The 2021 Cyber POSTECH-KAIST Science War (PKSW) was held from Sept. 24 to Sept. 25. All games were conducted online for the second consecutive year. Offline events including the festive booths were canceled due to COVID-19 cases on campus. This year’s PKSW was held under the motto of “Final’e”, signifying the hope that this year will be the last online PKSW. This year’s PKSW began with three friendly e-sports matches consisting of—Starcraft1, FIFA Online 4, and League of Legends (LOL). Five games were selected as regular games consisting of the e-sports games of Crazyracing KartRider and LOL, along with the science and technology games of AI, hacking, and the science quiz. The opening ceremony began with an opening speech by the presidents of POSTECH and KAIST, followed by videos made by the PKSW Advisory Committee.
The first day of PKSW started with the AI at 7 P.M.. POSTECH quickly secured victory by winning the first three rounds. POSTECH managed to win the next two rounds, concluding the first game with a score of 5:0. The Crazyracing KartRider was held at 8:30 P.M.. The game consisted of a speed race and an item race. The first team that won four rounds in each race took the set, and if the set score was tied, both teams had to select their best player to race against each other. POSTECH won both races in six rounds for a 2:0 win. POSTECH also dominated in the 1v1 race, held as a friendly game. Thus the first day was a perfect win as KAIST failed to win a single set.
The second day started with the announcement of the hacking results. The game began at 9 P.M. on the first day and ended at 9 A.M. the following day. Teams had to solve problems made by a computer security company, Theori. The game ended with KAIST solving a question with 30 minutes left making the final score in favor of KAIST by 9984:7984. Despite the hacking team’s best efforts, POSTECH fell a little short resulting in a narrow defeat. As this event was held over 12 hours, it was not streamed live. Instead, the PKSW Advisory Committee held events for Postechians such as making names for the photos of the hacking team solving the problems. Next, the science quiz began at 2 P.M.. Although both teams were tied after 20 rounds, POSTECH managed to pull off a strategic win by tie-breaking rules, securing POSTECH’s victory in the PKSW. The last LOL was held at 6 P.M. ending with a 0:2 loss, but the final score of the PKSW was 3:2 in favor of POSTECH, making POSTECH victorious for the third time in a row.
The closing ceremony began with both presidents expressing their appreciation for the level of performance from both schools and their hope that next year’s PKSW will be held on campus. All staff involved in the preparation of the event including the PKSW Advisory Committee put in a great deal of effort to make this event a safe and interactive event and their work deserves to be very much appreciated.