Until recently, I have a been a staunch supporter of the "no stickers" faction. All of my devices have remained sticker-free until one startling moment when I found a sticker lying around and said to myself, "My goodness, this would look mighty fine on the PS3." Thus is the result (crappy webcams notwithstanding):
"Dear Davo,
You deserve a congratulations of cosmic proportions for collecting all of the Stars and playing to the very end. Thank you!
You are truly a master of galaxies!
SUPER MARIO GALAXY 2 Staff
Play Time: 34:30:21"
Nintendo really knows how to make you feel welcome by putting this on the Wii message board.
I'm so pumped to have finally finished this game, mainly because the final level was so ridiculous. It took me probably upwards of 5 hours by itself, but now I've got this crazy shit-eating grin on my face that I won't be able to wipe off for the rest of the day. Woot!
If you're worried about spoilers than don't watch the video below, but there isn't really any plot to speak of in the game anyway.
I'm in a game playing funk: ever since I beat Final Fantasy XIII earlier this week, I can't play any video game for more than half an hour at a stretch. Usually I'll be more than willing to bust out at least an hour or two in front of the tube, but now I get bored and start thinking about doing something else. FF XIII took up a lot of my summer (my final time was 52:09 and I still haven't done any of the post-game content), so now I feel like something major is missing from my life. I don't really feel like playing it any more, even though it was a pretty decent game, and I can't really get into Super Mario Galaxy 2 again, mainly because the green stars are really tough.
I'm hoping that Metroid: Other M and the GTA IV Episodes (both of which I'm planning on getting this week) will reinvigorate my game playing habit, and I can get back into the groove of things as usual, somewhere in the range of 15-20 hours of game time per week. Anyone have any suggestions?
I always try to save money when buying games. When making any purchase, I go through a quick and dirty cost-benefit analysis, judging how soon do I actually want a game versus how much I am willing to pay. This war between my gaming habits and my wallet becomes most poignant with Amazon.com and its (in)famous pre-order games' credits. If I can save money on a brand-new, hot-off-the-presses video game I will, so when I see "$20 off next video game purchase" I can't help myself. Would I prefer buying a game on its release day in an actual store? Sure I would. But there's always Amazon leaning on my shoulder saying, "Hey man... (looks around) Wanna save some money?" Hell yeah I do Amazon, don't worry. It's just that it's difficult now.
The most recent examples of this are Red Dead Redemption and Super Mario Galaxy 2. My original plan was to buy both of them on their release dates (May 18th and 23rd respectively), but Amazon was right there with $20 off of a pre-order. And instead of being smart about it and paying a bit for shipping in order to counteract their tardiness (I'm getting 20 bones off already, right?), I decided to just get super saver shipping, which, although free, can take up to a week to arrive on my doorstep. What this leaves me with is a sense of emptiness, a feeling that I could be playing this game right now, but instead I'm stuck playing through my backlog.
In this section the PAX East impressions finally come to their stunning conclusion! Hold on to your hats kids, it’s going to be a bumpy ride!
The biggest goal that we had on Sunday was to see the Sequelitis panel, which had a few big names that we felt compelled to see in the flesh: Ken Levine of Irrational Games, Dan Teasdale of Harmonix, Chris Avalon of Obsidian, and Jeff Gerstmann of Giant Bomb. The panel was going to discuss the rapid pace of sequels being released in the video game industry, and how those sequels fair in respect to their original games. It was going to be a good one.
Knowing full well that the line was going to be massive, we staked out our claim in front of the Manticore Theater at around 2:30, a full hour and a half before the panel was due to start at 4. Funnily enough, the friendly PAX workers told us that we weren’t allowed to line up until 3, but that didn’t stop us (and plenty of other people, I might add) from lining up for the line. This type of behavior was frequented quite often at this convention, but up until this point we had never partaken in such activities. So there we were, just outside of the line that was for the panel an hour before Sequelitis; it was kind of ridiculous, but hey, we wanted seats. We were in a ragtag “line” (the officials wouldn’t let us call it that) waiting for another line to leave. Patience is key at any big video game convention.
