I had a great time - better than last year! I only had one piece of feedback: Severely cut back on media passes.
I know this wouldn't be the most popular thing to do - but this is a convention for gamers. The media and industry has E3. People with media badges were constantly getting demos ahead of lines (I was 2nd in line and got bumped 30 minutes at the Twisted Pixel booth as they let multiple media folks sneak in), hogging the booth reps and clogging the aisles shooting footage.
In today's age nearly everyone has a blog or can find a way to qualify - I think that really needs to be nipped in the bud and raise the requirements a lot or maybe only give one day media badges. I hate to point fingers, but every time I saw a violation of Wheaton's Law it seemed to be by someone wearing a yellow media badge.
Overall the con this year was better then last. There were some good times and of course there was still some problems. I honestly wonder if Boston is the best place for PE. There must be a larger venue someplace along the East Coast to hold such an event. If the current growth spurt it has been trending toward continues, I think it will cause the event to go downhill quick, like the one year at the NY Comic Con where there were several hard feelings.
Some of the cons were what many had mentioned above. The funk was a little strong in some places, and the food, ok so it was con center food, was a bit steep.
Lastly, as I had suggested in the past, I really would love to see the folks at Terrorwerks at PE. I think it would be an event that people would claw each other's eyes out for. I'll just have to get my fix at GenCon this year.
Overall the con gets an 7 out of 10. Some more streamlining and more options would make this the must go to con of the spring con season and rival some of the big boys out there.
+ Enforcers, Games, People I met, Fun I had, My new Droid (angrybirds got me through the lines...)
- Food. I don't mind amusment park prices if I get a decent meal, but I am not paying $8 for a slice of Pizza reserved for prison inmates. Don't even get me started on the chicken fingers or the totally tasteless fries. $3 for a 1.25oz bag of chips in the vending machines?!!! Not to mention the $23 at the Westin for a plate of scambled eggs and sausage. OK, I know you guys do not controll this, it is the convention center, but Boston needs to step up their game. They had twice as many cops as was needed to keep us all safe so there was room in the budget to serve us something besides Bantha Fodder or set prices accordingly. If Boston won't or can't step up, I know of 6 other facilities on the east coast that would love a taste of 50,000 nerds decending.
- Space Alocation. Spread out the expo and don't have so much dead space.
- Forums. Add some forums where the primary focus is us providing feedback to panelists, rather then panelists sharing their thoughts with us.
- Lanyards. I broke three of them... Kept catching on the table edges at Tabletop. Also, place them at the entrance after the initial queue room has emtied. No need for someone to walk to that back if they arrive later.
Overall, I had a great time and definately will be back... If you fix the food! Thanks for all of the hard work that went into putting this show on and a standing ovation for all of the volunteers!
Only thing I will say...The show floor. There was probably a third of the space dedicated to .... tables and chairs that were empty. I would have really enjoyed another 3 feet of aisle space as when there was something going on at any areas, traffic stopped. That just seemed like a waste of space. There were PLENTY of tables and chairs in the satelite food court. Didnt need to have them on the show floor.
The food prices were definitely problematic. I honestly hope that next year more people take to ordering delivery pizza or other food.
I've grown accustomed to convention food being overpriced, yes. But the food at this con was so overpriced I just didn't buy any of it.
On another note, I'd like to complain a bit about the convention organizers. Well, I'm not sure if they're responsible for this, but...
PAX East 2012 is scheduled for the SAME weekend that Boston's other geek con is scheduled, Anime Boston.
One of the core tenets of PAX, is, put simply, "don't be a dick". Now, i'm questioning if the MCCA originally planned to have 2012 in the BCEC or not, or if there was a different weekend planned, but this still smells of bad form by the PAX organizers. I'd like to have two great conventions in Boston, not have PAX cannibalize the attendance of a non-profit convention just to make a buck.
This being my first PAX I was blown away by how much fun I had. It really seems as though the organizers are more focused on allowing us to have fun rather than making money. I am sure that they are not making out to badly on this event but it did not seem to me to be there focus.
I think this is the secret to PAX and why it is as great as it is.
Some of the real highlights for me.
1. You guys. I have never met so many new friends within such a short period of time.
2. The concerts. The real stand outs were Paul & Storm, Frontalot, JoCo, VGO. I missed Protomen so I cant really comment on them, I heard they were great. I liked how accessible the artists were.
3. Tabletop gaming area. It was great to just sit down and play some things you have never played before.
4. Great great panels. If I did not make time to do other things I could have spent my entire time in the panels. I wish the Rage demo was in a bigger theatre as it was filled to capacity.
5. Enforcers. Super helpful.
6. Tenor and focus of the conference. One particular moment really stands out in my mind. During the PA Q&A there was an attendee which asked a question to Mike and Jerry about a fan-made free documentary. Even though PA makes there own event DVD and could have just as easily discouraged the idea Mike had the opposite reaction. Mentioning he thought that is was a cool idea and asked what the website was.
Things were so enjoyable I hate to even mention these minor critiques in such a sea of awesome but here they are.
1. Booth babes. Even though the new duke nukem had the sort of over-the-top hyper-sexualization in the game I felt they stepped over the line. To me cos-play is all about the attendees. If a female attendee wants to dress in a sexy cosplay outfit I appreciate it. She wants to do it. There is just something about booth babes that I find tacky and probably off-putting to the female attendees.
2. Food. If there is nothing that can be done about this then it is not a big deal to me. Maybe it is possible to get some vendors in there who charge reasonable prices for food. This could be a convention center no-no. For the most part I ate outside the center but it would have been nice buy some food within PAX.
3. Hand sanitizer in the goodie bag?
4. More PAX scarfs. I missed out on buying one because they were out.
after reading through this thread, i guess i'll put in my two cents on some of the hotter topics:
-booth babes: whether you love or hate them, the fact is pa makes a specific point of saying they won't have them, then they do. the duke nukem cosplay defense is silly, mainly because of a great point made by alex raymond from borderhouse blog at the 'one of us' panel--it's not cosplay, it's coswork. these are not fans expressing their fandom, these ladies are being paid to do this. not the same. at all. also a poor defense is "the whole game is like that" because the women in the game are not living human beings. also, duke nukem may have gotten the most attention, but they were not the only ones doing the booth babe thing and we all know it.
-food: definitely overpriced, especially for the quality, but that was easy to predict. i think i only ate the con food once all weekend, otherwise i walked someplace else (not super close, but not more than 15 min away either), got food delivered (tons of options), and filled in the gaps with a box of granola bars i brought from home and a water bottle i refilled from the many water coolers and drinking fountains around the center. sure it's not ideal, but you just need to plan ahead. if you can plan an hour wait for a panel, you can plan a 15 min walk for food. also, if you want to see what overpriced REALLY is, you should have seen the westin room service menu. totally laughable.
-bo: i didn't notice a problem with this, but i didn't spend a ton of time on the expo floor. i think the spaciousness in the rest of the bcec helped keep things comfortably cool and sweating minimal.
