Future of Lan gaming in UK

Fenris said:
Doomed to fail.

The reason lan gaming is in decline outside the massive events like Dreamhack or Insomnia is because online multilayer on consoles is far and away more accessible than multilayer PC gaming.

Also they are massively expensive, starting something from scratch would either require a huge injection of private cash or some insane sponsorship right off the bat, which just wouldn't happen.
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why and what started this. when.
 
Lan partys are pretty much dead I knew a few when I was 19 now im 27 and dont know any im from london and had only ever gone to 1 in the middlesex area it was a shoddy little internet cafe with a lan area upstairs was great and wish they came back another time I went to one in indiana usa for a 24hour session that was by far the best considering they had monster and tons of different energy drinks I could buy for cheap lol.
 
Only way to make it profitable would be cafe first gaming centre second


And you would need something that the general public can't do at home


Thinking oculus rift or 4k gaming or some other niche
 
I've been to a couple of LAN centres, one in Birmingham and one in Scotland. Both have since closed.

It's a properly difficult business to be in which is a shame as I do agree playing games with people in the same room is much more enjoyable than sitting on your tod at home on teamspeak.

Even if you held tournaments to bring the punters in you probably still won't be breaking even after the cost of premises rental, electric, etc. Actual system PC costs aren't that bad (providing you don't constantly get broken hardware but even then you have the warranty to cover it)

You'd be better off turning something already popular into a LAN cafe. Such as converting a StarBucks with an upstairs room with PCs for peoples use while drinking their coffee etc.
 
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Plenty of pubs closing down, sell nice coffee deck them out like starbucks, drop a few boxes of Zombicide behind the bar, put a nice sign outside so it doesnt like a 1960`s dive.

Nice PC lan 5 or 6 and bingo. Maybe it would work...
 
Holy thread revival. If they are in decline do they offer workshops for watercooling, system building, home networking or overclocking for example. Having some Oculus kits is a good idea too.
 
I did a shed tonne of research into LAN cafes and to be brutally honest, it's just not worth it anymore. It's no longer needed, anyone away from their console/PC is more than likely wanting to do something else.

It's a market that died long ago :(
 
quite the revival :p


been to a smaller lan or two. there a cafe in swansea "cross-fire" which is an internet cafe/gaming center. pcs are pretty boggo standard (I last went like 4-5 years ago) but had a lot of games to choose from and could run all night events too. my gfs (at the time) friend had a b-day party there. was pretty fun to be fair :D

then been to another one up near bolton somewhere (can't remember it's name) but that seemed more like a gaming cafe first. not sure how long it's been open but a friend of a friend owns/runs it I believe. pretty cool as it had decent gaming pcs but also a few big TVs to play co-op/party games on like mario cart/fighters :D


slightly different take... there was this place called "koopas" in swansea. it sold itself as a "gaming bar/club" :p had a few different consoles/arcade machines set up. nothing really fancy though. and the venue was a dive xD (place had changed ownership quite a few times prior to this). I mean the drinks were cheap and the music was decent (more to my taste should I say) but the gaming side of it was completely meh :( so yeah... was always pretty dead in there on the nights it was open. occasionally populated by myself and a group of about 8-20 mates... just for the drinking really haha. but that's long gone now I believe.



there were plans to try and set up a south west wales lan. a guy from FTL clan ( i think) posted up on facebook about arranging a 2 day lan down in swansea and asked how many were interested.... initially there was about 50 people who were up for it. so he started looking around for places to host it and decided on a venue (funnily enough it was koopas haha!) and then started to talk about dates and pricing. problem is, as soon as you start to ask people to hand money over they suddenly lose interest. it was going to be something like £20 each but if there was more than 20 it could be just £10-15 each... or something silly cheap. gave my £20 quid over. waited a bit... and after numerous weeks he called it off because there was only about 5 of us who paid up.

he returned the monies to those who paid and that was the end of that idea :( ( I said to keep the money as I really wanted a lan so said to put it towards the next... haha!)

was really gutted it didn't go forwards :( if I win the lotto I'll try and set up a mini lan xD just book a venue and hope people come.... if not.... I'll state free bar and then see how many show up! hahahha!
 
Its a shame really a shop like overclockers could try it put an all night every night gaming cafe upstairs 1 securitron to watch over the humans and hardware billions of energy drinks £15 entry and a huge ass bean bag for the weak cables set up for byo and beer if warhammer can do it so can we ask energy drink companys for sponsers and maybe companys like msi who build for lan
 
There was one in Glasgow which always seemed quite busy when I was in, actually I think I still had a wee bit credit, but that place didn't seem to last long at all.

Had lots of consoles and computers, both had interest but it obviously wasn't enough somehow :/
 
I thought about this a while ago, and it does seem like a a really hard business case.

As others have mentioned, LAN centres have died due to technology costs and the advances in computing meaning that they don't have the appeal they once had.

The only I can see for them nowadays is the rise in competitive gaming.
If you could focus around competitive gaming, making your centre/brand the place for competitive tournaments and such, you could get a lot of publicity and medium/large events. Stream matches on twitch + large screen(s) for viewers, organise tournaments etc.. and you could make it work.

Multiple revenue streams are always good, so selling food/drink goes without saying, and having sponsorship with a hardware partner such as OCUK would be excellent - giving you reduced costs and additional revenue from sales.

Tabletop games and roleplaying games as an addition would be fine, but won't bring in much money. Having say the top floor/basement for this might work, but you would be relying on food/drink sales to make it worth it.
 
I used to love LAN gaming, but that involved us all taking our PCs to a mate's, not going to a commercial place.
 
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