STAR WARS DAY 2026: OPERATION PHANTOM VANGUARD VICTORY!

Report by: Dean Bowditch

The results are in, the math was frantically crunched on the Phantom Arena admin desk, and Mike McKean has officially been crowned the new ruler. Taking home "Sidney the Stormtrooper", the MVP Trophy with a performance so ruthlessly optimised it would bring a tear to the eye of a Grand Moff's Chief Logistics Officer. McKean’s victory was the crowning moment of an evening that sat somewhere on the spectrum between a high-stakes military operation and a localised riot.

After a week of Discord countdowns and enough pre-event hype to power a small moon, the Lossie Phantoms finally descended upon their Arena. The rules were set in stone, the Empire Strikes Back Movie ‘clock’ was ticking, and the atmosphere was thick with the scent of ozone and the silent desperation of competitors trying to bind character movements to their keys. It was a 121-minute "power trip" into the chaos of Co-Op mode. A format designed to make everyone feel like a God, provided they could actually snag a seat before the visiting Kiwi (big Howard) took the last one.

THE MVP AWARD

Watching at first hand Mikey’s performance as Obi-Wan was less of a casual gaming session and more of a systematic demolition. Starting the night at Level 0, he rampaged through the battlefield with the clinical, hallway-clearing brutality of Darth Vader in the closing scenes of Rogue One. It is always inspiring to watch someone make the impossible look easy, right up until the moment I attempt it myself and immediately dissolve into a localized disaster… and back to the lobby!

Watching the "Level Up" notifications and lights pop on his screen with the rhythmic persistence of a malfunctioning droid unit, one realised Mikey was reaching his full potential as he lurched, perhaps a little too enthusiastically, towards the dark side of the scoreboard. He maintained an average score of 127,470 points over ten games, peaking at a force-disturbing 174,300 points. These unprecedented levels of scoring suggest that Mikey has either spent years blood doping his gaming with midichlorians in readiness for this exact moment, or he has successfully bartered his soul to a Sith Lord for better reflexes. Either way, the Galactic Convention would like a word.

KILL OR BE KILLED

While Mikey was busy ascending to godhood, Jay ‘Palpatine’ Witts was engaged in a pursuit far less noble: the systematic theft of every kill on the map from his teammates. His Northern Padawan, Nathan Lloyd, could be heard praying to the Ghost of Qui-Gon Jinn at one stage. It was to no avail. One couldn’t help but feel a twinge of sympathy for his teammates; as soon as Jay hit the hero qualifying points, a tactical "death" would occur, Palpatine would be selected, and then… the purple lightning began.

Playing the objectives? Certainly not. Jay found that floating around and clearing the choke points of rebel invaders was far more conducive to his personal brand. "Lightning Fingers" Witts managed to secure an average of 101 kills per game, a relentless onslaught comparable only to a Rebel Alliance trench run on the Death Star. If only his teammates had been motivated by sheer, Sith-like greed rather than galactic fair play and liberation. Every time one looked over, more enemies were being fried into the middle of next week. It was a performance of such profound selfishness that one half-expected him to start cackling about "unlimited power" while hoarding the last slice of someone else's pizza.

THE ULTIMATE WINGMAN

While some are clearly built to be Jedi or Sith Lords, others are heroes of a more pragmatic variety. Smugglers, bounty hunters, and rebel leaders who lack the Force sensitivity but possess a terrifying amount of common sense. These are the ultimate team players, the ones who selflessly set others up for glory while remaining in the shadows. Nothing says "institutional self-sacrifice" quite like the assist tally.

Enter Chris Liston, operating in the Officer class with a level of tactical annoyance that was genuinely breathtaking. Chris’s strategy involved sprinting to the objectives and placing his turrets in the most awkward, inconvenient locations imaginable to ensure maximum "clipping" effects on the enemy. Did it work? Well, you could bet your last Credit on a Fathier racing Grand National or a high-stakes Pod Race at a Mos Eisley casino, but for a guaranteed return, you’d put your money on this man getting all the assists.

Chris clipped his way to assist glory with a whopping average of 34 assists per game, peaking at a phenomenal 72 assists in a single match. It was a masterclass in being the helpful cog in a very violent machine, ensuring that while others took the credit, Chris provided the foundation.

FORCE WORTHY LORE

In the realm of high-stakes time keeping management, Lee Worth deserves a nod for a performance of pure, cold-blooded efficiency. Arriving fifteen minutes late, Lee bypassed the localised panic of the crowd and manifested a level of Force-sensitivity that allowed him to set up a laptop, connect to the WiFi and instantly bang in competitive average scores, sliding into the rankings with the cool indifference of a bounty hunter collecting a final check. In stark contrast, we must acknowledge Ant Kariuki, whose thirty-minute delay proved fatal to his ambitions. Finding the PC ranks closed, Ant was relegated to the sofa to watch The Empire Strikes Back for the first time. A tragic, yet culturally enriching, consolation prize that sits somewhere between "educational outreach" and "battlefield exile."

Meanwhile, international diplomacy took a backseat to the "New Zealand Incident," as visiting Kiwi Howard executed a flawless "coming over ’ere, using our gear" manoeuvre to snag the final seat in the house. It was a bold geopolitical statement that proved a high-spec gaming rig is more precious than any treaty. Providing the backbone to chaos on the battlefield was a dedicated supply line operated by myself and Callum Walker. We kept the troops sustained on a steady diet of pizza being cooked up by the staff in the Barrel & Bean, though it must be noted that our elite delivery service was met with a distinct lack of service tips. We can only assume the "service charge" was settled in the currency of Ethan Matthews who made the ultimate sacrifice by squadding up with Mikey. When your team mate is decimating scoreboards like a Death Star visiting Alderaan on an Empirical summer holiday, what chance would you have!?

As the blasters cool and the dust settles on another forever war in another galaxy, the mighty Phantoms committee starts to look toward June. We are trading the elegant precision of the light saber for the drunken, gelatinous mayhem of Gang Beasts. If the Phantoms’ Star Wars night was a ruthless precision strike, June promises to be a structural integrity test for the arena’s furniture. Prepare for a night of physics defying combat where the only thing more fragile than your grip on a moving truck is your dignity as you're headbutted into a giant fan by a man in a chicken suit. It will be a masterclass in flailing limbs and questionable alliances. The kind of glorious, primary-colored carnage that would make even a Luke Skywalker reconsider the benefits of a peaceful retirement. Stay tuned for the date; things are about to get very, very wobbly.