-maps: every map i looked at had a 'you are here' marker. they were small and easy to miss i guess, but they were on there. i really wish more things (like bag check) were marked on there, but i was at least happy to have a lot of maps around, so i wasn't usually far from one when i needed it.
overall, this was my first pax and i had a total blast. there were issues here and there, but i think next year i'll be able to manage my time better now that i know what to expect. this year felt like a test run, both for me and for pax itself in the new space. i'm sure next year they'll be able to work out some of the kinks as well.
-this may be a tall order, but more cameras at panels! I heard people in the back of some theaters tended to leave because they couldn't see (or hear) the panelists. Some of those theaters are very long.
-(related to above) the sound on a couple of the panels was sketchy, too.
Yeah, absolutely. I left Saturday Night's After Hours because I couldn't see Scott or Chris, the sound was pretty bad and all I could see was the static screen of PAX 2011. It would have been far better if I could have seen them on the screen.
Also, more beer. We cleaned them out of everything but bad light beer by Sat. Afternoon.
Overall though, this was leaps and bounds better then last year. (and I had a great time last year too) I didn't miss any panels because of lines, I didn't sit in lines for hours and hours hoping to get in. I just went and had a blast, thanks again to everyone who put this on and the enforcers who were kicking ass behind the scenes.
My only major gripe was the food prices, which were absurd. For lunch/dinner I found myself just walking to the South Station McDonalds and crushing a few hamburgers rather than dropping $8 on Chicken Fingers, $5 on one sandwich, etc. I was expecting it to be more like Hynes last year with pretty reasonable fare, but instead I was pretty hungry for most of PAX.
Another major gripe, some of the convention center staff, (not the food services, security, or customer service types) but the people moving stuff around, cleaning etc. were VERY rude.
Overheard one of them calling attendees "freaks". While another said "get out of the f'ing way you idiots", and things like "I'll be glad when these f'ing retards leave".
CARTER-A259 on
0
ShadowfireVermont, in the middle of nowhereRegistered Userregular
4. More PAX scarfs. I missed out on buying one because they were out.
Honestly, I spent $.99 on a small bottle of sanitizer before we left town. In fact, I think a lot of the complaints are "lessons learned" for next year - bring snacks, sanitizer, and water bottles with you from home. We learned it last year, some are learning this year.
As for the scarves, yea, it sucks. This year they had a solution at least, though - if you stopped by the Lite store you could order a scarf and have it shipped to you. Everyone needs to follow PAX_Official on Twitter.. lots of good information.
Big props on the Tabletop HQ. Had a ton of fun there, checking out new (to me) games was a blast.
Ikaruga. OMG, the tension was insane in the last event of the Omegathon.
Enforcers, as always.
Neutral:
Didn't notice BO as a problem, but wasn't the kibosh put on Ping Pong because we don't want sweaty nerds? If so, Dance Central seems to fall under the same category.
Booth babes. I don't care how "on theme" it is for Duke Nukem Forever, the policy needs to be clear.
Suggestions:
Wizard World Comic Con has a "parade of costumes" on Saturday that lets people show off, and lets others see. Something like this (maybe in the queue room?) would be awesome. I definitely noticed some great costumes, but others (Cammy?) got mentioned in the forums and I didn't see them at PAX or in photos (yet). I know costumes/cosplay isn't a major focus of PAX, but a congregation of characters would be cool. Contest/prizes optional.
Food prices were normal convention food prices. They weren't that much higher than Hynes, but magnified by the fact that the MCCA knows that there isn't much within a short walk of the convention center. (This was a major criticism of the BCEC being put there in the first place.)
Plan ahead for next year. Take the T to other areas of the city. There's lots of good places to eat that aren't terribly expensive if you look around.
Overall improvement vs. last year, and some comments from a veteran of many PAXes.
One thing I HAVE to point out as a positive. I don't know what PA said to the convention staff (I believe it's run by the same company as the Hynes) but it worked. Staff were much more friendly polite and typically didn't not have the horrible attitude / rude behavior that everyone commented on last year, so awesome job with that!
Few problems / concerns
- Food prices, srsly. We expect con prices to be high, but this was tantamount to highway robbery. My group walked the 2 - 4 blocks for food 90% of the time...but I know many are not willing to do that.
- Can you guys try to work something out with the hotel parking? Cost $140 for the weekend or more, and it's based on an "overnight" fee, not how long you are there. So you can't reduce parking costs by moving your car. If I had been by myself it wouldn't have been much different for me to just fly in.
- I am not sure if this is a new policy (we were told it was official PAX Policy), or an enforcer being a silly goose, but despite 1/3rd the guests leaving and constantly opening the doors to the room for they wouldn't let us into the Uncharted 3 Panel because it would "disturb the panelists". Really? I'm pretty sure they are here to promote their new game, and would rather have a full room than one that was 1/3rd empty. This was my 6th PAX and letting people in to full panels as others leave has never caused any issues in the past.
- Confusing room selections for Panels, for instance Bill Amend was in the main theatre, and don't get me wrong I love him, he's awesome, but I don't even think the main theatre was 1/3rd full for him, and I know some people came to just get a seat for the next event (X-Play). Where as the Guild Wars 2 panel was in the tiny Cat Theatre line was full like 2 hours before the panel, and they probably could've nearly filled the main theatre.
That's about all I can think of right now, overall great job, and the move to a larger space was handled excellently.
my legs really hurt from standing a lot but it was a great time i wish ps3 had more
of a showing there were a lot of xboxs around
the food there typical and so were the prices
but i got out to a few bars and resturants at night and had some fine meals
really liked the shuttles to and from the hotel
and booth babes dont impress me you are not going to win me over
if i want to go to that booth i will
This was my first PAX and first non-work-related conference of any kind. I went solo and every line I got in I made at least one friend. It was just amazing how friendly everyone was (except the one angry guy in the Irrational line). All the enforcers (except angry kilt/hand wraps guy) were amazingly friendly and patient. The keynote was surprisingly fun. I had a great time in the PA Q&A panels and the X-Play show. Bill Amend was a surprising good time.
I also want to thank (even though they won't see this) all the "celebrities" who were so accommodating to my interrupting them to ask for autographs/pictures. Specifically Jessica Chobot, Blair Herter, Gabe and Tycho, DJ Wheat and INcontrol, and Ken Levine.
I don't really have much to compare PAX East 2011 to but I'll give my impressions. I'm pretty sure I'm not saying anything that ppl above haven't said:
- The maps. After Friday I gave up using them and just asked Enforcers how to get to where I was going.
- Food prices and availability. It would've been great if there'd been a vendor in the queue room for those of us that didn't have anyone to hold our spot in line and didn't have time for breakfast.
- Popular panel spacing. Specifically Irrational and Day9/Husky.
- Hygiene. Yeesh.
- Demo lengths. I got in the queue room at 8:30am on Sunday, immediately speed walked to the Old Republic booth, and was told the wait time from my location was 8 to 9 HOURS. That's just stupid.
To address booth babes real quick. I brought my three year old son down to the exhibition floor for 20 minutes and those women couldn't have been nicer to him. Especially the women at the MS Kinect booth. I was already nervous about having him down there with all those impatient video game enthusiasts running about and those ladies really made it fun for me and him.
