N3D @ PAX East 2013

Howdy TeamLiquid! I was super lazy last week, and didn't post, which means this week is a DOUBLE POST DAY FOR THE N3RD DIMENSION! The first post is my PAX East 2013 experience, so I hope you enjoy it!

Board games. Tabletop roleplaying games. Collectible card games. And, of course, video games. The Penny Arcade Expo is home to all this and much more, from cosplay to eSports to chiptune concerts. Founded in 2004 by nerd messiahs Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik (creators of the eponymous Penny Arcade webcomic), PAX is a celebration of the whole of gaming culture. PAX is a fan-centric convention, one which focuses on regular gamers in a way that industry-oriented conventions such as E3 or GDC do not. A short time after PAX began, its creators felt that it was too popular to happen only once a year in Seattle. So they created another PAX: PAX East, a Boston-based clone of the original convention (now PAX Prime) for those on the east coast who desired an expo of their own. The 2013 PAX East was last weekend (March 23-25) and there was no way N3D wouldn’t be there.

Friday – Nerdvana

I had never gone to a video game convention before. Anime and comic conventions, yes, but never a video game convention. As an obsessive gamer, I was extremely excited. How would a gaming convention differ from the others, and what would be the same? I’d also never been to the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center (BCEC). Going to PAX East was a completely new experience for me, and I couldn’t wait to see what the fuss was all about.

PAX East exceeded all of my expectations.

To properly set the scene, it must be said that the BCEC is immense. As in, it’s absurd how large it is. To put things in perspective, it’s possible that the Javits Convention Center (home to NYCC) is as large or larger, but the open layout of the BCEC made it appear far bigger. When I approached the doors of the convention hall for the first time, I was already impressed.

Big Doors

I knew that the weekend would be awesome as soon as I walked in the door. After all, it’s hard to imagine a more fitting greeting for a fanboi like me than giant statues of League of Legends Champions, Ryze and Tryndamere. I was pumped.

SO COOL

MUSCLES

First, we headed towards the queue room to grab lanyards and programs. I only kept the program as a souvenir though, since PAX uploaded a full schedule to the Guidebook app. Having the schedule and map on my phone was very useful and I hope more cons consider adding the same things. The best part of this chore was seeing the amount of space reserved for the line. My party always arrived after the halls opened, so I never stood in line. The dozens of meters of barred-off space for the queue made me glad I didn’t have to do so. It was hard to even imagine the line filling up, at least until I saw the show floor.

Before I explored, I went to a panel. In N3D’s NYCC recap, I discussed how much I love the panels at nerd conventions, and PAX had many intriguing and entertaining ones. On Friday I attended the “Game Journalism in the Age of Independence” panel, which addressed the challenges and benefits to creating your own game-related content. As expected, the panel was informative and fun. The panelists were entertaining and dispensed a few explicit tips and useful allegories. I left the panel with the feeling that I knew a little bit more about how to make my creative content better.

After the panel, I eagerly started exploring the show floor. First thing I noticed? IT WAS GARGANTUAN.

Dat show floor…

I aimlessly wandered the Expo Hall for the rest of the day. The amount of game-related paraphernalia was overwhelming. My first top was the indie game zone, a large portion of the floor with many booths for different developers. I really wanted to play the new game from Supergiant, the creators of Bastion, but the line to play the demo was over two hours long all weekend. I’ll wait in line for a lot of things, but that line would have kept me away from the rest of the attraction for far too long. Many upcoming, high-profile titles boasted similarly huge lines, such as The Last of Us, The Elder Scrolls Online, and the new Neverwinter Nights. Playing other indie games was much more fun, since I could play many of them and they were still super fun (I highly recommend Color Sheep and Orion’s Forge for iOS). Plus, I ran into a lot of college and game jam acquaintances while touring the indie games area, further proving PAX’s ability to attract nerds from all over the country.

