Day 1:
Friday morning I wake up at 8am FREAKING PUMPED and carpooled with GHOSTCLAW and blabber to the convention center. We arrived and met up with GHOSTCLAW's former housemate Josh, boesthius, FragKrag, and two of their groupies who I can't remember (sorry!). We got our tickets and went to the main entrance where we ran into Kennegit, Nazgul, zatic, and Matt from TLAF who was wearing Dario's nametag. Matt was telling us how some people were asking if he really was "the TLO" and how tempting it was to give out fake autographs.
We basically started forming a giant TeamLiquid MMM ball and began 1a-ing our way through the line.
Kennegit and Zatic trying to locate Nazgul.
I was actually stopped on the way inside because I had 3 water bottles (wtf). I got separated and the only directions GHOSTCLAW gave me was "head toward the darkness to the progaming area". Wtf I was lost forever looking at computers with "Aiur Chef" splash pages and being super confused. Eventually I met up with the group again in the progaming area. That's when I turned around and say effing Sean Day[9] Plott standing and chatting literally 3 feet behind me. I was e-starstruck but me and FragKrag eventually asked him for pics and signatures.
FragKrag living out every nerds wet dream.
Life achievement unlocked!
We stuck around and got more pics with more e-famous people.
+ Show Spoiler +
After nerdgasming out at the pro-players, GHOSTCLAW, blabber, Josh, and I decided to go to Denny's and eat. Service sucked.
We came back and wandered the show floor and decided to try out King of the Hill - if you won 3 games against random players then you got a free poster. While standing in line we saw some pretty scrubby players. One guy was trying to just click minerals to harvest without selecting his scvs, and gave us and tried to harvest gas without a refinery. We were also trying to spot out some decent people playing by checking the lights on the Razer equipment with APM TECHNOLOGIEZ.
"I own these scrubs"
Playing the games actually kind of sucked. The mouse scroll speed was super low and I found the keyboard to be pretty unresponsive. I hope this doesn't accurately reflect the SCII razer products. I managed to win my 3 games, and snagged a free poster of Ghost Kerrigan sniping some Zerglings. Our friend Josh proxy void ray'd his way through all of his 3 games.
We decided to check out Aiur Chef and StarJeweled as well - the featured Blizzard Custom maps.
Aiur Chef was a hilarious game and really well produced - you were a zealot with a custom model frying pan and you had you collect ingredients around the map and cook it in the center in an FFA competition.
StarJeweled is basically Nexus Wars where you earn income by playing Bejeweled. Blabber and I teamed up for 2v2 but were completely destroyed. We played like Bronze Leaguers - no hotkeys, slow mouse clicking, no macro etc.
They were both really fun games, and I hope they release these maps on Bnet ASAP
A preview of StarJeweled - A bejeweled and SC2 hybrid. The next DotA for casuals?
We wandered around a bit more and took some pics of what else the show floor had to offer and then wandered our way back to the progaming area.
3D SC2. Gimmick wears off fast.
Horde of pins for an Nvidia contest
Liquid meeting.
Blabber and Xeris, who made Blizzcon extra awesome
We waited around the progaming area until Boxer vs FruitDealer came on. GHOSTCLAW and I decided to run to the bathroom really quick and while searching for it outside, we run into Tastless and Artosis chatting it up outside. I ask Tasteless to sign my TL Shirt, and I ask Artosis for his predictions (he went with FruitDealer). Totally a wtf-I-need-to-pee-wow-its-Tastosis moment.
The crowd was huge and the energy was amazing. GHOSTCLAW and I went around snapping pictures of the legends.
Two major titans.
Everyone's a fanboy for boxer.
The actual games were amazing. It was the first time I've been at such a huge eSports gaming event, so the energy and cheer of the crowd during the games was an amazing thing to experience.
Day9, Tasteless, Artosis, Boxer, and Fruitdealer.
Afterwards, FruitDealer got a huge framed and signed piece of art from Blizzard with the featured Zerg fruits. He took a pic with a lot of his fans too!
FruitDealer's exposure to foreign fame.
We tried to get boxer's signature but he kept getting pulled way and eventually left when we got to the front of the line! This happened at least twice. We managed to snag his famous korean actress significant other. There were film crews following them both around, but she was very nice and knew pretty decent English.
+ Show Spoiler +
We also caught Dustin Browder as well. We were about to get our pics with him when none other than MAMA PLOTT interjects through the crowd sporting a "Tasteless is my Homeboy" shirt (so awesome). Dustin's mind is blown, as well as everyone's mind around him.
We still managed to get pics with Dustin after some newbies asked for Void Ray nerfs (lol) and other ridic balance changes. Blabber asked for blue flame to be returned to dying Protoss buildings.
"Blue Flame? But then they'll just be like Terran buildings" -Dustin mistakens the request as giving Protoss a Planetary Fortress
After the crowd died down, we all went to the TL meetup. I didn't take too many pics except of GHOSTCLAW and fruitdealer. My friend took a pic of me and FruitDealer but hasn't uploaded it =(((
This blog is turning into GHOSTCLAW's Blizzcon 2010 adventures. Oh well, FruitDealer Fighting!
Special thanks to kOre for being the translator at the TL meetup and bringing in FruitDealer!
After the meetup we decided to head back home.
Day 2:
Most of the day was spent watching the games being casted and wandering the show floor some more with Xeris who used his special powers to make the Blizzcon experience even more amazing (huge thanks). We were trying to stalk boxer so we could get his signature but he kept laddering.
We tried KOTH hill again, and we all watched boesthius and FragKrag light up APM TECHNOLOGIEZ RAZER HEADSETS to red with their gosu 200+ apm. I actually lost my first set because people who were actually decent started to line up D:. Blabber managed to use his #1 NA Protoss Skills to snag another poster. GHOSTCLAW was matched against Xeris first round and was knocked out.
HuK asked Boxer for a practice game, so we took that oppurtunity to sneak our friend Josh to ask Boxer in korean to come meet us at the rail. Boxer only had time to receve a GG Button from GHOSTCLAW and he got to be the lucky one to take the pic before he had to go back and practice with HuK
He tried to return it to us thinking we wanted it back. No, its yours!
We spent the rest of the day waiting and wandering for the grand finals to start. Loner vs NEXGenius had amazing games and was met with amazing energy from the crowd. Not much more to say about that except that both players put on such an amazing show.
We just tried to snag as many pics as we could before we left Blizzcon 2010 for good.
+ Show Spoiler +
On our way out from the showfloor, I finally got to take a pic with Rekrul!
"Fucking fanboys" -Rekrul
Overall, Day 2 went by pretty quickly since we mostly spent time watching games, but being in a hall full of people cheering for SC2 will be an unforgettable experience.
This was my first time at Blizzcon but I was amazed at how many times I'd wander outside and bump into some sort of e-famous entity or progamer. It was basically TL IRL in every sense of the word, but thats what made the experience awesome. All the TL people I met were really great guys, which is what makes TL amazing in the first place.
Hope you all enjoyed the wall of pics and text (if you managed to read it all).
Phew, that took so long to write up.