1. Food prices were on par with what I expected to pay at an event like this. I think they may have even been cheaper than the standard concert/game food prices in Boston. That $3 water is $4 down at the Comcast Center. I guess this is all subjective... being 15 years post-College with a good, stable career makes $7 chicken fingers and fries sting less than to a current college student.
2. BO... Shower, nerds! We all joke about it, but those people really can't set their alarm 10 minutes earlier to take a shower? Deodorant is great, but putting some on your smelly body only masks the stench for part of the day. People joke about this one constantly, but some don't seem to get that it's not really a joke. Shower and brush your teeth at least once a day. Your skin won't rub off if you take a second shower.
3. Courtesy. Sometimes I expect better from nerds and geeks. At the Saturday concert there were people who were obviously at the end of the line trying to push their way up front. I had a group of 3 teenaged boys behind my group who spent the entire Jenga, VGO, and Paul and Storm segments complaining loudly about how they were there to see JoCo and needed to be as far up front as possible and how they should just push people aside to get up there... THEN they spent the entire JoCo set complaining that he wasn't playing the ONE SONG that they knew of his.
4. We need to encourage more social interaction. My group of 3 was sitting for dinner (well, chicken fingers...) at an 8-seater table. 5 empty seats. You know how many people walked by, alone, looking for a place to sit and didn't even bother sitting down? Too many! The moment we stood up some kid slid in and took the table and buried his face in his DS. Could have done that while we were there too!
5. The expo floor, while better than last year, was still a CF. too many people walking in too narrow aisles... also the whole "coming to an immediate stop to stare at something while there are a hundred people behind you walking". Move to the side and look, don't block the aisle.
6. Running out of shirts of fast. Either stagger them or order more. I think all of the shirts were sold out by Saturday early-afternoon. All of the bigger sizes were gone within 4 hours of the start of the show on Friday. Know your audience... larger-sized shirts will sell better at events like this, by nature of the fan-base... and you will sell them all... This goes for the exhibitors free shirts too!
One of the things that struck me about some of the booth babes was that they definitely didn't enjoy being there either.
One of the Sprint ladies came up to me and did her whole pitch, but when I talked to her like an actual person, and not a piece of dressed-up meet, she was totally surprised. Ended up chatting with me for half an hour about non-gaming related things, LOL.
So while I guess its one thing to have "booth babes" its another thing when half the con attendees don't exactly act nicely to these girls either. They are, after all, human beings. On numerous occasions she said she'd even had a few con-goers call her some unsavory things for being in that slinky yellow dress.
You can disagree with the whole "booth babe" letter of the law thing, but still, don't treat them like crap just because you don't want them there, LOL.
I'm surprised how many people were upset with the Duke booth babes. Although they were certainly there, they at least fit the theme. The ones that were most noticeable to me were the ones that didn't really have any relevance to the vendor - did no-one visit Turtle Beach? On Sunday they had ladies in outfits pretty much like Hooters waitresses that you could have your pic taken with - I'd say that would be more problematic for people.
I'm not sure the vendors would like this as much, but how about a small stage at some end of the floor where if you are a large vendor that wants to throw random shit into large groups of people you can do it in that designated area? It could have monitors and speakers so you can do a little spiel and then follow it by giving away your stuff without causing so many issues for folks passing by, the enforcers and the venue staff.
4. We need to encourage more social interaction. My group of 3 was sitting for dinner (well, chicken fingers...) at an 8-seater table. 5 empty seats. You know how many people walked by, alone, looking for a place to sit and didn't even bother sitting down? Too many! The moment we stood up some kid slid in and took the table and buried his face in his DS. Could have done that while we were there too!
Just wanted to remark, yeah, its a problem. I went solo myself, and it was amazingly tough actually meeting people. If there's one thing too, that the geeky loner knows all too well, its the fear of rejection. So more often than not, asking someone "is this seat taken?" is a bit too much for the fragile ego, especially when they say "yes" then watch the same person finish their meal and leave, lol.
So while I guess its one thing to have "booth babes" its another thing when half the con attendees don't exactly act nicely to these girls either. They are, after all, human beings. On numerous occasions she said she'd even had a few con-goers call her some unsavory things for being in that slinky yellow dress.
totally agree with this. the problem with the booth babes is not the ladies themselves, it's the way companies are choosing to use them. problems should be taken up with the people who hired them, not the nice women just doing their jobs.
I'm not sure the vendors would like this as much, but how about a small stage at some end of the floor where if you are a large vendor that wants to throw random shit into large groups of people you can do it in that designated area? It could have monitors and speakers so you can do a little spiel and then follow it by giving away your stuff without causing so many issues for folks passing by, the enforcers and the venue staff.
ugh, thank you for addressing the throwing stuff issue. i was so annoyed by this. i realize there are plenty of people who enjoy jumping and diving for random swag, but being a shorter lady, i usually have to live in fear of trampling or just getting clunked on the head with the stuff people miss. having a designated area for this kind of thing would help.
3. Courtesy. Sometimes I expect better from nerds and geeks. At the Saturday concert there were people who were obviously at the end of the line trying to push their way up front. I had a group of 3 teenaged boys behind my group who spent the entire Jenga, VGO, and Paul and Storm segments complaining loudly about how they were there to see JoCo and needed to be as far up front as possible and how they should just push people aside to get up there... THEN they spent the entire JoCo set complaining that he wasn't playing the ONE SONG that they knew of his.
Yeah, the concert behavior was really aggravating. A really tall guy near me was standing right behind a not so tall lady. We were only 5-6 rows from the front so the tall guy already had an amazing view of the stage. What does he do? Gradually push his way past her so that when the show starts he's standing directly in front of her.
Booth babes aren't slaves or indentured servants. They know what they're getting into, and they sign up for it willingly. People shouldn't treat them like they're prostitutes though.
The only issue most people have is that PA says there shouldn't be any booth babes, yet there were clearly plenty of them running around this past weekend.
I thought NVidia definitely went out of their way and did a fantastic job. EVGA was there and was cool to meet a couple of guys from there was great. I really liked posing for a 3D picture, that was awesome... I really liked how people were dressing up, very creative...
Unfortunately, the previous PAX east (2010) i would have to say was much better for me... maybe it was because i went sunday instead of saturday which is when i went this year. The B/O was insane, come on people, take a shower ffs... The crowds made it messy and I know I missed out on a lot of things to see... Having to wait 2 and a half to 3 hours to be able to see and do just about anything at the EXPO made it worse. I arrived at 9:00am and left at 2:00pm because it was very stressful and i'm still wondering if I'm going to go next year...
I was extremely disappointed and felt like i wasted $35.00 for nothing...
I hope they do a better job of organizing it next year...
AJ
PS. OMG!!! What's up with the utili-kilts... dresses look better on females...
1. Food prices were on par with what I expected to pay at an event like this. I think they may have even been cheaper than the standard concert/game food prices in Boston. That $3 water is $4 down at the Comcast Center. I guess this is all subjective... being 15 years post-College with a good, stable career makes $7 chicken fingers and fries sting less than to a current college student.
