PAX East 2012

[amauriel]

Ok, I guess I'm ready to start this: My PAX impressions thread.

Basically, I thought I'd make a post or two with some pics and some "What I did" comments, then I'll get the swag together and get some pictures and add to it.

First off, PAX stands for Penny Arcade Expo and is run by the PA guys. From what I can gather, they basically wanted an expo that they would want to go to, so there's a little bit of everything for the nerd or geek. I am a video gamer first, but I also enjoy tabletop and the other things going on, so I don't hit the expo hall as much as most people, and I honestly didn't take any pictures of it, sorry guys. Also, please assume that the good pictures are taken by Ronalopolis, and the questionable ones were me.

Anyway, first pic I've got on here is of the line to get into the keynote. This is after they got us into the waiting room, and really this is maybe a third or less of all the people in line. Lines are ridiculous at PAX. One thing I find hilarious here is how many people are sitting and looking down: They gave us Magic cards in our swag bags and about everyone has made random friends to duel. Lines are also AMAZING at PAX, because something will happen along the lines of "Yo, I'm playing Zombie Dice!" and people will shuffle around to join.

We didn't get any decent pictures of the Keynote, but it was Jordan Mencher, the guy who created Last Express and Prince of Persia. His actual speech left a bit to be desired, but the Q & A was much, much better. He did state that the last Prince of Persia game he worked on was Sands of Time and that the guys he worked with on that went on to do the Assassin's Creed games, so the later Prince of Persia games were completely devoid of any of the original people. He WAS the one that wrote the screenplay for the Prince of Persia movie, but I haven't seen it so I won't make any judgments there. He said they were bringing Last Express to iOS and the possibility of more Last Express stuff, which I was interested in. (Great Point 'n Click type game if you've never played it.)

The big reason that a lot of people go to the Keynote is that Mike and Jerry (better known as Gabe and Tycho) do their first Q & A directly after the speaker. And they are always HILARIOUS. Some guys in Aperture lab coats gave them potatoes in jars that they had to clip on their belts and wear around for all of PAX (and they did, at least every time I saw them they had them on) and a guy explained to them the faults of Dragon Dice, among other things. The second picture here is of them posing with a random tiny My Little Pony, by request of one of the audience members.

Let's see...after the Keynote I hit the Expo Hall, and some swag happened. (Pics later.) Then I hit the Arcade for a while...the arcade is provided by The American Classic Arcade Museum (http://www.classicarcademuseum.org) and is all classic games, all on free play. I got the high score on Carnival (knowing that it was just going to get unplugged and lost when it returns to New Hamshire  :'() and played a bunch of stuff from my childhood. I got Ronalopolis in there later and got a cute picture of him sucking at Space Ace.

Then I headed to the panel for On The Rainslick Precipice of Darkness Episode 3. Anyone here play Cthulhu Saves the World? (It's pretty great.) Well, those guys are the ones doing Episode 3, and they're doing it basically as Penny Arcade meets Final Fantasy III/VI, with Fruit Fuckers and Mimes. It looks amazing, and the guys from Zeboyd Games were fantastic, and Jerry from PA (Again, it's Tycho) was really, really cool. He stayed around after the panel and talked with people, and he talked with me for probably close to 10 minutes about writing. Signed my badge while we chatted and just acted excited about the game.

Leaving the panel, the third picture happened, which I think is an amazing example of PAX. The prince from Katamari Damacy stopped to dance near the Rock Band stage, where a bunch of guys are all trying to share the mike.

And the fourth picture for Friday is what Ronalopolis was doing while I was having fun: The LAN party area.

[amauriel]

I don't have nearly as much to say about Saturday. We got there much later (had planned on going to the Streetpass panel, but since I'd gotten all the puzzle pieces I needed and over 200 Streetpasses on Friday, I skipped it) and so we pretty much hit the Expo Hall as soon as we got there. We got to playtest Paint the Line, the trading card game being made by Penny Arcade about Ping Pong, and it was actually super fun. I met up with some girls from the Reddit girlgamers group and walked the hall while Ronalopolis did whatever he found to amuse himself for the day, then we went together to the concert. The Video Game Orchestra (VGO) was awesome again, although they were a little heavier on their Final Fantasy stuff than last year. The girl that sang for Snake Eater and the song from Bastion had some pipes on her though!

Then Paul and Storm came out and did their thing, singing very little. They did this little talk where they put other songs over the ASPCA sad animal commercial, and it was hilarious. I will always think of the Benny Hill theme when that commercial comes on, and that sorta lessens the blow.  Jonathon Coulton was next and was great as always. I think my favorite thing about PAX might be the feeling when you and 4,000 other people are singing Still Alive with JoCo, and you know that every person knows every word. It gives me chills. Last group on Saturday night was McFrontalot, and I'm not going to lie, Nerdcore isn't really my thing. So the only part I really, really loved was when Paul and Storm and JoCo sang Diseases of Yore with him.

First pic for Saturday is a couple of amazing cosplayers: Atlas and P-Body. They were really having a good time and were off to the side, just posing and laughing with the people that asked them to pose. Second is during the VGO concert (I love that someone threw the horns for video game music). The third is from Paul and Storm's "talk" (which I'm going to have to see if someone has on Youtube, it seriously was hilarious). And the last pic for Saturday is during JoCo's concert, when he's singing RE: Your Brains and the crowd is a zombie hoard.

[amauriel]

Sunday: Not a lot happens on Sunday. We got some stuff signed by the Penny Arcade guys (long line for that!) and we got the last of our swag (including an awesome Kid Icarus T-shirt) and got the rest of our stuff collected.

Then we headed over to the Main Theater again for the final ceremonies. I don't know if any of you know about the Omegathon, so a quick blurb about it:

Basically, a group of people (I wanna say 24) are picked from all the people that register for PAX. Those people get to compete as Omeganauts in the Omegathon. Basically, random games are picked and they compete. One or two people finally win at the closing ceremony, and they get a RIDICULOUS prize. The very first PAX, I think, it was every NES game. Yes, ALL the NES games. So it's that ridiculous. This year, it was a trip to Germany for a games show there, all expenses paid. But you don't know what the prize is going to be until the final round.

So this year, the Saturday night Omegathon was Dance Central, and it was before the concerts...so you've got about 4,000 people watching you dance to Baby Got Back. Fun, huh? (tee hee). Well, the last round happens before the final ceremony and it's always something weird. This year, it was Crokinole, which I had never even heard of, and is a game sorta like billiards or something on a specialized board that they play in Canada. It was honestly amazing, watching the entire crowd hang on every shot.

So the first two pictures I've got here are from Saturday, sorry. The first is a cookie Ronalopolis bought me. They've got this "Cookie Brigade" that goes around and sells cookies for a dollar or more each. All the money goes to Child's Play, and they made $13,000 this year. I'm quite the Portal fan, so he spent $5 to get the last Companion Cube cookie. The second is from the entrance to the Expo Hall, where the PopCap booth was...the Plants vs. Zombies Zombies were quite the dancers!

Third is from the Closing Ceremony, where Paul and Storm and JoCo sang the Canadian National Anthem before they announced the Crokinole game, and the fourth is my badge, after both Mike and Jerry signed it.

Unfortunately, I have an appointment now so the swag will have to happen this evening!

[desocietas]

Haven't had a chance to read this yet but will try to soon to live vicariously through you and your husband!