PAX East 2010

This past weekend I had the opportunity to attend PAX East 2010, the first east coast installment of Penny Arcade Expo. It was, in a word, insane. It was the most catastrophically organized convention I’ve ever been to because the 62,000 attendees were just way too many for the Hynes Convention Center.

Friday

After the long NYC->Boston bus ride, the usual issues with hotel check-in, and lunch, we got into the queue line on Friday to enter the convention. The queue line stretched through two gymnasium-sized rooms, and though we arrived an hour early, there were thousands of folks in front of us. By the time we made it up to the Main Theater for Wil Wheaton’s keynote address, the doors slammed shut in our face. The fire marshal had declared the space full, and we were left out. I asked an Enforcer (what they call the volunteers who help keep things running smoothly) if it was going to be broadcast in any other rooms since there were thousands more people in line behind me, and he told me I could “probably catch it later on YouTube.” Great.

Turns out Wheaton spoiled the end of Dragon Age: Origins, so maybe I was better off anyway.

I then tried to make it to the first Penny Arcade panel, but because that was in the same room as the keynote no one left and I couldn’t make it there either. Lines were forming for panels that were two or more hours away. Seriously.

Knowing there wasn’t a chance of hitting up the Women in Gaming panel, I instead opted to head to 33 Lounge for the Kotaku meet-up. Upon arriving I found a handful of confused PAX attendees who said that the meet-up had moved to another bar. Once we got to that bar, the line stretched around the BLOCK.

So Friday I didn’t make it to a single event. Not. One.

Saturday

Pissed, frustrated, and tired, I refused to let Saturday happen the same way. I wanted to make it to the Saturday night concerts, and we were told that the first 2,000 folks in line in the morning got wristbands that guaranteed entry. Of course, the line begins at 8am, so this meant waking up at 6:30am and heading into line just after 7am. At 9:30am they finally handed out wristbands–except that upon inspection of said wristband, it revealed that it was only good for standing room on the floor–and we wanted balcony seats! Balcony seats were first-come first-served, so we were going to have to line up for several hours again that evening. All that waiting for nothing!

We were also in line for the Bill Amend panel at 10am, and we made sure that it was the right place to be–I was not missing another panel because of bad organization. Or was I! Just after we got the wristbands, a different Enforcer came by asking if any of us were hoping to go to that Amend panel. When dozens of hands shot up, his face fell and he said “Oh. Shit. Um.” We were in the wrong line. They did manage to rectify the situation, though, by escorting us upstairs to where the real line was. Of course, the people in front of us got in line at 9am. You know, two hours after we did.

It was here that I learned the convention had 62,000 people. Each of these panel rooms held about 900, and there were only two tracks of programming.

The Amend panel mostly involved him reading FoxTrot strips (no complaints here). We then queued up 90 minutes early for the Penny Arcade Make-A-Strip demo/Q&A, and managed to get good seats for that. Mike and Jerry are funny, humble, and totally engaging. Watching Mike draw was just mesmerizing, and Jerry knew exactly how to handle even the weirdest, most obnoxious query.

After that we headed to the open console gaming section, and since none of us had a PS3 we opted to try that out. Over the course of the weekend I was able to see God of War III (SO COOL), Uncharted 2 (bleh), Bayonetta (what…what?!), Heavy Rain (the first 30 minutes of which is basically The Sims), Little Big Planet (infuriatingly stupid), and Street Fighter IV (what it says on the tin). We also entered a Rock Band competition (and lost, hilariously).

By 6:30pm it was time to queue up again for balcony seating (yaaaaaay), but we were very close to the front of the line. The doors didn’t open for actual seating until after 8pm, and shortly before that two folks with wristbands came up to the front of the line, right by us, and cut the line. We complained to the Enforcer that we had been very explicitly told that wristbands didn’t grant special permissions up here (and everyone in line waved their wristbands, because we weren’t the only ones), and that they should properly be going to the back of the line. He disagreed, though, so they cut the line right next to us. INFURIATING.

A classic example of the disorganization, by the way: one Enforcer came by and told us all, who were sitting against the wall, to bunch up about six across and scootch in. We did so. Literally 10 seconds later another Enforcer told us to sit against the wall single-file. AHHHHHH

My rage abated once we realized we were getting front row center balcony seats for the show, which started several hours later. The first act was Video Game Orchestra, which is exactly what it sounds like. They played medleys from Final Fantasy, Castlevania, Super Mario Bros., and Chrono Trigger, among others, and they were all really fantastic. At the end the crowd cheered for an encore, but the group’s leader sheepishly admitted that they didn’t have any other songs! So they repeated one of their songs for us.

Following them were Paul & Storm, who are hilarious and wonderful and, if you ask me, much better performers than their headliner, Jonathan Coulton. JoCo played a good set, though, and this time he seemed to actually rehearse. (The last show of his we saw he kept having to start over because he hadn’t practiced. Seriously.)

The concerts went until 2am, and by the time I drowsily returned to the hotel room, I collapsed almost immediately.

Sunday

I had set an alarm to get up early for the “An Awkward Hour With Rock Band Designers” panel, but slept right through it. We packed up to check out, and headed back to the convention mostly for the Expo and open gaming. We did make it to the second Penny Arcade panel, which was just as much fun as the Make-A-Strip panel.

Sunday was what PAX should have been. It had about half the attendees of the previous day, aisles were full but not claustrophobically so, and we were able to duck in and out of panels without absurd queues. Waits for games in the open gaming rooms were about 20 minutes, which was fine, and we even managed to try out some Left 4 Dead 2 on the PC.

In terms of the Expo Hall, I got a peek at some 3-D gaming demos (Just Cause 2), Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, and Just Dance, a Wii dancing game. I was too late to catch the Civ V demo, but apparently you didn’t actually get to touch the thing, so meh. The big winner of the day was Intel, whose Game On contest finally came to fruition with some swag: I got a T-shirt (“Life’s a Glitch”), a hat (“Geek is Chic”), and a really nice ceramic mug (“Rock out your inner core”).

Damn I need a new computer.

All in all, the parts of the convention I actually got to attend were fantastic. I didn’t make it to many panels, but I really liked the vibe there. People were mostly young, excitable, and nerdy. There was no clique feeling at all. I didn’t feel weird as a woman (it was at least 40% women there). I felt welcome.  I liked that in long lines you could log into Pictochat on your DS and chat with folks, and huge groups of strangers were sharing Pokemon, and occasionally someone in a killer costume would walk by. (There was a Bayonetta there. INSANE.)

So would I go again? I’d love to, but if they don’t either find a bigger space or limit the number of badges, not a chance in hell. That was an expensive weekend of waiting in lines, getting up early for no reason, being herded to and fro to no purpose, and getting locked out 90% of programming.

Rumor has it that they’re aware of the issues and definitely moving the convention next year. If that’s the case, I will definitely be there.

2 Comments

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  By BSD, March 31, 2010 @ 8:56 am

  So I imagine you don’t want to borrow my copy of Bayonetta, then?

• 

  By Torie, March 31, 2010 @ 10:05 am

  @ BSD

  Hahaha. No thank you. That game is ridiculous. I love how they couldn’t even bother to animate cut scenes, so it’ll be a still image with voiceover, as if it were the early 90s.

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