primesuspect had this to say
I'm of the same opinion as Camman:
If you don't want to participate in a given tournament (for example, I suck at and dislike RTS games, so I won't be participating in any RTS tournaments), there's still gonna be other people that are gonna be playing what you want to play. Nobody said you can't play whatever you want while you're "waiting" for the tournament.. I can't imagine how any waiting is gonna take place....
My thoughts exactly.
As far as what Mack says:
The servers will be running the latest update of the official server for each game. Due to this, we will strongly advise everyone to have all games fully updated to the latest version. Keep in mind the... method you acquired... a particular game may effect it's stability when played over a LAN.
For instance, UT2K3's server will actually kick all non-legal keys from the game, as these keys get checked with the master online server. This means, that even when playing a burned copy of UT2K3 over a LAN, and being connected to a dedicated server, you will be instantaneously knocked out of the game. I have seen others experience this with my own two eyes, so I know it for a fact.
In short: As long as everyone has legit, fully updated copies of whatever game played, there shouldn’t be any problems. If you are using an illegally acquired game, and you are having difficulty connecting/playing because of it, that’s tough sh!t.
This is why legal copies of these games is advised.