PAX East Impression via Jessness

Boston, Massachusetts - March 26-28, 2010

Only 5 hours driving my little car up north to Boston. To the Penny Arcade Expo, a gathering dedicated to people just like me; nerdy beyond belief. Spent a small fortune between gas, parking, etc. But the memories made it well worth it.

Once I had arrived in Boston I settled into our hotel room, claimed a spot in our very packed hotel room floor and made my way over to the Hynes Convention Center. I had not packed appropriately for Boston weather – BRR.

As I picked up my media pass, I tried to take in my surroundings… I believe there are two types of geek: You have your stereotypical geeks and some people you wouldn’t have taken as a geek by face value. But it did not matter what you looked like or how much money or fame you had, on this particular weekend you were on everyone’s level. If you had even one game in common with another person, you were making friendships that could possibly last a lifetime.

Keynote

The PAX keynote was given by 2007′s keynote addresser, Will Wheaton. For those of you who may not know who Will Wheaton is, he is just like you… and uber nerd. He is best known for his role as Wesley Crusher in Star Trek: The Next Generation.

He let it be known that everything that he is… everything he has become in life, stemmed from being a geek. From his early games of Dungeons and Dragons to his tedious hours spent playing Dragon Age Origins – his lifetime of gaming has always kept him connected to others. Gaming had furthered his imagination to run wild – which he was able to use effectively in his line of work.

He goes on to say that gaming has made the friendships he still has today. He asked the audience to celebrate games and how they inspire us to do great things. I really enjoyed Wheaton’s keynote speech. He really made me even more excited to be there, as if this was a monumental moment in history about to take place.

“Gaming is the lens that focused my imagination to use it in the real world.” – Wil Wheaton

Girls in Gaming

One of the panels I was able to attend during PAX was a topic that is very dear to me; Girls in Gaming. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed by the panel. I was not disappointed with the panelists themselves since needless to say they have all been successful within the industry. I was most upset with how it ran. The room swarmed with both women trying to understand their roles and men trying to understand women – they opened the room up to a general Q&A.

The questions simply always had a common hook – whether it was woman’ sex appeal in video games, harassment online, and/or people not taking girls in the gaming world seriously, the panelists had very vague returns to the questions and undermining their authority on the subject by their lack of focus. It was a serious topic that wasn’t being took seriously. I cannot tell you the number of times I heard Bayonetta mentioned in that sitting.

Points were made about certain “girl gamer groups” that are shown as competitive gamers but are used “simply for marketing“. It was quite obvious that they were referring to Ubisoft’s girl gamer division, Frag Dolls. I myself was able to speak with both Brookelyn and Valkyrie from Ubisoft’s Frag Dolls and to be honest I felt they had more command with the topic than the panelists had throughout their whole hour.

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Many gaming companies were at PAX on the expo floor to display their upcoming games. There were many promising titles coming out, but it seemed like three games really stuck out in my mind: Monday Night Combat, Shank, and Split Second. Take a look for yourself.

Monday Night Combat – Uber Entertainment

Split Second – Disney

Overall, I had an amazing time at PAX and I’ve only brushed the surface of all that was at this convention to offer geeks everywhere. I look forward to attending PAX next year and hitting it stronger than ever.

Thank you to my Chocolate Lemon crew and all my amazing friends!