The following post originally appeared on attractmo.de, on May 7, 2014.
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This is it; Comics vs Games 3D is a little over 24 hours away. And hopefully you’ve caught glimpses of the show over the past week, via Tiny Cartridge, Polygon, and the like. But does the image above look at all extra familiar?
Yup, those are the Ventla figures that were originally supposed to be part of our previous shindig, Fangamer X Attract Mode, but were a total no show. Thanks entirely due to efforts of the hard working men and women who comprise Seattle’s Post Office (and I thought NYC’s branch was the absolute worst).
Well the important thing is that they’re finally ready to make their way overdue public appearance. But before the festivities officially get under way, there’s still some unfinished business to attend to: time to once again see what video games look like through the eyes of those who use Instagram.
The last one was filed just as IndieCade East 2014 was starting, so that’s where we’ll officially kicks things off. And one of the conference’s many highlights was the first (far as I can tell) east coast appearance of Tenya Wanya Teens…
Though my favorite part of the entire weekend was the talk dedicated to video game zines, and not just because literally 75% of everything covered was stuff found in the Attract Mode shop…
Not sure if I mentioned to here before, but am currently trying to move to Toronto; New York City’s great and all, but sometimes you just need some change. So I’ve been spending my final days in the Big Apple revisiting fave haunts, or in some cases, seeing what’s left of its former glory…
J&L is the last remaining vestige of Chinatown’s once glorious, gaming past (cheap plug time: which is detailed in the second installment of the FORT90ZINE). And inside you’ll find plenty of broken controllers, and broken dreams…
Not long after IndieCade East was Toy Fair, populated by all kinds of action figures, model kits, stuffed animals, and everything in between. Some of them game related; most impressive sight was the gargantuan Metal Gear Ray toy from ThreeA…
Though I’m going after another Hideo Kojima creation, in a far more diminutive (and affordable) package, this Zone of the Enders figure…
May as take a peek at my own personal toy shelf (Adam suggested I take some pic, before packing everything up)…
While re-visiting certain parts of NYC one last time, I’ve often made curious discoveries. Like the designer toy shop in Grand Central, which had a series of prints depicting what’s inside certain iconic assemblages of plastic…
Also took the time to re-exploring my own neck of the woods, and was delighted to discover that Pac-Man and company were still around (thought they had been painted over, but turns out, they were just buried under piles of ice for many weeks)…
Saying goodbye to your surroundings also means having one last taste of local delicacies, like the taiyaki shop in Jersey I frequent. Which happens to be guarded by Pikachu…
Was also motivated to finally check out places that I’ve long been curious about. Case in point: the Two-Bit Retro Arcade, which I’ve posted pictures of in the past (taken by friends). Hate to say it, but I’d gladly take rubbing elbows with LES bohemians over Williamsburg hipsters (sorry Barcade fans)…
Also swung by Modern Pinball, which is basically some dude’s private collection. Pay $12 and you get to spend an hour playing whatever you want, however you want. And the owner keeps track of how much money you spend; if there’s a machine you end up buying (cuz it’s basically his private showroom), the amount of all your visits are subtracted from the final bill…
Wasn’t planning on going originally, but since I found myself in the area, swung by PAX East 2014. One pleasant surprise was this Samurai Gunn arcade cab…
Fellow Attract Mode member Ted Martens was on the show floor, with the latest build of Crypt of the NecroDancer, though the real highlight was the customized dance pads…
Ran into Andy Wallace, literally the nicest guy on the face of the earth, as well, along with the latest build of Particle Mace (which I first pointed about last fall. I particularly dug the brand new WTF ship…
The Oculus Rift was (not surprisingly) everywhere. All kinds of games were being demoed with the newly acquired by Facebook VR headset, even 2D sidescrollers…
Gotta say, was kinda underwhelmed by the the cosplay at this year’s PAX East. Not sure what’s up with that, but there was still some good examples, like old man in the very first cave in Zelda 1…
