All that glisters is not gold
I have been looking forward to attending a Penny Arcade Expo since long before I was able to snag a couple tickets in the internet free-for-all that is PAX ticket sales. They sell out in mere hours, and many of them are then resold for many times their face value on the web. But the vast majority are purchased for personal use, with the envious have-nots told they should have been quicker. I wanted this to be the ultimate gamer party, a land of acceptance, nerd pride, and gamer glory. What my wife and I found was a truly cheap experience, making our $75 3-Day-Badges (which we were constantly asked to show to Enforcers) feel about as special as the plastic they are printed on.
I got a golden ticket...?
The first thing you learn about PAX tickets is that they are by far the least expensive thing about a trip to Boston. Airfare, lodging, transportation, food, hand sanitizer... it all adds up to WAY more money spent than PAX alone can make it worth the trip. Which is why my wife and I showed up a couple days early so we could take in the local sights and history of Boston. It's a beautiful city, with a high density of American heritage. Paul Revere, Ben Franklin, Samuel Adams, George Washington all spent a lot of time in Boston to say and do all the things needed to start a war with England. We walked the Freedom Trail from Boston Common to Charlestown. We stood at the site of the Boston massacre, we sat in a pew at the Old North Church, and we walked the decks of the well-preserved USS Constitution. This was worth the trip in my mind, as we had a great (thought tiring) time walking through history. Going to PAX was bit of a let down after taking in so much real meaning and culture. But that is only the beginning of the problems that adult perspective lets you see.
PAX is too many things going on at the same time, and few are done well. Let's start where we did: the Expo floor. To get in before 11am, you have to join the queue and sit on a concrete floor for... well, it depends on how long you want to wait in each line. Show up at the Convention center and wait for two hours on a cold slab, you get to be first on the Expo floor, so if you hurry (and can quickly find the booth you want to see most), you only have to wait a few minutes before you can try the 10-15 demo of the game that will be on sale in a month anyway (if it's not already available). If you choose to wait in the main queue only an hour, you might be waiting another hour in the booth queue anyway. We saw capped (maxed out) booth queues with four hour estimated wait times. That's half the day. For a 10 minute demo. I would suggest that the exhibitors don't know what the hell they are doing, but after one XBOX booth attendant rejected my suggestion how they could speed up their hands-off demo of their open beta I-could-download-it-to-my-PC-right-now "game maker" Project Spark, she told me they found the way they were doing one-on-one demos for 20+ minutes per person (at four stations) "provided a better experience." I told her waiting in line for 45 minutes watching the group demo right in front of us to be sufficient experience and promptly left the line.
There were a few nice things that happened down there. I got to meet and lose a match to a Killer Instinct game dev. We got to run around collecting pins and buttons from the various booths that were giving them away with each demo. We tried a lot of really nice indie games, some of which we will be buying instead of an XBOX. But best of all, we got to leave the expo floor, leaving it's confusing, unlabeled tape line queues and underwhelming exhibits for the next thing we heard were fun at PAX: Panels.
Walk your feet off and then sit your butt off
Good gravy, the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center is HUGE. It is, no joke, 1000 ft end-to-end, 600 ft wide, and 3.5 floors. Did I mention that I'm too old for this crap? I had already spent two days walking around Boston, and now I was going to spend 8 hours a day on my already aching feet trying to get from one theater to the next, often from one end of the BCEC to the other. This is the part of PAX no one talks about - walking and waiting take more of your time than any other activity. Nothing is worse than waiting in the expo queues, but waiting for everything started to get on my nerves. Mostly my leg nerves, because sitting on the floor isn't something people over 30 are good at anymore, and certainly not my 6-months-pregnant wife. However, the nicest people I got to meet at PAX I met in queue for a panel. The experience feels a lot like church - you're sitting too close to people you don't know, but you're both there for the same reasons. Before you know it, you're talking and joking, and you never even learn each other's names. I mean, I didn't get anyone's name the whole time we were there. The queue friendships are many, but fleeting. It helps to develop the sense of community everyone raves about PAX, but it doesn't help that half of the panels you attend aren't worth waiting for in the first place.
Some panels are made of experts in their field, but put on boring, business-like presentations. Others are just enthusiasts of one kind or another but know little about public speaking. For every panel worth attending, you get 20 minutes into the next one and start thinking "Damn, I should have gone to the panel instead!" With literally hundreds of feet between you and the next panel on your schedule, any wasted time and energy becomes a severe disappointment. Also, there weren't anywhere near enough maps or signs to find your way around easily. We got lost and disoriented over and over again for the first two days, only really getting our bearings on Sunday. It was a constant frustration that would have been very, very easy to help by printing more "You Are Here" maps and signs directing you TO the specially named theaters that you only knew you had found by standing right in front of them.
Then there was the time we got on an elevator, then 13 more people got on the elevator, then the elevator didn't make it all the way down to the next floor, so we had wait 10 minutes to be freed by maintenance men. With a guy that thought he might puke. That was... terrifying. The point is, if you're going to PAX, you can't be too prepared for anything.
You get nothing! You lose! Good day, sir!
Overall, I had a good time at PAX, but not because they made it easy. It was a maze, a hike, a sham, and my casual gamer wife had nearly nothing to do. I laughed at the Make-A-Strip panel with Gabe and Tycho in a way that made me realize why I've been a fan of their work for so long. The concerts Friday and Saturday were very nice and made up for some of the BS that we had to deal with earlier in the day. Some of the cosplay was the most detailed, intricate work I have ever seen outside of the movies. We walked away with a collection of the rarest pins that were available at the show. And the best part for me is we got to meet most of the cast of PATV's Strip Search (probably my favorite reality show ever). Every one of the artists were just as warm and fun as they were on the show, and the conversations we got to have with some of them was like talking to friends. There was also a thousand things we didn't do at all, like compete in the game tournaments, try the open console play rooms, or demo tabletop games with the vendors. In the end, my Willy Wonka theme is holding true: you can walk into PAX expecting a magical experience, but in the end you have to give up all your expectations, hand in your everlasting gobstoppers and walk out knowing there is no lifetime supply of chocolate. The only thing we went home with is a little swag and a few nice memories of a few nice people that we never would have met without Penny Arcade. Was it worth it? Barely.
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