This was my first year at PAX East, despite having lived in Boston for over six years, now. It takes a special kind of person to allow her husband to abandon her with three kids to go to a video game convention for the day (and much of the night). As such, I was only able to get in for one day of the expo, but what a day it was!

The Penny Arcade Expo (PAX) is the largest video game exposition on the U.S. East Coast. It is an opportunity for small studios and large studios alike to get exposure to gamers, feedback, and press coverage. Hardware manufacturers, energy drinks, vendor booths for used games and gaming dice, and all manner of assorted gaming tie-ins were also present. Not having been before, I could have done this many ways, but I chose to wander aimlessly from one shiny booth to the next for about four hours or so, whereafter I watched Danny O'Dwyer's (Gamespot staffer) presentation, followed by an evening of food and drink around Boston with O'Dwyer.

How many Gamespot staffers can you name?

In the course of my wandering I found WAY more attention was being lavished on derivative and franchise PvP shooters than they deserved. Lines to get into Borderlands 2 were over an hour long. Ignoring the headliners, though, you could walk right up to many of the Indie booths and put hand to controller of unreleased titles within minutes. There were many indie gems to be found in the sold-out show.

BEST IN SHOW (in no particular order)

• Monaco: What's Yours is Mine - This was by far one of the most interesting games at PAX East. You are part of a heist and your team needs to puzzle through the respective "job" without being discovered or - if discovered - make a break for it. The visuals might be confusing at first glance, but it makes use of a very cool, real-time updated line-of-sight function that is both elegant and beautiful. It's kind of like a real-time Kill Dr. Lucky.

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• Mark of the Ninja - Picture the original NES Ninja Gaiden with updated graphics, more fluid animation, a stealth component, and platforming puzzles. Yes, it was that good. It's coming to XBox Live Arcade, no Steam support is planned according to booth staffers, unfortunately.
• Antichamber - Antichamber is tough to explain. I have to imagine that it is an accurate recreation of what it might be like to trip on acid or shrooms, though without having done so myself it's tough to say. The game looks amazing though, as an extremely colorful first-person puzzler that reminded me of the film, "Cube." You have to watch some gameplay if only to see something almost completely original in the world of video games.

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• League of Legends - This game has been out quite some time, but the booth was ridiculous, and its fans absolutely ravenous. There were dozens of cosplayers for the Riot Games contest, and they were loving every minute of it. Great booth, great fans, great atmosphere. You just loved being there.
• Firefall - A free-to-play MMO FPS? That's been tried before, and the results were- not great. This one has some serious pedigree, though, with a very slick graphics engine and team-based gameplay that was a ton of fun. The worlds are vast, original, and you can't help but want to explore. Being F2P is going to help, too, though it remains to be seen how much the paid items "enhance" gameplay.
• Airmech - This intriguing action RTS has tons of appeal to anyone that enjoys transforming robots and real-time strategy games. Bonus points if you loved Robotech.

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MOST DISAPPOINTING

• Primal Carnage - The basic concept is excellent: One team plays humans with various classes and abilities, the other dinosaurs, ditto. The T-Rex is a tank, you've got flying Pterodactyls, velociraptors, etc. The graphics and audio are fantastic. The problem was that in their effort to keep the game as simple as possible, it became oversimplified. It was difficult to locate teammates, dead dinosaurs to refill health, the attacks were awkward to aim as a dinosaur, and most required cracker-jack timing. With an overhaul of the HUD and better controls, this game might be a serious contender for the next amazing multiplayer FPS, but I left sorely disappointed.
• Loadout - It's like Team Fortress, but with extensive weapon customization. The only problem was that the game was having issues, at least on Friday, and it was tough to get beyond the this is a Team Fortress 2 knockoff mindset, no matter how much I wanted to give it a shot.
• Bean's Quest - Good Lord was this a stinker. I love Indie games and I love platformers, but this mexican jumping bean with ADHD was not for me. The bean never stops jumping, and requires only the directional pad to operate. After twenty seconds it was all I could do not to yell at my avatar to stop jumping around like a toddler on Red Bull.
• Orcs Must Die 2 - Want multiplayer? Sure! So long as it's a local client, meaning on a LAN. Otherwise it's the same game with more traps and an additional avatar. I was hoping for more varied environments and Steam-supported multiplayer gaming via the internet, but the development cost was apparently too high, which is too bad, as I loved the original. This could have been like Portal 2 in terms of multiplayer goodness.

Left to Right, Gaijin Games developers Alex Neuse (@AlexNoisy), Andrew Hynek, and Bozanimal

MOST SURPRISING

I was not expecting to see Lollipop Chainsawat PAX East, much less the star in uniform on-site in front of a burned-out bus. I walked by several times before I got up the nerve to get a shot with her, then I accidentally grabbed her butt as I went to walk off (seriously). I had my arm around her shoulder for the picture - pretty standard, nothing weird - but when I went to remove said arm it brushed up against her tush. She didn't seem bothered by it, but I was a bit red-faced. Then proud. Then ashamed again. It was a mixture of emotions really.

The point is: Sex still sells.

ULTIMATE WINNERS

By far, the cosplayers won over the attention of convention-goers. What time wasn't spent staring at a screen, attendees spent checking out their costumed peers. Everywhere you went there were folks dressed up in mech costumes, elves, popular game characters, and an absolute slew of League of Legends cosplayers. The latter cosplayers were by far the most impressive as well, and warranted many of the (blurry) pictures taken:

ESCAPE FROM MT. STUPID LIVE!

Really, PAX East was just an excuse for me to meet Danny O'Dwyerand some of the Gamespot staff. Danny did a presentation about how he went from Gamespot blogger to Gamespot staffer in the past five years. I've known Danny for years, now, and it was by far the highlight of the show, for me.

To embarrass him as much as possible, the video that got him off the ground, in my opinion:

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Thank you to all the Gamespot staff that took time out of the show to chat with me for a few minutes, and especially to Danny, who was kind enough to bring a Wenlockfrom London for my kids. They love the little guy. Er, girl. Creature. Thing.

ADDITIONAL SHOW IMAGES
If you want to check out all my images from the show, including booth shots, you can view them in Bozanimal's PAX East 2012 Gallery.