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PAX 2006 Recap

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the even-that-was dept.

Above and beyond the announcement of their videogame last Friday, PAX apparently passed pleasantly for the PA fans who made it to Bellvue, WA this past weekend. Various news organs have a look at what transpired. eToyChest has a journal of each day, with firsthand accounts and lots of pictures. Gamasutra covers the Penny Arcade Scholarship announced at the event; $10k towards an education to get yourself into the games industry. Kotaku was there to liveblog the keynote, while Joystiq covers the making a comic panel. For wrap-up, we have an IGN report, and the ever exhaustive 1up minisite for everything you'd want to know.

28 comments

  1. Ok I Admit by neonprimetime · · Score: 1, Interesting

    I didn't read the article(s), but that is because there were 7 frickin' links!

    Don't you love it when people can get along though!

    Not only was it a celebration of the popular webcomic, which enjoys its rep of mercilessly skewering the gaming industry, but it also marked a convergence of interests: table-top gamers standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Nintendo fans hoping against hope that the Wii would be playable in some dark corner of the exhibition hall.

    1. Re:Ok I Admit by stoolpigeon · · Score: 1

      i'm hoping some dotters who made it will post their own pics, links, etc.

      --
      It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
    2. Re:Ok I Admit by RiotNrrd · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Here ya go!

      It's small but it is about 30 mins after the doors opened. Please ignore the stuff in my teeth. I'll try to upload some more later.

      For pics, I got three:

      Tycho and Gabe
      One half of one of the LAN rooms at PAX
      Me + Frag Dolls

      The entire con was a blast. Jerry and Mike were EXTREMELY polite. They got mobbed everywhere that they went and they did everything that they could to try to spend a few minutes speaking with as many people as possible. The Enforcers were incredibly cool and very helpful. If you get the chance to go next year, DO IT.

  2. cool by stoolpigeon · · Score: 1

    i would love to have gone - and i'm not even really much of a gamer. these guys do such a good job of giving more context to the whole scene that it helps solidify it as a culture. the comic presents this life that i'll never get to live but can dream about. just hanging out, playing games and in general not worrying about reality. (and i'm not saying i want that life-- i think the reality would not be the dream, but that's the point of most escapism i think)

    --
    It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
    1. Re:cool by Lovedumplingx · · Score: 1

      Amen. Who has time for that type of lifestyle outside of college. But going still would have been a lot of fun.

    2. Re:cool by twistedsymphony · · Score: 1

      I was pissed, I have family in Bellvue, I could have walked to the convention center from there, but I had a big project at work that I had to get completed so I missed out.. maybe next year...

      --
      Collector's Edition
    3. Re:cool by kv9 · · Score: 1

      Amen. Who has time for that type of lifestyle outside of college. But going still would have been a lot of fun.

      going away for a weekend... yeah, that's fucking crazy! $DEITY forbid you should take a little vacation from time to time and not feel guilty about it.

      --
      Stop Computers/Cars Analogies on S
  3. Panel! by Rob+T+Firefly · · Score: 3, Funny
    while Joystiq covers the making a comic panel.
    After only two or three more cons, attendees will have made enough panels to make a full strip!
    --
    Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
    1. Re:Panel! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      After only two or three more cons, attendees will have made enough panels to make a full strip!
      Attendees were only required to make one Ziggy panel.
  4. Pax 2006 by HeWhoRoams · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I was in attendence this year, it was a blast. You felt out of place if you didn't have a DS however, so friday night I got one from the local bestbuy. That place was a barren wasteland. Empty shelves, depleted stock, I got 1 of the 2 last DS's they had. The Tabletop room at the Red Lion was great, and it definitly benefitted from having it's own location. The smell... was not as bad as I was lead to believe, but not flowers by any means. Lots of free swag, demo's, contests, and raffles. Bawl's was everywhere... til they sold out, but Sno-bawl's was excellent! I took a few pictures, but haven't had a chance to digitize them and upload yet. Next year's bigger location in Seattle should make it an even bigger and more enjoyable event, and I highly recommend that video game inclined persons make it out at least once

  5. Bellevue, WA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    n/t

  6. Half a decade? by Guysmiley777 · · Score: 1

    Ok, I think PAX sounds like awesome fun, wish could have made it. All of the articles really make the event seem like a really great thing. But one quote from one of the multitude of articles stuck in my craw a little.

    As a journalist it's very easy to get jaded, and after more than half a decade of writing about games professionally

    More than half of a whole decade!? I guess it sounds much longer than "5 years" somehow? Honestly, someone is taking themselves a little too seriously.

    --
    Coding with assembly is like playing with Legos. Coding an application in assembly is like building a car with Legos.
    1. Re:Half a decade? by cowscows · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't know. I really don't mean to crap on video game journalists, but as much as I enjoy video games, I don't think that I'd find spending five years writing about them particularly satisfying.