While waiting in the line for the line, I noticed a familiar-looking face over in the next hallway. Lo and behold, it was one of the Sequelitis panelists-to-be, Jeff Gerstmann. He was with Rich Gallup, who currently works at 38 Studios but used to work with Jeff at Gamespot. It was another weird experience for me, seeing these “internet people” in real life. You feel like you know these people, when in actuality you have absolutely no idea who they are and they know zero about you. In fact, they don’t even know that you exist. And yet, you feel like you know this person, and that you could approach them as if you were approaching a friend. This must have been the experience that my friend had with Jeff Green a couple days back. Anyway, Jeff and Rich were swarmed by a crowd of Giant Bomb fans who all wanted photos. I thought about saying “Thank you” or a handshake or something, but I decided to wait until after the panel.
Finally, the line for the other panel went in, and we were able to get in the “official” line for Sequelitis. The wait was a long one, and it was another weird experience for me, because this was one of the first times that I had actually felt perfectly comfortable playing Pokémon in public, without a drop of embarrassment. Everyone else around me had either a DS, PSP, or iPhone cracked open and were playing games, so me with my copy of Pokémon HeartGold and a DS blended right in. I remember getting the 8 gym badge right in that very line.
Eventually we were let into the theater, and boy were we glad that we had gotten there early. The theater filled right up to the brim, but we had very good seats, only five or six rows back. There were tons of people with cameras flashing away at the panelists up at the head table at the front, even though the room was very dimly lit. I noticed that only a couple of rows in front of me was the back of Rich Gallup’s head, and I decided that I would at the very least get a handshake out of him before all this business was done.
Then the panel started. They kicked it off by asking Ken Levine about his work on System Shock 2 as a sequel to the original System Shock, a game he hadn’t worked on. He said that it was extraordinarily difficult to come up with the right balance of old and new when developing the sequel, essentially because he didn’t want to abandon the older fanbase while still making it a new-feeling game. Essentially that’s what everyone agreed is the most difficult part of sequels: feeling new and nostalgic at the same time. Chris Avalon had similar sentiments about his work on KOTOR 2. The original KOTOR had been an extremely well-received game, and he, like Ken, hadn’t worked on it in making the sequel. He said that it was a really interesting experience, mainly because it was great to work with Star Wars and its characters. There were plenty of tweaks that he would have liked to have made if he had been making a new IP, but it was great learning experience anyway. Fortunately for him, KOTOR 2 was indeed well-received, if not quite to the degree of the original. (Note: I have played neither of these games.)
Dan Teasdale had one of the more interesting points in the panel. He was asked about downloadable content and the future of the Rock Band franchise, which is what his company, Harmonix, develops. His greatest concern was that it has become much more difficult since the advent of DLC to make new, standalone music games because the instrument sets have become so standard and there is such a great variety of songs available for download. However, that was his company’s idea from the beginning: they tested the waters of a complete-band rhythm game with the original Rock Band, and then refined the experience with Rock Band 2. Since then, Harmonix has released a ludicrous amount of music onto their store which is available to download for a per-song or per-album fee. He said that it’s a great business model because his company is continuously getting revenue, but at the same time they need to come up with grander schemes for boxed products, which is what investors look for. For example, The Beatles: Rock Band worked out well for them because it featured lots of music that was unique to that game and provided a specific experience when compared to other rhythm games: you got to play through the Beatles career with their music.
Jeff Gerstmann, as a reviewer instead of a developer, was generally more inclined to comment on the end-product and how it compares to its predecessor. A figure displaying the Metascores of Uncharted 2, Assassin’s Creed II, and Mass Effect 2 showed how all of these games scored higher than the first game in their respective franchises. Jeff said that this is often the case in the video game industry more than in film because developers, after figuring out the basic game mechanics and story in the first game, can refine and fix the sequel so that it is a more polished and overall better experience. I’ve played both Uncharted 2 and AC II and their predecessors, and I agree with Jeff completely: both Naughty Dog and Ubisoft-Montreal, respectively, had chiseled down the original game to its core and then expanded upon it with the basics already established, thus making a better final product. During the question and answer section of the panel, I managed to ask Jeff about his thoughts on Persona 4 (which I have never played but I watched plenty of Giant Bomb’s endurance run) and what he would like to see in Persona 5. He said that he enjoyed the characters more than the gameplay, so he would like to see their backstory enhanced and possibly see some slight gameplay changes for the sequel. I found neither particularly endearing when watching P4, but 100 hours with a game will make a man grow familiar with the characters, I suppose.
