{"id":18721,"date":"2019-01-23T00:01:07","date_gmt":"2019-01-23T00:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=18721"},"modified":"2019-01-23T15:28:09","modified_gmt":"2019-01-23T15:28:09","slug":"pax-south-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2019\/01\/23\/pax-south-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"PAX South 2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n
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The Penny Arcade Expo, or PAX for short, is one of the largest video game conventions open to the public in the US.\u00a0 It started out in Seattle, then expanded to another show out East in Boston, and for the past few years, they\u2019ve also had a show in San Antonio with PAX South.\u00a0 Since that\u2019s only a few hours\u2019 drive from where I live, I decided to go again this year along with my dad.\u00a0 Let\u2019s check out what I saw.<\/p>\r\n

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Blowfish Studios<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Most of what I do at these shows is set up meetings with PR professionals and developers to check out their games.\u00a0 But keep in mind there is no way I can see everything at these shows.\u00a0 One of my first meetings was with Blowfish Studios.\u00a0 I checked out one of their games called JackQuest.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 2-D platformer with 16-bit style graphics and Metroid style exploration.\u00a0 You must save a girl who was kidnapped by a giant purple hand, and soon after entering a cave, you find a giant sword and must swing it to mow down enemies as well as run and jump and scoot up walls like Mega Man X.\u00a0 It had great play control so hopefully I\u2019ll be able to review it when it comes out later this year.\u00a0 I swear I\u2019ve reviewed a game almost just like this one before.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I played a lot of games like JackQuest from other developers at this year\u2019s PAX South.\u00a0 They all had 16-bit graphics and 2-D Metroid style exploration.\u00a0 One was called Eagle Island, another was Forsaken Castle.\u00a0 But the one that caught my eye the most was called Gestalt Vanguard.\u00a0 I like the character designs and the developer told me it mixed elements from Metroid and Final Fantasy 6, so that won me over right there.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Fantasy Strike<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Right next to Blowfish\u2019s booth was a display for a 2-D one on one fighter coming to PCs and consoles called Fantasy Strike.\u00a0 It looks great, and is designed for both beginners and experts, so I\u2019m happy about that.\u00a0 Hope I get to review it, too!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Konsui Fighter<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And speaking of 2-D one-on-one fighters that look great, Konsui Fighter is designed for mobile devices and features controls that work on that format very well.\u00a0 It also looks nice, too.\u00a0 The cartoony graphics almost look like something you\u2019d see in a Guilty Gear or BlazBlue title.\u00a0 In the game, a man is in a coma (Konsui means Coma in Japanese I found out), and in his mind he must fight characters that represent his different emotions.\u00a0 Kind of interesting.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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NIS America<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Surprisingly, I think my favorite company I visited at this year\u2019s PAX South was NIS America.\u00a0 Which is unusual because I don\u2019t play many of their games.\u00a0 They\u2019re not bad games at all, they just publish a lot of long and complicated RPGs and strategy games, and I just don\u2019t have time for them anymore.\u00a0 But they really were very nice at this year\u2019s PAX South and treated me very well.\u00a0 They had TONS of games shown, probably more than any other company.\u00a0 There were a few that caught my eye, though.\u00a0 One was a PS4 version of the SNK 40th<\/sup> Anniversary Collection.\u00a0 I have it on Switch, and it\u2019s great.\u00a0 Another one that surprised me was Lapis x Labyrinth.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 2-D platformer dungeon crawler with fantastic sprite based graphics and gameplay where you can stack characters on top of each other to use their skills and make extra jumps.\u00a0 And did I mention the game looks great?\u00a0 Finally, NIS America has been working with Falcom with games like Ys 8, and they announced at PAX South that they are bringing out another one of Falcom\u2019s hits: Trails of Cold Steel 3.\u00a0 I haven\u2019t tried that series, but I\u2019m glad that NIS is still working with Falcom.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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tinyBuild<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another game company that I met with at PAX South that ended up being one of my favorites at the show was tinyBuild.\u00a0 Like NIS America, they had TONS of games shown and really treated me well, too.\u00a0 Most of the games they showed were for PC, but many of their games find their way to consoles at some point, too.\u00a0 Some of the game I remember they had were Lovely Planet 2.\u00a0 I reviewed the first one a few years ago.\u00a0 It\u2019s a first person shooter with Katamari Damacy style graphics.\u00a0 Another new one was Totally Reliable Delivery Service.\u00a0 It\u2019s a rag-doll physics-based 3-D platformer where you can deliver packages to people.\u00a0 Or not.\u00a0 Do whatever you want.\u00a0 It\u2019s designed to be perfect for streaming, which a lot of tinyBuild\u2019s games seem to be.\u00a0 Next was Secret Neighbor, a multiplayer version of their hit Hello Neighbor game with elements of hide and seek and tag.\u00a0 And last one that caught my eye was Swag & Sorcery.\u00a0 This is one of those games where you send out people to find stuff, and wait a while for them to come back with goodies for you to build up your kingdom with.\u00a0 But while you wait, you can play the game and do other things as well.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Bee Simulator<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another one of my favorite games to play at PAX South was Bee Simulator.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 3-D game where you are a bee and must fly around doing bee things like collect pollen, communicate with dances and pheromones, and battle rival wasps and other insects.\u00a0 It could even be considered educational, too.\u00a0 Even I learned a few things about bees.\u00a0 You can also do silly things like pop balloons with your stinger to scare people!\u00a0 And the game looks fantastic, too!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Bombfest<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