My complaints is the value, vs. the specific dollar amount. As I mentioned, we ate off site for most of the weekend and in almost every case, we spend significantly more than we would have if we ate at the convention center.
I have no issues paying higher prices, if the value is there. The food at the convention center did not provide value (small portions, not very good).
Also, I'm reasonably sure there are less of us (individuals with more disposable income than the average college student) than there are of those who have to make sacrifices in their regular life in order to make PAX a possibility, so I'd prefer if their food needs were catered to over my own.
The only issue most people have is that PA says there shouldn't be any booth babes, yet there were clearly plenty of them running around this past weekend.
It's somewhat necessary to differentiate "booth babe" from "attractive woman marketing a product." The Sprint ladies were wearing yellow dresses, and attractive, but were demoing the products and appeared to know their shit. The Duke Nukem booth had women in "slutty" school-girl outfits, posing.
It's tough, I suppose, to differentiate attractive, costumed vendors from booth babes, but only when trying to write down a policy. In practice, it seems pretty obvious. Nexon had cosplay for their Dragon's Nest area, which seemed much more awesome than booth-babe-ish.
1. Food prices were on par with what I expected to pay at an event like this. I think they may have even been cheaper than the standard concert/game food prices in Boston. That $3 water is $4 down at the Comcast Center. I guess this is all subjective... being 15 years post-College with a good, stable career makes $7 chicken fingers and fries sting less than to a current college student.
My complaints is the value, vs. the specific dollar amount. As I mentioned, we ate off site for most of the weekend and in almost every case, we spend significantly more than we would have if we ate at the convention center.
I have no issues paying higher prices, if the value is there. The food at the convention center did not provide value (small portions, not very good).
Also, I'm reasonably sure there are less of us (individuals with more disposable income than the average college student) than there are of those who have to make sacrifices in their regular life in order to make PAX a possibility, so I'd prefer if their food needs were catered to over my own.
As someone with less disposable income, I probably would've purchased more food at the convention center if prices were only slightly less. There's a certain "trigger factor" for items, and the pricing basically went from "oh, I'll buy this and this" to "oh, I'm not gonna buy anything". I'd actually think profit for the MCCA would improve considerably if prices were dropped just a dollar.
I think for the panels, it may benefit folks a bit to do some pre-registration.
Think of it this way - as much fun as waiting in line at PAX can be (and I'm not joking, lots of people were enjoying themselves) most of us would rather not wait in line.
I think my friend has a decent proposal to help curb this.
Limted pre-registration for panels. It goes like this:
1. Each person who registers for PAX before a certain set date is also eligable to pre-register for up to 3 panels.
2. Pre-registration for panels closes after it reaches 60% capacity.
3. 40% of the panel room can still be filled by waiting in line for those who really want to see it.
Because each pre-registrant is only allowed to pre-reg for up to 3 panels, they can't dominate every single panel they want to see. Also, for those who can't or won't pre-register for PAX itself, they can still get in to the panels if they're willing to queue up.
How to manage it? Some ideas:
1. Badges with your guaranteed entrance printed on them.
2. Badges that can be swiped. To cover this cost, charge $1.00 per pre-reg. That'll help pay for scanners and scannable badges.
3. Armbands (blech - not the best of the ideas).
I have been to a lot of conventions in my life, and I do agree that there can be some people who smell awful. However, if I ever attended a convention where they give me fucking deodorant at the door, I would stop going. The people who stink do not think that they stink so giving deodorant to the rest of us who do shower before getting there is legitimately insulting.
All in all, I had a great time at PAX. Doing the usual +/- routine:
Pros:
Enforcers: Seriously, can't say enough nice things about every one of you I encountered. Thank you for taking your time to make everyone elses' time better.
Free Play areas/Classic Arcade: Loved all of this; everything ran smooth and was a ton of fun.
Free Shuttle: Ran smooth, saved me a bunch of cash. Go team.
Needs Improvement:
Food: Over-priced (as expected), but surprisingly poor quality. I don't expect anything great here, but this was notably bad.
Location: As a Boston native, I hate to say this, but I'd probably have had a better time if this was in Providence, Philly, or another major East Coast city with lower costs. Between parking being criminally high (~$40/day), the BCEC being in a less-than-ideal location, and the city being nigh-impossible to navigate; I'd really like this to be somewhere else. Can you check out the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence for next year?
It's somewhat necessary to differentiate "booth babe" from "attractive woman marketing a product." The Sprint ladies were wearing yellow dresses, and attractive, but were demoing the products and appeared to know their shit. The Duke Nukem booth had women in "slutty" school-girl outfits, posing.
Well, from my experience, plenty of booth babes know a good deal about the product they're they to represent. A good booth babe (like the Sprint ladies) will be attractive AND understand the product they're pushing. A bad booth babe will simply be eye candy.
I'm sure Khoo will look at their policy and see if it needs to be tweaked or not. I don't mind the eye candy around, intelligent or not, but I also understand why they don't really want that.
All in all, I had a great time at PAX. Doing the usual +/- routine:
Location: As a Boston native, I hate to say this, but I'd probably have had a better time if this was in Providence, Philly, or another major East Coast city with lower costs. Between parking being criminally high (~$40/day), the BCEC being in a less-than-ideal location, and the city being nigh-impossible to navigate; I'd really like this to be somewhere else. Can you check out the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence for next year?
$40 a day? We arrived at just about 10am every morning, and parked at the BCEC for $10.
Sure, we had to walk 2.5 minutes to get in to PAX but if you were paying $40 you were either late, or missed the correct lot.
i'm not sure if anyone has said this (i'm at work for now, so cant read thru this whole thread).... but the staff at the BCEC also deserves some credit for being one of the nicest, cordial, and helpful staff at a convention center. alot of them got a kick out of seeing all the cosplayers, and we're always quick with answers with a smile.
one employee that caught me on sunday to do a survey (hope i win that kindle) for the BCEC was exceptionally kind and informed me there were no incidents with anyone attending PAX.
so as good as PAX East 2011 was... just think about how much better things will get in 2012!
TeknoRed10 on
"Walking the path of Heaven, the man who will rule everything."
Location: As a Boston native, I hate to say this, but I'd probably have had a better time if this was in Providence, Philly, or another major East Coast city with lower costs. Between parking being criminally high (~$40/day), the BCEC being in a less-than-ideal location, and the city being nigh-impossible to navigate; I'd really like this to be somewhere else. Can you check out the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence for next year?
If you're a Boston native, why are you driving? Take the T!
Well, from my experience, plenty of booth babes know a good deal about the product they're they to represent. A good booth babe (like the Sprint ladies) will be attractive AND understand the product they're pushing. A bad booth babe will simply be eye candy.
IMO, and I could be wrong, but if they understand the product and can give a good demonstration, they're not a booth babe. A person is a "booth babe" if they're there solely as eye candy.
It's somewhat necessary to differentiate "booth babe" from "attractive woman marketing a product." The Sprint ladies were wearing yellow dresses, and attractive, but were demoing the products and appeared to know their shit. The Duke Nukem booth had women in "slutty" school-girl outfits, posing.