After the panel ended, Jeff (who was one possible handshake target) was instantly inundated in a sea of fans, so I decided to go with my original Plan B. Rich Gallup had nobody around him, possibly because he’s been out of the reviewing industry for a couple of years, so I managed to get a handshake and say “I really enjoyed the old Hotspot. I just wanted to say thanks.” He returned the favor, and thus my endeavor was successful.
Now there was only one thing left to do at PAX: the closing ceremony. The entirety of the convention was being funneled into the main theater. The balcony was already closed when our panel ended, so we ended up (after waiting in the Queue Room for 30 minutes) getting to stand on the floor. It wasn’t terribly difficult to see what was going on thanks to the dual massive screens at the front of theater, so all was well.
The closing ceremony was not much of a ceremony at all, but rather just the last section of the Omegathon, which is a video-game based competition that is regularly featured at PAX. In this part, there were only two teams of two left, and the winners would get to go to this year’s GamesCom in . The final round of the Omegathon featured four televisions per team, and the goal was to complete all of the assigned challenges in each game first. The first three TVs had single-player games, while the fourth was co-op. However, what the games and challenges were was unknown to the players, with each TV covered by a sheet. Each previous challenge had to be completed before the next could be started, so it was the ultimate video game relay race. And if there were any technical difficulties, the competition would start over.
As soon as the first TV was unveiled, the 8-bit glow of Super Mario Bros. lit up the theater. Cheers abounded. The goal: get 50 coins. However, the right team’s controller was broken, so there was a false start. One new controller later the games began for real. The left team blasted through Super Mario Bros. and moved on to the old racing game to get a certain score (I forget the name) on the next TV before the right team had even gotten 25 coins. Then the left team had moved on to Tetris (clear 10 lines) just as the right team finished SMB. And then, 10 lines in Tetris were cleared, and the co-op game was revealed to be: Contra for the NES. Everyone was in a frenzy at this point. And then… Contra froze on the left team while the right team was still in Tetris. “Robbery!” screamed the crowd.
So they started again, but this time the right team did better. Much better. Both teams reached Contra at almost the same time, and the goal was to beat the first boss. However, the left team was doing terribly, getting hit over and over again, while the right team was flaming through towards victory. And then the boss blew apart, and the right team had won. The left team had tasted victory and had it stolen. A tough ending indeed.
And with that, PAX East 2010 came to its conclusion. I, personally, had I great time, although it was very tiring and by that point on Sunday I was totally burned out on video games. An overload, if you will. It took me a couple of days to recover and get back to my regular routine. In any case, it was well worth the $45 entry fee and I’ll definitely go again when PAX returns to next year.
I was almost happy that Sunday was the final day of PAX. I was dead-tired at that point, not from expressly exerting myself, but just from the sheer patience it required to wait in oh-so-many lines as part of this ongoing ordeal. Don’t get me wrong, I am a hearty fan of video games, but there comes a point where it’s just too much. Video game overload, if you will. When I woke up Sunday morning, my mind was starting to melt from the amount of screens my eyeballs had been plastered to over the last couple of days. However, being a three-day pass owner, I had to make Sunday a go. And boy, I’m glad I did.
The first and foremost goal on Sunday was to get in line for Red Dead Redemption and actually get to play the damn game after all the talk and hype surrounding it. So, after standing in line with the masses in the Queue Room, my friend (same friend as before) and I made haste to the show floor in order to get ourselves in yet another line. It was a very long line, especially considering that we were waiting for a mere 10-15 minute demo which we could (probably) play on our own consoles, in the comfort of our own homes, within the month. But we wanted to play it now! And so, we waited.
As we waited in line for what seemed like forever, we saw the booth adjacent to Rockstar’s were passing out free copies of The Lord of the Rings Online. Each person at that booth got a boxed copy for free which was then plastered with signatures from some smug, and wide, people sitting behind a metallic desk. I’m assuming that these people had something to do with the game, but I honestly had no idea what their respective roles were. I also assume that the game wasn’t really free, but was merely a trial that one would have to begin paying for after a week or so. Again, I don’t know for sure. It was merely an observation.
As we rounded the corner to the front of the Red Dead Redemption booth, we saw the best Ghostbusters cosplay that I have ever seen. There were four guys, all in matching gray/tan suits with the requisite nametags, as well as gloriously crafted proton packs. These proton packs were something else, featuring lights that showed energy levels, power, and other assorted necessary information for the working Ghostbuster. The suits looked like they were ripped straight from the movies. Props to whoever made them. Also, soon after they walked by we saw Ash and Misty. Nice work kids, but you ain’t the best by a longshot.
