All-Girl Tournament Rocks NHS For First Fun Friday Of The School Year

By Eliza Hallabeck

The “Legends Of Rock” assembled in a Newtown High School classroom as the Guitar Hero III all-girls tournament kicked off the school year’s first Fun Friday.

Guitar Hero III: Legend’s of Rock is the third installment in the Guitar Hero game series. The game involves players using a plastic guitar game controller to strum out the tune to their favorite rock songs. Guitar Hero III includes 70 different songs that players can choose from to play.

“Earlier last year [the school] had a Guitar Hero II tournament,” said Austin Cirella, a sophomore at NHS who started going to the Guitar Hero Tournaments on Fun Fridays when his friend, Chris Bochino began the program, “but we didn’t like how it was run.” 

Chris, a junior at NHS, said he started by posting flyers across the NHS campus, and soon people were playing after school during Fun Fridays.

On Friday just after school got out, girls wearing band T-shirts, stripes, and skinny jeans prepared to rock along with their Guitar Hero counterparts.

Fun Fridays started three years, and, according to Jeff Tolson, a guidance counselor at the high school, teachers stay after school to allow students the chance to do what they want with teacher supervision.

Chris said last year the program was for both genders, but the boys were more aggressive than the girls. The boys approach to playing the game forced the girls to stand on the sidelines and watch, for the most part, he said.

“You see when a guy gets a video game the mentality is ‘I gotta be good at this,’” said Austin.

Chris added the boys who play in the Guitar Hero tournaments tend to get riled up easily.

“The girls I haven’t seen playing much on expert,” said Chris. The expert level of the game is the highest level possible for the challenge of hitting the notes on time with the screen. In comparison, he said the boys play more at this level of the game. Separating the girls and the boys allows the girls to play more, he said.

Friday’s group of girls had ten players for the tournament and multiple friends sitting on desks and rooting. The players were divided into pairs that played, compared scores and the player with the highest score moved on to face the next challenger.

Chris and Austin sat in the far corner of the room with a small group of friends playing Yu-Gi-Oh!, while the girls played their rock songs on the television. Yu-Gi-Oh! is a trading card game and it also is a television cartoon. During Fun Fridays Chris and Austin also have Yu-Gi-Oh! tournaments, but they said those are not as popular as the Guitar Hero tournaments.

Marissa Chappell, a sophomore, sat on a desk watching as her friend played her turn on the guitar.

“It feels less competitive,” said Marissa, who said she attended the tournaments before the boys and girls tournaments were separated.

Marissa has songs that she likes to play, but she also has songs that she does not like to play, she said.

A group of girls watched from the center of the classroom, and sat between the Guitar Hero tournament and the Yu-Gi-Oh! tournament. 

“We’re onlookers,” said Miriam Wilson, a sophomore at NHS. “We cheer for our friends.”

Miriam said she would not play the game, because she does not think she is good at it. She comes to the Fun Friday event to see her friends.

“It’s fun to watch,” said Miriam, “ and I think the people here are having fun.”

Two members of the audience were not playing the game, but they were leading the cheering. Eugene Hall, a teacher in the math department at the high school, and Mr Tolson monitor the event on Fun Fridays. 

“I’m pleased with this,” said Mr Hall, “and this is one of the only things that we do that is strictly for girls.”

Mr Hall said the concept of Fun Fridays was born three years ago when “we just kept doing fun things after school on Fridays.”

The “fun” activities are not kept only for Fridays, because, Mr Hall said, weekends hold events too. Things like basketball are put together for the students to participate in, and Mr Hall and Mr Tolson supervise.

“Kids come up with ideas all the time,” said Mr Tolson, “and we’re just here to help them along.”

According to Mr Tolson, Chris has been one of the stars of the Fun Fridays, because he has been putting events together and coming up with ideas. He also won four tournaments, Mr Tolson said.