One of the most popular subjects for cosplayers was, at least when it came to personalities from indie games, Octodad. Here we have some kid’s take on the character, and his mother was genuinely proud of all the attention her boy was getting…
Turns out, hipsters love Half-Life…
And this guy dressed up as a contestant from Legends of the Hidden Temple was one of the stars of the show floor…
Another look at Y2K, my previously mentioned game of the show…
Was also fond of The Lickening; I think it’s fairly clear, from the name alone, what it’s about…
As a fan of pixelated dogs and pixelates snow, Dog Sled Saga got a big thumbs up…
Yet my runner up pick for game of the show had to be latest CAPY X Double Fine collab, mostly since I’m such a huge fan of both TowerFall and mini golf…
Celebrated another birthday recently, and after a night filled with ramen, beer, and karaoke, was confronted with my first real decision as a 37 year old: to take home this InuYasha DS game found on the top of an old-timey, Oscar the Grouch-esque garbage can lid in Harlem, around 1am or not…
Though despite being ever closer to being officially middle aged, when one is supposed to finally act like an adult, I still waste my Friday nights drinking PBR and playing Wave Race 64. I yam what I yam…
As for what I got on my birthday, for myself, am now the proud owner of a Super Famicom! Been in love with the design of the hardware practically my entire life and finally decided to pull the trigger…
But what’s a console without games? Here’s a thank you note that came with my copy of Turtles In Time, which again demonstrated that Japanese eBay sellers are often times the best…
Also got a 3DS XL, which came with a free game thanks to a promotion Nintendo was running. And because I already owned everything up for grabs, decided to pass my download code over to Dante, Adam’s son, who was celebrating his birthday as well. I also knew that he really wanted Pokemon X, but there was one catch: he had to name one of his Pokemans after me…
Speaking of 3DSs, still haven’t picked up Bravely Default; played the demo and I kinda like the art style way more than the gameplay itself. Which is why I may simply opt for the art book, the same one my pal Peter showed me…
Sticking with the world of Japanese print, I recently picked up an issue of Brutus (by far my favorite rag from those parts), which was all about crazy collectors. This woman loves Famicom carts…
It’s easy to understand why; they’re so pretty! Here’s a layout from some other magazine that miki800 came across…
Via txaxkxu comes a guide to collecting capsule vending machines. It’s hard to tell, but some neat, game-related toys are visible in the background (really wish I could see inside)…
On the completely other end of the spectrum, yet still related, are a bunch of Lost Level zines that Cesar Quintero just folded up…
Another thing that also came and went: GDC. Didn’t go, though I sure wish I had, if only to get a taste of THE FUTURE, like Andrew Yoon here is enjoying…
I have no idea what the heck this is (and Diego never answered when I asked him directly), but whatever it is, I wanna mess around with it…
Word on the street that the next big thing are games you can control with just your eyes, which I think is what Jake is trying to do. Whatever; MORE OF THE FUTURE…
Back to PAX East; the 17-Bit booth had my favorite bit of mercy of that entire weekend. And that’s this poster for Galak-Z, one designed to resemble Super Famicom box art…
On tha note: no talk of Super Famicom box arts is complete without a few pics from the Super Famicom Guy himself, Stu Brett. And recent standouts from his collection include something that I may have to add to my own library…
Again, no idea what this is (other than the title, Ihatovo Story), but that box art is simply beautiful…
Whereas this Fami cart, which Thymine dug up somewhere, is scary as all hell…
retrokk_jp reminds me how sorely I miss the way anime babes used to rendered, back in the 80s…
Most people know about Summer Carnival ’92, but what about Summer Carnival ’93?
Said it before, and I’ll say it again: Famicom carts sure are easy on the eye…
The thing I like the most about retrokk_jp’s feed is seeing the piles of vintage hardware he picked up each weekend, often in poor shape, to bring back to life…
A lot of his projects look pretty tough, though his success rate appears to be fairly high…
But even if you can’t make something like the Robotic Operating Buddy work, one can still find uses; this one’s from miki800, during a recent video game themed pub crawl (this place to be precise)…
Back in the States, Nic Maynard asks: “18 Gallons of Chiptunes For Sale. Any takers?”
