The event was held in London's Bush Hall, a smart little place where the staff had created the dream Nintendo room! It had huge posters of Nintendo characters on the side walls and I remember a huge one of the not-so-new-anymore-look Link next to one of Samus that encased in a cylinder type case had some fire effect of colored paper blowing up in front of them. I wish I could have taken a few pics because it looked so cool, but due to the multiple signs reading 'Strictly no filming or photography' I thought I'd better not! There was also this very cool looking DJ deck table that was designed as the Nintendo logo playing some sweet tunes for us to play to.

The room had good 15 or so Nintendo GameCube terminals, most of which had brand spanking new versions of Zelda and Metroid Prime stashed inside them. Other games that were there were:

� Resident Evil Zero
� Star wars: Bounty Hunter
� 007: Nightfire
� BMX XXX
� Ace Golf
� Rayman 3

Though, Zelda and Metroid clearly stole the show!

There were also a fair few GBA's to play on which had the new Zelda GBA game to play which was nice to just chill out with and relax.

For the most part though, everyone was standing around the Cubes in distinct amazement, mouths dropped with dribble slowly streaming out!, every now and then you'd hear laughs and claps from fellow gamers experiencing something cool on one of the games, and you can't blame them; Zelda and Metroid are undisputedly amazing games, everything about them was incredible, the graphics, the gameplay� all of which you can read about in the play test impressions here at C-E.

The terminals consisted of huge widescreen Panasonic TVs which offered the best possible visuals you can get�sweeeet! There was a whole range of people from the gaming industry that showed up to play the cream of the crop on offer there that day including many others like me from websites but also some from the major GameCube mags. CUBE, NGC and NOM were all present and having a laugh, enjoying the free drinks I might add the pesky devils! Ones I remember were Chandra, Martin and Tim but there were more I recognized but just couldn't put name to face, it was quite a scene to see them all talking together 'building bridges' as they said between the mags! There was also a NOE correspondent on hand which was very impressive and he was always around to answer questions as best he could, most often saying 'I'm sworn to secrecy' or something along those lines the tight�.erm�well he's got to do his job I suppose!

The whole atmosphere there was great; everyone was friendly, introducing themselves, offering to let you play and offering you free drink and food. It was a great experience to meet all these people and to discuss the gaming world with them, many expressed some interesting views on the Megaton announcement and online plans, it was good to talk to people that had some knowledge of the gaming world and especially to see those that write for the mags.

The day was subject to run from 2pm until 12pm though did start a bit late due to finishing touches to the room and getting it all set. I could only manage to stay until 8 o'clock as I had to make my way back to Birmingham, I had to be torn away from Zelda though let me tell you! All I can say is be prepared to have some sleepless nights when you get your eager hands on these games and watch the hours waste away!

The party on the whole was a huge success and I hope that more events like this are scheduled because I simply cannot wait much longer for an English version of Zelda or my own Metroid copy for that matter. Great stuff, hats off to Nintendo for putting in the effort to do this and for making it such a cool place to be, I only hope I could have took some pics for you peeps to see, never mind eh.

Javid Sangra