The first thing I saw after they swiped my credit card and gave me my wristband was a giant room with a big divide. The room had a distinct eau de parfum, or was it just unventilated gamer sweat? There were vendors to my left and a single line of tables with a massive, evenly dispersed crowd to my right. But what caught my eye were all the people holding controllers. I soon found out that the price of admission for these games was bringing your own hardware. Because this was a space for pros, and if the pros can’t use their specific pro controllers for Super Smash Brothers, then “fuck everything, I’m going home,” right? I get that tournaments take place at conventions, but why was that the only option? Were the consoles brought from home by the fans too? Why did we have to throw comradery out the window? To me, big gaming scenes should be about coming together. There were only a few public games (“public” weirdly needing to be specified) scattered in this tiny section.
Just before I left, though, I caught a girl holding up a controller asking if anyone wanted to play Super Smash Bros. I jumped on it, taking my seat in a coveted folding chair, because I wanted to see my long-time companion, Link. I wasn’t interested in falling into that overly competitive vibe that was ruining this con for me, but I soon found myself in a match against 3 players and 4 AI. I felt stupid for being the only one cheering on my character and giving subtle commentary (read: sound effects). I’m used to playing on a couch at my friend’s, where you were weird for not yelling curse words by the minute. The other players were dead silent. People were taking this way too seriously, and that’s dumb. You’re not in a tournament, you’re allowed to have fun. I know you’re playing with new people and you feel the need to be the best, but damn. Minutes in, the battle came down to me and another player as Fox. Oh man. All of a sudden, I cared. I could hear a spectator to my back-left talking about how, “All Link has to do is get one good hit off.” Yeah. I know. Thanks. We were down to our last lives and I had nearly no damage, and Fox was at ~90%. But then to my back-right I hear some guy bitching out his girlfriend and soon learn it was because I was using his precious controller. She was supposed to take it out and leave when she finished playing. The more annoyed I became at this god damned tryhard, dissuaded and unsoothed by his girlfriend’s profuse apologies, the worse I did, each of my attacks less effective than the last. I ended up losing terribly, Fox coming back and winning from almost an entire life behind. I didn’t say anything afterwards. I just handed the controller to the girl, eager to retrieve it the moment the match was done, and walked away.
It didn’t take long to shrug off that frustration, because I’d soon find a new one. I was now faced with a wall of vendors. Of course the majority of this convention would be dedicated to shops. Oh my god, there was no shortage of vinyl POP! figures. I visited my favorite shirt vendor, Shark Robot, and ended up with two beautiful nerd mash-ups. Mario and Bowser in Attack on Titan and a Young/Adult Link blend paying homage to Tron… we think. The entire area was basically a 9x9 grid with only its bottom left corner dedicated to a previously unnoticed gaming section called “Utah Indie Games.” I love when people can gather around and experience a new game with a new person. I played a game that was like a flat Towerfall, some 4 player button mashing 2D brawler-type that was clunky at best. Maybe I’m drawing too much from my time at Sony’s PlayStation Experience in Las Vegas. I was elbow to elbow coming out of that keynote and saw hundreds of booths filled with PS4s ready to play. Every game had something to offer and I left the convention with a PlayStation 4 in my Amazon wish list, wherein I don’t even remember the name of what I played at this con. But, yeah. I get it. Utah Indie Games can’t compete with Sony, and that’s fine.
Ironically, I did find a small Sony booth where they were demoing the new Guitar Hero Live. I couldn’t take any pictures, but their new guitar only has three buttons with dual switches that you can hold together, effectively giving you nine combinations. Holy shit. I've played this game on expert since middle school, but this was hard. They abandoned their play-doh faced drummer and now a live band and audience react to your playing, hence the name. They will encourage you or mouth curses, and it was the only gauge on performance I saw; they probably took out the fail-state for the demo so you could suffer through Gold on the Ceiling by The Black Keys. I think someone in the crowd was bugged, hilariously cheering no matter what. Black and white picks and dual-colored squares indicated the notes to hit, as well as a long white bar for open string strumming. The color determines if you play forward on the fret, or induce carpal tunnel and reach back. The booth staff were enthused that I was wearing my “I WAS THERE” PlayStation Experience shirt, and they took a picture for definite promotional reasons. I slipped the photographer my email address and hoped to use that picture in this blog, but I’ve yet to get anything. Sorry folks.
Like any con, there was cosplay, and it was underwhelming at best. I hope all thirty of the cosplayers that showed up and formed their own inner circle had fun. Though, there were some excellent character interpretations. I love the homemade outfits. The level of obvious passion for a character or genre is inspiring. I haven’t brought myself to make and wear a costume, but there are ideas in the works for a male version of Dawn from Contrast. If that takes off, expect a piece on it, with pictures. That being said, I have a lot of problems with the hypersexualization of women in gaming culture and I’m planning a more focused piece on that, because it always manages to creep up. This con was no exception.
I like to go to the local cons because Utah can feel isolating for a heathen such as myself. Gaming Con felt like it was missing something big, something important. As time goes on, I’m hoping to see improvements made to game accessibility and having more games in general. We’re a big step up from the first Salt Lake Comic-Con; they had a wrestling ring for some clueless reason, and it was smack in between two heavy-traffic areas. Within the coming years, I think we’ll have something pretty spectacular. Maybe we won’t have to argue about who’s bringing their Wii, and people won’t have to feel stressed for using someone else’s $19.99 game cube controller.
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