You may have played a variation of the game party night of Kaimana or on the sidelines of Potlatch. But now two Seattleites, Ali Mastan and Brad Sliger, are hoping to bring this disc game to the next level with Bendercup. What’s more is they hope to involve and eventually support the Ultimate community through prize tournaments and more. They’re currently raising funding on Kickstarter so they can begin manufacturing, so check out the video and interview below to learn more about their project.
Support Bendercup on Kickstarter
Skyd: Tell us a little about yourselves. Who are you? What’s your background?
Ali Mastan and Brad Sliger: For two the past two years we (Ali Mastan and Brad Sliger) have been designing and creating an outdoor game that we love to play when camping, at the beach, and even in our own backyards. We are game enthusiasts at heart and designers by trade, giving us what we believe is the perfect storm of talent and passion to create the ultimate outdoor game. I (Brad) spend my days as the Lead Industrial Designer for one of the world’s leading Medical Imaging companies, and Ali is a Design Project Manager at a large software company in the Startup Business Group. We met at Western Washington University.
The Skyd staff gives Bendercup a whirl.
Our game is called Bendercup. We have designed, developed, and engineered every aspect of the game, seeing how important design integrity is to us, we took the creation of Bendercup very seriously, wanting it to immediately set itself above and apart from others, from fun-factor to design quality to eco-friendliness. From our first brainstorming meeting we knew that we would not release the game until we truly believed it was on-par with the current frontrunners in the outdoor gaming market.
Bendercup has some unique design elements to it. Tell us about what went into designing Bendercup.
We wanted Bendercup to be more than just cups on sticks. We wanted to meet every need a player might want in the game from portability, to flexibility in the poles, to durability in all the components. We felt that in order to set this game apart, it needed to have a unique element that increased the challenge; that’s where the unique cup design comes into play.
Founders Brad and Ali try to nullify some points.
What do you hope Ultimate players will see in Bendercup?
We hope that Ultimate players will see Bendercup as a game that truly challenges their abilities and offers them another option with something of a competitive nature.
Where do you hope Bendercup will go? What’s the next step?
We hope that Bendercup will become a household name in the disc community and our plan is to develop a sports community behind Bendercup. This means, Bendercup organized, country-wide tournaments with prize money and even a national championship. We want to celebrate our game and the players who love it by creating opportunities to interact and compete.
We’re also excited to support other members of the disc community, be it Disc Golf, Freestyle and especially Ultimate “Frisbee”. We’ll do this by running tournaments that generate funding for individuals as well as college and club teams in their competitive seasons.
Bendercup means the opportunity to compete in a new sport using the same skills they love with Ultimate.
How can Ultimate players support Bendercup?
Besides supporting us on Kickstarter by pre-ordering a game, Ultimate players can support Bendercup by playing and sharing the game with others that have a competitive nature and love to throw a disc. We look forward to sharing our game with the Ultimate community at future tournaments.
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