At long last, we found ourselves peering into the gaping maw of the Red Dead Redemption booth. The kindly gentleman in front split us into groups and we went in. I was paired with a guy who liked his aiming controls inverted (craziness I tell you), so I had to switch the controls around every time I got the controller. Anyway, Red Dead Redemption is looking to be a fine cowboy game. I do believe it is running on the same engine as GTA IV (the Rage engine), and the character models move similarly to the characters in GTA. The protagonist (whose name I failed to catch) doesn’t have quite the same distinctive gait that Niko Bellic is so famous for, but he certainly did have a nice rogue-ish strut going down, a kind of walk that says “Yes, I am badass. What of it?”
RDR was first introduced to me (by the helpful gent in the booth) as an animal wrangling game, and wrangle animals I did. I wrangled me some coyotes before he also told me it was a shooting game. The real key to the shooting is the dead-eye system, in which you can temporarily slow down time. With time slowed, simply move the reticule over the men/horses/misc. animals that you would like to cap, and then release the trigger to let all hell break loose. And my goodness is it satisfying we you kill four other dudes before they even pull out a gun. Best of all, the characters respond directly to where you shot them. If someone is shot in the leg, he will start to limp; shot in the arm, he might drop his gun; shot in the head, that man is a goner. You can even trace multiple points over a single person/animal. Want to shoot someone in both legs at once? Go for it. He will drop to the ground crying until either you end him or he starts crawling away using his arms. Sadism has never been so sweet.
The game also features some quality, albeit tried-and-true, cover-based shooting. Similarly to GTA IV, you can take cover behind pretty much any object that looks like cover (although some plants are iffy). Shootouts are great fun, with other cowboy-hat-wearing folk popping out behind swinging doors, bar counters, rooftops, and windows. It truly feels like the Wild West. The guns feel great, rumbling the controller and creating loud, convincing bangs with each pull of the trigger. The shotgun is always a good time because you can walk into a room, hide behind a table and then proceed to kill upwards of four guys with one shell. Their knockback from the force of the shotgun is also amazing, with some great ragdoll physics kicking in to make the enemies splay themselves horribly across the ground after being blasted to bits. The other guns work well too, with the pistol and hunting rifle doing their respective duties with such glee. I’ve never had so much fun just experimenting with shooting enemies in different areas of their bodies, if only to see how they fall down. It may be sick, but I had such a good time.
All in all, Red Dead Redemption seems like another great game from Rockstar. The graphics aren’t all that spectacular, but the open-world elements are convincing enough, and the horse controls are pretty good. The real draw here is either lining up your shots and killing them before they kill you, or just hellblazing through a bar and killing everyone in sight. Either is a just as viable an option, and each is a great deal of fun. I do believe that this is true revolution of the Western game, and I’m really looking forward to it.
COMING SOON ~ PART 5, FEATURING THE SEQULITIS PANEL (I MEAN IT THIS TIME), MORE SHOW FLOOR, AND THE OMEGATHON
Saturday afternoon was by far the most panel-heavy segment of PAX East, and thusly it deserves a section all to itself. To begin, we headed over promptly to the Penny-Arcade Makes a Strip panel, which, although first and foremost was about Gabe and Tycho making a comic on-stage, also focused heavily on Q & A. I was all for this, simply because I felt compelled to know more about the gentlemen who were behind all this nonsense. Yes, I had read plenty of Penny Arcade before attending PAX, but I hadn’t read nearly as much as many of the other, nearing-religious attendees. I learned a lot more about the inner-workings of Child’s Play (which, for those not in the know, is a fund created by the Penny Arcade guys that helps to buy games for sick kids in hospitals). The coolest part about it was simply seeing how Mike (who’s pseudonym is Gabe) draws the characters. Tycho’s hair has to be just right, with that little dark patch behind all of the dirty blonde-colored dew. Gabe’s hair is similar, but it’s not quite as intense. I couldn’t draw (sorry) my eyes away from it. Quite cool stuff indeed.
We had to sneak out of that panel early because we had to get in line for the next panel that we wanted to see: IGN’s Game Scoop Podcast. I’ve been a regularly sporadic listener to this podcast for the last year or so, and it’s one of the few remaining good things about IGN. It was a very long line for the panel (we ate lunch in line), and although we got there 45 minutes early, our seats were towards the back of the room. Not that it really mattered – podcasts are about listening, after all.
