DJ's Stuff - PAX, 2006

PAX - 2006

For the third year, I trekked to Bellevue, WA for PAX. We signed up too late to get a BYOC spot this year. Having that was a wonderful thing in 2005. It not only gave us an opportunity to play unfettered games, but it was also a sort of "home base." Out of fear of not having such a thing for '06, I bought a DS Lite to help me pass the time while at PAX. Actually, after I bought mine, I had to buy one for Jarod, Patrick and Amy, so I ended up bringing four and handing them to my friends whenever I needed entertainment. ;-)

I had a great time. Got to meet lots of people... watch some cool matches in the Omegathon (which LeRoy won this year... he was runner up last year)... and just generally enjoy ourselves.

They definitely need a venue switch as attendance has climbed from ~1500 pre-reg attendees in 2004, to ~9k in 2005 to a whopping ~17k this year. Total attendees (pre-reg & day-of) was just shy of 20k this year. PA has already rented out space in the Washington State Convention & Trade Center for next year.

But... I may not make it to 2007. My brother got engaged while I was at PAX and informed me that the wedding would be in "exactly one year." :-(

All Hail Ball (2.87MB WMV)
The first thing I did when I got there was attend my PAXsassins meeting. That's Charles Tishman (ctishman) running the show.	I thought I'd take some shots of people to try to remember them. My first target was JRunder. I think that's him on the right, but I'm not sure as his picture didn't look anything like him in real life... and now my memory is skewed. And I never did get a chance to kill him.	Here's another shot of some assassins. The girl drinking the SnoBawls is HolyHesus. She and I never targeted each other, but mind games were played. You can read more about the game in the PAXsassins '06 thread on the PA forums.
More assassins. In fact, one is in full ninja garb. Oddly, he stood out like a sore thumb. The girl you (partially) see on the far right is Areilka. She won it all (and killed me on the last day).	Uninspired wide shot #1...	#2...
#3...	#4...	and #5. Hey, at least they give you a chance to find yourself. ;-)
The keynote was by Alex St. John. Here's a recap. (Ball is also mentioned and linked to.)	My buddies and I went to Rock Bottom at the end of the first day. I made Kevin (left) get the full rack of ribs.	And here we have Phil and Mark pounding away at a massive plate of nachos.
Kevin could only finish half the rack of ribs. Mark took the rest back to our hotel room. We promptly put them on top of the room's fridge, where they stayed for 3 days until we left. Oops.	Mark & I checked into the Hyatt late in the day, which meant we ended up with a single bed instead of a double. Mark prepared for what he knew the night had in store for him. (Side note: as I was checking in, Jynx, Calyber and Psyche of the FragDolls checked in right beside me.)	This was the Quake 2 round of the Omegathon. On the left is Anna, an Omeganaut that I am acquainted with from PAX '05 and the forums. (She got out in round 2, I was sad to hear.)
And here's a closer shot of Tycho and Gabe. They played in the Q2 round of the Omegathon just to add some zest.	Here are Mark, Kevin and Phil posing for the camera, icy hot stuntaz style.	I think this was the line for the Guitar Hero round of the Omegathon.
We played with our DSes most of the time.	So did everyone else...	Classic.
Same line. Still waiting. It was excruciating.	I think this is after we got into the main theater for the Guitar Hero round. Though it might be the final round of Tetris.	I have no idea what this is. I must be out of touch with some part of the gaming world, but you can find out about it at the URL on his chest.
I was on the 2nd floor balcony while in line for the final Omegathon round of Tetris. A beach ball made its way out to replace the temporarily unavailable Ball. The Enforcer pictured confiscated it, then set it free. She later toppled onto an unprepared couple occupying a Sumo bag.	Yeah, these guys. She crunched them good. By the way, these Sumo things rock. I'm thinking about buying a few. They seemed sufficiently more sturdy (and larger) than normal bean bags... enough so to make me want them.	OK, mildly amusing story. There was a picture thread on the PA forums. I said hi to many people I recognized from their picture posts. One of them was a girl named "Sumi". I said hi to the pictured girl (not Sumi) and got a really weird look in return. Later on in the thread, this girl agreed she looked a bit like Sumi and said she remembered my blundering greeting. Unless that is Sumi and I'm just confusing them again. Crap, I dunno. But I do know one thing: DS Lites FTW!