Magfest 13 (2015)
Saturday Con Report:
I was only able to go on Saturday (and could not stay late into the night), and consequently, missed a number of things that I would have enjoyed: The sega history panel, JonTron, AVGN Movie, Famikamen Rider movie, Kosoge panel, On Being Human concert, Triforce Quartet, Bit Brigade, Powerglove, DJ Battle, Hot Pepper Gaming Live, Power of Glove movie, playing more video games, tabletop gaming, and partying/hanging out.
I got to the convention a lot earlier than I had expected, on account of having misread the address. I thought I was driving to INNER harbor (in Baltimore), and was pleasantly surprised to discover it was National Harbor which was only about 20 minutes from my house. Getting there very early turned out to be a good, because it meant I didn't have to wait in line for my badge, and I could have free access to the mostly empty arcade, and even browse a few of the dealers booths who were already there and score a couple bargains.
I knew this was going to be a good convention from the very first moment I stepped onto the arcade floor, and there staring me in the face on the retro computer table was my very first computer of my childhood: The TI-99/4A, loaded up with Parsec. I played a few rounds of that, then wandered over to the pinball machines played Dr.Who, and a couple others. Next I played some arcade games: Zaxxon, Ghosts'n'Goblins, Mario Bros, Donkey Kong, Ms. Pac-man, Missile Command (so much fun with trackball), Discs of Tron (I love stepping inside the cabinet, the pepper's ghost effect on the display and the control scheme), Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (brought back a lot of nostalgia for me. I haven't seen this cab since it was in my local bowling alley almost 30 years ago. Playing it is also is what prompted me to grab the NES port in the dealers room.)
I also played Portal 2 for the first time in the console gaming room. (I am definitely going to buy that at some point!) And a couple really cool indie games:
Default Dan- A Mario-style platformer that reverses all your preconceptions, things that look good are bad. Things that look bad are good. In Default Dan, coins and prizes kill you, while falling into pits is fine and spikes act like trampolines. The hardest part of this game is overcoming your natural instincts.
Disorder- another 2d platformer where you switch back and forth between two overlayed worlds in this glitchy dream like presentation. The game forces you to do actions such as make a leap of faith and then switch worlds in midair so that the platform will appear under you. It was pretty cool.
Cosplay: I had read that MagFest was fairly light on cosplay, but in my opinion it was very plentiful. I would say that the percentage of cosplay participation was comparable to Awesome Con or Baltimore ComicCon. This was my first time going in a costume. I had the idea to dress as a contestant from the Nick Arcade contestant. Most of the pieces I ordered off Amazon, I just had to apply the show logo to the back which I did by carefully applying masking tape to the back (so that the logo would not be permanent). I was very pleased with the results. I got many compliments throughout the day and was stopped for many photographs. A couple people even thought I had might have actually been on the show and was wearing the authentic original jumpsuit from the show.
Here is my introduction during the "Super Awesome Cosplay Battle"
I loved seeing all the artistry and creativity that people put into their costumes.
There is a lot more stuff I would have loved to have purchased from the dealers room, but my wallet is probably glad that I did not.
Here is my pickups:
Nintendo Power 8 (Ducktales cover), 16 (Maniac Mansion cover)
Parody Parade graphic novel
NES: Legacy of the Wizard CIB, Jackal, Marble Madness, Indiana Jones and the Temple of doom, Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat, Metal Gear,
Genesis: Mortal Kombat II , Lawnmower man
Tournaments:
I entered a bunch of tournaments including:
the pinball tournament – which I did fairly terrible at, aside from 96 million on Revenge from Mars. Still nothing compared to the top guys. Apparently some of the top pinball players in the country were playing here.
The claw machine tournament – they spent almost 40 minutes calling attendance. That was painful. Wish they had just started. I only rescued 3 prizes in about 10 tries.
The retro gaming tournament – I made it to round 3 (out of 4). Round 1 was to last as long as you could against Mike Tyson without scoring any points (mostly just dodging) No one did particularly well on this challenge so I was right in the middle of the pack. Round 2 was to land the plane on the aircraft carrier in Top Gun. I have not played a whole lot of Top Gun, and I had never successfully done this before, however I understood the basic concept and was able to do it for the first time ever in front of a cheering crowd. That was an awesome moment. Round 3, I had the misfortune of being the first player up on a game I had never played before: Zombie Nation. I had to face an axe throwing grandpa boss. I got destroyed by him and knocked out of the tournament. Oh well.