On the panel were two of the regular crew, Greg Miller and Daemon Hatfield, as well as two other gentleman from IGN’s subsidiary Gamespy, Anthony Gallegos and Ryan Scott. It was set to be an entertaining experience, and I can assure you that it was. Greg ran the show almost completely, although Daemon is “technically” supposed to be in charge. Fortunately, Greg is by far the most jovial and rowdy member of the IGN crew, and takes no shame in spouting nonsense at any given moment. Instead of it being a regular podcast, it mostly involved questions from the audience, as well as some of panelists impressions of the show floor. They all agreed that Red Dead Redemption may well be a contender for Game of the Year, which was definitely a good thing considering that it was one of the few games at the show that I was seriously interested in. Greg got to sign a PSP as part of the proceedings (something he was exceedingly happy to do), and someone asked Anthony to show off his Star Wars tattoos. His response: “Oh yeah, these are my Star Wars tattoos: the nerdy ones.” I only saw one of them, and sure enough, there was the Death Star right on his arm. Classy. Also, Ryan barely said anything during the entire podcast, much to the concern of some members of the audience. If you want to hear it in all of its glory, head over to IGN.com.
We wanted to see the Naughty Dog panel after the Game Scoop podcast, but going to that would be cutting to close to the panel that we really wanted to see, Podcasting (f)or PR. So, instead of going to see how Naughty Dog made Uncharted 2, we decided to roam around the show floor for a bit. On our way through we came across the Red Dead Redemption booth (it was pretty hard to circumvent), and now they were handing our posters! Big posters! We each got one, as well as some serious-looking stickers, and kept moving through the show floor. There was a spot open at the Splinter Cell: Conviction booth, so we decided: what the hell. I have never played a Splinter Cell game before (at least, not for any extended period of time), so I had no idea was what going on. My friend was also clueless, and he’s played many a Splinter Cell game. Of course, like idiots, we didn’t bother to ask for instructions on how to control the damn thing, but we figured: if it’s a good game, we should be able to figure it out pretty easily. Well, we dove into the co-op mode and died twice in the space of 5 minutes. My character got stuck in a crouch (not sure if it was my fault or the game’s), and I got loaded full of lead pretty quickly.
Just to kill the remaining time before the next panel, I suggested that we check out the Nvidia booth, because that was purported to have some crazy-ass 3D technology. And color me impressed, it was really, really good. Like, really good. Emphasis on good. And really. I watched gameplay from both Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Just Cause 2 (both of which I had already played the demos on my own PS3), and damn, they looked awesome in 3D. The glasses were pretty light, if a little bulky, but I didn’t mind that much. It was just worth it to see the “future” of gaming. My friend wondered how much horsepower it took to run that many frames at such high resolution. I saw a PC half the size of a loveseat and realized: this isn’t going to be a reasonable price-point anytime soon. But my goodness, it looked good.
We got in line for the Podcasting (f)or PR panel quite early, and it was actually an okay wait as opposed to the torture of the Game Scoop line. However, while waiting, some people were handing out swag, and we managed to get a Power Gig t-shirt (I never did check out the game, but apparently you can take a real guitar and play it in a game) as well as an Irrational Games shirt. Awesome! Finally, waiting proved fruitful. Also, we saw a Spy from Team Fortress 2 sneaking behind people, Dom from Gears of War, as well as (I had been worried for a bit) the requisite FF VII cosplay: Sephiroth.
The panel itself was great, featuring Julian Murdoch (Gamer with Jobs), Ken Levine (Irrational Games), Jeff Green (EA) (yes, the same Jeff Green as earlier), Shawn Elliot (Irrational Games), as well as a couple other people whose names have slipped my mind, one of whom was from Insomniac. They discussed how podcasts can work for developers when they don’t have a product ready, and how podcasts work in general. It was great to here their opinions on how listeners to podcasts become associated and grow accustomed to the voices of the podcasters. Murdoch mentioned how although the voices may become familiar, those personalities aren’t necessarily attributed to the people that they emanate from. I had this precise experience right in that panel, because I had never seen what Murdoch looked like. I had heard his voice plenty from the podcast, but I never expected him to be bald. It was really pretty surprising. Also, Jeff Green asked Ken Levine what his favorite EA game was, and Ken responded with “Command and Conquer which doesn’t exist. Jeff’s response: “You asshole.”
