PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The competitive video gaming world will converge on the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center later this summer.
The Valley Forge Tourism and Convention Board partnered with the Green Bay, Wisconsin-based Global Esports Association to put together a gaming event at the expo from Aug. 25 to 29.
Aaron Ludwig, CEO of Game Together Entertainment, said it will feature competitions involving the latest games.
“Anything from Madden, NBA2K, Fortnite — any video games that you can probably imagine,” he said.
They’re even planning on making it a family affair.
“You can bring your kids there — you can maybe compete with them,” he said. “We’re looking to maybe put together even some events where we have kind of a parent-child team versus another parent-child team.”
Ludwig said retro games will also be available, and it’s OK to BYOC — bring your own controller.
“There are some people, especially more hard-core gamers, who want to bring their own controller and stuff,” he said. “You can feel free to do that, just make sure it’s labeled with your name on it so we know it’s yours and not ours. Otherwise, we’ll have all the consoles and everything for you.”
The event is open to anyone of any age or experience level.
“For those gamers out there who do streams, whether it’s on Twitch or Facebook or YouTube or anything like that, if you have your own channel and you want to come and you want to sign up for a couple hours and stream from our event, we’ll promote you,” he added.
Valley Forge tourism officials said it’s just what the area’s hotels and restaurants need to speed up their recovery from the devastating economic effects of the coronavirus pandemic.
Jon Scheuren, director of sports for the Valley Forge Sports, Events and Tourism Authority, predicted it will draw people from near and far.
“A big event like this brings a ton of economic impact,” he added.
Ludwig said the Game Together Valley Forge event will foster friendly competition as well as unity.
“The event is meant … to really bring people together,” he said, “especially right now with everything going on in our country and all the division and that kind of thing.”
For more information, visit gametogethervalleyforge.com.