When did you first get into gaming? What was the first game you fell in love with?
I grew up playing on the old Atari system. Pac Man, Joust, and Centipede were favorites of mine as a young child. I moved to the first Nintendo and fell in love with a little Italian boy named "Mario" and Princess fascinated me in that game! It was one of my first experiences with a female character.
However, my total addiction to hardcore gaming came with a green-hunk-of-a-man named Master Chief from Halo. This game brought something completely new to my gaming world...LAN (Local Area Network) and multiplayer competition. Everyone was throwing LAN-parties with this game. I loved the social aspect--as well as the Zen-like game play. It really transformed me into the gamer I am today.
Can you tell us a little about Pandora's Mighty Soldiers? What is the history of the group?
Pandora's Mighty Soldiers (PMS) was born by finding other female gamers in a male-dominated online gaming community on Xbox Live [a game competition] in 2004. In January 2005, PMS XBOX and PMS PS2 merged to create the first and largest multi-platform female gaming clan.
Early 2005, we also saw the creation of our PMS PC platform. In the attempt to recognize males that have supported females in gaming, PMS created the title of H20. This title can be given to any male gamer by a PMS member as a way to recognize their friendship and support of one another. H20 members typically try to raise the industry's awareness of female gamers, and train, support and compete alongside PMS members at events or competitions.
The main focus of the PMS clan is not to be the best, but rather to be a safe and competitive playing environment for other female gamers. It is our mission to provide a fun and positive environment to other female gamers, while maintaining competitiveness, fairness and respect in clan matches.
How many people are members? What do you have to do to become a member?
Currently PMS Clan has close to 500 female members, across various platforms and games. We also have an active international division (iPMS), teen division and H20 division. All females are welcome--we only screen for attitude and dedication.
Each girl will go through a one-month recruitment in which she will play with all the girls who play her game of choice. After this, she will move to a one-month trial period in her chosen division. Once made a member, each girl is given a copy of our 28-page member handbook with background history, code of conduct and general information about PMS Clan.
What's the difference between a professional gamer and a non-professional gamer? Is this your full-time job, or do you have another job on the side?
My definition of a professional gamer is someone who makes a living playing video games, although I am sure many would beg to differ with that. I never woke up one day and decided to be a professional gamer, it just kind of happened. However, being a professional gamer allows me to make video gaming my life's passion. I am now contracted to work in an industry for companies like Xbox Live and Verizon FiOS (www.fiosgrand.com).
Until recently, I was a manager for a multi-billion-dollar finance company. I was also the youngest--and only female--in my district. I have been playing in a man's world for a long time in every aspect of my life and I see it as a wonderful challenge. Now, my full-time job primarily consists of managing the clan, the teams and independent consulting in the games industry.
Thankfully, I have more time to play games than ever before...and with all this free time on my hands, I think I can finally get back into the arena. There's nothing quite like the feeling of victory--like when my team placed in the top 8 at CPL Summer Championships 2005 (Cyberathlete Professional League)!
How often do you train? How many hours a day?
Last year when I was running pro-tournaments on Halo 2, I spent about five hours after work every night training with my team. Due to the nature of my position with PMS, I am now contracted out by companies to play many games, which means I cannot dedicate my training time to just one game. This year, I currently spend most of my time as a trainer/coach while I run PMS Clan and organize our events.
This month, I am team captain for our pro Halo 2 team for World Series of Video Games, trainer for Dead or Alive 4 for CGS and playing Counter Strike PC for the Verizon FiOS Grand Tournament Finals. I still spend about five hours a day playing a variety of games and look forward to getting back into the pro-tournament competitions as a player for the '07 season. I just need to decide what game will be my forte! Gamers are so lucky that so many new tournaments are emerging and 2007 is going to launch an amazing array of professional video game players.
