PAX East 2010 Recap!
This weekend was the first ever Penny Arcade Expo: East Coast! Up until now, the fabled convention had only existed in Seattle. However, thanks to nagging fans like myself, the guys finally decided that the demand was strong enough to have a PAX on the east coast. After setting up shop in the Hynes Convention Center in Boston, Massachusetts, the place was packed full of new games and awesome people!
Monday Night Combat
Take one part Team Fortress 2, and add some Unreal Tournament. Now, stir diligently until your product takes on a pasty texture and smells of awesome. Monday Night Combat is a multiplayer third person shooter that will be available on the Xbox Live Arcade. The demos at PAX East featured team-based gameplay, which pitted two groups against each other while competing for control of the other team’s ball. The team who has possession longest wins. At the other side of this booth, there was an instant giveaway for a t-shirt, a figurine, and a jar of Baconnaise. While I didn’t win anything, I’m really happy I walked away empty-handed rather than owning a jar of Baconnaise. I’d have been tempted to try the stuff; I’m glad I didn’t have that option. Anyway, I need to get my hands on this game, but we don’t know when yet.
Red Dead Redemption
This booth was busier than a Best Buy on black Friday all weekend! While I didn’t get a chance to play Red Dead Revolver’s sequel, there was gameplay-a-plenty on display. It looks like the boys at Rockstar have only improved on their Western. Camera angles were extremely welcoming and smooth in movement, making aiming look like more of a pleasure than in the last game. The graphics have been upgraded significantly without doing damage to the game’s grim and serious feel. It honestly looked like the player would feel like Clint Eastwood while getting through this game. I’m definitely keeping my eyes on this one, it looks as though it may out-do the first game by a lot! It’ll be out on May 18th of this year.
Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction
I had the chance to play Splinter Cell Conviction’s multiplayer. The booth was running local matches all weekend. The Terrorist Hunt co-op game-type has made its return in style. My partner and I were able to take down most of the opposition without getting in too much trouble. There’s a nifty little feature that allows you to defend yourself while incapacitated in this mode. I’m not gonna lie, popping headshots on attacking enemies while injured in a “last-stand” type of situation really got me excited. Plus, it gave my partner a hint at where I was – he just had to follow all the screaming terrorists. Look for the game on April 13th.
Crackdown 2
Playing a super-cop never felt so good. Another game I played a multiplayer match in; Crackdown 2 has been a long time in the making. The controls remain similar if not identical to the first game – which is just fine, considering the original controls only needed a few adjustments. It felt as though those adjustments were made. There’s much more of an emphasis on multiplayer gameplay this time around. The match that I played involved being in possession of an orb. Rather than being team-based, this match was free for all. After speaking with a developer, I was informed that the game is going to include a better narrative to give us a more refined story than the previous installment. The graphics looked similar to the original Crackdown, but the game is not quite finished yet, so no judgements can be finalized until we have a release copy to toy with. We’ll know more around the release date – July 6th, 2010.
Skate 3
As far as I was able to tell, Skate 3 looks extremely similar to Skate 2. I didn’t see any obvious updates, but what I did get to see was a Hall of Meat competition for (real) skate decks. For those of you who don’t know, the Hall of Meat was in Skate 2, and is a score for how badly you injure your skater. They had this running on the big screen, and I caught myself stopping to watch the next huge and hilariously painful bail. If you scored 70,000 or higher you got a free skate deck. The line for this was always around the entire booth, so I didn’t bother; but so many people had their own PAX East skate decks!
Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands
I was able to take a good look at the new Prince of Persia game, and I have to say that I’m very excited about it. At long last, we can use the Prince’s power to control time once again. In a demo, the Prince was able to freeze fountains of water (in time) and use them as climbing / swinging platforms. I don’t quite recall water being used like this in the Sands of Time, but the effect was gorgeous either way. After chatting with the director of character animations on the game, it’s clear that they have a very close eye on some of the quirks that come with such a fluid looking game. They’re spending a great deal of time assuring that the Prince isn’t wasting too much of our time completing animations; making sure the transition into the next animation much more fluid and natural. I can’t wait to see the result, but I will have to – at least until May 18.
These are just some of the great games I encountered at PAX East. I also got eyefuls of APB, a new (GTA-like) MMO that makes you play cops and robbers, Starcraft 2, which we’ll discuss soon; and Split-Second, a driving game that lets you orchestrate environmental hazards to make your opponents get wrecked! I’ll spend the right amount of time on these games when I’ve got a little more to say. In the meantime enjoy some pics from the convention!
