GamerFest Spring 2024 returned with its second Counter-Strike tournament last weekend which saw four teams qualify from the open qualifier and battle it out on stage in front of the Dublin crowd. In the Grand Final, the crowd and players alike came alive as Full Metal Jacket faced off against gruffnuggets.
After a back-and-forth affair full of clutches, the dust settled on the final of Anubis with a scoreline of 13-11 to Full Metal Jacket resulting in ack “Jackmon” O Donnell and Nathan “N8” Dowd being crowned as back-to-back GamerFest champions.
Full of adrenaline from the close victory, Jackmon sat down with UKCSGO’s Freddie “GrimyRannar” Pritchard to discuss how his team sealed the win, GamerFest’s place in Irish CS, and whether he will be aiming for a third title in a row.
Full Metal Jacket lifting the GamerFest Spring 2024 trophy
Firstly congratulations, how does it feel to be a back-to-back LAN winner
Ah great, great actually. I was coming in with the head that this might be one of the ones I lose. Even towards the end of the game there we got a bit panicked and it might go to overtime, and things might turn around completely. Luckily we stopped it at the end before they got the come up to take us back in OT.
Coming into the finals it would be fair to say you were the underdog, did you not feel any pressure because of that?
To be honest no I wasn’t too pressured going into any of the games at all. You’ve down it before and I know who they play, they know how we play, it was more or less mind games. On Ancient the first map, we knew that was our best map and we thought as soon as we got going on that it would be fine. On Mirage, we thought “Ah get it out of the way, that isn’t going anywhere.” We were happy to get that out and go straight away into Anubis.
Anubis was very intense. You had a rough first half, how important was it getting the final round of the half and the second pistol?
I felt like the round we easily trolled was the 4v2 where JamesBT was stuck on jail B site, he killed Nathan [N8] in lower and killed aza coming into B. We had to turn around and eventually lost the 1v1 to a defuse. It was a bit of a tough one and knew straight away it was going to be rough. We did bounce back hard after that.
It was really back and forth at the end, how come you came out on top?
We actually have been playing the game more consistently as a five-together. We don’t get angry at each other we are just consistent talking and playing off each other. As opposed to the other guys like JamesBT who hasn’t played over the last year and then Dragsy is a veteran but is on the pints more than anything else
Dragsy: “Not wrong”
Who made the call in the final round when you pushed the smoke in round 24?
I did. In my head, I knew they would throw the smoke down and have no info anywhere on the map. In my head, I knew if we pushed the smoke they wouldn’t be staring at the smoke when connector was open. I said let’s just wait out the smoke they will just rotate back. It worked out for us, it was a gamble call and it seemed to work pretty well.
A lot of the people here have been around for a long time. You have seen Irish CS go up and down. How important is it for you all that you have this opportunity to play on LAN like this?
It feels great. This is a great stage and you have somewhat of a crowd that shouts. Compared to other LANs where you have a couple of lads who aren’t even playing just standing behind shouting away. QUB was a great LAN and I know there is another one coming up next month but I won’t be going to it myself. Overall it just felt fairly great.
Jackmon standing up to shout at gruffnuggets
For you yourself, we haven’t seen you compete properly but you have won back-to-back GamerFest LANs and more outside of this event. Would you ever want to compete?
Right now undecided. I just want to get my exams out of the way more than anything else. I said look if I take it today that is great, I have won Lotus LAN, QUB LAN and the two GamerFest back-to-back wins. Other than that now, I will see how the future goes. Right now it is undecided and I just want to get my exams out of the way.
Going for a three-time GamerFest win?
We will see, question marks surround it.