The LoL Stage

I also spent a large portion of my time on Friday at the Riot Games booth. League of Legends occupied one of the best spots on the floor: a huge amount of space just outside the entrance to the Expo Hall. Two more Champion statues (Katarina and Ziggs) flanked the Riot area, which consisted five “Role” pillars, a huge stage, and massive screens showing collegiate showmatches, Champion Spotlights, and various presentations. Riot employees stood at each pillar and talked to fans about the associated in-game role while giving out free skin codes and lanyards that corresponded to each role (I got them all). One of my favorite Champion artists, IronStylus, was there as well. He posed with cosplayers, drew commissions for fans, and demonstrated the splash art creation process in LoL (using “Sunbathing Leona” as an example). Chatting with Rioters and other enthusiasts was awesome, as was listening to and asking questions of the Rioters on stage (ohmikegoddess and [Katieperson - find name]). Yet the best part was meeting team Curse, my favorite North American LoL team. They idled around Riot’s booth for a long time, giving me ample opportunity to get pictures with them, which was FUCKING AWESOME.

Me and Nyjacky

Me and Cop

Me and Liquid112

Me and Voyboy

Me and Rivington

The Radiant DRAAVEN

As much as I wanted to stay at the convention, I got tired around dinner time and decided to head home. Perhaps more importantly, I needed to play games. Strolling around a video game convention is great, but it really makes you want to play games… until 3 A.M.

Saturday – Not Everyone You Meet on the Internet Wants to Murder You!

After a late night of playing and watching games, I woke up early to head to day two of PAX. Saturdays are typically the most eventful and well-attended days of weekend conventions, so I anticipated PAX’s Saturday would be awesome. It turned out that my early awakening wasn’t necessary because I ended up waiting a few hours for my friends to get out of bed for the con, but it was still nice to play some games before I went. I knew that I’d want to play a ton when I returned, so playing before I went was also great.

Upon arrival, I ran to another games journalism panel. This one examined mainstream games journalism and working at one of the big sites (Kotaku, Polygon, IGN, etc.). This panel was an insightful discussion about the best and worst parts of being a professional in and around the games industry. I thoroughly enjoyed the strange and hilarious stories of the professionals and shared the crowd’s dismay when they described how different their relationship to games was now. One reason I could not miss this panel was because it featured Justin McElroy, a games journalist whose writing I respect and podcaster who constantly cracks me up. In fact, it was his (and his brothers’) podcast that got me into podcasts, and that in turn inspired me to write this blog. As such, thanking him for what he’s inadvertently done for me was extremely rewarding as well.

After the panel my plans were to meet up with some members of the TeamLiquid LoL subforum who were also attending PAX. On Saturday afternoon, I convened with a few other forum members to eat, check out games, and wander the show floor (with a bias towards the LoL area). This was a bit scary since I’ve only met one other internet person before (hai neo), but I was definitely looking forward to it. While only a few people showed up (thanks Soniv and sylverfyre!), it remained awesome to finally put faces to the names I interact with on a day-to-day basis on one of my favorite places on the internet. Plus, it shows that meeting people on the internet can go very well, assuming you’ve planned sufficiently (and you meet in an bright, crowded area).

Me, Soniv, and Sylverfyre. NOW EVERYONE KNOWS WHAT YOU LOOK LIKE

I broke away from the TL contingent around 5:00 to go to a panel about player behavior in League of Legends. The panel wasn’t so much informative as it was a Q&A for fans who wanted to learn more about how Riot planned on making LoL a more positive game. Most questioners seemed like nice people, but I wished more of them had posed questions that weren’t inane, self-serving, or a waste of panelist/attendee time. Then again, the day that doesn’t happen is probably the day the world ends. There were a few good questions, and Riot maintained their reputation for clarity and availability to the community with their answers. Of course, there was the one douchebag that harassed the panel, annoyed the whole audience, and demanded that Riot to clean up all of the virulence and hate in their game. The irony of the first questioner at a player behavior panel being an asshole and getting turned on by the audience was incredible. Toxic behavior indeed.