Well, from my experience, plenty of booth babes know a good deal about the product they're they to represent. A good booth babe (like the Sprint ladies) will be attractive AND understand the product they're pushing. A bad booth babe will simply be eye candy.
it's one thing if someone working a booth just happens to be attractive, it's another totally when that person has to be dressed in tight/revealing clothes. what makes it a booth babe situation is when the woman's body is being used as a feature of the booth, regardless of whether she also knows her stuff or not.
also, using booth babes perpetuates the straight male gamer stereotype, and can be really off-putting for female gamers in a -THIS IS NOT FOR YOU- kind of way.
All in all, I had a great time at PAX. Doing the usual +/- routine:
Location: As a Boston native, I hate to say this, but I'd probably have had a better time if this was in Providence, Philly, or another major East Coast city with lower costs. Between parking being criminally high (~$40/day), the BCEC being in a less-than-ideal location, and the city being nigh-impossible to navigate; I'd really like this to be somewhere else. Can you check out the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence for next year?
$40 a day? We arrived at just about 10am every morning, and parked at the BCEC for $10.
Sure, we had to walk 2.5 minutes to get in to PAX but if you were paying $40 you were either late, or missed the correct lot.
My comments were for people who have to travel in and stay at a hotel. Their parking rates are "overnight" not based on how many hours you spend there, so driving to the BCEC and parking there for the day would just result in an extra $10 a night charge because the Hotel will still charge their over-night rate, even if you were only there from 2am to 9am or something like that.
This should help things a bit if the BCEC is indeed the venue for next year.
Pro:
I thought over all this year there was more space to spread out, i was actually able to find tables this year to play games.
I was able to actually get into panels this year. (last year i got into 1 panel and had to sit/stand on the floor next the the loud speaker)
Cons:
I felt that there was a lot of wasted space in the main expo hall. Yes you need walking lanes, but you dont need food / game tables in space designated for demoing games and other product.
Having an extra 5 or so feet on either side of the booths would have made congestion not so much of a problem.
Also i know this one is going to be harder, try and not put the most anticipated games next to each other. Having very popular games back to back is going to cause problems. Same with raffles. If 2 booths next to each other are having raffles at the same time, you can just forget about getting down those isles.
Other notes:
All in all i had a positive time at PAX this year. I do hope its at the BCEC again next year, with some minor changes. Boston is always changing folks, they are trying to redevelop that area, so next year you may find that there are more restaurants that are much easier to get to.
IMO, and I could be wrong, but if they understand the product and can give a good demonstration, they're not a booth babe. A person is a "booth babe" if they're there solely as eye candy.
Booth babe is simply slang for any trade show model, ie a freelancing model who is hired by the exhibitor to work in their booth. They could be working as eye candy only (the DNF schoolgirls), or as knowledgeable demonstrators of the product/service.
I just dug up the last PA booth babe poll, and seems like people did in fact comply with it here. They didn't have a problem with booth babes who were "trained/educated about the product", so that covers ones like the Sprint girls. Cosplayers are OK, as long as the costumes are relevant to the game, so that covers the Bioshock girl up front, and the DNF girls.
Loved PAX. I thought the organizers did an incredible job this year.
I was photographing PAX this year, mostly for practice, and I found a couple of annoying things that might be easily improved.
During the Q&A panels the lines for the microphones blocked a view of the stage for non-trivial portion of the audience. This could be improved by putting the mics right up to the stage and having the lines go out to the side.
The stage was too low for me (and I am 5 11) to see the lower half of people during the concerts and presentations. I think the stage should be higher if possible. Wouldn't say no to stadium seating either ;-)
Unrelated to photography, but I also noticed several attendees in wheelchairs at the concerts. Seems like they should get advance seating up front. They can't look over the crowd and they don't impede visibility of those who are standing. Right now their only option for the up close and personal concert experience is to wait in line for several hours (AFAIK).
I also noticed the excess of booth babes. I think booth babes hinder PAX's inclusivity. I find the exhibition hall degrading in general (stand in line for your crappy shwag? no thanks) and the booth babes don't improve on that.
That said the Bioshock exhibit and costume were great. If booth babes weren't allowed that wouldn't have been there. I still think erring on the side of exclusivity where reasonable is the right approach. I can get all the .jpg girlfriends I need on the internet. There is no need for the exhibitors to ship them in.
Posts
I know this wouldn't be the most popular thing to do - but this is a convention for gamers. The media and industry has E3. People with media badges were constantly getting demos ahead of lines (I was 2nd in line and got bumped 30 minutes at the Twisted Pixel booth as they let multiple media folks sneak in), hogging the booth reps and clogging the aisles shooting footage.
In today's age nearly everyone has a blog or can find a way to qualify - I think that really needs to be nipped in the bud and raise the requirements a lot or maybe only give one day media badges. I hate to point fingers, but every time I saw a violation of Wheaton's Law it seemed to be by someone wearing a yellow media badge.
Overall the con this year was better then last. There were some good times and of course there was still some problems. I honestly wonder if Boston is the best place for PE. There must be a larger venue someplace along the East Coast to hold such an event. If the current growth spurt it has been trending toward continues, I think it will cause the event to go downhill quick, like the one year at the NY Comic Con where there were several hard feelings.
Some of the cons were what many had mentioned above. The funk was a little strong in some places, and the food, ok so it was con center food, was a bit steep.
Lastly, as I had suggested in the past, I really would love to see the folks at Terrorwerks at PE. I think it would be an event that people would claw each other's eyes out for. I'll just have to get my fix at GenCon this year.
Overall the con gets an 7 out of 10. Some more streamlining and more options would make this the must go to con of the spring con season and rival some of the big boys out there.
- Food. I don't mind amusment park prices if I get a decent meal, but I am not paying $8 for a slice of Pizza reserved for prison inmates. Don't even get me started on the chicken fingers or the totally tasteless fries. $3 for a 1.25oz bag of chips in the vending machines?!!! Not to mention the $23 at the Westin for a plate of scambled eggs and sausage. OK, I know you guys do not controll this, it is the convention center, but Boston needs to step up their game. They had twice as many cops as was needed to keep us all safe so there was room in the budget to serve us something besides Bantha Fodder or set prices accordingly. If Boston won't or can't step up, I know of 6 other facilities on the east coast that would love a taste of 50,000 nerds decending.
- Space Alocation. Spread out the expo and don't have so much dead space.
- Forums. Add some forums where the primary focus is us providing feedback to panelists, rather then panelists sharing their thoughts with us.
- Lanyards. I broke three of them... Kept catching on the table edges at Tabletop. Also, place them at the entrance after the initial queue room has emtied. No need for someone to walk to that back if they arrive later.
Overall, I had a great time and definately will be back... If you fix the food! Thanks for all of the hard work that went into putting this show on and a standing ovation for all of the volunteers!
I've grown accustomed to convention food being overpriced, yes. But the food at this con was so overpriced I just didn't buy any of it.
On another note, I'd like to complain a bit about the convention organizers. Well, I'm not sure if they're responsible for this, but...
PAX East 2012 is scheduled for the SAME weekend that Boston's other geek con is scheduled, Anime Boston.