Panels/Events: I attended the video game years live (they also showed some clips from upcoming episodes. I also attended the Hot Pepper Gaming Q&A, I'm excited to see the new competitive gaming version of their show, and I caught a few minutes of the stunt show. (I had already seen snippets of it previewed at the cosplay contest). I watched some of short films in 3d, but I ended up taking the glasses off soon after it began because the 3d effect was almost non-existant and was just making it hard to see the films. I thought this was a neat one: chalk warfare :
I also checked out the circus workshop to see who the magicians were that I might be able to jam with. I probably ended up spending too much of my limited time doing magic, but as this is one of my other main hobbies, its hard not to get carried away.
I also got play a game that was possibly the highlight of the whole convention for me: Johan Sebastian Joust!!! I had heard about this before, but this was my first time playing it. Oh my god, it was so fun. I could have been happy just playing this all day. If you are unfamiliar: Basically each player holds a Playstation Move controller (the one with the glowing orb on top). And the object is to make the other player shake their controller, by either hitting their controller, pushing or pulling on them, or causing them to move it themselves. If this happens, the light turns red and the player is out. Classical music plays in the background and the tempo alternates between slow and fast indicate the varying amount of movement that the controllers will be able to tolerate. We played 2 versions, every man for themselves, and then 4 teams of 4.
Concerts: This is one area I regret I didn't get to do more of, as there were a number of bands I would have loved to see, but by the end of the night I was starting to get a bad headache and thrashing heavy metal probably wouldn't have been the best thing for that. I did however get to catch one of the chiptunes bands, (I think it might have been Crashfaster. I was really digging their arrangement of Weezer's Say it Ain't So.
If I had gone for all of the days, I probably would have taken a more leisurely schedule, and not tried to cram so much in. (I would have also taken time out to eat meals). The only real downer for me was when I was trying to leave and I was asking about how to get the convention price for the parking, I got sent on a wild goosechase all around the hotel. Another lesson learned was that I was probably carrying too much stuff with me. I had brought a long a card game (in case I wanted to do some table top gaming), and an FC Mobile to play some NES games) This ended up being unnecessary weight. Also, I made some purchases fairly early on and did not work out any plan to drop if off somewhere, so I just hauled it around with me. As far as convention experiences go, this was a great one and I will definitely come back.
I was only able to go on Saturday (and could not stay late into the night), and consequently, missed a number of things that I would have enjoyed: The sega history panel, JonTron, AVGN Movie, Famikamen Rider movie, Kosoge panel, On Being Human concert, Triforce Quartet, Bit Brigade, Powerglove, DJ Battle, Hot Pepper Gaming Live, Power of Glove movie, playing more video games, tabletop gaming, and partying/hanging out.
I got to the convention a lot earlier than I had expected, on account of having misread the address. I thought I was driving to INNER harbor (in Baltimore), and was pleasantly surprised to discover it was National Harbor which was only about 20 minutes from my house. Getting there very early turned out to be a good, because it meant I didn't have to wait in line for my badge, and I could have free access to the mostly empty arcade, and even browse a few of the dealers booths who were already there and score a couple bargains.
I knew this was going to be a good convention from the very first moment I stepped onto the arcade floor, and there staring me in the face on the retro computer table was my very first computer of my childhood: The TI-99/4A, loaded up with Parsec. I played a few rounds of that, then wandered over to the pinball machines played Dr.Who, and a couple others. Next I played some arcade games: Zaxxon, Ghosts'n'Goblins, Mario Bros, Donkey Kong, Ms. Pac-man, Missile Command (so much fun with trackball), Discs of Tron (I love stepping inside the cabinet, the pepper's ghost effect on the display and the control scheme), Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (brought back a lot of nostalgia for me. I haven't seen this cab since it was in my local bowling alley almost 30 years ago. Playing it is also is what prompted me to grab the NES port in the dealers room.)
I also played Portal 2 for the first time in the console gaming room. (I am definitely going to buy that at some point!) And a couple really cool indie games:
Default Dan- A Mario-style platformer that reverses all your preconceptions, things that look good are bad. Things that look bad are good. In Default Dan, coins and prizes kill you, while falling into pits is fine and spikes act like trampolines. The hardest part of this game is overcoming your natural instincts.
Disorder- another 2d platformer where you switch back and forth between two overlayed worlds in this glitchy dream like presentation. The game forces you to do actions such as make a leap of faith and then switch worlds in midair so that the platform will appear under you. It was pretty cool.