After the panel, the guy from Insomniac was handing out T-shirts, yo-yos and download codes for Ratchet and Clank Future: Quest for Booty. Free games! I ran to front of the room as fast as I could, and I narrowly missed getting a T-shirt and a download code. However, I did manage to get a yo-yo. We then went back to the dorm to get dinner in preparation for the final panel of the evening. (Looking back on the PAX schedule, I now know that the other two gentlemen were Larry Hryb of Major Nelson, Microsoft and James Stevenson of Insomniac. Thank you Mr. Stevenson for the yo-yo.)
The final panel started at , and it was 1UP presents Retronauts, another podcast that I’ve listened to intermittently over an extended period of time. On the panel was Jeremy Parish of 1UP, Chris Kohler of Wired.com, Kurt Kalata of Hardcore Gaming 101, and Shane Bettenhausen, formerly of 1UP. The panel was about game collecting, and some of the insane lengths that the panelists have gone to improve their collection. Kohler talked about his Nintendo 64 DD acquisition and his adventure in getting all of the games for it (it was a zip-drive add-on for the N64 that was only released in ), and it was pretty ridiculous some of the prices that he paid for this stuff. Parish had actually been slowly selling off his collection, and he was quite happy with lightening his load, compared with Bettenhausen who has built up a collection of over 5,000 games. Also, they talked about a friend who had all of the NES games (a complete set) in shrink wrap, completely untouched. My game collecting tendencies felt fairly insignificant compared to this nonsense. In the Q & A at the end, those with good questions would either get a copy of Deadly Premonition for the Xbox 360 from Parish, or, if they didn’t have a 360, they would get a random item from Kohler. The first guy got an NES game from Kohler, and another got a half-broken TurboGrafx-16 controller that was fixed with electrical tape. And so, that is how Saturday at PAX came to a conclusion.
COMING SOON ~ PART 4, FEATURING RED DEAD REDEMPTION IMPRESSIONS, THE SEQUELITIS PANEL, MORE SWAG, AND MORE STUFF IN GENERAL.
Saturday was by far the busiest day out of PAX, simply because there were so many panels that my fellow convention-goers and I felt were necessary to attend. It was truly a remarkable day, simply because I finally got to see some high-profile people that I actually knew (not to knock Jeff Green when we met him on Friday, but I’ve never been much of a PC gamer and therefore didn’t listen to GFW Radio).
Anyway, we gallivanted over to the at approximately and entered the Queue Room to await the opening of the expo floor. I had thought a half hour would be a fair amount of time beforehand, and although it was a decent wait, there were plenty (and I mean plenty) of people ahead of us in line. Before we got in line, we picked up the official PAX East swag bags that we had missed the day before and finally got our mitts on the official PAX East schedule, which had at least six pages reserved for notes (advertising failure?). Whilst in line, more PAX Jump was played, along with various YouTube videos that people got to vote for (“My spoon… is too BIG.”). Fun times were had by all in line, but the real party started once we hit the show floor.
Unfortunately, the Red Dead Redemption line was already a mile long, so we decided to check out other such rarities like Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands. And what can I tell you: it looks a hell of a lot like the Sands of Time, except with a few more pixels. Gone is the beautiful artstyle that may have been the only redeeming characteristic of PoP ’08, and it is replaced by a boring, drab, realistic-ass artstyle. Boo Ubisoft. However, the gameplay seems as solid as ever, with a plethora of gravity-defying wall runs and jumping puzzles to keep one interested. The combat looked pretty janky (the Prince may have been missing a couple of frames of animation, I might add), but then again, PoP has never been truly about combat. Also, the Prince has some nifty water-freezing ability that can temporarily turn waterfalls (why the hell are there waterfalls in a fortress?) into sheets of ice, and thusly scamper up said waterfalls with the greatest of ease. At least, that’s what the platinum-blonde women at the Ubisoft booth with too much mascara and hoarse voices tried to explain to me.
Then the first Bayonetta cosplay walked by, and this girl nailed this costume perfectly. She even had the arched back and the ridiculous swagger to boot. Scary stuff indeed, especially considering she was pretty tall to begin with, and the tower of hair atop her head capped her off at around seven feet. Apparently there was another Bayonetta cosplay walking around somewhere, but I never got a chance to compare and contrast.
