Honorary Members

AirFrance Cup on a flying plane with tween

AirFrance airlines hosted the first ever eSports tournament in a flying plane. Ten qualified players from all over Europe competed on a sky way from Paris to Toulouse and Marek “tween” Pacher was one of them. The tournament was also the first event where a revolutionary Li-Fi technology was used in the air.

The tournament itself was a very tricky to handle for the players. There were other passengers, media crew and players had to deal with really small monitors and slow game in terms of frames per second. For tween however, the biggest struggle was the gaming input. He always played with keyboard since the first time he launched Trackmania almost 13 years ago. But in the plane, he had to play with controller which was a gamechanger for him. Even though he practiced at home for 2 months, he couldn´t fully get used to it and finished the tournament on second to last place.

“Taking part in the first tournament in the sky was truly an experience. We were welcomed on board and the other passengers were curious about what was happening around them. I think in-flight gaming has a future, it’s a fitting place for entertainment. However, the organizers were pushed to their limits. In an extremely small time and space they had to solve problems the players were having. After a while I was told that despite the glaring issue that I had with the performance of my tablet, the tournament has to start right now. It’s a pity that some of the problems could have been avoided, but, I really appreciate the experience and the fun that was shared.”