      Turning a hobby into a job is a pretty good way to turn it into something you don't enjoy very much. And while playing video games can be fun, it's not the most productive thing in the world. I guess my point is, in the grand scheme of things, how much does this guy's job really matter? Maybe he feels that it's more important than that, or maybe he just does it for the money. I don't know. It reminds me of people who report on what celebrities wear to the academy awards or whatever. Sure, they sell magazines, and they're probably getting a decent paycheck. But at the end of the day, how can they really be satisfied with how trivial the result is of what they do with the bulk of their time. I would find that work soul crushing, no matter how much I got paid.

      --

      One time I threw a brick at a duck.

    2. Re:Half a decade? by twistedsymphony · · Score: 1

      I can't imagine being a video game journalist is anywhere near as bad as spending the same amount of time as a faceless cube hermit at generic software company... I don't care HOW long you've been doing it.

      Also the fact that you assume someone who makes a career out of a hobby ruins the hobby because work = sucks leads me to believe you've never had a job doing something you loved. As someone who used to work doing something I loved, for years in-fact, I can tell you that yes I did have my days where I just didn't want to be there, but on a whole I was far more happy then I am doing something that's not related to one of my hobbies.

      As for why I'm not still doing that, honestly I'd love to be but it doesn't actually pay well enough for me to survive in the manor in which I'm accustomed... turning a hobby into a career is probably one of the most rewarding (in terms of happiness) life choices someone can make.

      --
      Collector's Edition
    3. Re:Half a decade? by cowscows · · Score: 1

      Well, I've never worked at a software company, but I have heard plenty of horror stories about the corporate world sucking the life out of people. So maybe those jobs suck too. I guess if you assume that for some people, work is just going to completely suck regardless, doing something like writing about video games is a relatively bearable version of suck.

      Also, I guess I didn't properly explain what I was trying to say about the hobby thing. The point I was trying to get across is along the lines of, just because something makes a good and fun hobby doesn't necessarily mean that it would make a fulfilling career. And while I accept that different people have different requirements for feeling "fulfilled", writing about video games seems like one of those things where I wouldn't be surprised if someone doing it for a while felt like something was lacking in their life.

      Not all hobbies are created equal. One of my hobbies when I was younger was drawing buildings. And now I'm an architect, and for the most part, I'm quite happy. Like you, there are plenty of days in which I'm tempted to just stay home, but when I'm working on an interesting building, the thought of it one day existing as steel and concrete and being inhabited by dozens/hundreds/thousands of people is pretty damn motivating to me. At the end of the week, I can look back, and see something coming into existance that I feel has a lot of value. Not only to myself, but to humanity as a whole. That's a bit idealistic and vague, but it's basically how I feel.

      Writing about video games can be fun and interesting. I do it reasonably often on slashdot infact. But I just don't think it would be very fulfilling to do for a living. It just seems like the sort of job where, if everyone paid to do it stopped doing it tomorrow, the world would go on just fine without them. If IGN, Gamespy, and all the rest disappeared this instant, I'd still be able to find plenty of unpaid people writing about video games just for the heck of it, and I'm more inclined to find their opinions believable because the "real" video game media is so heavily influenced by publishers and developers.

      My original comment wasn't meant to be taken as broad statements on career choices. Just an explanation as to why I think it's perfectly reasonable for a "video game journalist" to be so jaded after only a few years.

      --

      One time I threw a brick at a duck.

    4. Re:Half a decade? by jchenx · · Score: 1
      Not all hobbies are created equal. One of my hobbies when I was younger was drawing buildings. And now I'm an architect, and for the most part, I'm quite happy. Like you, there are plenty of days in which I'm tempted to just stay home, but when I'm working on an interesting building, the thought of it one day existing as steel and concrete and being inhabited by dozens/hundreds/thousands of people is pretty damn motivating to me. At the end of the week, I can look back, and see something coming into existance that I feel has a lot of value. Not only to myself, but to humanity as a whole. That's a bit idealistic and vague, but it's basically how I feel.

      Writing about video games can be fun and interesting. I do it reasonably often on slashdot infact. But I just don't think it would be very fulfilling to do for a living. It just seems like the sort of job where, if everyone paid to do it stopped doing it tomorrow, the world would go on just fine without them. If IGN, Gamespy, and all the rest disappeared this instant, I'd still be able to find plenty of unpaid people writing about video games just for the heck of it, and I'm more inclined to find their opinions believable because the "real" video game media is so heavily influenced by publishers and developers.

