Pod Winner Gets $10,000 Fixes

Parents who tell their kids that great gaming skills will never pay off don't have a leg to stand on anymore. Ubi Soft announced this week that a player known only as Leadbest won US$10,000 playing Pod in the Race In Space Online Challenge.

ABC Interactive is also dangling three US$10,000 prizes for top online players of its sports titles. MGM Interactive is offering a more modest purse of US$2,500 in its current Machine Hunter contest, and last month, Dennis "Thresh" Fong won a Ferrari in the Red Annihilation Quake tournament held at E3. Sure, it was a used Ferrari, but it was used by John Carmack, the closest thing this industry's got to a celebrity.

Yes, the prizes in game contests are definitely getting better. Not long ago, the best a hot gamer could hope for was a shiny new joystick or a T-shirt. Now you don't even need to be particularly good at a game to compete for a new Hummer (from Interactive Magic) or an all-expenses-paid vacation (Sierra).