At that moment my friend informed me that we should probably get in line for the first panel that we wanted to see: The Ten Best Video Games of All Time: A Multiplayer Game. This panel was to be hosted by N’Gai Croal and Steven Totilo, and we most certainly did not want to miss it. We headed on up to the Manticore Theater and found ourselves accompanied by a large mass of nerds with a similar goal, many of whom were frothing at the mouth to see N’Gai in person. After around an hour of waiting outside the theater with little to show for it, the doors opened and we found ourselves seated not far from the actual table were the hosts themselves were seated. Croal and Totilo were joined by three other semi-high-profile gamemakers, one who was in charge of the multiplayer component of Uncharted 2, one who was a leading member of Obsidian, and I can’t remember the significance of the third guy on the panel (pardon me for not being able to remember their names). And so, the panel began by the hosts putting up a chart of the top ten games of all time according to Gamerankings.
The point of the panel was that Croal and Totilo had devised a multiplayer game where they would talk to other members of the games industry to find out what they would do with the Top 10 list. Each person asked would be able to make one change to the list. The rules: a player can remove a game and put in an entirely new one, he/she can swap two games that are already on the list, or he/she can do nothing and leave the list as it stands. However, almost everyone person asked decided to add/replace instead of either of the other two options. People that had participated in the game included Patrice Desilets (the creative director of the Assassin’s Creed games), Peter Molyneax (designer of Fable franchise), and former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling just to name a few.
Many of the games on the original list were pulled and replaced to “refine” the list. There was a great deal of swearing, booing, yelling, name-calling, and cheering as part of this process of revealing each revision to the list. Some of the more memorable moments include the fact that Metal Gear Solid (Game Boy Color) didn’t get pulled for at least the first four rounds, and when Super Mario World was replaced with Madden NFL 2004. People (including myself) were pissed about that. Eventually the list settled down, and the three other people on the stage got to make their picks. Finally, the changes stopped, and we got to see what new list had resulted from this great amount of strife.
It was truly a highly entertaining series of events, and one I shall most certainly remember for a long, long time. For the complete story on this panel, head over to Kotaku. http://kotaku.com/5504403/in-search-of-historys-best-video-games-canon-fodder-season-one
COMING SOON ~ PART 3, FEATURING MORE PANELS, MORE SWAG, MORE COSPLAY, AND MORE AWESOME.
As my first opportunity to go to a major gaming convention, PAX East most certainly did not disappoint. I got to play some cool-looking games and see several excellent panels, including Sequelitis which featured Giant Bomb’s very own Jeff Gerstmann. Fun times were had by all, and I have a vast amount of swag to prove it. The only disappointment in the swag department was that I narrowly missed a free download code for Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest for Booty, several of which were being handed out in a panel entitled Podcasting (f)or PR.
Armed with my gleaming red three-day badge, I went along with a friend to the in somewhere in the range of on Friday. We entered the doors, and not two minutes later we run into podcaster extraordinare Jeff Green, formerly of GFW radio. My friend (who is much more of PC gamer than myself) shook hands with Mr. Green, and I just simply watched, mouth agape, struggling to grasp the fact that this man had practically materialized straight of the internet. We were standing in the main lobby outside of the Queue Room (with which we become very accustomed to quite shortly thereafter).
After the Jeff Green incident, we headed up to the Expo Hall to saunter around and get the general idea of what sort of wares were on display. We were greeted by a very loud, big, and prominent Rockstar booth that was pushing Red Dead Redemption with unmatched vigor. Gentlemen and ladies in Rockstar tees were handing out all sorts of merchandise like candy, like humongous posters and exceedingly large quantities of stickers. It was quite a sight to behold. We also witnessed the 2K booth which featured Mafia II and BioShock 2’s multiplayer mode, the Nintendo booth at which I finally got to hold the monstrosity that is the DSi XL (my comment: “God dammit, that’s huge!” Dick jokes ensued), the Skate 3 booth, EA’s booth featuring Dante’s Inferno, the Lord of Rings Online booth, as well as lots of indie developers and other gamemakers of the like.
