THE MAGFEST ADVENTURE
October 31st-November 2nd, 2003
(as told by Tim Ekkebus)
Friday
We finished up the rough, and I do emphasize ROUGH cut of RCR together at 1:30AM and then headed out the door for MAGFest. Myself, Yuleya, and Chad
rode in his car as Team Yoshimitsu and Rory, Juese and Steve were in his car as
Team Lizard Man. We hit the PA Turnpike about 3 hours into the trip and let me tell you
what crap it is compared to the NYS Thruway. It is CRAP. The entrance ramp was more of a
deserted construction site out of a survival horror game than the on to what should have
been the best kept road in PA. Furthermore, it's mind boggling as to why the turnpike isn't in
better condition considering the tolls are at least twice what they are in NY. Bah.
(Chad note) - We hit some sort of large metal object while passing through the deserted tollgates. Scared the crap out of my car.
Anyway, we stopped, got gas, then headed back on the road - leaving PA at about daybreak around 7 in
the morning. Stopped for gas again where Chad was verbally berated by Team Lizard Man for
some abrupt lane changing over the course of the past 3 hours of driving. Back on the
road, hit some traffic in Washington DC which in turn almost caused Steve to rear-end us. Whoops.
We finally safely arrived at the Clarion Hotel in which MAGFest was housed a little before
noon on Friday after a 10 hour drive. We got checked in, registered with the con and
got into the game room to find....not much happening...a few dealers scattered about the room
and lots of games being played. All in all it was pretty sparse but things were just beginning. Around 2pm I found that the opening ceremonies hadn't taken place yet so really the con itself
hadn't really begun either.
After aquiring a $40 audio cable so we could link the video projector
in the main event room to the huge sound system (supplied by Swampgas of Zophar's Domain)
the con was ready to rock. Everyone was called upstairs for opening ceremonies and this
is where things really started rolling. All the guests introduced themselves as well as the
staff, and then after wrenching the microphone from an over-excited DJ Potato the River
City Rumble premiere was underway!
How did it go over? Good, they tell me. I honestly have no clue as I was running up
and downstairs to participate in the F-Zero GX tournament which was being constantely delayed
by power outages until they finally got things wired up proper. I still lost the tourney,
which was run by a guy dressed as Link (also known as Hyperfusion around the net). I ran
back upstairs to catch the latter half of a Hollywood Squares type game featuring guests
of the con uncluding Steve dressed as Slayer from Guilty Gear XX and Rory as a Tonberry of
FF fame. Highlights included Steve messing with contestants, Rory messing with Robert Aldrich,
and virt doing some "Name that Tune" style stuff. He also subtely initiated a random battle
so I was forced to fight Rory until eventually I fell to a vicious doink from his X/O card.
I then had to make way downstairs for the Puzzle Fighter tournament which I was
almost sure I could win until Justin Wong from Empire Arcadia put the whup on me and went on
to win the tournament. Meanwhile, I was missing the costume contest. The conglomeration of
Chad (Gasper), Juese (Maxmillian Roivas), Rory and Steve managed to win the Technical Award
for a skit involving all 4 of their characters. After that we kind of dispersed throughout
the hotel. I did a bit of filming for the doc, Yuleya and Rory did some gaming. I talked
a bunch with Bobby of Virtual Fools fame. Also got a bunch of good reviews on River City Rumble
as I gave out business cards across the game room. Finally, I begrugedly went to bed and that was
the end of a very long 34 hour day.
Saturday
Yeah, well, the beginning of Saturday sucked due to an overly long adventure to an
overly priced Waffle House with overly crappy food. Chad was the only one who stayed behind
and taped virt's presentation which I can atest was very good after reviewing the footage.
I rolled in just in time to catch the Q&A with the Minibosses who were well on their way
to becoming quite intoxicated.
From there up until the concert it was a whirlwind of
interviews and tournaments, with way too much stuff going on to be a part of all of it. We talked
with every guest present. DJ Potato turned out to be a really cool guy after being all loud and crap the first day. He was showing off his latest creation, DDR Eric Mix 3 which was getting a shitload of play. He also told us of some upcoming projects including
a side scrolling beatem up starring famous movie characters. Talked to all the bands about their various trials and tribulations in getting to MAGFest and whatnot. All a bunch of really cool guys.
