Harvard-Yale 2.0

Comparing admissions rates, teacher-to-student ratios, or the attractiveness of your resident sex blogger on IvyGate are some ways to show your Ivy League school is the best. But with the upcoming Go Cross Campus (GXC) tournament, there’s a new way to prove just how much your Ivy League school pwns. The game, which is a revamped version of last year’s Risk tournament sponsored by the College Events Board, will pit student armies against each other in an Ivy vs. Ivy smack down—US News & World Report rankings be damned.

“The prize is being able to say that you are the top Ivy League school and that you have conquered the entire Ivy League,” said Matthew O. Brimer, one of the organizers of the tournament and a junior at Yale.

“You’re not playing just some game online,” he says. “You’re playing for the sake of your loyalty to your school.”

If so, Harvard kids better pull out those Crimson sweatshirts that have been rotting away in closets since Pre-Frosh Weekend: registration has begun, and it doesn’t look promising.

“If it comes down to school spirit, I think we’re going to lose,” said Joseph S. Bechtold ’08, who has already registered. “As it is right now, we’re going to get owned.” (pwned?)

But Harvard Interactive Media Group President Ben S. Decker ’08 isn’t as ready to hang up the sweat-free towel.

“Take the first Harvard football night game—people say there’s no spirit but the place was packed,” said Decker. And where spirit lags, competition reigns. “I feel like we hate Yale a little more than they hate us,” he added.

Or maybe not. “I don’t want to see Harvard marching into New Haven,” said Brimer.

We’ll see about that in November. Until then, Yale, watch your computerized soldier’s backs.