We then wandered over the other expo floor that was adjacent to the first. At this point we were simply trying to get a hold on the situation instead of actually trying to play anything. On the way there we passed the Behemoth booth (which also featured Castle Crashers. Very cool stuff.). In the next room we saw the Ubisoft booth, which was cramming Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands down your throat whether you wanted to listen or not, and also featured Red Steel 2 and had a large test area for Splinter Cell: Conviction. The Microsoft booth was right next door and had Crackdown 2 (among other things). There were also booths for Split/Second, Newegg, Nvidia (brilliant 3D tech there), APB, and many other companies.
Unfortunately, the show floor closed at 7, so we were summarily expelled along with the masses of nerds in our vicinity. The obvious next choice was to get in line for the concert, and as we entered the Queue Room, we realized that we certainly were going to wait in line. And we waited in line for a long time. Stupid move on my part, I had forgotten for bring my DS, so we had to sit, twiddle our thumbs, and pass the time my discussing the show and what we thought of it. We had met another friend (more like a friend of a friend really, but it still counts) in the Queue Room, and we discussed at length such concepts as Final Fantasy VII, Super Mario RPG, Oblivion, Zelda, Mario, Half-Life, Diablo, etc. etc. We pretty much discussed anything regarding to games that popped into our heads, and we definitely in good company. At this point everyone was sitting on the ground, and the group next door to us was playing a riveting round of Magic Cards, something that was far beyond my understanding. I didn’t even bother to ask how to play, even though one of my companions had picked up the official PAX East swag bag, in which was a small deck of Magic Cards. I simply sat there and watched the masses of nerddom sweep by, as well as involving myself in the perennially popular game that is PAX Jump.
PAX Jump is a game that entails complete participation by everyone waiting in a given line. If you have already been to PAX, you probably have played this already, and you can attest to the fact that people get really frigging serious about this game. Essentially, a camera at the front of the room can tell which way people are holding up their hands, and this movement determines which way a character (in this case Gabe) goes on several big projections scattered around the hall. The goal is have Gabe climb up this long staircase of platforms in vertical orientation, collecting either positive or negative types of games memorabilia or internet memes along the way. The game was a lot of fun, and I played it several more times over the course of the Expo.
Finally, after two hours of waiting in line, the doors for the main theater open wide, and hundreds of geeks were funneled into the big auditorium for a nerd-centric concert. I only stuck around for the first couple of bands seeing as it was already late and I wanted to get to PAX early the next day. The opening act was the Protomen, who played very highly produced rock on an epic scale. At first at I thought that they were pretty good, and then they eventually settled into the realm of okay, not quite “meh” though. However, they really got my attention when the main singer dressed up as Protoman himself, and there was even a microphone jack in the back of the helmet. Quite entertaining indeed.
The other band that I saw was Anamanguchi, which one of friends had told me were fantastic. They most certainly were. The real catch here was that they, instead of having a lead singer, had an NES or a Game Boy play a file from a hacked game cart over the top of their elaborate, loud prog rock. For visuals, they had an almost seizure-inducing display of 8-bit images flying across the large screens at the front of the theater, creating this crazy montage of insanity that was nearly impossible to not look at. On top of that, although the music all sounded the same, it all sounded completely awesome, and I’m really, really glad I got to see them play.
Atter that, it was sufficiently late, and we decided to head back to the dorm for the evening. Saturday would be another day!
COMING SOON ~ PART 2, FEATURING SATURDAY PANELS, THE EXPO HALL, AND COSPLAYERS
I really think that 2010 is going to be a year that is remembered in gaming for a long, long time. Why do I say this? Well, I'm sure that we can all agree that this first quarter has been the best that we've seen in years. 2009 was fairly impressive with Street Fighter IV, RE5, etc, but that ain't a patch on this year. Sure, all of these games that have come out in the last couple of months were supposed to come out last fall, but hey, I'm not complaining. Last fall almost broke the bank with the amount of good games it had, but it seems like this year is going to have typical Q4 releases all year long!
Let's be honest, we like games. I enjoy games, and I presume the vast majority of people on this site do as well (hell, that's why you're here, in't?). But I think we're running into a big problem with how many (presumably) excellent games are being released. The great side effect of all this is that games need to be spread out through the year in order to give them some breathing room, but there are just so many AAA games coming out that it's hard to keep up at all.
Looking at this month alone, and just on one console (the PS3, for example), we've got Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Final Fantasy XIII, God of War III, Just Cause 2, Yakuza 3, and the GTA IV Episodes From Liberty City. May I remind you that this is March, not October.
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