Journal Entries
Jetlagged in Seattle, part the fourth
Posted Aug 30, 2006
Sunday was a slightly less busy than the previous days were, at least until later in the day.
The second tournament I'd signed up for, Mario Kart DS was a complete and utter disaster for me. In the group of 8 I was put into I managed to finish rock bottom! I can only blame that everyone was playing as Shy Guy in order to even the odds, and I could never get the hang of Snaking.
In the Exhibition hall again I had a look round some of the other stands. I bought a few event T-shirts, as well as some Pocky for work. I also had a good look at The Behemoth/Newgrounds stand where they were demoing their new game that will be on Xbox Live Arcade soon, Castle Crashers. The best way to describe it would be to think of a cross between Golden Axe, Metal Slug and River City Ransom, but with the same graphic style as their previous titles, Alien Hominid for the PS2 and Gamecube, and the Flash game Dad N Me. Also Tom Fulp will forever be known as a renegade folk hero by out-freebie-ing the US Army, by giving away T-shirts, copies of Alien Hominid for PS2 and even some of their limited edition vinyl models .
By 3pm I started queuing for the Omegathon final, which was the best decision I'd made all day. By the time the doors opened to let everyone in, the queue had gone right up to the top floor and back down again. It was crazy full! It was around this time I had my highlight of the day, a 1 on 1 race against NOA-Andy, one of the site admins at Nintendo of America.
The Omegathon final itself was a surprise, last years runner up managed to wipe the floor with the other finalist at 1st to 30 lines Tetris. The prize he walked away with was an XBox360, plus the car it was mounted in. With all the mods and stuff they'd done to the car, they essentially doubled its price. Impressive stuff.
So that was it. I headed back to the hotel and started packing for my trip home...
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Latest reply: Aug 30, 2006
Jetlagged in Seattle, part the third
Posted Aug 30, 2006
Day 2 of PAX was just as good, if not better than the first. Straight after going in the door I headed up to the Satellite Theatre for a compilation of video game speed runs. Compared with how they look on a computer's monitor, they looked even more jaw-dropping on the giant screen with the theatre packed wall to wall with gamers cheering and applauding as the runs went on.
To get myself nicely warmed up and in-the-zone for the Tetris DS tournament I'd signed up for the previous day, I had a quick blast of Super Mario Bros on the NES down in the wireless lounge next to the Bawls stand. Surprised myself by finishing it with no lives lost, something I've not done for a long while. Not the fastest run through, but I was pleased nonetheless.
As expected though, I got well and truly trounced at Tetris. Did better than I expected to though, the top 3 players from each group were to go on to the next round, that third place spot I just narrowly missed out on. There's always next year, hopefully.
That afternoon Gabe and Tycho (the creators of Penny Arcade) did a Q&A session whilst creating this comic http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/08/30 about their proposed video game they're involved in, as well as making a few phonecalls to Scott Kurtz of PvP webcomic http://www.pvponline.com/images/news/pax_message.mp3 and to Florida "attourney" and imbecile Jack Thompson.
On the exhibition floor I was a little disappointed by the non-appearance of Nintendo's new flagship console, the Wii, that they intend to launch globally by November. They did make up for the lack of console action with an all-out bombardment of DS material that will be out by Christmas. Managed to play Starfox Command, Mario Vs DK 2, Yoshi's Island 2, Elite Beat Agents, remakes of Final Fantasy III and V, Mario Hoops 3 on 3, and others. It's also quite an odd feeling when you're trying to play Mario Vs DK2 with Princess Zelda on your left and Link on your right also playing the same game. Wish I'd got someone to get a photo of that happening. I did get a few photos (and video clips) of these and other games, but at the moment I can't upload them. Will explain why later.
Oh yeah, I may be in some videos somewhere online. A few web journos spotted my black DS lite that I had out most of the time and wanted me to demo it for them. They're not out in Japan until this weekend and not in the States until mid October, so in that respects myself and a hot Japanese girl with a pink DS lite were very minor celebrities for about 2 minutes. Unfortunately I didn't get her number.
That evening was round 4 of the Omegathon, a 1 on one rock-off between the 8 remaining entrants at a randomly chosen song in a demo version of Guitar Hero II. To open the round and the concert that followed, Tycho and Khoo of Penny Arcade shredded out to Trippin' On a Hole in a Paper Heart by Stone Temple Pilots, twice (the first time the PS2 crashed half way through). The concerts finished off the night superbly, nerdcore rapping courtesy of MC Frontalot and video game cover group The Minibosses rocking the Meydenbauer to its foundations.
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Latest reply: Aug 30, 2006
The traveller returns
Posted Aug 29, 2006
I should have been back by 8am this morning, but obviously I wasn't. It's so funny it's almost unbelieveable, so I'll wait until tomorrow to tell it and the rest of the story. Hopefully my baggage will have arrived by then too 
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Latest reply: Aug 29, 2006
Jetlagged in Seattle. Part the second
Posted Aug 26, 2006
Just got back from day one of PAX06, and what an afternoon it's turned out to be. As I'm typing this up on my psp I'll have to be brief.
I've signed up for Tetris and Mario Kart DS tournaments tomorrow and Sunday respectively. I'm going to get trounced!
Co-op play Katamari Damacy is madder than an infinite number of badger filled sacks.
Bawls (an energy drink) is nectar of the flying spaghetti monster. The slush version is nicer still. They need to ship it to the UK.
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Latest reply: Aug 26, 2006
Jetlagged in Seattle. Part the first
Posted Aug 25, 2006
Been here for about 12 hours, just woke up in fact.
The journey was a bit of a pain, the Manchester to Chicago leg was delayed by nearly two hours due to some fault on the plane. Thankfully there was another flight available a few hours later.
As soon as I checked in at the hotel I was mobbed by con attendees wanting us all to go watch Snakes on a Plane. Would've joined them but I fell asleep whilst unpacking, damn timezones...
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Latest reply: Aug 25, 2006
Zak T Duck
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