Cosplay: I had read that MagFest was fairly light on cosplay, but in my opinion it was very plentiful. I would say that the percentage of cosplay participation was comparable to Awesome Con or Baltimore ComicCon. This was my first time going in a costume. I had the idea to dress as a contestant from the Nick Arcade contestant. Most of the pieces I ordered off Amazon, I just had to apply the show logo to the back which I did by carefully applying masking tape to the back (so that the logo would not be permanent). I was very pleased with the results. I got many compliments throughout the day and was stopped for many photographs. A couple people even thought I had might have actually been on the show and was wearing the authentic original jumpsuit from the show.
Here is my introduction during the "Super Awesome Cosplay Battle"
I loved seeing all the artistry and creativity that people put into their costumes.
There is a lot more stuff I would have loved to have purchased from the dealers room, but my wallet is probably glad that I did not.
Here is my pickups:
Nintendo Power 8 (Ducktales cover), 16 (Maniac Mansion cover)
Parody Parade graphic novel
NES: Legacy of the Wizard CIB, Jackal, Marble Madness, Indiana Jones and the Temple of doom, Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat, Metal Gear,
Genesis: Mortal Kombat II , Lawnmower man
Tournaments:
I entered a bunch of tournaments including:
the pinball tournament – which I did fairly terrible at, aside from 96 million on Revenge from Mars. Still nothing compared to the top guys. Apparently some of the top pinball players in the country were playing here.
The claw machine tournament – they spent almost 40 minutes calling attendance. That was painful. Wish they had just started. I only rescued 3 prizes in about 10 tries.
The retro gaming tournament – I made it to round 3 (out of 4). Round 1 was to last as long as you could against Mike Tyson without scoring any points (mostly just dodging) No one did particularly well on this challenge so I was right in the middle of the pack. Round 2 was to land the plane on the aircraft carrier in Top Gun. I have not played a whole lot of Top Gun, and I had never successfully done this before, however I understood the basic concept and was able to do it for the first time ever in front of a cheering crowd. That was an awesome moment. Round 3, I had the misfortune of being the first player up on a game I had never played before: Zombie Nation. I had to face an axe throwing grandpa boss. I got destroyed by him and knocked out of the tournament. Oh well.
Panels/Events: I attended the video game years live (they also showed some clips from upcoming episodes. I also attended the Hot Pepper Gaming Q&A, I'm excited to see the new competitive gaming version of their show, and I caught a few minutes of the stunt show. (I had already seen snippets of it previewed at the cosplay contest). I watched some of short films in 3d, but I ended up taking the glasses off soon after it began because the 3d effect was almost non-existant and was just making it hard to see the films. I thought this was a neat one: chalk warfare :
I also checked out the circus workshop to see who the magicians were that I might be able to jam with. I probably ended up spending too much of my limited time doing magic, but as this is one of my other main hobbies, its hard not to get carried away.
I also got play a game that was possibly the highlight of the whole convention for me: Johan Sebastian Joust!!! I had heard about this before, but this was my first time playing it. Oh my god, it was so fun. I could have been happy just playing this all day. If you are unfamiliar: Basically each player holds a Playstation Move controller (the one with the glowing orb on top). And the object is to make the other player shake their controller, by either hitting their controller, pushing or pulling on them, or causing them to move it themselves. If this happens, the light turns red and the player is out. Classical music plays in the background and the tempo alternates between slow and fast indicate the varying amount of movement that the controllers will be able to tolerate. We played 2 versions, every man for themselves, and then 4 teams of 4.
Concerts: This is one area I regret I didn't get to do more of, as there were a number of bands I would have loved to see, but by the end of the night I was starting to get a bad headache and thrashing heavy metal probably wouldn't have been the best thing for that. I did however get to catch one of the chiptunes bands, (I think it might have been Crashfaster. I was really digging their arrangement of Weezer's Say it Ain't So.
If I had gone for all of the days, I probably would have taken a more leisurely schedule, and not tried to cram so much in. (I would have also taken time out to eat meals). The only real downer for me was when I was trying to leave and I was asking about how to get the convention price for the parking, I got sent on a wild goosechase all around the hotel. Another lesson learned was that I was probably carrying too much stuff with me. I had brought a long a card game (in case I wanted to do some table top gaming), and an FC Mobile to play some NES games) This ended up being unnecessary weight. Also, I made some purchases fairly early on and did not work out any plan to drop if off somewhere, so I just hauled it around with me. As far as convention experiences go, this was a great one and I will definitely come back.
posted by Geo | 10:59 AM
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