I know it's almost been a week since PAX, but I figured at least a few people would like to see my personal take on the show. I'll try to include pictures throughout, but it'll mostly be a series of stories describing the entire Saturday.

Got up at 8AM Saturday morning. Didn't sleep much the night before because I was so damn excited! For context, last year was my first PAX, and it was pretty fantastic, but I barely managed to do half the things I planned to going in. This year, I kept expectations low, and I came out having had an amazing time.

Anyways, my friend's mom drove us to the train station. The two of us talked all about what we're excited to see, what we're going to do better than last year, and what we needed to do. We get to South Station. Time to switch to the Silver Line!

We've dubbed the Silver Line bus ride to the convention center "The Nerd Exodus". Last year, one of the kids got separated from his friends when the bus filled up, and I distinctly remember half of us yelling "NOOOOOOOOOOOO, DAVE!" Later, a bunch of people started singing Still Alive from Portal. Yes yes, roll your eyes.

This year's Exodus was less fun. We were all squished like sausages, and I could already tell who hadn't showered (side note: fucking shower before conventions, people!) A big realization I had this year was that conventions like PAX are the only time a lot of these people get to be themselves. We all do our jobs day by day, usually keeping the games for the evening, and trying to blend into society in the morning. At PAX, everyone is on an equal playing field. You have pink hair and Minecraft hoodie? No judging here. Three kids and a stable job? Have fun! It's basically the one weekend where I don't want to pick on the dude with the ponytail and utilikilt.

Back to stories. We get to the convention center, and people are just milling around the lobby. 15 minutes until the floor opens. We chose to line up for the Make A Strip panel hosted by Penny Arcade instead. I highly recommend this panel to anyone attending PAX. Basically, Gabe and Tycho from Penny Arcade create the next Monday's comic strip based on audience participation and Q&A. There's a hilariously gross audience-wide knuckle crack, a Swear Word of the Year, and plenty of hilarious responses from the audience. Highlight of this year was Tycho rapping to a fan's beats and vice versa.

We walked out of that panel cracking up with laughter. After a quick lunch, we finally made it onto the show floor! First destination was the combination Double Fine/Capybara booth. Reason for this was I had actually prepared a big ole' bag of candy for Double Fine and Idle Thumbs' Chris Remo, who had mentioned on a recent podcast that he couldn't resist candy. We get there, and BOOM Greg Rice is towering over us on a platform like a god. The exchange went something like this:

"Mr. Greg Rice!"

"Oh hey!"

"You're the guy from the documentary and the Double Fine and the video games!"

"I...I am! What's up?"

"Awesome booth, man! Have you seen Remo? I have this bag of candy for him."

"Aww man, Chris had a bit too much to drink last night. He was SUPPOSED to be here, but I think he just woke up. He could be here any minute!"

Slightly dejected, I decided to try out the games in their booth because they were one of the few companies to not have massive lines for a fifteen minute demo (ahem Transistor ahem). Brutal Legend PC looks sweet. I already have it, so I didn't really play it much. Dropchord, their new game for the Leap Motion Controller (think Minority Report-style finger controls). The game basically involves you taking your two index fingers, pointing them at the screen, and rotating them around a circle to keep the line between them away from obstacles while picking up powerups. The music was pretty awesome techno, and the tech seemed to actually work. There was a few issues where it would lose track of my fingers, which I can imagine would suck if you were trying to play any of the harder modes.