PAX Prime 2015 – Day 1 in Review
You’ve heard from Jon and Charles about their PAX day 1 highlights, now here’s mine, guaranteed to contain 100% more dating pigeons than my next competitor. (Sidenote: I did actually see Hatoful Boyfriend cosplay and the person I was with will attest that I did not take my eyes off that crossdressing pigeon maid until they were out of sight.)
Star Wars: Battlefront
Unusually for story-game-centric-me, there are actually a few FPS games in the near future I am incredibly excited for and I was lucky enough to get my hands on one of them today! Star Wars: Battlefront is at the top of that hype list. I played a 2 player co-op level centered around protecting a central point from waves of enemies. While it reminded me how terrible I am at FPS games on consoles (I played on the PS4), I did really enjoy the experience. As someone who’s far from a hardcore FPS-player, I found it mostly easy to play and overflowing with that Star Wars atmosphere.
I did have a consistent problem finding waypoints on the map – my poor co-op partner had to point me to the location of the pod we were supposed to protect at least three times. A map or better on-screen markers would have been incredibly useful for me.
But man, we go to take down an AT-AT and there’s just something wonderfully special about that.
Minecraft Story Mode definitely has the best looking booth at PAX.
I’m not the target demographic for this game and I don’t know who is.
I was skeptical about a narrative-driven game based on and in a game like Minecraft – while there are plenty of servers based around roleplay and stories, the game itself has always hinted around story. Minecraft prefers to give you the building blocks (heh) of a quirky world and construct your own ideas.
Story Mode fits into the Telltale Games story-game model squarely (heh heh) – the gameplay is the same, filled with choices to change the narrative and quicktime-esque events through action sequences. There is a screen for building, which is of course obvious for a Minecraft game, but the demo only allowed the construction of one item (a sword) at a workbench, so I’m not sure how in-depth the gameplay in that aspect will be.
Do the young kids who play Minecraft also play story games like this? Will the relatively low level of interaction (dialogue choices, QTEs) appeal to them, especially in a universe that usually allows nearly unrestricted creativity? I’m not sure, to be honest. It was a fun few minutes but I can’t possibly see myself playing through all 5 chapters of this game. But if you’re someone who loved The Lego Movie and enjoys lots of Minecraft jokes and references, this game is probably for you.
YouTube Gaming
I did a lot of walking around and eyeballing games, displays and shops, making notes of things I want to check out over the weekend, so I didn’t spend much more time on Day 1 getting hands-
The Doom BFG
on time. I did, however, check out a panel hosted by YouTube, which just launched its YouTube Gaming venture.
The panel was hosted by YouTube Gaming’s community moderator OpticJ, and the big draw was the panelists: Arin Hanson (Game Grumps), Jordan Maron (CaptainSparklez), Preston Arsement (PrestonPlayz), and Jonathan Indovino (ShadyPenguinn).
I was expecting for an hour-long panel designed to sell me on YouTube Gaming, which I was certainly willing to sit through so I could see Arin Hanson’s glorious hair in person, but what actually happened was pleasantly surprising. The panel was focused on actual advice, tips and discussion of content creation for YouTube, similarly to YouTube and Google’s Creator Academy.
I didn’t know the Creator Academy even existed, so the panel was a great way to introduce it. The information was actually helpful (which can be rare with con panels) and delivered by people who obviously care. Good on YouTube for putting out a great panel as opposed to just trying to sell us all on a venture that most of us are likely going to check out anyway.
I also sat in for A Mighty Chat with Keiji Inafune, which I went into detail about here.
That was my PAX Prime Day 1 – it feels like it passed in a blur! I’ll be demo’ing more games on Day 2 as well as checking out more panels including Megan’s highly anticipated panel Flagged for PvP: Examining Culture, Identity, and Bullying. Keep checking in for more PAX Prime coverage here at Dorkadia!
