The American arcade scene may be coughing and wheezing, but there is a digital oasis where gamers can play the titles of yesteryear: The American Classic Arcade Museum. Nestled in Laconia, New Hampshire, the ACAM is dedicated to preserving that former pop culture staple that has come close to going the way of the do-do in recent years. I had the good fortune of meeting Gary Vincent, the president of the American Classic Arcade Museum, at the ACAM PAX East 2011 showcase. We spoke about the origins of his establishment, and the arcade scene as a whole, which you can view in the video above.
Musclebound professional wrestlers aren’t the demographic that comes to mind when one thinks of highly enthusiastic cosplayers, but Eric “The Smoke” Moran isn’t one to let macho flexing prevent good times. This gentle giant–a man who has has wrestled in professionally in the ECW, WWE, and NWA–spoke to us during PAX East 2011 about many a nerdy thing, including cosplay, 8-bit ties, and overall geek culture.
Keith Apicary may have been the first person that we interviewed at PAX East 2011 about the date-ability of a person wearing ThinkGeek’s 8-bit tie, but he wasn’t the last. We ran into Stella (a Team Fortress 2 cosplayer) on the main video game hall, who was happy to discuss the badassery of the ties, as well as what it means to be a geek in 2011
The folks behind Viewtiful Joe and Okami took the Bible, gave it to Sawaki Takeyasu and came up with an awesome-looking, Ninja Gaiden-style action platformer with puzzle elements. My mind was blown just from hearing that. Every single level has its own distinct art style; one even covers 200 years. They’re all sparing and impressionistic … except for the one that looks sort of normal and was put there to intentionally mess with the player. The platforming levels look like cell-shaded 2D – even the ones where enemies are trying really hard to kill you while you solve puzzles jumping from platform to platform. Very pretty.
PAX East 2011 may not have had a high density of cosplayers, but there were a handful of excellently garbed attendees that caught the eye. One was Paige, a cosplayer who was celebrating her honeymoon at the nation’s largest gaming convention. This “Tiny Leia” was not at all shy about the chatting us up despite the revealing outfit, and promptly shared her thoughts on PAX East and the upcoming Star Wars: The Old Republic video game.
If you didn’t get a chance to hit up PAX East this past weekend — or if you didn’t see everything you wanted to — never fear! We’ve got you covered with more pictures from the exhibition floor. Here you’ll find nerds, geeks, cosplayers, booths, Scroll down for PAXy goodness, and don’t forget to check out our other PAX East photo set. You’ll be very glad that you did.
Nestled between the large, crowd-filled booths that immediately attract eyeballs at Pax East was Autumn Games’ set up. There, I had the opportunity to sample Skullgirls, an upcoming 2D fighter developed by Reverge Labs. Skullgirls‘ fighters feature large-eyed, cutsey manga-like visuals that are comprised of 3D polygonal models. The combination results in a game that looks very much like a comic Japanese comic in motion; a comic punctuated by cool, dynamic lighting effects based on positioning and time of day.
I saw an Alpha version of the game that nicely informed me at the beginning that the final version of the game might look nothing like what I was about to see. The game opens when Jackie Estacado – now head of the Estacado crime family – comes to from black. His hand’s being pounded into a plank, crucifixion style (blood spatters across the screen as the nail crunches through flesh and bone; if you didn’t know this game was visceral, Hello!), and some creepy-looking ugly dude with a cane attempts to persuade him to give up The Darkness. Creepy guy does this by triggering memories in Jackie – and those memories form the game.
Note to video game journalists who think they have enough hours in the dojo to wax any challenger: You will lose to a developer and lose with much embarrassment. After selecting Reptile, my de facto Mortal Kombat character, I began exchanging blows with a dev that clocked over a decade’s worth of MK fighting expereince. The result wasn’t pretty, but revealed some valuable information.
Back at New York City Comic Con, I proclaimed ThinkGeek’s 8-bit tie the ultimate geek accessory due to the way that ladies flocked to the piece of cloth. They pointed, they stared, they said that it was one of the coolest things ever. Today, as PAX East 2011 kicked off, we decided to test that proclaimation by polling random attendees (which you’ll see in detail in an upcoming clip). But as we made our way through the BECE crowd, we found someone with a rather strong opinion regarding the 8-bit tie. As we queried the crowd, we encountered Talking Classics infamous Keith Apicary, the man best known for a series of hilarious retro gaming YouTube videos, and being booted out of nearly every major video game convention in the nation. In this clip, Keith proved that the 8-bit tie gives gamers an extra dose of geek machismo and the ability to sweep a lady off her feet.