In this frantic couch multiplayer game, you are a person made of blocks and must avoid bombs in an arena to be the last one standing in locations like a tree stump or a kitchen sink.\u00a0 It comes out soon and I hope I get to review it!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Lumosity Mobile<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I met with them last year and played their 2-D platformer game about artwork called The Painter\u2019s Apprentice and I reviewed their educational turtle racing math game called Tortuga Racing.\u00a0 This year they had a new game called Osunia.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 3-D game that is like Harvest Moon or Stardew Valley, but it\u2019s set in the future!\u00a0 For only being three months into development, it looks great so far!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The Arcade Crew<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

They showed a bunch of games as well, but the one that caught my eye the most was Blazing Chrome, because it looked just like a 16-bit run and gun game, such as Contra 3, that I would\u2019ve rented back in the day on the SNES!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Devolver Digital<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I\u2019ve reviewed a ton of games from Devolver Digital in the past.\u00a0 In fact, I\u2019m working on a review for one of the games they showed at PAX South, PIkuniku, right now!\u00a0 The Loco Roco style graphics sold me on it.\u00a0 Another one at the show that grabbed my attention was Gato Roboto.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 2-D platformer that looks like Metroid, but the graphics are all black and white, similar to Minit, another game I reviewed a while back from them.\u00a0 I hope I can review this one, too<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

A Fold Apart<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

In this game you play as a couple in a long distance relationship, and it\u2019s a 2-D puzzle platformer where you fold the scenery like a piece of paper on the back of a MAD Magazine to bring them together.\u00a0 It got quite a reaction from show goers, too!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Mercury Learning<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

PAX South isn\u2019t just about video games.\u00a0 They also have board games, and that section was just about as big!\u00a0 There are also a lot of schools and colleges there with programs that people can take on making games.\u00a0 And Mercury Learning sells books you can read about video game design and other things.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be reviewing a few of their books later, so check back then to see what they\u2019re like.\u00a0 From what I can tell, these look like great books that no gaming college student or hobbyist should be without.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Charity Organizations<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

