I’ve just returned from the Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle, and I’ve got some stories. Gather ’round, children!

First off, let me just preface this by telling you that this is something I’ve been looking forward to for a year, ever since I left last year’s PAX. Last year’s event could be called the turning point in which I decided once and for all that gaming journalism is what I want to pursue. Here I am a year later working at PAX instead of merely enjoying it. But don’t get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed it too!

Day 1: Thursday, August 28th, 2008

Sarah and I arrive in Seattle at around 10:30pm PST, which is way-past-our-bedtime-o’clock Eastern time. When we walked into our room, it completely blew us off our feet at how elegant our room was. We got it at a severe discount through a special PAX rate, because otherwise, there’s no way in hell we could have afforded that. The room was basically 3 rooms: a living room/office, bathroom and bedroom. There were also two lighted closets complete with a safe, shelving and an umbrella! The bedroom and living room both had large flat screen TVs, and the bathroom was covered in marble flooring, granite surfaces and the fanciest of the fancy shampoos, conditioners and soaps (all of which I snagged, tyvm). There was a glass shower AND an elegant bathtub. This room seriously had everything, but we were doubting that we were put in the right room. For the price we paid, we were expecting worse than what we had last year (which was a dump), but this was an amazing surprise.

Day 2: Friday, August 29th, 2008

After crashing into bed, I wake up bright and early the next day (4:30am PST) and begin writing a bit. At 7am we head out for breakfast in the Hyatt’s general vicinity, when who do we happen upon at the Starbucks downstairs? None other than Adam Sessler himself. Of course I didn’t talk to him because I’m always scared of bothering people, but it was a cool experience, and unknowingly, a prelude to what would later become a series of laughable encounters with Mr. Sessler.

We had a fantastic breakfast at The Dragon Fish (I think it was called) and get ready for the day. Soon we meet up with Junk, Crim, Astara, Kal, Louden, Rory and Rys. We then went out to a fabulous lunch and had a great time, but I had to cut my visit short for looming work activities.

I arrive at the convention center about 45 mins before it opened in what was supposed to be an exclusively allotted press-only time period. This was shortened by the fact that I had to ask 38738723557 people where the press entrance was, because standing in that line was not going to get me in early.

By the time I finally got myself to the exhibit floor, I had about 10 minutes to snap some booth photos before everything was covered in gamers. I got about 20 pics out and the announcement began, “PAX is now open.” The rush of people was frighteningly entertaining, but I was happy to get some good shots in beforehand.

I was able to meet up with a few key people like Regina Buenaobra and Amy “Critters” Crider before things got too hectic. My first interview of the weekend was with Jon Radoff of GamerDNA, which went off surprisingly well.

Later, I met up with a few good friends of mine from the LotRO kinship I’m in, and we hung out for a good part of the rest of the day. We got to see Meghan “Patience” Rodberg at the LotRO booth and somehow weaseled our way into helping her bring boxes of t-shirts across the street to Gameworks for the after-party later that night. In exchange, she gave us each a shirt earlier than everyone else, as well as letting us sit down and eat while everyone else stood in a line outside staring at us with envy.

After that party, Sarah and I headed on over to the GamerDNA party which was conveniently held at our hotel, 5 floors down. That party was smaller, but still packed to the capacity of the small Menzies Suite. Rockband was certainly entertaining and the free beer and t-shirt was an added bonus. A great end to a great first “real” day.

Day 3: Saturday, August 30th, 2008

We begin this insanely long day with breakfast at the same place (hey, it was great food and relatively cheap!) and head off to the expo. I had an interview at 10am with Starr Long of NCsoft, but he had to cancel for health reasons. Apparently, the previous night’s after-party held by NCsoft didn’t go so great for him. No worries though as later on I got to interview Dane Caruthers instead, and Starr seemed to be ok the next day. Dane gave a great little interview and I was on my way.

I also had my interview with Jeffrey Steefel, the executive producer for LotRO a bit earlier in the day. I must say, in retrospect, out of all of the interviews I had, Jeffrey was the most calm and collected of them all. He seemed completely oblivious to the insanely loud background noise all around him. He presented the game for almost an hour, showed us the features and hardly skipped a beat. Truly a professional at what he does.

Saturday night played host to the best PAX after-party I’ve ever attended (ok, so there’s only been 4, but still). ArenaNet’s party at Gameworks was truly epic, but mostly importantly was the company I was with. You guys rock! We played darts, drankmore free beer and played some great arcade games. I won myself a Guild Wars mousepad, as did Louden. Crim made out the best though by winning a 5.1 surround system for her computer. I wonder if Junk confiscated that by now or what.

Day 4: Sunday, August 31st, 2008

This was supposed to be a “light work day” as I only had one interview with the guys from Meteor Games at 1pm.  Sarah and I repeated the usual breakfast and Adam Sessler sighting (seriously, it was up to like 5 or 6 by then) and head off to the expo in time to catch a great panel called “Podcasting: the New Media” or something like that. It was a great panel, fronted by a few popular podcasters like Doc from the Sarcastic Gamer, but I learned a good bit. I must admit, even though I think Sarcastic Gamer is a ridiculous podcast with guys who do wacky morning radio as their day jobs (and hence, automatically have the very best equipment and instant fan-base), this Doc guy was an interesting listen. When he’s not trying so hard to be funny and all shock-jock or whatever, he’s actually a very intelligent guy with some great points about getting started and being successful in podcasting. He was hilarious too though, don’t get me wrong. Unfortunately, Godfrey was at this panel again, just like last year, and every time he talked, I wanted to slap him and rip my eardrums out.

The Meteor Games interview started off a little rough, as I couldn’t hear a darn thing anyone was saying (Thank God for my miracle mini-recorder) but after we got settled into a semi-quiet room away from the Rockband tournament held 10 feet away and I was shown the demo of this game in action, I was absolutely blown away. Mark my words people, Twin Skies is going to be huge. I was so enthralled by this demo, the guys giving the demo and the general atmosphere of the game’s ideas that I grabbed Sarah and we came back to sign up for the beta. We got some great little stuffed animals for our efforts too. The girls will love them!

We ended the amazing weekend with an unforgetable dinner with Teale & Co. ™. It was my first time eating vegetarian Indian cuisine, and I absolutely loved it. I just wish I could somehow take the leftovers home, because it was amazing and I was about to make myself ill with how much I ate.

Some other comments and tidbits of excitement:

• I was almost close enough to Felicia Day to require a restraining order.
• Seeing Will Wheaton in person will never get old.
• The stench of 58,000 gamers is repulsive.
• This is the way down, the only way down.
• I have some awesome friends.
• I think the final Adam Sessler sighting-count was 7 or 8.