Okay, here's my excuse for not going to Colony Wars last night: I spent nearly the entire day at a mall called TriNoma, covering one of the year's first gaming events: the Philippine Online Gaming Summit. I sort of had an obligation to go to this one, since I work for Game! Magazine and they were the ones who put this whole shebang together.
Malls in my country normally open at 10am, but I bluffed my way in an hour earlier. Technically, I'm part of Game! staff so I pretty much had a good reason to come in early.
The first booth on the right at the entrance turned out to be that of IP e-Games, and they were setting up as I arrived. pCM Veya was thinking about playing the FFA films Not Another Love Story?, Lonely Hearts Club II, and Relapse on the flatscreen monitors strung up around the booth.
Booth set-up.
Opening time and everyone at the venue - the central activity area of TriNoma - got ready for the influx of gamers, cosplayers, and the just plain curious. The price of admission was a copy of either the Nov 2007 or the Dec 2007-Jan 2008 issues, and the latter were being sold at the gate for those who hadn't got their copies yet. Gamers lined up for entrance and immediately swarmed the game outfits' booths.
[CRUMMY entrance procedure though. Filling out forms before letting people in for the lose. Also, why were the Game! servers down for the weekend?]
In front of the stage were several cordoned-off areas hosting about a couple dozen high-end Intel PCs each. These were the free-play/tournament areas where all the games at the show could be tried on for size. The IP e-Games/Granado Espada portion was located at front right, facing the stage.
The GE area. Nice machines, eh?
Soon after the program started I ran into DeSanggria, and when we came back from breakfast we promptly gathered up Darrick and Nate of Casa Reclusion, Fiksdotter, and Mena. Another of the early arrivals was Charles/Device. Later on, we ran into Sigrid, and MUCH later on, Alex Crosse. After lunch we also saw the arrival of the AdeptasFraternas contingent, led by none other than their faction leader Welling.
[Whew, that's a lot of link love =3]
Left to right: DeSanggria, Darrick, Mena, NineMoons, Device, Veya, Nate, and Fiksdotter.
The Bahia Island banner that marked the GE PC area.
Left to right: Device, NineMoons, Darrick, Fiksdotter, Mena, Sigrid, Anne, Nate, and Blacksword.
NineMoons, DeSanggria and Sigrid strike a pose.
Left to right: Blacksword, Nate, Darrick, Mena, Fiksdotter, Device, and Fiksdotter's friend.
DeSanggria got the tech crew to play the FFA film entries on stage after lunch: first came Not Another Love Story?, then Lonely Hearts Club II [and Nate, Darrick and Fiksdotter indulged in several mock squabbles over the subtitles while we were watching], and then Relapse late in the afternoon.
[Not nice that that movie was played so late, after its creators had left! They should have simply run all three films together instead of sticking to whatever list they had!]
After the cosplay event we had the PvP tournament. Several teams of two signed up to play [the Reclusion brothers made one team, and Fiksdotter and Mena another], but in the end, the Welling and •™ families emerged victorious.
Fiksdotter and Mena get into battle mode.
The Reclusion brothers prepare for PvP.
Team Welling and •™ on the way to the championship.
Finally, as the events of the day wound down, all of us remaining bloggers ran off to ToastBox for a round of drinks and some very interesting things to talk about.
Left to right: DeSanggria, NineMoons, Mena, Nate, Darrick and Fiksdotter.
It was a great day full of bonding and friendship - and Granado Espada too!
For more about POGS, please visit the following blogs:
Casa Reclusion: POGS 2k8 Photo Story
Fiksdotter's Box: Post Philippine On-line Gaming Summit (POGS)
Tales from Granado Espada: The Philippine Online Gaming Summit (POGS) 2008 event
Tres Mujeres: [Picspam Aftermath] POGS 2008 + Thoughts on CW
Diario el Familia Sigrid: Sigrid Invades POGS 2008!
Lady Veya's Musings: Aftermath: POGS 2008
The Deniva Chronicles: The Philippine Online Gaming Summit
2 comments:
Thanks for the company! I'll have to thank you big time because if it weren't for you, we wouldn't have become a happy community.
Let's continue the tradition in future events and hope to grow bigger and bigger each passing event! :D
@ filsimmer
thank you as well for being enthusiastic!
hope to keep seeing you at many of the events both online and in real life!
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