Whew! I just crawled out of my Vita-Chamber, refreshed and revitalized. With a little help from our friends at Synthetic Insights I have the necessary augmentations to cope with life post PAX. Penny-Arcade Expo 2011 was a transcendent experience of nerdery comparable to none. I experienced a level of dorky satisfaction that I have never found anywhere else. If I were to try to appraise you of all the events thoughts and feelings I experienced in this higher plane, there would not be room enough on the internet. So I will present only a meager few photos with captions. This will hopefully give s great a glimpse into the super-reality of PAX as an uninitiated mind can handle, and help fellow PAXers to re-experience it for a moment.
Thursday night kicked off with the Tri-Wizard House Drinking Tournament for the Child's Play Charity. We were in Dumbledore's Army Slytherin House.
1/8 of the line for the Keynote followed by Q&A with Gabe and Tycho.
Bizarre challenges were the order of the day at this year’s PAX. It basically boiled down to how much weird stuff you were willing to do to score great swag.
The 'Fake Your Death With Promo Code Visible' challenge.
The 'Make a Mustache Out of Anything' challenge for Fire Fall. The first of eight challenges for each day.
The 'Spell Fire Fall With Your Friends' challenge.
The 'Accost a Fire Fall Employee and Take Your Picture With Them' challenge
After About a million challenges, 90% of which were from the Fire Fall booth, there came the grandeur and adornment of the expo itself.
Me partially obscuring the giant statue of a Fire Fall resource extractor and two soldiers.
A very real and functional WWII tank driven by a pair of models in Nazi uniforms advertising the new Tank Shooter 'World of Tanks.'
A statue of Marcus from Gears of War 3.
A giant Frost Dragon looking over the Skyrim booth. Sorry my new computer doesn't have photo shop yet so this picture is super dark.
A statue of Drizzt at the D&D booth. Believe it or not he's a good guy.
Drizzt's Panther companion. Katelyn played him in a D&D demo and got him killed. Way to go Katelyn.
Statue of a Mage from Magic the Gathering's booth.
No less colorful than the statuary were the cosplayers, arguable a valid reason to attend PAX in itself.
Buzz Lightyear cosplayer had such a good outfit I thought he was a booth model till the second day.
The Bio Shock booth model in need of saving from a giant hand. Anyone who needs to stand in one spot for eight hours in heels sure needs saving.
You can't have party without inviting the Brotherhood of Friendship.
Sorry dude, you're not juicing anywhere near enough to be in Gears of War.
Every year there are Halo cosplayers, and every year I'm ok with it. 'A' for effort.
Cosplaying Final Fantasy is all well and good, but why would you copslay the worst character? Kimari looks cool but lacks mojo.
Commander Shepherd booth Model for Mass Effect 3. People were pissed that Shepherd was portraid as a woman. I guess they forgot you can play as either gender.
Ah Mortal Combat, ye olde standbye.
Princess Peach looking for Mario. Sadly Mario had a crap costume and didn't make the cut.
Portal 2 cosplay couple. Aint love grand!
A Zombie Nurse booth model for some Kinect horror-survival game. She was super creapy but looked away at the last moment. Interesting but not interesting enough to try for another shot.
A War Hammer 40k Space Marine cosplayer. His outfit was so good I thought he might be a booth model. Then I got closer and realized his underwhelming size was probably not what Games Workshop had in mind when they concieved the zealots who will rule the universe with fire in a few thousand years.
One cosplayer reaches out and rubbs the tummy of another in what was litterally a croud-stoppingly awkward interaction. Cosplay nerds = not smooth.
A bunch of ninjas pose in front of a Cygnar War-jack at the Privateer Press booth.
There was so much judicious gaming that I took very few pictures. As one would assume.
Katelyn and I playing a D&D board game designed to draw you deeper into the web of nerdery. At last we have our hooks in you Katelyn. The board game today, a bag of dice and Mountain Dew tomorrow and FOREVER!!
Our party of heroes including Drizzt and his panther. Moments before Katelyn leads him to his doom in a spray of lava.
Zombie Dice, best brainless game ever.
I convinced a booth model to give me her gun for a picture at the WAR Inc booth. And yes, I am wearing a paper D&D crown.
My rating of the whole event.
So there it is folks. A hearty thanks to all my friends who made this year’s PAX awesome, and a hearty huzzah to Gabe and Tycho for the game changing web comic that started all this craziness!
Thanks for inviting me along! I feel like my nerd education would be more complete after hanging with you guys for a full three days at PAX. But there was a very nice nerd who stood in line with me to crack the SquareEnix safe who explained the difference between the FinalFantasy games and a swift blow to the genitals. I’m still not sure which one he said would be more desirable, but I do feel like a more rounded individual now.
I have no understanding of pen and paper/board game/card game RPG’s, and I’d always assumed they were a fringe/niche market with very little in the way of paying customers. I guess the thousand square foot castle booth for DnD changed that perception pretty drastically. Mayhaps you and Commodre Reilly can teach me more, although I’ll be the first to admit that I’m still skeptical that they can be fun.
By: The artist formerly known as Truckin on August 30, 2011
at 5:17 pm