ANNOUNCING : USPF 2011 in spectacular LAS VEGAS, NEVADA !!



This is the national tournament for Pump It Up which will award FREE TRIPS* to China to represent the USA at WPF 2011 !! World Pump Festival (WPF) is the world championship for Pump, where our USPF winners will be competing against other national champions from invited countries around the world, in order to crown this year's world champs !!

The event will be held on Saturday, July 2nd, at the amazing Gemini Arcade Palace, which has been wowing music game fanatics in the short year that it's been open (check out their extensive lineup of rhythm games on their website --

http://www.gemini-arcade-palace.com/ ).


This is during the long July 4th holiday weekend, so this provides plenty of time to experience the wonders of Vegas as well (there's plenty of sightseeing, shows, shopping, and of course gambling....a side trip to the Grand Canyon might also be appealing to some).

In keeping with the holiday weekend, the arcade plans to have some indoor barbecue for the players, cajun-style, for a nominal cost. We're also working on a special guest appearance -- Cein Lee, WPF 2006 Freestyle winner !!

We certainly realize that this is very short notice for everyone, but please realize that there wasn't going to be any USPF at all this year, until the generous folks at Gemini Arcade Palace offered their proposal at the last minute, to save the day ! Granted, some will not be able to attend due to the late date, but we and Andamiro still wanted to offer this to the USA community. Because of this, we remain an official WPF country. '>'>'>'>'>

The Gemini staff runs tournaments regularly with their music games, and will be handling the mechanics of USPF. We will be using their new-model CX Pump machine, which has fantastic pads (the old style pads, not the new, fyi). The software version will be Fiesta EX. The Speed tournament will have separate male and female divisions. It is an open tournament (any player can enter) and will be Round Elimination style, with an initial qualifier song that all entrants will play. The top 16 qualifiers only (top machine scores) will advance to the next round. Then the top 8 scorers in that round advance, the top 4 in the next round, and so on. Upon reaching the Semifinal (where 4 players remain), players must switch over to Nightmare songs (now called Doubles in Fiesta EX) for this round and the Final Round. For the Final Round, an additional condition is that it will be best 2-out-of-3 (first player to win 2 songs). We will follow WPF official rules. WPF rules include selecting songs using the "Random for WPF Mode” section of the Fiesta EX software. Note also that bar use is now allowed if a player wishes, according to WPF rules (please check the complete rules at www.piugame.com which also has the official WPF song list we'll be using).

For the Freestyle division, due to the inadequate time left for player preparation of choreographies, we will not award a WPF trip in Freestyle (2 different songs must be prepared from the official WPF songlist for that). Instead, we will still have a Freestyle competition with other prizes (see below), where the player performs just one song. Other differences from WPF rules are that the player (or 2-person team) can use any song on Fiesta EX (except from the Shortcut, Remix, Full, and Mission Zones), and a player can enter both Speed AND Freestyle, should they wish.

EDIT -- there was concern if our Freestyle players would have enough time to prepare WPF-level routines. Realize that Andamiro is forking over ALOT of money to fly WPF players across the globe and back, not to mention hotel/meals/etc. They certainly deserve some return on their "investment" in the WPF players, so they don't want to just blindly hand out the trips to just anyone, and given our special situation with little time for our players' preparation, the feeling was the USA would not be awarded a WPF trip for our Freestyle winner.

However, a nice compromise has been reached. Here's the deal we are offered: If we have a decent amount of Freestyler entrants at USPF, we will send video of all the routines to Andamiro. They will review them and then decide if they can invite our winner to WPF. So, our winner has a decent shot now !!


Entry fee is $20 and may include a special T-shirt (working on that...if not, fee may be reduced a bit). Prizes will be WPF trips for 1st place in both Male Speed and Female Speed. Cash from the entry fees of each division (minus a small house percentage to help defray expenses) will be split among the top 3 finishers of each division (1st place = 70%, 2nd place = 20%, 3rd place = 10%). Exclusive Pump merchandise (!) will also be distributed as prizes, based upon the amount of items we receive from Andamiro. Freestyle division prizes will follow the same format, minus the WPF trip, as already mentioned.

Registration begins at 9 AM thru 11:30 AM, with the tournament starting at 12 NOON. Warm up games will be available on the machine during registration.

For anyone that would be coming with parents that might need convincing to take you to USPF, remind them that it's in VEGAS, so they'll be anything but bored while you're at the tournament all day ! So, please join us for the big event this Independence Day holiday weekend ! Make your travel plans now !!



*Free trips to WPF include round-trip airfare, hotel, meals, and transport within China. Winners must obtain (and pay for) their own passport and travel visa.