One of the core tenets of PAX, is, put simply, "don't be a dick". Now, i'm questioning if the MCCA originally planned to have 2012 in the BCEC or not, or if there was a different weekend planned, but this still smells of bad form by the PAX organizers. I'd like to have two great conventions in Boston, not have PAX cannibalize the attendance of a non-profit convention just to make a buck.
I think this is the secret to PAX and why it is as great as it is.
Some of the real highlights for me.
1. You guys. I have never met so many new friends within such a short period of time.
2. The concerts. The real stand outs were Paul & Storm, Frontalot, JoCo, VGO. I missed Protomen so I cant really comment on them, I heard they were great. I liked how accessible the artists were.
3. Tabletop gaming area. It was great to just sit down and play some things you have never played before.
4. Great great panels. If I did not make time to do other things I could have spent my entire time in the panels. I wish the Rage demo was in a bigger theatre as it was filled to capacity.
5. Enforcers. Super helpful.
6. Tenor and focus of the conference. One particular moment really stands out in my mind. During the PA Q&A there was an attendee which asked a question to Mike and Jerry about a fan-made free documentary. Even though PA makes there own event DVD and could have just as easily discouraged the idea Mike had the opposite reaction. Mentioning he thought that is was a cool idea and asked what the website was.
Things were so enjoyable I hate to even mention these minor critiques in such a sea of awesome but here they are.
1. Booth babes. Even though the new duke nukem had the sort of over-the-top hyper-sexualization in the game I felt they stepped over the line. To me cos-play is all about the attendees. If a female attendee wants to dress in a sexy cosplay outfit I appreciate it. She wants to do it. There is just something about booth babes that I find tacky and probably off-putting to the female attendees.
2. Food. If there is nothing that can be done about this then it is not a big deal to me. Maybe it is possible to get some vendors in there who charge reasonable prices for food. This could be a convention center no-no. For the most part I ate outside the center but it would have been nice buy some food within PAX.
3. Hand sanitizer in the goodie bag?
4. More PAX scarfs. I missed out on buying one because they were out.
-booth babes: whether you love or hate them, the fact is pa makes a specific point of saying they won't have them, then they do. the duke nukem cosplay defense is silly, mainly because of a great point made by alex raymond from borderhouse blog at the 'one of us' panel--it's not cosplay, it's coswork. these are not fans expressing their fandom, these ladies are being paid to do this. not the same. at all. also a poor defense is "the whole game is like that" because the women in the game are not living human beings. also, duke nukem may have gotten the most attention, but they were not the only ones doing the booth babe thing and we all know it.
-food: definitely overpriced, especially for the quality, but that was easy to predict. i think i only ate the con food once all weekend, otherwise i walked someplace else (not super close, but not more than 15 min away either), got food delivered (tons of options), and filled in the gaps with a box of granola bars i brought from home and a water bottle i refilled from the many water coolers and drinking fountains around the center. sure it's not ideal, but you just need to plan ahead. if you can plan an hour wait for a panel, you can plan a 15 min walk for food. also, if you want to see what overpriced REALLY is, you should have seen the westin room service menu. totally laughable.
-bo: i didn't notice a problem with this, but i didn't spend a ton of time on the expo floor. i think the spaciousness in the rest of the bcec helped keep things comfortably cool and sweating minimal.
-maps: every map i looked at had a 'you are here' marker. they were small and easy to miss i guess, but they were on there. i really wish more things (like bag check) were marked on there, but i was at least happy to have a lot of maps around, so i wasn't usually far from one when i needed it.
overall, this was my first pax and i had a total blast. there were issues here and there, but i think next year i'll be able to manage my time better now that i know what to expect. this year felt like a test run, both for me and for pax itself in the new space. i'm sure next year they'll be able to work out some of the kinks as well.
Yeah, absolutely. I left Saturday Night's After Hours because I couldn't see Scott or Chris, the sound was pretty bad and all I could see was the static screen of PAX 2011. It would have been far better if I could have seen them on the screen.
Also, more beer. We cleaned them out of everything but bad light beer by Sat. Afternoon.
Overall though, this was leaps and bounds better then last year. (and I had a great time last year too) I didn't miss any panels because of lines, I didn't sit in lines for hours and hours hoping to get in. I just went and had a blast, thanks again to everyone who put this on and the enforcers who were kicking ass behind the scenes.
Overheard one of them calling attendees "freaks". While another said "get out of the f'ing way you idiots", and things like "I'll be glad when these f'ing retards leave".
Honestly, I spent $.99 on a small bottle of sanitizer before we left town. In fact, I think a lot of the complaints are "lessons learned" for next year - bring snacks, sanitizer, and water bottles with you from home. We learned it last year, some are learning this year.
As for the scarves, yea, it sucks. This year they had a solution at least, though - if you stopped by the Lite store you could order a scarf and have it shipped to you. Everyone needs to follow PAX_Official on Twitter.. lots of good information.
https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197970666737/
Big props on the Tabletop HQ. Had a ton of fun there, checking out new (to me) games was a blast.
Ikaruga. OMG, the tension was insane in the last event of the Omegathon.
Enforcers, as always.
Neutral:
Didn't notice BO as a problem, but wasn't the kibosh put on Ping Pong because we don't want sweaty nerds? If so, Dance Central seems to fall under the same category.
Cons:
Magic could be better served by removing TJ's from the post. Either direct oversight by WotC, or another local TO like YMG/Rob Dougherty is preferable. More details here: http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?p=18675644&posted=1#post18675644
Booth babes. I don't care how "on theme" it is for Duke Nukem Forever, the policy needs to be clear.
Suggestions:
Wizard World Comic Con has a "parade of costumes" on Saturday that lets people show off, and lets others see. Something like this (maybe in the queue room?) would be awesome. I definitely noticed some great costumes, but others (Cammy?) got mentioned in the forums and I didn't see them at PAX or in photos (yet). I know costumes/cosplay isn't a major focus of PAX, but a congregation of characters would be cool. Contest/prizes optional.
Plan ahead for next year. Take the T to other areas of the city. There's lots of good places to eat that aren't terribly expensive if you look around.
One thing I HAVE to point out as a positive. I don't know what PA said to the convention staff (I believe it's run by the same company as the Hynes) but it worked. Staff were much more friendly polite and typically didn't not have the horrible attitude / rude behavior that everyone commented on last year, so awesome job with that!
Few problems / concerns
- Food prices, srsly. We expect con prices to be high, but this was tantamount to highway robbery. My group walked the 2 - 4 blocks for food 90% of the time...but I know many are not willing to do that.
- Can you guys try to work something out with the hotel parking? Cost $140 for the weekend or more, and it's based on an "overnight" fee, not how long you are there. So you can't reduce parking costs by moving your car. If I had been by myself it wouldn't have been much different for me to just fly in.
- I am not sure if this is a new policy (we were told it was official PAX Policy), or an enforcer being a silly goose, but despite 1/3rd the guests leaving and constantly opening the doors to the room for they wouldn't let us into the Uncharted 3 Panel because it would "disturb the panelists". Really? I'm pretty sure they are here to promote their new game, and would rather have a full room than one that was 1/3rd empty. This was my 6th PAX and letting people in to full panels as others leave has never caused any issues in the past.
