Students tested out new and unreleased video games, including a virtual skateboard program, at Lisner Auditorium’s loading dock Wednesday night.

The event, “Play Station 2 Locker Room Challenge Tour, Featuring 989 Sports,” attracted about 70 students that sampled the games in front of a locker room set-up with five televisions. Sony held the free event to promote new releases for the holiday season, Program Board parties co-chair Josh Giles said. Sony contacted PB officials to put on the event for the first time at GW.

“The turn out was good, especially on a night a little cold for standing around playing video games,” Giles said.

Giles chose the hours and location, 6 to 9 p.m. outside J Street’s entrance, to attract the most students.

“This thing just came up randomly,” senior Noah Rothstein said. “But I’ve played some virtual reality games before and this is cool.”

The virtual reality game system ,”Eye Toy”, released last November, features a digital video camera that is attached to a player’s body. There are 14 new games for “Eye Toy” coming out in the next year.

After playing the unreleased “ATV Off Road Challenge 3,” freshman Ed DeRose said, “I play a lot, and PS2 is my favorite system, but 989 needs to improve its sports games, EA definitely beats them.” Sony’s in-house software gaming company, 989 Sports, competes with such sports video game leaders as EA Sports.

The major video sports game in 989’s fleet, “MLB 2005,” held a steady crowd of players throughout the event.

One of a handful of girls at the Locker Room Challenge, senior Tai Prince, played “Hot Shots Golf.”

“The event was a nice break from class, to go out and have fun,” Prince said. She added that while she loves to play games, she doesn’t think she could beat the male students.

The new event was not met with praise from all sides. Freshman Mohammed Butt said he thinks video games are a waste of time.

“There’s so many other things you could be doing, like experiencing reality, instead of playing video games,” Butt said.

Giles, of Program Board, said he looks forward to keeping in contact with Sony to bring a similar event back to GW in the future.