Here’s another look at Batsly Adams’s Genesis-centric set up, courtesy of Alex Bond…
And no talk of Sega’s Mega Drive is complete without posts from mister sixteen bit himself. Here we an absolute gorgeous shot of my personal favorite console of all time…
Along with a close up of the best part of Vib Ribbon‘s packaging…
Camila Gormaz got her boyfriend a copy of Ground Zeroes, with his face Photoshopped on the cover. Am always a sucker for expression of love when MGS is added to the mix…
Time for yet another Batsly Adams appearance, this time courtesy of a totally different Adam, from a livestreamed Mega Man marathon. 6 different players had 6 hours to beat all 6 NES games; Batsly managed to nab Mega Man 3…
Ivan has a really high ceiling and totally empty walls. Perfecting for playing Super Mario Bros on…
Though just good old fashioned code looks nice as well, as demonstrated during Vector Fest’s live coded electronica jam session, which Kent Sheely attended…
And here we have two individuals dissecting a pinball machine, which is the Arcade Hunters‘s favorite subject matter at the moment…
Chris Person shows us what happens when pinball gets real…
miki800 poses a very interesting car related question…
And Anton Sombetzki‘s Peugeot is 24-bits, turns out…
Via Patrick Miller; I wanna play the version of Third Strike with a huge “east” button because that’s the only way I’d win…
Everyone loves cutesy pics of little kids playing with huge arcade sticks, right? First we’ve got Linus‘s kid (presumably)…
And here’s (some other) Chris‘ kid (again, presumably)…
Christina hails from Russia, where the controllers for their Genesis/Mega Drive are kinda wacky looking…
Via Famichip; I love it how, whenever an anime character is shown playing a game system, there’s at a 40% chance it’s a Sega Saturn…
And courtesy of ketta_gg, essentially the same thing as above, but for your shelf…
Another one from Famichip; one’s little lady from Love Plus is very little indeed, when standing next to a Game Boy…
Back to retrokk_jp, showing us a super cute Dragon Quest figure set…
Though I want txaxkxu’s Strange Journey figure the most…
Gotta love how Jennie‘s Mass Effect shots all resemble covers to ambient rock CD…
I also know it’s pretty cheesy, but I totally want this GoldenEye watch (gotta fin out where Kent got his)…
Mike recently posted a Zelda-related image that I find pretty awesome. Would be interested in seeing (and wearing) it as a shirt!
Note to self: ask Israel what pixelated street this is and how can I go there…
Kris‘ nephew is at it again, providing fan art based upon his uncle’s game. Which in this case is Below…
Guess who got himself a Caine’s Arcade staff shirt, plus a lifetime free fun pass? Stu to be exact…
Chris Furniss was at this year’s Emerald City Comic Con, and doing what he does best once again…
He also spotted these Papers Please cosplayers…
Yet, and as demonstrated several times already, simply no one does it better than Jenni. Her latest and greatest is this Okami cosplay, with cel-shading included…
Still, not everyone has such skills, but so long as you have some stuff lying around the house… like an old kimono, NES Zapper, and werewolf mask (with the latter belonging to Ted)… you’re good to go!
But be warned: you might confuse your cat…
Via Zack; yet another thing I missed where still being in NYC was this year’s edition of TOJam was WWF vs WWF…
In a showdown between the World Wildlife Fund and the World Wrestling Federation, guess who the victor was?
With TCAF almost upon us, might I make a recommendation? This year’s book of the show, guaranteed, will be Kimi will be, unquestionably, Geng Dunk…
And a look behind the scenes, at an earlier version of Kris Mukai‘s upcoming Comics vs Games 3D piece…
K, time to start putting the big show together. Yesterday was my first glimpse of the Comics vs Games 3D artwork in actual 3D, and as the saying goes: they MUST be seen in person to be believed…