There are also charity groups at PAX South, too.\u00a0 I visited two of them.\u00a0 The first was 1upOnCancer.\u00a0 After the former president of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata, passed away from cancer, this group was formed to raise money for adult cancer patients.\u00a0 Seems like they have locations near where I live, too, so you might hear more about them from me later!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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The other charity group I visited was Stack Up.\u00a0 They send video games to US military overseas.\u00a0 At their booth, they had a contest where you could win raffle tickets by how many push-ups you could do in a minute.\u00a0 I did 55 push-ups in a minute there, so I guess that wasn\u2019t too shabby.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Bandai Namco<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Bandai Namco is my favorite video game company.\u00a0 Well, actually just the Namco part, as they make games like Pac-Man, Soul Calibur, Katamari Damacy, and more!\u00a0 They were at PAX South showing two games.\u00a0 The first was Ace Combat 7, an arcade style flight combat game.\u00a0 I have some younger brothers who are really looking forward to this game, so I tried to play it at the show but the line was too long.\u00a0 The booth attendees at that station were wearing military outfits, so that was a cute idea.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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The other game they were showing was Jump Force, a 3-D fighting game starring popular anime characters.\u00a0 After you played it, you could get a thing of \u201cCup Noodles\u201d ramen, as they are doing a promotion with the game.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know about you, but I would\u2019ve been disappointed if I waited in a long line to play, only to get a cup of ramen as a freebie, since you can get those for pocket change at the grocery store.\u00a0 But then, I don\u2019t like ramen much anyway.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Capcom<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another one of my favorite game companies, Capcom, was also at PAX.\u00a0 They were mostly showing off Resident Evil 2 (a remake I\u2019m guessing), and Devil May Cry 5.\u00a0 What surprised me is they didn\u2019t have a store at their booth this year.\u00a0 Anyway, here\u2019s a picture of the RE2 area that looked like a haunted house.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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And here\u2019s a police car with some scary zombie parts on top of it.\u00a0 I think Capcom has used that same police car in many other E3\u2019s I\u2019ve been to in the past.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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ToeJam & Earl<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

A while back, a new ToeJam & Earl game subtitled Back in the Groove was released for PC, and now it\u2019s coming to consoles as well.\u00a0 I hope I get to review it!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Artovision<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

At PAX South, there are also many companies selling merchandise, like T-shirts and other game accessories.\u00a0 My favorite was Artovision.\u00a0 They take popular screenshots from games, and put them on framed layers of glass so they have a bit of a 3-D effect.\u00a0 They had so many cool ones and I really wanted some, but they cost 120 bucks each.\u00a0 They were really nice, so I\u2019m sure they\u2019re really worth that, but it was still out of my price range so I didn\u2019t get any.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Another merchandise booth that caught my eye was one with a giant inflatable dog and a doghouse made out of candy that you could walk into.\u00a0 Very cute.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Misc. Stuff<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And here\u2019s some pictures that I didn\u2019t know where to put so they go here.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

There was a Minecraft booth where you could build things with LEGOs, so here\u2019s a table with what people built on display.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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I forget what booth this robot was from, but he was a cute little guy so I took a picture of him.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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You could take an escalator to get a bird\u2019s eye view of the show, so I took some shots of that again.\u00a0 The show was much more crowded this year, so attendance was up.\u00a0 So much so that I may only go Friday next year, since it was impossible to do anything there on Saturday.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Here\u2019s a picture from another angle.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t even take any pictures of the board game area, which was just as crowded!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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At night we ate at a German restaurant on the San Antonio Riverwalk.\u00a0 It was good, but our food took too long and it was really more of a bar than a restaurant, so I may not go back. I did like how they decorated it for PAX South showgoers, though.\u00a0 I\u2019m such a sucker for Pac-Man.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Cosplay<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

At these shows, some people like to dress as their favorite video game characters.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t take too many pictures of them this year because most people were just either Mario or Overwatch characters.\u00a0 But I did get a chance to snap a few shots of costumes that caught my eye.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I don\u2019t know what this is.\u00a0 Some kind of Deadpool robot\u2026thing?\u00a0 I don\u2019t know.\u00a0 But this costume was really big and cool so I took a picture of it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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And here are some Street Fighter characters just hanging out.\u00a0 Oh, hi Cammy!\u00a0 (sigh)\u00a0 I think my favorite, though, is Blanka over there on the right.\u00a0 He\u2019s sitting there just chillin\u2019 and happy to be there!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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And that\u2019s all for now!\u00a0 Hope you enjoyed my overview of this year\u2019s PAX South.\u00a0 Let me know if you have any questions in the comments section!\u00a0 –Cary<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Penny Arcade Expo, or PAX for short, is one of the largest video game conventions open to the public in the US.\u00a0 It started out in Seattle, then expanded to another show out East in Boston, and for the past few years, they\u2019ve also had a show in San Antonio with PAX South.\u00a0 Since […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":18714,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18721"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18755,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18721\/revisions\/18755"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}