eGames '07

Well, yesterday was the big day. eGames expo - Australia's largest gaming exhibition was coming again, to the Melbourne Exhibition Center, known affectionately as "Jeff's Shed".
Nick and I had agreed to go together. I would pick him up at his house, and we would proceed to the expo. As we pulled up on Jeff's Shed, I found myself again marveling at the sheer size of the building. I have been many times, but each time I visit I am struck anew by it's awe-inspiring monolithic...ness.
After hurrying down to Southbank to get some lunch and back, I could barely contain my apprehension for what eGames would hold for me this year. Last year it was great fun to play the games that had not come out yet, but that was about as far as the worth of the expo had gone for me. Now that I am interested in breaking into the gaming industry, the courses I will need and the contacts and skills I will need to establish, I knew that this year's expo would prove far more valuable.

As we opened the doors to the Exhibition Center, my eyes widened instinctively, just so I could grasp as much of the view presented to me as possible. The ceiling was easily 50 meters high, and facing me was a corridor which would take easily 10 minutes to walk down. Neither of us were sure which of the many exhibition rooms eGames was being held in, but as we walked down that massive corridor, we soon found what we were looking for. After a surprisingly short line, we walked, almost reverently, into the expo. I was hit by a sensory tidal-wave.
The most prevelant sense was noise. A combination of the exited voices of over 500 people, otaku, gamers, cosplayers, industry-people, officials screaming into microphones, games being played loudly on surround-sound keyboards and the general ambiance of enough footsteps to mistake the crowd for a stampede was enough to make me almost stop walking forward. However, before I could process this mass of noise assaulting my eardrums, I adjusted, and everything just became a loud drone. This didn't stop me from having to yell whenever I wanted to talk to Nick, however.
Before really moving forward, I looked around. It was clear that there were very many things to see this year. Nintendo had a small, slightly disappointing area right at the front, where they were last year. They really only had old games that I had already played many times, so I didn't visit that area at all during the time I was there. Industry and education stalls lined the two side-walls, and I had a bit of a look at these while walking around. It was interesting to see just what it might be like for me in the years to come, as I am shaped to become the game-producing machine I will hopefully turn out to be. The back wall was a competition-area. Team Immunity, Australia's most noted gaming-clan had a large stage set up, with 10 state-of-the-art gaming PC's set up. It seemed that they were taking on a few players in various games. I had a look at how that was progressing a little later-on, I saw that they had inverted their controls and were using only pistols, and were still completely obliterating all of their opponents. I briefly considered giving it a go myself, but decided I had better things to do than wait in a massive line in order to play Source against a group of professional gamers for five minutes. There was also a Halo-3 area, but that too had tremendous lines. The center of the area was a hodgepodge of various companies. Hardware, Software, Game-Developers, Vendors, even an anime-vendor, who I recognised from last-year's eGames. Probably the most interesting feature of the center was very close to the Team-Immunity stage. Crysis - one of the biggest releases for the gaming industry this year, was being showcased. 8 PC's were running single-player Crysis, 5 were running MultiPlayer. I wanted to try it, but knowing that it will be some time before I will be able to play it, my PC being the equivalent of CSIRAC in comparison to what is needed to run Crysis, I decided to only give single-player a quick go, before going to play COD2/Quake3, which was running in an area adjacent to the Crysis multi-player area. Nick, having a PC that is good enough to play it, for the most part, played quite a lot of Crysis. There was a competition running every hour, in which five contestants had a match of Crysis, first to 20 kills. The winner gained the ultimate prize-a free copy of Crysis. Needless to say, the response to this was phenomenal. When the commentator spoke the words: "NOW WHO WANTS A FREE COPY OF CRYSIS?!!??!!!", 50 people simultaneously exploded, jumping, screaming, begging to be chosen to be in the running. The loudest, wildest-looking fans were chosen, and the one who displayed the most skill would be the one to take home the game. While I was playing COD2 and Quake, nick was training, seeking to gain the skills required in order to win this competition. I must say, I wished him the best, but doubted that he would be chosen over the horde of ecstatic fans who looked like they would kill for a copy. The first competition began, and ended, with disappointment.

Nick said that he would watch Team Immunity compete against "The Community" (A bunch of n00bs selected from the audience), so I decided to go and have a look at a presentation that was about to begin: "The gaming industry - What goes into it, what comes out of it."
It was actually surprisingly fascinating and informative. I learned many things which I believe will be invaluable when I go and try to break into the industry itself. I got quite a lot out of that presentation.

After that, I went and found nick, and we walked around for a little longer. Nick said he would go train at Crysis some more, and I decided to go and play Quake3.
I found that game surprisingly easy. I had never played before, but after coming first twice in a row, I had decided that either I was awesome, or everyone else was a total n00b. Someone behind me, who had been watching, asked: "Oh my god, dude, you're totally awesome! How long have you been playing Quake?!!" to which I replied: "This is my first time. How do you switch weapons?" He just looked at me. I figured it out eventually though. Once the round was over, I got off to give someone else a go, and went to look at other people's computers, to see if they were as sucky as the seemed.
I found myself shaking my head at how horrible they were. I was almost entranced by how much they sucked at the game. I was suddenly and unpleasantly broken out of this reverie by a loud, blaring voice coming out of a speaker next to my head.

"OK! THE NEXT, AND LAST CRYSIS COMPETITION IS ABOUT TO BEGIN!!! COME OVER HERE IF YOU WANT TO WIN A COPY OF CRYSIS!!!!!"

A large crowd almost instantaneously formed around the Crysis booth. I spied nick over on the far side, in the outskirts of the crowd, behind some sort of microphone-stand. Knowing nick, I sort-of doubted that he would make it into the competition, so I decided to go back to watching Quake. I heard people being chosen one by one, each time my heart sinking further as I knew Nick had not been chosen. Finally, it was announced that the contestants had been chosen, and the competition was about to begin. I decided to go and have a look, to see what was going on. I couldn't believe my eyes as I saw none-other than Nick, sitting at the furthest computer, a concentrating look on his face.

I must admit, I was quite surprised, but I couldn't keep a grin off my face. I almost ran over to where he was, standing next to the computer. He did not turn to look at me, concentrating as he was, but I knew that he had noticed I was there. I watched him play. I watched him dominate. It was really great seeing a friend of mine beat down other gamers to win something. A few times I was scared that he might suddenly trip up and lose, but after seeing him obliterate two people with one rocket, I was pretty confident that he would win, and so were the commentators. Finally, he needed three more kills to win. He was ahead by four, and it looked like the game was his. *BANG!* two to go. Before the commentator had even finished saying the sentence, it became one to go. 30 seconds later, and it was all over. Nick actively relaxed in his chair, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I glanced at my watch. 4:30. Nick was going to be late for choir, but I don't think either of use really cared at that point.

Nick gave his details to an official from the company, who said Nick would be receiving Crysis in the mail. Nick was at first disappointed that he couldn't take a copy home with him, but I pointed out that I probably wouldn't feel comfortable carrying a copy of Crysis around with me, and he agreed that neither would he.
On the walk back to Flinder's Street Station, we grabbed a drink, as after all that yelling and screaming, both of us were barely capable of speech. The train ride passed quite quickly, and as soon as it had all started, I was home.

Exhausted, I collapsed on my bed, and studied. >_<
Hehe...long post. :P