[PAX East] Boston, April 21-24, 2022

ASimPerson

https://twitter.com/pax/status/1470189243108634627

Vaccine and face masks required: https://east.paxsite.com/en-us/health-and-safety/health-and-safety-information.html

I went to East in 2019 and had a grand time. I'm thinking about making the cross-country trip over.

Houk

Part of me does want to go, but this spring is likely to be pretty hectic/unpredictable for me, April especially, so whether or not I can go is probably gonna come down to the last minute.

I haven't been to East in...at least 6-7 years? And didn't get to do much when I was there since I was working. So I definitely wouldn't mind making a proper trip out of it, but we'll see.

Maddoc

I live close enough that I'll almost certainly swing by for at least one day like I usually do

Lindsay Lohan

We hope to go. The only concern I have is hotel costs. That week is school vacation week and often is more expensive to get rooms.

Naphtali

Probably only going to do one day, maybe. I'd be down for a hang out or something though.

DisruptedCapitalist

My niece and nephews convinced me to go so I guess I am?

QuantumTurk

I'm not much for cons but I am in the area and down for meetups.

rhylith

I don’t foresee myself doing a pax until 2023 probably, especially with south dead. Maybe when the conventions can get fully back up to scale. That last west just absolutely didn’t look worth cross country travel (especially when I’ve been to like 20 of these things), and the number of us attending east and west kept getting smaller and smaller over the years.

Maddoc

I was considering going to West without buying a convention pass at all honestly

Lindsay Lohan

Tickets and hotel rooms are up. I went back and forth on the cost, but it's my son's senior year, who knows if we'll end up going to a convention together again, so I went for it. Bought 3 of the full 4 day passes so either my wife or a friend of his could go a day or two and booked the Aloft. I was hoping the Yotel would be on the list since we were just in Boston over the weekend and I liked the looks of it, but the Aloft is super close which will be nice.

ASimPerson

rhylith wrote: »

I don’t foresee myself doing a pax until 2023 probably, especially with south dead. Maybe when the conventions can get fully back up to scale. That last west just absolutely didn’t look worth cross country travel (especially when I’ve been to like 20 of these things), and the number of us attending east and west kept getting smaller and smaller over the years.

I definitely hear you on this. I went to the revived West and it almost felt like a dry run for putting a PAX on again. Monday was a ghost town.

But I still had fun with the South-esque exhibiter line up and I didn't mind the mask/vax requirements. So I decided to go ahead and give East a shot.

CptKemzik

Was supposed to go in '20 just as covid was starting to spread, and wound up not due to unrelated things in my personal life compelling me not to (though in retrospect prob better that I didn't!).

Wound up breaking a ritual that had been going seven years pre-covid, and now I'm likely to continue passing on it. Moreso cause the novelty of wandering around a packed BCEC has since worn off for me than any concerns of going to a con "post-covid".

Sterica

I think part of it is that these hobbies aren’t really niche like they were 10-15 years ago, so the concept of traveling to meet likeminded people just isn’t as critical as it may have been. There are D&D live shows so successful they are serious franchises, you can get sponsorship streaming video games, cosplay can be a professional career if you’re dedicated, and they’re showing esports on TV.

Like, it’s definitely been more of a social thing for me: just being able to travel somewhere and hang with friends for a long weekend. Although I do like talking with indie devs and board game folks; just a nice level of accessibility.

Solo PAX would be an…interesting experience.

Crippl3

I might get a one or two day ticket, but I'm not getting one now. I gotta know more of what's gonna be there first honestly, after the last South and West.

ASimPerson

Bumping this because it's starting tomorrow (well, later today). I realize a lot of y'all probably aren't here but I'll report back. FWIW, PAX is still a vaxx and mask event.

Maddoc

Today is my PAX East day, the whole vaccine pass/bag check process was pretty painless

Maddoc

I think I'm behind someone in line cosplaying Papa Emeritus

Mortal Sky

Sterica wrote: »

I think part of it is that these hobbies aren’t really niche like they were 10-15 years ago, so the concept of traveling to meet likeminded people just isn’t as critical as it may have been. There are D&D live shows so successful they are serious franchises, you can get sponsorship streaming video games, cosplay can be a professional career if you’re dedicated, and they’re showing esports on TV.

Like, it’s definitely been more of a social thing for me: just being able to travel somewhere and hang with friends for a long weekend. Although I do like talking with indie devs and board game folks; just a nice level of accessibility.

Solo PAX would be an…interesting experience.