- Confusing room selections for Panels, for instance Bill Amend was in the main theatre, and don't get me wrong I love him, he's awesome, but I don't even think the main theatre was 1/3rd full for him, and I know some people came to just get a seat for the next event (X-Play). Where as the Guild Wars 2 panel was in the tiny Cat Theatre line was full like 2 hours before the panel, and they probably could've nearly filled the main theatre.
That's about all I can think of right now, overall great job, and the move to a larger space was handled excellently.
my legs really hurt from standing a lot but it was a great time i wish ps3 had more
of a showing there were a lot of xboxs around
the food there typical and so were the prices
but i got out to a few bars and resturants at night and had some fine meals
really liked the shuttles to and from the hotel
and booth babes dont impress me you are not going to win me over
if i want to go to that booth i will
1 more thing penny arcade rocks
I also want to thank (even though they won't see this) all the "celebrities" who were so accommodating to my interrupting them to ask for autographs/pictures. Specifically Jessica Chobot, Blair Herter, Gabe and Tycho, DJ Wheat and INcontrol, and Ken Levine.
I don't really have much to compare PAX East 2011 to but I'll give my impressions. I'm pretty sure I'm not saying anything that ppl above haven't said:
- The maps. After Friday I gave up using them and just asked Enforcers how to get to where I was going.
- Food prices and availability. It would've been great if there'd been a vendor in the queue room for those of us that didn't have anyone to hold our spot in line and didn't have time for breakfast.
- Popular panel spacing. Specifically Irrational and Day9/Husky.
- Hygiene. Yeesh.
- Demo lengths. I got in the queue room at 8:30am on Sunday, immediately speed walked to the Old Republic booth, and was told the wait time from my location was 8 to 9 HOURS. That's just stupid.
To address booth babes real quick. I brought my three year old son down to the exhibition floor for 20 minutes and those women couldn't have been nicer to him. Especially the women at the MS Kinect booth. I was already nervous about having him down there with all those impatient video game enthusiasts running about and those ladies really made it fun for me and him.
1. Food prices were on par with what I expected to pay at an event like this. I think they may have even been cheaper than the standard concert/game food prices in Boston. That $3 water is $4 down at the Comcast Center. I guess this is all subjective... being 15 years post-College with a good, stable career makes $7 chicken fingers and fries sting less than to a current college student.
2. BO... Shower, nerds! We all joke about it, but those people really can't set their alarm 10 minutes earlier to take a shower? Deodorant is great, but putting some on your smelly body only masks the stench for part of the day. People joke about this one constantly, but some don't seem to get that it's not really a joke. Shower and brush your teeth at least once a day. Your skin won't rub off if you take a second shower.
3. Courtesy. Sometimes I expect better from nerds and geeks. At the Saturday concert there were people who were obviously at the end of the line trying to push their way up front. I had a group of 3 teenaged boys behind my group who spent the entire Jenga, VGO, and Paul and Storm segments complaining loudly about how they were there to see JoCo and needed to be as far up front as possible and how they should just push people aside to get up there... THEN they spent the entire JoCo set complaining that he wasn't playing the ONE SONG that they knew of his.
4. We need to encourage more social interaction. My group of 3 was sitting for dinner (well, chicken fingers...) at an 8-seater table. 5 empty seats. You know how many people walked by, alone, looking for a place to sit and didn't even bother sitting down? Too many! The moment we stood up some kid slid in and took the table and buried his face in his DS. Could have done that while we were there too!
5. The expo floor, while better than last year, was still a CF. too many people walking in too narrow aisles... also the whole "coming to an immediate stop to stare at something while there are a hundred people behind you walking". Move to the side and look, don't block the aisle.
6. Running out of shirts of fast. Either stagger them or order more. I think all of the shirts were sold out by Saturday early-afternoon. All of the bigger sizes were gone within 4 hours of the start of the show on Friday. Know your audience... larger-sized shirts will sell better at events like this, by nature of the fan-base... and you will sell them all... This goes for the exhibitors free shirts too!
One of the Sprint ladies came up to me and did her whole pitch, but when I talked to her like an actual person, and not a piece of dressed-up meet, she was totally surprised. Ended up chatting with me for half an hour about non-gaming related things, LOL.
So while I guess its one thing to have "booth babes" its another thing when half the con attendees don't exactly act nicely to these girls either. They are, after all, human beings. On numerous occasions she said she'd even had a few con-goers call her some unsavory things for being in that slinky yellow dress.
You can disagree with the whole "booth babe" letter of the law thing, but still, don't treat them like crap just because you don't want them there, LOL.
I'm not sure the vendors would like this as much, but how about a small stage at some end of the floor where if you are a large vendor that wants to throw random shit into large groups of people you can do it in that designated area? It could have monitors and speakers so you can do a little spiel and then follow it by giving away your stuff without causing so many issues for folks passing by, the enforcers and the venue staff.
Just wanted to remark, yeah, its a problem. I went solo myself, and it was amazingly tough actually meeting people. If there's one thing too, that the geeky loner knows all too well, its the fear of rejection. So more often than not, asking someone "is this seat taken?" is a bit too much for the fragile ego, especially when they say "yes" then watch the same person finish their meal and leave, lol.
Generally though, the attendees were very polite.
totally agree with this. the problem with the booth babes is not the ladies themselves, it's the way companies are choosing to use them. problems should be taken up with the people who hired them, not the nice women just doing their jobs.
ugh, thank you for addressing the throwing stuff issue. i was so annoyed by this. i realize there are plenty of people who enjoy jumping and diving for random swag, but being a shorter lady, i usually have to live in fear of trampling or just getting clunked on the head with the stuff people miss. having a designated area for this kind of thing would help.
Yeah, the concert behavior was really aggravating. A really tall guy near me was standing right behind a not so tall lady. We were only 5-6 rows from the front so the tall guy already had an amazing view of the stage. What does he do? Gradually push his way past her so that when the show starts he's standing directly in front of her.
The only issue most people have is that PA says there shouldn't be any booth babes, yet there were clearly plenty of them running around this past weekend.
Unfortunately, the previous PAX east (2010) i would have to say was much better for me... maybe it was because i went sunday instead of saturday which is when i went this year. The B/O was insane, come on people, take a shower ffs... The crowds made it messy and I know I missed out on a lot of things to see... Having to wait 2 and a half to 3 hours to be able to see and do just about anything at the EXPO made it worse. I arrived at 9:00am and left at 2:00pm because it was very stressful and i'm still wondering if I'm going to go next year...
I was extremely disappointed and felt like i wasted $35.00 for nothing...
I hope they do a better job of organizing it next year...
AJ
PS. OMG!!! What's up with the utili-kilts... dresses look better on females...
My complaints is the value, vs. the specific dollar amount. As I mentioned, we ate off site for most of the weekend and in almost every case, we spend significantly more than we would have if we ate at the convention center.
