If they could only have more semi-journalistic, uninformed criticism like mine to help them out next year, that would be great.
Montreal’s Arcadia is Canada’s only open-to-the-public gamer festival. A weekend choc full of cool new games, geeked-out gear, innovative ideas, frenzied energy drink sales people and awesome LAN setups - right? Now that would have been cool. At least the coatcheck people were nice. But that’s about where it ended.
Pricey
The fest was held at the Uniprix Stadium, in the north end of Montreal. Cool venue - good setup, nice lights and sound. But why do I have to pay $2.50 for a coat check, when I just paid $20 to get in (on the high end of the scale for a trade-show type event) - all this with only 2 hours left in the entire festival. Strike one.
Stupid Loud
When I walked in to the main venue, I was assaulted by ... noise. Games are loud - and that’s good, right? Of course it is, gramps - until you get 400 consoles in a warehouse, all competing for sonic space. My Konami can out Dance-Dance your Ubisloth. And my Wii-Wii is bigger than your XXX box. Now that’s loud. Add to this the big stage blaring out another track of everyone’s favourite Guitar Hero track and what have you got? Stupid Loud, which is one notch up from regular old Way Too Loud.
Old Spice Girls
Hey, who are those hot babes over there, under the big gay red tent? Oh, it’s the Old Spice girls; I guess they’re not so old and gay after all - certainly not if they called me in for a photo op. I guess it’s because I’m famous. You can have a shot taken with two Old Spice chesty promo babes. After you and your four-year-old daughter are whisked in and whisked out, you’re thrown a card with a code on it. After Guido explains to you to “get da code” (what?) “use da code” (whaaa...) “on der site, mehnz” (wtf) “hey gitup okie smile lollzzz NEXT...” you will know exactly what to do... Apparently, I’m supposed to go to the Old Spice Website to see my silicone-enhanced portrait. Since it was explained to me so clearly, I did so upon my arrival home. Big surprise - there was no photo.
Four Dollar Yogurt
Hungry? I was. Like a lamer n00b ready to be PWNed, I ordered a yogurt and an apple juice for my daughter and I. “Seven dollars please.” Sorry? I was.
What Was Cool
But there must have been some cool stuff at Arcadia, though, right? Well, yes, there was - the Machinima demo was really neat, amidst the actors all killing each other, which was funny for about 2 minutes. But then, it was even funnier because the director couldn’t speak French, and I’m pretty sure Jean-Marc and his buddy were at very least pretending they didn’t know what the hell she was saying.
The Vintage Consoles section was also pretty dope. Where else can you show how badly you still suck at Colecovision and all your other 8 bit faves?
What else wasn’t cool
Enough about what was cool - what was definitely not cool was when a few of the booths started packing up around 5:30pm (the event ended at 6pm). It really irks me to see “professionals” in the industry who are supposed to be not only selling their wares but educating the public and contributing to the gaming community, packing up and leaving early. Arcadia needs to make it clear to all the people running booths that they need to be pro enough to chill at their respective booths until the official end of the user experience. That’s 6PM in this case.
But hey - at least you get a cool loot bag on the way out, right? Yeah! So I thought. Much to my chagrin, when I opened it at home, I found exactly three photocopied pieces of paper for mail-in rebates to shit that I would never buy, a three-month-old magazine and a coupon for discounted batteries. Nice!Christ - Uniprix paid for the stadium where this event was held - and did I get at least a roll or two of free ass wipe in my loot bag? Nary a one.
The Verdict
In Arcadia’s defense, it takes guts to get this thing off the ground - kudos to the organisational team that pulled it off. The organisers also integrated the live music element in the same building this year (I didn’t get to see any shows, so I can’t comment) but that sounds like a pretty (obviously) excellent idea to me. If they could only have more semi-journalistic, uninformed criticism like mine to help them out next year, that would be great.
All that being said, this is still the only weekend hang for gamers in the Great White North. That in itself accounts for a mega power-up in cool factor.
Despite its lack of creativity, crap loot bags and four dollar yogurt, Arcadia is still a fairly well-organised mega-event and cool activity. If you’re a hard-core gamer with $20 burning a hole in your pocket, definitely go. If not, stick to Pictionary.
