Written for The Argo by Esmeralda Rivera

On Monday, October 31st, The Stockton Gaming Club and E-Sports Club partnered together to throw Gaming Club’s annual Monster Smash event. Invitees attended in their best costumes and enjoyed a variety of video and board games. The party was held in the Campus Center Event Room.

One of the main events of the night was the costume contest. Onstage, participants presented their creative outfits one by one, each followed by passionate cheering from onlookers. In the end, the winners would be the ones who evoked the loudest cheers. Sophia Fortner, a Nursing major, won the costume contest with a police officer costume.

“I come to this every year, and I love it. They have all these different events, and every year, they have new ones— they have other video games happening in the corner. And the Costume Contest, everyone loves that. It really brings everyone together,” said Fortner. As the winner, Fortner took home a prize basket. 

Attendees were able to enjoy a variety of game setups, including Five Nights at Freddy’s 4, Mario Kart, Just Dance, and an intense tournament of Super Smash Bros. Large board games were also interspersed throughout the room, including Giant Jenga, Giant Connect 4, Giant Sorry, and more. Invitees connected with each other while enjoying the games, taking photos at the entrance, and eating complimentary pizza and cookies. Those in attendance considered it to be a great way to finish the October month and the Halloween holiday.

Demetrios Roubos, one of the faculty advisors in the Stockton E-Sports Club, was satisfied with this year’s turnout. He also mentioned Carl Mansen, Alexander Rodriguez, and Alexandra Gonzalez, three other staff members that helped create and host the special event. “This is our fourth year doing this, and we partner with Gaming Club and other groups on campus, like Theatre Club and the Horror Society, to make a Halloween event that appeals to gamers,” he stated.

“And why do we do it? Because gamer culture is pervasive. At this point, there’s a lot of crossover between what we do at E-Sports, what the Gaming Club does, and even what other student organizations do. So, we’d like to bring everyone together and party,” said Roubos.

The E-Sports undergraduate coordinator, Ryan Andjel, agreed with Roubos. “I’ve been doing this since August 2021. And since then, we’ve been growing. I’ve had a mission, and one of those missions was to expand. We’ve had a few competitive titles, all the way up to 12 competitive titles. It’s really about expanding and helping the program grow,” said Andjel.

The Stockton E-Sports program participates in many competitive gaming events. They are located at the E-Sports Innovation Center in the Atlantic City Residential Complex. Future events hosted by the E-Sports program and Gaming Club can be found on Ospreyhub.