stream. every one of you always puts your best foot forward, and i'm always glad to work with you. hope we get to return the favour one day. a special s/o to jmax in particular for having a foot in both sides and doing what he could to help out beyond just the b-stream

and ultimately, a huge shoutout to all the teams for coming out to compete. it was our very first lan event as an org, and the first for quite a few of our crew as well. so having a full venue of teams was something really special. i'll never forget it. big ups to witness for bringing over the aussies and euros. having this lan be fully intercontinental was always the goal, but seeing it become a reality, with both teams playing so well, was deeply special

this event was awesome :) was so cool seeing and talking to people I never saw before but knew for years

Shoutout to Prealpha for letting me crash at his place and being a cool person in general
Shoutout to wrander for being the goat and driving me, Prealpha, mild, and ryvn around
Shoutout to Prealpha, mild, ryvn, and wrander for being genuinely chill people to hang around with
Shoutout to everyone else I met and talked to ya'll were dope af
Finally shoutout to siyo and the Fireside Cast crew, you guys should be proud of yourselves for the event you pulled off, and for creating another international lan in so long, this was no easy feat

This has been by far one of the most memorable LANs for me, and I need to thank a lot of people responsible for it.

First and foremost shoutouts to the leads of Fireside as a whole; antlers, siyo, Nyna and resin, without you we would still be in an intercontinental drought and I wouldn't have gotten to see so many of the people I care about. Truly one of the best NA LANs of all time.

In no particular order, thank you to:

-Bethnicz for keeping me company in the ER and helping keep me calm

-All of the friends that swung by production to say hi; Grape Juice, entropy, knsume, fyg, and several more my sleep-deprived brain from LAN cannot recall

-Nyna for going above and beyond and wearing like 5 different hats over the duration of the week, doing admin magic, and for pulling me into this project in the first place. I really missed rooming with you in Atlanta, glad I got to do it again <3

-resin for punching well above his weight in almost every aspect of LAN production; for having no experience with most of our hardware/software in the months leading up to LAN and still keeping the production moving in spite of all its shortcomings.

-Ecchymoses for getting to finally chill after getting to play 2 1/2 seasons of RGL with you, had such a good time hanging with you

-Louster200 for being chill all weekend, as well as helping a quite violently ill me get to the hotel from the airport

-Our whole broadcast talent team; all of you did an exceptionally good job at making the broadcast as entertaining as possible to watch; there wasn't a moment producing or watching that I didn't enjoy your commentary. Extra big shoutouts to Tcmano for delivering a fantastic LAN-closing speech.

-DubThink, for finally getting to meet again after RGB 4, and for doing an amazing job as our roaming cam operator.

-siyo for pulling sponsor money out of thin air to keep the production alive time and time againsaved the LAN in multiple instances. Also for being one of the drivers during LAN hauling people to, from, and around the venue.

-antlers for starting Fireside in the first place. Back when you guys started this org, I assumed it would be just be a small passion project, but to see how you've grown it from some friends casting open/IM games in mumble to running the greatest NA LAN of the decade is truly amazing

-DrHappiness for coming all the way out to admin the tournament, was very nice seeing you again after DH Atlanta and i69

-All of the Australian and European players that put on the best intercontinental clash of all time

-Printstream for putting on a great B-stream with a stacked online talent roster

Lastly, thank you to everyone who tuned into the broadcast over the course of the week. We ran into a ton of unforeseen circumstances, but tried our best to put on an enjoyable show. Hope you enjoyed, and CU@ next LAN?

- Shoutouts to all of the Fireside Casts crew for their incredible work not just with this LAN but for the years of effort they have poured into the organisation. It is a pleasure to work with them everytime.

- Shoutout to Lacy for giving me the opportunity to be one of the Tournament Admins and taking the reins on a project of this scale on site, I am honored that you invited me to take part in this event.

- Shoutout to Plinko for being a great admin partner for the weekend, a steady presence throughout which gave me a huge reassurance that the event was in good hands.

- Shoutouts to all the talent for their hype casting, insights, and storytelling.

- Shoutouts to those working on photos and videos, both on and off site, for the great content that has been developed for this LAN.

- Shoutouts to all those who worked production for keeping a level head and working around the clock to ensure the best possible livestream and in-person experience.

- Shoutouts to the venue staff at Localhost Denver for being super accommodating and flexible to our...dynamic schedule.

- Shoutouts to all those who worked on the B-Stream, excellent work for casts that took place at some very inconvienient times.

- Shoutout to Witness for supporting both the EU and AU teams for so long leading up to this event.

- Shoutouts to all the players who turned up, spectated in person or watched online. Especially those who came up and thanked myself and the others. I'm still quite awkward with getting praise, but this kind of thing does go a long way of making the months of prep and stress worth it.

- I've probably forgotten some others but just know that if I've spoken to you about this event, in the lead up or during, I appreciate every single one of you. It is, and always will be, the TF2 community that is at the heart of everything I and others do. Much love.