My #E3 Experience
#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @maniacalmorgan
The following article was originally posted on the SpiritHoods Blog:
For those of you that don’t know what E3 is, it’s the Electronic Entertainment Expo. Once a year the biggest video game companies get together and showcase all of the big projects on the horizon. Now, I’ve been a jock, I’ve been a musician, but one thing I have and always will be is a nerd. I remember walking up to the TV screen for better aim (yeah, some would call this cheating) with that horrible orange-plastic gun for Duck Hunt. So yeah, I’ve been playing video games for a while.
Wednesday, the 2nd day of E3 started just like any other day. Wake up, run 25 miles, do 1,000 push-ups and sit-ups, and then take my private helicopter to work (I wish that any of this actually happened). I did work-ey stuff as soon as I got there. I might have danced a little bit, but that’s a normal occurrence around the Den. After a couple hours of slaving away, Ashley and his assistant Jenny saved me. “Let’s go over to E3. We have passes waiting.” Little did Ash know, but I was already in his car by the time he finished the sentence. I can move pretty quick when I need to. Fast forward through $25 parking and trying to figure out where to get our passes and you have us walking into E3, me for the first time. I was like a little kid in a candy shop. I didn’t even know where to begin. It was like Vegas, but you don’t have to worry about strippers stealing your wallet. Here was what I saw when I walked in.
Ashley, the seasoned E3 vetran in our group, was cutting his way through the crowd while Jenny and I were stunned at the lights, the crowd, and all the awesome video games waiting to be played. We fought our way to the Nexon booth to meet with some of our business contacts. We made custom hoods for Nexon’s game Vindictus. Last year Nexon just tossed hoods out into their audience and as you can imagine, people went crazy. A little bit too crazy in fact. Punches were thrown, names were called, and I think someone’s finger got bitten off. Madness. They had their own stage where they held raffles twice a day. Here’s Jenny and I hanging out with one of the booth babes modeling the custom Polar Bear we made.
Day 2 (my first day) of E3 was a lot of fun. We met all kinds of cool people as well as some of my Twitter friends. As day 2 came to an end, my energy was at its end. It was time to go home and get rested up for another day filled with adventures.
I didn’t want to miss any E3 action on day 3, so I showed up bright and early before the actual expo opened with a few extra of the Vindictus hoods, hoping to figure out how to make good use for them. After meeting with the peeps at Nexon, we decided I would run around and hand them out to deserving people wearing Nexon t-shirts. Oh boy, what pressure! I met up with my friend Adam (@violent_gamer) as I needed a partner in crime. We frolicked, skipped, and even did some walking throughout the day. We got some hands on time with a lot of the games. We played with confused pets, blew up helicopters, manipulated the force, and destroyed Alien hordes.
It was a pretty busy day considering it was Thursday. Nexon ended up announcing that someone from SpiritHoods was at E3 and that they were going to be handing out hoods to people wearing their t-shirts. Holy crap, they are talking about me! I felt like I was famous! Not because people asked for my autograph or anything. It was more because I had people stalking me the rest of the day. I have to give a shout-out to the final guy I gave a hood to. The announcement that I was at E3 was made at 1:00PM. Immediately after, I had people asking if I was the person from SpiritHoods. One gentleman in particular came up to me wearing an inappropriately tight t-shirt. He explained that he was wearing his girlfriend’s t-shirt because he wanted the hood so badly. 4:30PM rolls around, and I run into this gentleman still wearing his girlfriend’s t-shirt. He suffered a day of asphyxiation just so he could win a SpiritHood. I was so impressed I couldn’t say no. E3, I am going to miss you. Until next year, adieu.