We also got to talk more in depth with a group called Empire Arcadia out of NYC. They were
there at the fest to help try to promote video game fandom in general by holding different events,
competing in the tournaments and generally interacting with all the fans present. This led a lot
of people including us to believe that they were just going to show off
how much better they were at games than us- but that turned out be totally not the case. They were all a bunch
of very cool people who did everything but stick out. Half the time I didn't even notice I was hanging
out with one of them. They also brought an artist with them, Zero G, and let me tell you that man can draw. He had an extensive portfolio of prints and drew anything on commission (see the picture of
Yoshimitsu and Lizard Man in a flying car for evidence).
As I mentioned previously, the group included
Justin Wong, the 3 time WORLD CHAMPION of Marvel vs Capcom 2, east coast champion of Capcom vs Snk 2
and a bunch of other crap. He kicked my ass at Puzzle Fighter but I did manage to beat him at Soul Calibur 2. [ Odd factoid, Jason was the only person I've met so far who owned an N-Gage ] But yeah top to bottom all
very cool people. You can contact the leader of the bunch, Isaiah, for more information.
It was all such a blur. Playing games and interviewing fans, and then finally we come to the
concert. Oh my, the concert. It was opened by DJ Potato who was...decent for an opening act. I don't think
the audience particularily appreciated his rhymes but whatever. It was all in good fun.
Then Wave Theory took the stage. Well half of them at least. Only A Rival (AE) and Digimatic had made the long trip out from Oakland. Honestly I was a little skeptical at the time. Would AE's mixes translate well to the
live performance? Would they be able to hold it down with only half the band? The answer: hell fucking yes. They took the stage and rocked the house so hard shit literally fell from the ceiling. AE breakdanced
in the crowd and did handstands on the amps as well as busted a HILARIOUS freestyle, taking
game suggestions from the audience. Their entire set included Simon's Quest, Quickman with the Quickness,
Schala's theme, Flashfire and 8-bit Pimp, an original rap that was excellent. During the post
show interview AE let us in on the fact it was their first show as a band which was really amazing.
After Wave Theory it was Smash Bros time- a band composed of virt, Ailsean, prozax,
Midee and Matt Pollard. They opened with a medely of the Zelda theme and Writhe in Pain from
Guilty Gear, one of Rory's favorite tunes. Then I don't know whether it was by coincidence or
design they busted out with an AMAZING take on the town theme from River City Ransom and HELL
YES it is going in the movie. Lessee, then Matt Pollard popped on stage and busted a
Kirby rap with virt which I don't think the crowd got into nearly enough. Then back to the rocking
Blaster Master level 1, Magnet Man and closing with an improved Zelda underworld with a
fantastic violin solo from Jason Zaffrey (Midee). All in all probably the best set of the night
based on the fact that every song was a surprise.
Now the moment most everyone had been waiting for- The Minibosses. While there were
no surprise songs in there set, hearing their music live was like a dream come true. No
more canned live recordings on my computer - this was the real thing and it rocked everyone. You could feel the entire room shaking. A mosh put broke out during some particularily rocking
songs- I myself hopped in during the Goonies theme. How many people can say they moshed to
Cyndi Lauper? Not many.
Most people would say Metroid was the best song of the set and it
probably was but I personally cared more for the final stage of Double Dragon and the Contra
medley. It was also great during some of the slower songs people got out their lighters, then
some celphones, then finally some GBA SPs burned outward from the crowd. How incredibly
appropriate. While there weren't any surprises it was a real treat to hear the Minibosses live
after all these years.
Here I would just like to inset some MAD props to the Virtual Fools. Not only are they
really cool guys but at this point Saturday night we were fresh out of tape and they GAVE us
one of theirs. Totally bailed our asses out of a crap situation. But anyway...
After the concert I feebly attempted to compete in the Soul Calibur 2 tournament and lost
miserably then it was time to set up fro the RCR reshowing. This one I got to sit through
and it was great. Clearly a lot of the crowd were big fans of the game. Everything got a
reaction...it probably went over better than the first showing.
Afterwards I did an brief
interview with Virtual Fools and then we interviewed them as well as Brendan (the con
owner/chair). That was also fun as we had participation from more than a couple random people
that were just walking by. Also got AE breakdancing to the X-Strike beatbox version of Star-Stealing Girl on tape. We wandered back to the game room and talked to some of the people still up then
retired to the room and realized it was 5:30 in the morning.
Holy shit it was time to go to bed.
Sunday
We didn't stay too long on Sunday. Pretty much got up, said our goodbyes and that was that.
The fact of the matter is that this report barely scratches the surface of everything that happened, so
definitely watch out for the MAGFest 2.0 documentary, coming soon from X-Strike Studios!
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