Notes from the floor: PAX 2014

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I’m standing here in the Melbourne Exhibition Centre surrounded by tens of thousands of like-minded people.

This place is blaring on a Saturday morning; the boomy bass of the Just Dance 2015 booth, the constant chattering match commentary from the Bethesda Battlecry booth. Off in the distance I can hear frantic yelling from the Wargaming stage. A man is throwing shirts and lanyards into the audience.

Speaking of Battlecry, I’m writing this on my phone while I’m in the queue to play it. Take a look:

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It’s a new free to play game that’s coming next year. Australia & NZ is the first region to get a beta for this game, which is nice.

This place is kind of disconnected from time and place; it’s 11:30am right now, but it could be 8pm, or 3am. When you’re on the exhibition floor, you have no idea.

You will also queue a lot here, and that makes time pass in strange ways. You’ll spend half an hour on your phone, bored out of your skull, in order to play a new game frantically for 5-10 minutes.

You want hype? Come here.

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I’m pretty relaxed though — we had our panel yesterday, and so now I have the whole weekend to just enjoy the show and soak up some stuff.

Of course, the other facet of PAX is the panel and talks. So far I’ve seen a few and they are a very different experience. Much more chilled, and you can sit, relax and take in the opinions of smart people, or watch some Omeganauts play (the conference-wide game tournament).

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You want knowledge? Go there.

If you wander outside, you’ll find cosplayers hanging out on the lawn outside the centre. Taking photos, chatting to each other, comparing costumes.

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You want community? It’s there. It’s all over the place.

Anyway, I gotta go. We just got ushered into a room for a Battlecry orientation.

Yeah, that’s a thing.