Now that PAX South is dead I might evangelize MAGFest as a January event, because that is a nerd event that feels like it has a genuine culture of its own

Having live music as a pillar of the convention space really adds a certain something, hence why the name has the 'Fest in it

BahamutZERO

Did magfest sort out the fuckery they were doing? I heard some sort of scandal arose around the organizers

Mortal Sky

BahamutZERO wrote: »

Did magfest sort out the fuckery they were doing? I heard some sort of scandal arose around the organizers

oh yeah that was cleared out LONG before the 2022 event happened, they re-hired Debra (the very effective and much-beloved con organizer whose firing escalated the entire incident) and the entire board of directors got re-shuffled including the ouster of the heads of the event

speaking of which, since the 2022 event happened during peak Omicron, they did a fantastic job of mask/vaxx enforcement as well as active contact tracing post-event, with only about 300 cases out of 11,000 people on site (so, even slightly better than the population at large for that weekend in the mid-Atlantic region)

BahamutZERO

Excellent, glad to hear it

Cello

I think if anything I'd maybe do East again, not sure about MAGFest

Part of the appeal for South was also getting more sun/warmth in the middle of Deep Canadian Winter and I'm familiar with the DC version, hahaha

I am curious about how East compares to the East/West PAXes of previous years, though

Maddoc

It's definitely smaller this year from what I've seen, but not as quiet as South

Also I've said it before but this is just a really bad area for it, doing anything outside the con requires too much travel

Not that I'd be opposed to people coming back to East since I'm already here

Naphtali

my friend talked me into going just for tomorrow, curious to see how's it looking. floor already looks... a lot smaller just off the map I saw

Crippl3

I really really wanted to do East this year, even for a day, but costs and health problems kept me away
Hope you're having fun @Maddoc !

Maddoc

Another show in the bag for me, pretty chill time just mostly hanging out with my friend and his kid

Finally tried Dice Throne after seeing it at what feels like a decade of shows and it's actually pretty rad and I bought the second season, because I clearly have a problem judging by my five seasons of the Exceed Fighting System

DJ Eebs

I tracked down some interesting tabletop games at East, this year. Thursday was pretty chill, but things picked up a lot more yesterday and today, and tabletop in particular looked pretty well attended

ASimPerson

Yeah today was the only sold out day of the weekend. It sort of felt more like a PAX today in terms of the crowds and stuff. I’m hopeful West gets some AAA studios back.

ASimPerson

Also if any of y’all are around, my Sunday is pretty free other than the Omegathon finale. I should’ve checked the activity in this thread earlier!

Cello

ASimPerson wrote: »

Yeah today was the only sold out day of the weekend. It sort of felt more like a PAX today in terms of the crowds and stuff. I’m hopeful West gets some AAA studios back.

Did any of 'em show up to East? There's a part of me that's tempted to go to West again this year if things have settled down in any appreciable way, but if it's still barely above South levels then I'd probably hold off to do East and spend like half the flying budget, haha.

ASimPerson

Cello wrote: »

ASimPerson wrote: »

Yeah today was the only sold out day of the weekend. It sort of felt more like a PAX today in terms of the crowds and stuff. I’m hopeful West gets some AAA studios back.

Did any of 'em show up to East? There's a part of me that's tempted to go to West again this year if things have settled down in any appreciable way, but if it's still barely above South levels then I'd probably hold off to do East and spend like half the flying budget, haha.

Probably the biggest developer that’s here is Gearbox, which I’m not sure that’s saying much anymore. Intel has the largest booth at the show, followed by Discord. It’s sort of like a really big South otherwise.

My hope for West is that it’s a longer time from now to get back to “normal”, plus it’s always had an advantageous spot on the calendar and is physically closer to the West Coast publishers. Also the attendance at East this weekend, while not 100% of pre-2020, has to be an encouraging sign and it’s a noticeable uptick from West 2021.

Trajan45

I’ve always wanted to go to a pax. Kind of slipped my mind when I moved to the east coast (and with the pandemic). I’ll have to look into amtrak for next years.

Dark Raven X

This has been the most chill PAX I've attended, had a lotta fun wandering the expo floor, but the panels have been pretty thin for me. Went to a good one on 3D modeling, and the Q&A with Kris and Jerry was a ton o' fun, but not much else jumped out at me.

...also I was led astray by Enforcers trying to get into Nicole Tompkins autograph session, ended up missing it, that was a bummer. :<

DJ Eebs

There were a couple of panels I would have checked out if they lined up with my schedule a bit better. Seemed like there were a few interesting board game and board game design panels

Lasbrook

https://twitter.com/fanbytemedia/status/1518291505856884736

BahamutZERO

Yeah.
Please get tested friends!

DJ Eebs

Keep in mind that you're probably not going to have any results for a week or so, so don't get a negative test tomorrow and assume you're in the clear.

Dark Raven X

Me and Lady Raven got infected, awhoops. Symptoms started today, so guessing I got it Saturday or Friday at the earliest?

We didn't actually spend that much time together the first couple days, doing different stuff, so she thinks we got exposed on the train / bus on the way in. Or at the Q&A panel maybe? Blah.

BahamutZERO

Really looking forward to the covid outbreak at summer games done quick Ugh god why are conventions even allowed to be held right now, fucking governments trying to wish the pandemic over with hopes and prayers.