And the winner is...

July 8th saw the grand finals of the SA Injustice Championship Series come to pass, and the Nexus was fortunate enough to be in attendance. The event, hosted at Weiveld in Pretoria East, courtesy of ACGL, Jack Parow, Fokofpolisiekar, Warner Bros. Entertainment and Ster Kinekor Entertainment, was immensely enjoyable and thoroughly well organized.

When we first arrived, we announced ourselves, got our (ahem) VIP tags, and headed for the entrance. As we walked into the auditorium, a centre stage presented itself at the front of the room. It had been fitted to accommodate the fighters who were going to slug it out for the lion’s share of a R60 000 cash prize, as well as a trip to the VS Fighting tournament in Birmingham, UK. Surrounding the consoles and monitors were guitars, drums, and microphones; a foretelling of the musical madness that would ensue in the aftermath of the imminent super hero showdown.



Giant Injustice 2 banners cloaked the upper walls of the venue, and cardboard standees of Superman, Harley Quinn and others peppered the halls, leaving no question in anyone’s minds that this was going to be something special. As we made our way to the (ahem) VIP area upstairs, we were welcomed by the village gatekeeper, known as a bouncer in these parts, who allowed us entry once he had glimpsed our armbands of unlimited entry (level 3, I believe). Once in the area, we were able to find a comfy place to sit, have a drink or two, and even play a few rounds of Injustice 2 amongst ourselves as a great little gaming area had been set up to accommodate us geeks.



Before long, proceedings were underway and first up were the two semi-final rounds that would determine who would make it to the Grand Final. The initial rounds saw the demise of Zibusiso ‘Zee The Janitor’ Mangena and Vasudev ‘Taga Kahn’ Stringer, leaving the final to be decided by the skills of Brandon ‘Sho Kahn’ Jacob and Prakash ‘PARASURAMA’ Kathan.



The audience was treated to a humorous little interlude when Fokofpolisiekar front man, Francois van Coke, squared off against his nemesis for the evening, Jack Parow, in a best-of-three mini match-up. Parow took the first game, van Coke came back with a win in the second, with Parow taking the eventual third to clinch victory.



Thereafter, things got a little bit more serious as the finalists made their way to the stage once more. The tension was evident on their faces. The contestants did their button checks, wiped the sweat from their brows, and selected their characters. Interestingly, the two contestants were familiar with each other’s play styles, as they are part of the same team, and often face each other in a less competitive environment, so it really was anybody’s victory for the taking. In the end however, Brandon ‘Sho Kahn’ Jacob edged out his opponent, Prakash ‘PARASURAMA’ Kathan, crowning him SA’s Injustice Championship Series winner for 2017. Amidst an explosion of celebratory confetti, Brandon was awarded a monster cheque of R20 000.00 by event creator and coordinator, Ronelle Hendriks.



A little later in the evening, Nexus media man, Ebrahim Naidoo caught up with Brandon, who kindly granted an interview for the following week, so keep your eyes peeled for that a few days from now. A big thank you to my fellow colleagues, fighting game guru, Paul Delargy and Ebrahim Naidoo for heading out and enjoying the event with me, and to the event organizers for inviting us along.