Pilgrimage of Nerds: NYCC 2009

I’m not really a morning person. I’m particularly not a five-in-the-morning person. Five is a time at which I should either still be awake or still be sleeping it off from the night before, or (if my mother is reading this) be in my sixth or seventh hour of blissful slumber before getting up to make a healthy breakfast, clean my apartment, and get some exercise. You can imagine my dismay, then, when this past Sunday, February 8^th, I felt a rather insistent prodding on my still-sleeping shoulder at that very ungodly hour. Elaine wasn’t any happier than I was to be doing said shoulder-prodding (although she thoughtfully refrained from throwing something at me to wake me, so I returned the favor by not immediately throwing out a fist in the general direction of the prod), but it was all worth it, because we then got to spend the day (my birthday!) at the New York Comic Con.

Neither of us had ever been to a comic con before, so other than general impressions, we didn’t really know what to expect. Being the over-prepared nerds that we are, though, we spent quite a bit of time the night before printing out maps and schedules, figuring out the most efficient routes through the booths to get to all the things we wanted to see, as well as potential escape routes for when I inevitably threw a hissy fit and started attacking people at the Square Enix booth. Getting an early start seemed to be the best option, as we were facing somewhere between two and three hours of transit time, and the panels we had the most interest in started a bit after noon. Once we had both downed our first cup of coffee for the day, it started to seem like a decent idea again, and, feeling like real adults or something, we managed to navigate our way through the New Jersey transit system and all the way to the Jacob Javits Center, where the con was taking place. It was definitely a good thing that we got there early. We already had our tickets, but the line to actually get in was still formidable, even arriving just as the festivities were kicking off for the day. Things moved pretty fast, though, and soon we were inside, preparing to soak in the nerddom as never before.

The very first thing we encountered upon entering was a small flock of DS interactives set up around the Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars booth. The game itself looks a lot more solid than I was expecting (as you’ll note if you check out Elaine’s post on it), but what really got my attention was the amount of free swag they were handing out. We walked away with a full bag each, and it was only our first booth! This, I felt, was a good omen. What I really wanted to do, though, was hit the Penny Arcade booth early, as I figured it’d be crowded pretty quickly, and my mission for the day was to procure a sketch of some type as a birthday present to myself. As it turned out, this particular mission was more than manageable. I ended up with a tee shirt that I’d already been eyeing from their online store as well as a poster, which both Gabe and Tycho were awesome enough to sign for me, complete with a sketch of the Fruit Fucker by Gabe (I’ll post pics once I get it framed). My other personal mission was to hit the Square Enix booth, which we did, despite my current exasperation with them over the whole Final Fantasy XIII thing. (Incidentally, if this turns out to be true, I’m probably going to cry. More.) There, I picked up an adorable Tonberry plush, complete with little plush lantern and knife, and a gorgeous Shiva statue (which I’m still trying to decide how best to display). I refrained from buying the Meteor materia necklace that I really wanted, though…. barely.

Consumer whoreism aside, we also got to check out a lot of sweet booths, both game- and comic-related. Hitting up Namco gave us a chance to check out Afro Samurai, and the few minutes I spent with it convinced me that it’s probably going to be worth at least a rental—I’m pretty much sold on anything that can offer me that level of stabbity death. We also got to seal ourselves up in a tiny little atmospheric booth of awesome (warmed in the glow of half a dozen 360s) to check out the upcoming Riddick game, Assault on Dark Athena. Once again, Elaine has already posted the goods on that one, but just from watching, I am very impressed, despite not having played the first game. More impressed than I was by the “Vin Diesel”-alike they had stationed outside the booth, for sure. You could have done so much better, Atari. For shame. The questionably-fated Ghostbusters game also made an appearance, although sadly, it wasn’t playable. There were, however, some sweet proton packs making the rounds on their booth guys, and a video featuring what appeared to be some pretty solid gameplay. I’m intrigued, to say the least.

I think the fact that we ended up exploring more video games than comics at the con points to two things: one, that the general direction of Elaine’s and my interests definitely lie in a predictable way, and two, that the two worlds are merging—colliding, if you will, just like in Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. Well, maybe not exactly like that, but it does make a nice segue into talking about the comic-related booths we checked out. The big ones, of course, were Marvel and DC. Now, from my own personal experience, while people may read books from both of these publishers, most tend to fall into one or the other that they definitely prefer. As it happens, Elaine and I are both Marvel Girls. (See what I did there?) I think that we were both a little surprised (and disappointed) then, to find that the Marvel area—it was, of course, far too large to simply be called a booth—was kind of… well… lame. Since we visited on a Sunday, I kind of wonder what the rest of the weekend was like, and if they were perhaps a bit spent by that point, but overall, there just wasn’t much to see. We did not, however, check out their schedule of signings or guests, so perhaps that would have bolstered my impressions a bit. The DC area, on the other hand, was much more engaging; this was likely due to the fact that every available surface was plastered with Watchmen paraphernalia. They’re pushing it big-time due to the upcoming movie, and you know what? I am completely okay with that, because everything I’ve seen has been awesome. Dave Gibbons was actually there signing, and we were going to hop in line to get Elaine’s copy autographed, but when we turned the corner to find the end of the line, we found that it extended roughly to where we got on the train to begin with, so that idea sort of got abandoned. I think I speak for both of us, though, when I say that the highlight of the comic booths had to be over at Mirage Studios, where Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird (that’s the creators of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, kids!) were giving out autographs, allowing both of us to snag signed retro promotional posters (this, incidentally, may have been the hardest I’ve ever seen my esteemed companion geek out ever… and that’s saying something).

Par t of our preparations the night before the con was to scope out the panels that would be taking place so that we could hopefully catch a few. As it turned out, we were both pretty wiped by that point, so we only ended up going to one: the Penny Arcade comic-drawing workshop, which was intended for grade-school children. Predictably, however, that particular demographic was present only in a small smattering; most of the attendees were, like us, twenty-something nerds who just wanted to see the boys draw something. We weren’t disappointed; aware of their audience, yet committed to the original intent of the talk, Gabe and Tycho… er, Mike and Jerry…. gave an interesting and entertaining talk, and did, in fact, teach us how to draw some basic comics. (That’s Deep Crow taking shape in the image there.) I’d be really interested to see how that presentation would go with a room full of actual children, as it really shows a different side of Penny Arcade that what generally gets displayed in the comic. After that panel, we decided that we had one more stop to make, and it wasn’t one in the convention center; it was more of a pilgrimage. How, after all, could we justify being in New York and not going to the Nintendo World Store? So, we took the long trek there and prepared to become broke…. broker. Whatever. I love these types of stores because while yes, you can find a lot of this stuff anywhere, there’s some you just can’t, like the Pikmin plush Elaine picked up, or my Ghost Mario plush from Galaxy. Checking out the “museum” of unique Nintendo artifacts in the middle of the top floor was also super cool (with the side effect of reminding us both of just how very old we are…). When we wrapped up there, our adventure was pretty much at an end; we lugged our treasures back to the train and made our way home.

All in all, I had a fantastic birthday at the con, and I’d like to try it again sometime; we’ve already decided that PAX 2010 is going to remain firmly on our radar, as I think that’ll feel even more like somewhere I should be. If you’d like to see more pics of our travels, hit the link!