I have no issues paying higher prices, if the value is there. The food at the convention center did not provide value (small portions, not very good).
Also, I'm reasonably sure there are less of us (individuals with more disposable income than the average college student) than there are of those who have to make sacrifices in their regular life in order to make PAX a possibility, so I'd prefer if their food needs were catered to over my own.
It's somewhat necessary to differentiate "booth babe" from "attractive woman marketing a product." The Sprint ladies were wearing yellow dresses, and attractive, but were demoing the products and appeared to know their shit. The Duke Nukem booth had women in "slutty" school-girl outfits, posing.
It's tough, I suppose, to differentiate attractive, costumed vendors from booth babes, but only when trying to write down a policy. In practice, it seems pretty obvious. Nexon had cosplay for their Dragon's Nest area, which seemed much more awesome than booth-babe-ish.
As someone with less disposable income, I probably would've purchased more food at the convention center if prices were only slightly less. There's a certain "trigger factor" for items, and the pricing basically went from "oh, I'll buy this and this" to "oh, I'm not gonna buy anything". I'd actually think profit for the MCCA would improve considerably if prices were dropped just a dollar.
Think of it this way - as much fun as waiting in line at PAX can be (and I'm not joking, lots of people were enjoying themselves) most of us would rather not wait in line.
I think my friend has a decent proposal to help curb this.
Limted pre-registration for panels. It goes like this:
1. Each person who registers for PAX before a certain set date is also eligable to pre-register for up to 3 panels.
2. Pre-registration for panels closes after it reaches 60% capacity.
3. 40% of the panel room can still be filled by waiting in line for those who really want to see it.
Because each pre-registrant is only allowed to pre-reg for up to 3 panels, they can't dominate every single panel they want to see. Also, for those who can't or won't pre-register for PAX itself, they can still get in to the panels if they're willing to queue up.
How to manage it? Some ideas:
1. Badges with your guaranteed entrance printed on them.
2. Badges that can be swiped. To cover this cost, charge $1.00 per pre-reg. That'll help pay for scanners and scannable badges.
3. Armbands (blech - not the best of the ideas).
Thoughts?
Pros:
Enforcers: Seriously, can't say enough nice things about every one of you I encountered. Thank you for taking your time to make everyone elses' time better.
Free Play areas/Classic Arcade: Loved all of this; everything ran smooth and was a ton of fun.
Free Shuttle: Ran smooth, saved me a bunch of cash. Go team.
Needs Improvement:
Food: Over-priced (as expected), but surprisingly poor quality. I don't expect anything great here, but this was notably bad.
Location: As a Boston native, I hate to say this, but I'd probably have had a better time if this was in Providence, Philly, or another major East Coast city with lower costs. Between parking being criminally high (~$40/day), the BCEC being in a less-than-ideal location, and the city being nigh-impossible to navigate; I'd really like this to be somewhere else. Can you check out the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence for next year?
Well, from my experience, plenty of booth babes know a good deal about the product they're they to represent. A good booth babe (like the Sprint ladies) will be attractive AND understand the product they're pushing. A bad booth babe will simply be eye candy.
I'm sure Khoo will look at their policy and see if it needs to be tweaked or not. I don't mind the eye candy around, intelligent or not, but I also understand why they don't really want that.
$40 a day? We arrived at just about 10am every morning, and parked at the BCEC for $10.
Sure, we had to walk 2.5 minutes to get in to PAX but if you were paying $40 you were either late, or missed the correct lot.
one employee that caught me on sunday to do a survey (hope i win that kindle) for the BCEC was exceptionally kind and informed me there were no incidents with anyone attending PAX.
so as good as PAX East 2011 was... just think about how much better things will get in 2012!
If you're a Boston native, why are you driving? Take the T!
IMO, and I could be wrong, but if they understand the product and can give a good demonstration, they're not a booth babe. A person is a "booth babe" if they're there solely as eye candy.
it's one thing if someone working a booth just happens to be attractive, it's another totally when that person has to be dressed in tight/revealing clothes. what makes it a booth babe situation is when the woman's body is being used as a feature of the booth, regardless of whether she also knows her stuff or not.
also, using booth babes perpetuates the straight male gamer stereotype, and can be really off-putting for female gamers in a -THIS IS NOT FOR YOU- kind of way.
My comments were for people who have to travel in and stay at a hotel. Their parking rates are "overnight" not based on how many hours you spend there, so driving to the BCEC and parking there for the day would just result in an extra $10 a night charge because the Hotel will still charge their over-night rate, even if you were only there from 2am to 9am or something like that.
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=138797
This should help things a bit if the BCEC is indeed the venue for next year.
Pro:
I thought over all this year there was more space to spread out, i was actually able to find tables this year to play games.
I was able to actually get into panels this year. (last year i got into 1 panel and had to sit/stand on the floor next the the loud speaker)
Cons:
I felt that there was a lot of wasted space in the main expo hall. Yes you need walking lanes, but you dont need food / game tables in space designated for demoing games and other product.
Having an extra 5 or so feet on either side of the booths would have made congestion not so much of a problem.
Also i know this one is going to be harder, try and not put the most anticipated games next to each other. Having very popular games back to back is going to cause problems. Same with raffles. If 2 booths next to each other are having raffles at the same time, you can just forget about getting down those isles.
Other notes:
All in all i had a positive time at PAX this year. I do hope its at the BCEC again next year, with some minor changes. Boston is always changing folks, they are trying to redevelop that area, so next year you may find that there are more restaurants that are much easier to get to.
Booth babe is simply slang for any trade show model, ie a freelancing model who is hired by the exhibitor to work in their booth. They could be working as eye candy only (the DNF schoolgirls), or as knowledgeable demonstrators of the product/service.
I just dug up the last PA booth babe poll, and seems like people did in fact comply with it here. They didn't have a problem with booth babes who were "trained/educated about the product", so that covers ones like the Sprint girls. Cosplayers are OK, as long as the costumes are relevant to the game, so that covers the Bioshock girl up front, and the DNF girls.
I was photographing PAX this year, mostly for practice, and I found a couple of annoying things that might be easily improved.
During the Q&A panels the lines for the microphones blocked a view of the stage for non-trivial portion of the audience. This could be improved by putting the mics right up to the stage and having the lines go out to the side.
The stage was too low for me (and I am 5 11) to see the lower half of people during the concerts and presentations. I think the stage should be higher if possible. Wouldn't say no to stadium seating either ;-)
Unrelated to photography, but I also noticed several attendees in wheelchairs at the concerts. Seems like they should get advance seating up front. They can't look over the crowd and they don't impede visibility of those who are standing. Right now their only option for the up close and personal concert experience is to wait in line for several hours (AFAIK).
I also noticed the excess of booth babes. I think booth babes hinder PAX's inclusivity. I find the exhibition hall degrading in general (stand in line for your crappy shwag? no thanks) and the booth babes don't improve on that.
That said the Bioshock exhibit and costume were great. If booth babes weren't allowed that wouldn't have been there. I still think erring on the side of exclusivity where reasonable is the right approach. I can get all the .jpg girlfriends I need on the internet. There is no need for the exhibitors to ship them in.