PAX Prime: An Extra Day In 2013, and Plans For Australia 45
PAX Prime, probably by far the largest ongoing event spawned by a web comic, is in progress right now in Seattle, with an attendance of 70,000 gamers (and a smaller number of dancing stormtroopers). Two big announcements about future PAX events were announced on Saturday. The first is that next year's event will be a four-day gathering rather than the thus-far usual three; the second is that, some time next year, PAX will make its first international foray, with an event in Australia — exact time and place to be determined.
Re:Am I getting old? (Score:4, Insightful)
Never heard of it
We're all getting old.
Penny Arcade [penny-arcade.com] is a gamer webcomic, I believe the first gamer webcomic -- if not the first, then definitely the most successful.
E3 was an expo for Electronic Entertainment (games), but a few years back they decided to throw out the dirty hippies (gamers), which understandably pissed a large number of people off. On the other hand, it was completely out of control and the focus (a press event) was lost.
So, deciding that was quite absurd, the Penny Arcade guys decided to have their own Expo, and the timing was just right that all the people not allowed to go to E3, went to PAX. And it kind of exploded from there. PAX is now "the" place to get hype about your upcoming game / console / etc set up, especially among the actual consumers.
It's also a great place to trade Pokemon and Dragon Quest 9 maps.
Re:Am I getting old? (Score:2, Insightful)
How does anyone justify going to a Penny Arcade convention? Why hasn't everyone joined the boycott? What kind of people go there? For the three people in the world who don't know, instead of apologizing to fans offended by their rape joke, Penny Arcade creators Mike Krahulik (left) and Jerry Holkins mocked the outrage with a Dickwolves T-shirt. [thephoenix.com] The Dickwolves incident has transformed Penny Arcade from a welcoming, inclusive public commons to a place with a constituency â" however small â" that is hostile to outsiders. Such a con should, theoretically, endeavor to include rape survivors, as well as other marginalized groups, from non-white gamers to disabled gamers to genderqueer gamers.
Boycott? Yeah, uh, no, not going to boycott a funny webcomic because a bunch of prats got upset. I believe the proper vernacular is "Deal with it, nerd."
Pretty successful boycott, too, since It's apparently been going on for a year and this is the first I've ever heard of it.
Seriously, the second the words "rape culture" come out one has to physically restrain the eyes to prevent harming oneself from rolling them too far, too fast. What an asinine, retarded phrase.
Other things that completely destroy your credibility: "Porno Culture" and "American Patriarchy," or calling it "fE-Mail" or intentionally misspelling "Women" (as "Womyn" or what have you).
Re:Am I getting old? (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/8/11/ [penny-arcade.com]
I... just don't understand how this kind of outrage works. How can someone construe the comic as saying that rape is fun or something to mock? They point out that most med-fan video games give us a disney-land version of a medieval universe where there is a lot of unacceptable things happening : slavery, murder, torture, violent monsters, snatched children, eternal damnation, violent battles, lost limbs and, yes rape. I just don't get it : the guy is a slave, chained, whipped all day long, can be killed when his master wants, can be tortured for fun, and the thing people focus on is... rape?
So yes, if you understood this as an endorsement of rape you clearly missed the point totally and it is fair to make fun of you [penny-arcade.com] in a non-offensive and totally tongue-in-cheek way.