      You could say this about the video game industry in general. I've definately heard the argument that a lot of good talent is "wasted" on video games, when it could be better off on something "meaningful" like new research to cure X, or working on technology to make people's lives better, etc. (FYI, I happen to work in the games industry, and I'm pretty sure some of my old CS professors think of me in this way)

      To me, my job is to make people happy. Games are just one form of entertainment that everyone seeks out in some way or another. True, it may not be as important as building a house, but I still think it's important nonetheless. Besides, building a house may affect a family or two, whereas the work I'm doing literally affects millions. (Scary if you think about it, heh)

      On the flip-side, I used to work as a government contractor (and I have many friends who currently are one), and some of the projects you're given are sooooo useless, and sometimes you just want to kill yourself for wasting so much taxpayer money on the most useless projects. Or you work on military projects where your job is essentially to help people kill other people faster, better, and more efficiently, which is really quite morbid.

      So comparitively speaking, working in games is pretty fulfilling. :)
      --
      -- jchenx
    5. Re:Half a decade? by cowscows · · Score: 1

      You could say that, but I wouldn't. Making games is different, because well, you're making something. I love games, and I appreciate the effort that goes into them. Entertainment is a legit human need, and I don't think entertainers or artists or game designers/programmers/whatever are necessarily wasting time.

      I also think that journalism, in general, is an important and admirable profession. It's just that there are some topics that really, in the grand scheme of things, don't matter enough to be fulfilling. I know that not everyone is going to change the world in some big way, but I like to think that all those hours I put into work are going to leave the world with something substantial and beneficial.

      Even though the speed at which software development happens nowadays means that games are pretty quickly obsolete, everything builds on what came before it, so you're at least involved in a creative and continuing process. But I don't think video game journalism adds much to the equation. I'm sure some people who are involved in it would beg to differ, but I just don't see them having much impact on the industry which they owe their existance to. They're just sort of there.

      I think being involved in video game design could be totally awesome. Sadly I don't have the patience or skill to be an artist, and looking at code for more then 15 minutes makes my eyes glaze over. And sadly, no one's going to hire me off the street to be a game designer, no matter how cool I think my ideas are.

      --

      One time I threw a brick at a duck.

    6. Re:Half a decade? by jchenx · · Score: 1
      Even though the speed at which software development happens nowadays means that games are pretty quickly obsolete, everything builds on what came before it, so you're at least involved in a creative and continuing process. But I don't think video game journalism adds much to the equation. I'm sure some people who are involved in it would beg to differ, but I just don't see them having much impact on the industry which they owe their existance to. They're just sort of there.

      I definately think they're having an impact, although it's debatable whether its overall a good or bad one. :)

      To me (and I'm a total outsider when it comes to anything journalistic, so take my comments with a grain of salt), it seems like there are two areas of journalism. There are those who cover large topics that people ought to know about (world news, social issues, important scientific discoveries, etc.), and then those who cover the not-so-important stuff, such as sports, off-beat things, TV/movies, and games. (And obviously there's a lot of gray area in between as well; there is definately not a fine line here)

      I agree with your sentiment. If ESPN, IGN, or E! or ceased to exist, the topics they covered would still be there. There would be sports, there would be games, and there would be TV shows. So having that type of journalism isn't necessary. Having people there to cover them, though, definately does provide exposure and increases popularity, which has its benefits and disadvantages. And it's gotten to the point that people are entertained by the articles and reporters themselves. So it's become it's own mini-entertainment industry. (Just wait until you have journalists that cover what other journalists do!)

      I think the blogging scene is going through a similar issue. How important is a blogger? Is it journalism? If no one reads your blog, even if it's the most poignant and informative thing on the Net, does it matter? Or rather, what if no one links to it?
      --
      -- jchenx
    7. Re:Half a decade? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Get a room you two.

    8. Re:Half a decade? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      "On the flip-side, I used to work as a government contractor (and I have many friends who currently are one), and some of the projects you're given are sooooo useless, and sometimes you just want to kill yourself for wasting so much taxpayer money on the most useless projects. Or you work on military projects where your job is essentially to help people kill other people faster, better, and more efficiently, which is really quite morbid. So comparitively speaking, working in games is pretty fulfilling. :)"
      Fulfilling to you. Comparing how satisfying various jobs are is never a conversation worth having. Look at how this thread originally got started - someone made a slightly critical remark about game journalists and offended someone else. Why don't we just agree to say that some people enjoy their jobs and some people don't. Any discussion beyond that is only inciting others.
  7. It's cool to see two people... by casualsax3 · · Score: 1
    ... take something like gaming and really turn it into something better - between this and ChildsPlay, it's nice to have these guys around.

    BTW, does anyone actually have a link to the mentioned strip?

