Quakecon 30
Quakecon 30 was so much fun. I celebrated the 40th bday with a group of friends. We decided to go out to Dallas for the weekend for Quakecon to celebrate and it was just such an amazing experience. I hadn't had that much fun at any sort of convention or road trip since Akon 2004 in Dallas. It really is the ultimate LAN party setup and we even got the opportunity to showcase a early build of our own game, X Killerz. The feedback we got was great. People genuinely were impressed by the look of it and especially got a kick out of the over-the-top kill cam (always made em snicker n shit). But the main attraction was Quake 1, which we played the most of, and even started a public server for fellow Quakers at the con to join. We also played Quake 3, Blood Run, CounterStrike 1.6, CounterStrike 2, Quake Live, Left 4 Dead, and the main event, Carrier Command 2. Brian even worked on custom projects including a new radically improved Quake 3 engine, a new SFIII Third Strike Mod, a Sonic engine with unlocked framerates, a custom level circuit with our custom stages for Quake 1 QSSM, and even found the time to update X Killerz. He was busy lol.
Meeting people at the show was fun as everyone there had one thing in common: love for gaming. Any conversation I started with someone went on and on until it was basically forced to be stopped. I mainly met people in lines, whether it was equipment check-in, Bawls booth, mug refill, merch line, Papa John's line, ect. Speaking of the merch line, the hot item was the Quake 1 themed NIN shirt. We waited in line for a 2 separate mornings to secure one. Thankfully Cesar and Ty showed up to the line about 10 mins before I arrived which resulted in about 50 people between us. Wow. The guy in front of me, whom I was talking to the entire wait, was also trying to get a medium shirt. Cesar and Ty were able to secure me a medium. The guy in front of me went up and they told him they had sold out of medium. Woops! He glanced back at me with a pissed face. It's all about who you know in this world, buddy...
On the third floor, a classic Quake tournament occured daily. I was able to make it to that for a little bit to see how the pros play. I got tips on how to get my ass beat.
They also had some Japanese candy cabinet arcade games including Sonic the Fighters and SFIII. SFIII always had a match going on which was pretty awesome. It's always fun to play some strangers. I beat the first guy, then a pro came along and took me out, but out of all the people who went against him, I got the closest to winning, so... I actually won... ?
The ID Software 4 founders were present at the show for the anniversary and it was cool to at least be able to see John Romero, even though I'm a much bigger Carmack fan.
On our way back to Houston, we stopped by the infamous Dealy Plaza to see where JFK was assassinated. We even got a rundown of the conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination by a gentleman walking around selling information booklets. He was a good salesman so I couldn't resist. We also found a dine-in Pizza Hut on the way back and stopped in for some pizza before finishing off the trek. Lots of drum n bass was played in the rental vehicle. Overall, a 10 out of 10 weekend. Check the gallery for some pics!
