What do they say about "best laid plans"? We all managed to wake up on time, get showered, get cleaned and roll of Becky's house about when she wanted (she had told her office she had guests and might be later than usual).
But then, as we were driving over, she had a thought - what if there was no parking at the T station?
Apparently, this was a recent problem. Boston has been doing a lot of construction and telling people to use the T but their garages don't have the spots. So on a Thursday morning at 10am, they would max out. Which is what happened. We pulled into Wonderland (yes, that is the name of the T station, apparently there use to be a theme park nearby) and the "GARAGE FULL" signs were up. Becky told us to jump out so we could catch the train and she would drive to the next station and get to work.
Honestly, that was the best thing that could have happened though - if we had let Becky go to work and had driven ourselves over, we would have had no idea where to go next.
We managed to navigate the T during rush hour. Weird thing about getting to the convention center is that you have a couple options and we took the most straight forward - we got on the silver line. Problem is, the "silver line" is actually just a really big bus. That can get stuck in traffic. But it wasn't all that bad, the only rough part was how WARM it was with our winter coats in that crowded space. As soon as we got into PAX, we went in search of the coat check.
Let me tell you, Thursday PAX is my favorite PAX when it comes to actually getting to DO things. Friday and Saturday may have the best panels and events, but Thursday during the day is the best time to just meander the expo hall and play what you want.
We walked through the doors and the first game we saw, well, we didn't actually want to play it but I needed a picture in front of the sign because it was too perfect for our first photo:
Right after this, Mathew ran off to find the miniature arena table because he wanted to see if they had any games going on that day. Zac and I entered the fray. It was my intention to play video game demos but we couldn't resist what we saw next - the new game from Cyanide and Happiness, the creators of Joking Hazard,
Trial By Trolley. It is just as messed up as it sounds. Based on the idea of
The Trolley Problem (which, let's face it, most of us know about because of
The Good Place), players have their own train tracks assigned to them and play cards on that track, trying to convince a third player to kill the people on their opponents train tracks.
My train tracks started out with the little girl that would grow up to be the first female president. Zac got the last remaining honey bees on the planet. Then we had to talk with the demo guy and feel out his likes/dislikes to know which card we should play next. I found out he had a family and he liked them, and I had a card in my had that put his entire family on the train tracks. And it went on from there, us trying to convince him which track to roll down. You could see it being fun with friends that you know how to manipulate. Similar idea to 'Joking Hazard' where you can appeal to their twisted minds.
Mathew caught up with us after this and as we walked deeper into the Expo Hall, we passed Apple TV+ booth with a giant eagle statue, promoting their show Mythic Quest. I didn't really care about the show, but it was a GIANT EAGLE STATUE and we could pose on it and no one was there so heck yeah I got in line!
I got Mathew to do it too:
I had a little fangirl moment as we walked through by the tabletop area and I saw a big sign for Dicebreaker.
I know the company that runs the convention also owns their production company, but it made me giddy to see them advertised there.
They have a lovely website now too, in addition to the
YouTube channel. We knew Nintendo was doing a pin giveaway for members of Nintendo Club (i.e. anyone who bothered to register online) and we figured we would head over toward that booth. Little did we know there was a HUGE Animal Crossing set up:
Like I said, I can't resist a photo op! Zac loves this series. I've only played the iPhone game, but I knew enough that I knew I didn't want to miss out! Mathew confessed to us that he has a fear of people in mascot outfits (Mathew is odd sometimes) but he opted to stay with us. I'm so glad he did, look at these awesome pics:
BONUS! Even though it was afternoon, Nintendo STILL had free pins to give away!
And then Tom Nook was coming out from the back so Zac did a quick photo, like you do when a celeb is walking by:
I struggled for about 30 seconds last night over whether or not I should get the game on release day but then thought, screw it, it is my birthday month! I want to play this and be a part of the conversation! So March 20th, I will definitely be playing this!
It's almost midnight so I'm going to break here for the post. But this is not the end of day 1!
Thanks for reading!
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