    1. Re:It's cool to see two people... by L-Train8 · · Score: 2, Informative

      The article erroneously says it was Monday's strip. Gabe and Tycho made several strips in advanced, so they wouldn't have to work on comics while PAX was going on. Monday's strip was the last of those premades. The strip created at PAX will be up tomorrow. The link will be http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/08/30

      --

      Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
  8. Better Blog than the one's posted: by ghaltmann · · Score: 2, Interesting

    http://www.gamehelper.com/pax06/index.html has videos of not only gabe tycho and Khoo but of Gabe and tycho's WIVES... because we know you want to see that. Also there's an interesting video of the PAX line. I thought it was better. I also created it.

  9. No Love For Sony by L-Train8 · · Score: 4, Informative

    There was no love for Sony at the PAX this year. At the first Penny Arcade panel, an audience member took the mike and asked the crowd who had a DS. Over half the 2000 or so people in the room cheered or held up their actual DS. He then asked how many had PSP's, and the cheer was pretty small, maybe 1/4 or 1/5 of the DS response.

    Minutes later, Gabe was asked what he thought about the PlayStation 3. He replied, "We won't be getting one at launch. It (the price) is ridiculous, and they need to know it's ridiculous." He added, "The future of gaming is the Wii-60," meaning, I guess, a combination of the XBox 360 and the Wii.

    Microsoft and Nintendo also both had big booths (although Nintendo was only showing DS games, nothing for the Wii), but Sony didn't show up. It helps that both Microsoft and Nintendo have their headquarters a short 5 minutes from the venue, but there was zero Sony presence.

    --

    Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
    1. Re:No Love For Sony by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There was zero Sony presence because they called to request booth space 2 months ago, and the Exhibition Hall sold out in February...

  10. The Wizard! by PSXer · · Score: 1

    What, nobody mentions the real reason to go to PAX, The Wizard? Unfortunately, the audience participation this year and last were nowhere near as good as it was in '04. Hell, back in 04 I skipped a chance to play Halo 2 to see The Wizard. It was so worth it.

    The panels, tournaments (I'm not that good) and freeplay rooms were good, I suppose, but just hanging out with a DS was awesome. There were so many DSes being used, in fact, that it was hard to play without getting a connection error even if you were right next to the other people you were playing, unfortunately. Pictochat was awesome if you could get past the aformentioned connection issues and you were lucky enough not to be chatting at a time when ten people all think it's the height of comedy to draw dicks.

    I brought my PSP but never really had a chance to use it. Maybe if the number of PSP games that supported single disc play was anywhere near the number of DS games that support single cart play, that'd be different.

    The Omegathon (6 or so game contest spread over all 3 days among a handpicked few lucky contestants) ended anticlimactically. I waited in line at least an hour to see the final, and it was just a guy who wasn't that good at tetris (Tengen, baby!) vs. a guy who absolutely sucked. The prize was a car. I really thought it should be game related like the last two years, but I suppose the car manufacturer paid them or something.

    Also, the Guitar Hero II omegathon round was weird. They started demonstrating Trippin' on a hole in a paper heart on expert and said the contestants were FUCKED. The contestants then preceded to play games on medium difficulty. Boring! (Then again, seeing them miss every note probably wouldn't be that exciting either)

    As for the concerts, same old, same old. The videogame pianist (guy who played the mario theme in a blindfold), Optimus Rhyme, the NESkimos, MC Frontalot, and the Minibosses. Hell, I don't think they even played a single song I haven't heard before. In one of the panels, they said they're trying to get Freezepop, so let's see how that goes.

    I didn't like the expo room that much. I was expecting a PS3 or Wii or something. There was a few good things (Guitar Hero II, the DS holiday linup), but there was also a lot of stuff I just didn't care about, like some guy promoting Fury with a mic turned up so high that you could hear it just about anywhere in the room. Also, the Army made a big appearance. I really don't see what they think that game'll do, though. "Gee, looks like fighting a war is really hard, and you can't respawn!"

    The worst part: They ran out of Bawls bottles near the end of the second day, and the Snobawls (like Bawls slurpees) took like an hour to make, and each time they would run out in like five minutes. How am I supposed to stay up three days for no reason without Caffeine?

    Thank god it'll actually be somewhere in civilisation next time. Bellevue? Bah!. Downtown Seattle's where it's at.

    1. Re:The Wizard! by ShadowsHawk · · Score: 1

      Seems like there wasn't a single item that you really enjoyed about PAX. Why did you go again?

    2. Re:The Wizard! by PSXer · · Score: 1

      Because I'm not psychic and didn't know that I wouldn't like it as much this year as I did previous years, duh.

      Actually, both PA panels were awesome (as well as the one where they showed us how they make the cartoons and we gave out suggestions for today's strip) Also, Beat the Pros, where you get to watch random guys who were standing in like take on pros at Soul Calibur III and Halo 2 was pretty fun to watch. They also showed a guy who got over 3 million points in geometry wars before he purpousfully died so we could get on with the rest of the show.

      Should be a lot better next year because it'll be in a much bigger venue so it might be possible to move around a little.