That panel was the end of my Saturday at the convention, but not the end of the night. There was a final TL meetup to attend at the Official Riot Games League of Legends pubcrawl. I departed the BCEC for the Granary Tavern (code name Jayce), which is located in the State Street/Aquarium area (and was definitely the nicest pub on the crawl). When I arrived, Riot employees were chatting with the assembled nerds, and LoL signs and drinklists covered a corner of the bar to label the pubcrawl area for us and confuse the other patrons. One Rioter mentioned that the drink list was created by a part-time mixologist at the company, but I was suspicious until I tried the “Insanity Potion.” It was super delicious, and you should try it. The food and drink and company was great… though the only TL people who showed up were the two who already had. Regardless, it was a good two hours at a bar. I called it a night when the crawl moved on to “the Nexus” to join all the crawlers in one place. It was late, I am lame, and there were more games to play.

Insanity Potion. DRINK IT.

The LoL Drink Menu.

The Bar Area.

Sunday – Panels and Purchases

If Saturdays are typically the biggest day at a convention, Sundays are usually the least exciting. This was not true of PAX East 2013. Instead, Sunday was my busiest day, a day in which I was running between events rather than wandering the Expo Hall. As soon as we arrived at the BCEC, my friends and I lined up at the Double Fine Adventure panel, featuring game design legend Tim Schafer. Though I’ve never played any of Schafer’s games (Psychonauts, Grim Fandango, Brutal Legend, a number of old LucasArts adventure games), he’s important enough to the games industry that I wasn’t going to miss his panel. The big reveal at the panel was the name of his Kickstarted adventure game project. Formerly known as just “Double Fine Adventure,” attendees were the first to learn it would be named Broken Age. It was fascinating to hear the questions and adulations of his many fans. The experience provided a perspective on what I must sound like to most people. Furthermore, listening to the insights and observations of such a successful game designer was extremely informative.

That blurry guy in the middle is Tim Schafer. Trust me.

In my final moments of non-panel time, I roamed the Expo Hall once again, searching for something on which I could waste my hard-earned money. Above all, conventions are magnets for disposable income. With so much wonderful nerd miscellany gathered in one place, it’s nearly impossible to avoid getting something. Some people can escape with the purchase of a mug or T-shirt to commemorate their attendance or that one special game/DVD/book that’s only available from a special con vendor. I bought a 3DS. XL. In fairness, I knew I’d have to (have to) get one for Pokemon X/Y anyways, but I could’ve waited. Yet it was too tempting to but it and Fire Emblem: Awakening at the big, shiny Nintendo booth. I’ve also heard a lot of good things about the latest Fire Emblem installment, and I’ve missed having a strategy RPG in my life. My spending impulse sated and my free time running short, I hurried from the cash register to my next panel engagement.

The last two panels of PAX were simple and straightforward amusement. The first was the OverClockeD Remix panel: an hour discussing the greatest community of game music remixers and rearrangers on the internet*. The event was offbeat and silly, including a ridiculous Powerpoint, some silly videos and references (IRIS), and Shaq Fu (really). It also showed off the upcoming OCRemix albums, all of which sounded awesome and got me hooked on their site (seriously, it’s amazing). The next (and final) panel was a history of eSports as told by djWheat and Slasher, two of the most prolific, outspoken, and involved members of the international eSports community. Whether it be FPS, RTS, MOBA or Fighter, the two men regaled the audience with the annals of eSports’ history and their visions of what the future may hold. It was awesome hear the tale of how one of my favorite pastimes evolved from arcade cabinets and IRC to the worldwide phenomenon it is today. Not to mention that those guys are really funny. Even though there was no Q&A time at the end, I heartily enjoyed the panel and wished that more of my non-eSports-loving friends could have learned about it too.

* probably

The eSports gang. Slasher is behind the panel.

I only was able to wander around a bit more before the convention halls finally closed and all the assembled nerds packed up to go home. Exhausted as I was at the end, PAX East was easily the best convention I’ve ever attended. Maybe it was the size of the BCEC, in which I never felt truly crowded. Maybe it was that singular gaming focus that gave all the attendees a common interest. Maybe it was simply that I’ve never been so interested by everything going on around me. No matter what the reason, PAX East was an incredible weekend. Every gamer should make a pilgrimage to PAX as soon as they can.

Here are some more pictures.