Anime Central

This post is a bit overdue, but I thought I'd attempt to recap on the amazing experience that was Anime Central. As you might have read in our previous post on C2E2, we're new to this stuff, and I for one was completely unprepared for the spectacle we were about to witness. Where else but an anime convention can you see scantily clad women in varying degrees of body paint, men dressed as Sailor Moon, and giant robots all wandering the streets in droves. Well, besides the Gay Pride Festival, anyways.

I never imagined I could fall prey to the urge, but I have to admit I found myself longing for some bad ass platform boots, shiny leggings, and a cape. Not a hero's cape, mind you. I've already decided that if I were to suddenly wake up with super powers, I would be joining the dark side. Super villain extraordinaire. Unfortunately, Paul would be the valiant hero; the shining white knight; and I would be forced to send him to his doom.

Anyways.. where was I? Ah yes, Anime Central. One thing we learned, very important, is that you MUST buy your tickets in advance, unless you wish to stand in line for upwards of 2 hours. In the case that you have no choice but to purchase your tickets the day of, always stand in the CASH line. It doesn't matter what the well meaning (or 'secretly chuckling into his hand') line attendant tells you, the credit card line is NEVER the faster line.

Although the journey of Getting To the event is interesting enough in itself for all the eye candy, once inside the gates it just got better. Personally, my favorite part of a convention is the panels. Paul likes the shwag. There was plenty of both to be had of course, and we were both glad to be wearing comfortable shoes as we covered miles of ground viewing adorable asian toys, clothes, and artwork. My favorite panel was a hilarious look at Japanese Western animes. We took an in-depth and tragically hilarious view of the various "stereo-typical Americans" as seen through the eyes of the East, such as the rude and ego-centric cowboy who has no regard for social rules and claims his own authority; the busty blonde whore. And the brunette one; the care-free college bi-sexual; the meat-head jock; and the womanizer who always wins in the end. What was really funny were the crowds of scandalized and perfectly upright Japanese citizens ever present in the background, shaking their heads in disbelief at our American ways.

The night wrapped up with a half and half audience participation comedy show. It was half 'laugh until I cried', and half awkward creepy silence. Paul convinced me to get up and share one of our favorite jokes, which was a sure crowd pleaser. "What is something 9 out of 10 people enjoy?" "Gang rape." ... At least, this crowd found it entertaining. ;)

We would have liked to go on to a few of the X-rated anime events, but with my usual finesse, I once again had left my ID at home, and we were forced to call it quits with the kiddies.

All in all a fun experience. Looking forward to the next one!

Dabong Review

I put the batteries into our brand new automatic card shuffler and loaded up the copy of Dabong we won at C2E2 and prepared to go to town. Right off the bat Sarah noticed the one year time limit per turn rule fell in love.

The rules are funny and whimsical, and you probably know them all already. Basic game play consists of playing cards that match the color or suit of the previous card. There are draw 2's, reverses and skips, you can play straights and flushes, you can even shoot the moon. There is a caveat or two as to how these special hands can be played but they all make sense. The rules are basically descriptions of special hands you can play broken down by how unorthodox they might seem. We had little problem with incorporating the entire rule set right off the bat however.

Dabong plays easy and still retains a bit of strategy. The hands one can play feel like special attacks and are very satisfying. The rules avoid the discouraging "draw cards until you can play one" rule, which feels weird but welcome.

I don't think this could be a regular 2 player game for us. The hands go by way too fast and there really isn't an attempt to play different strategies. Also I can't get over the fact that while Dabong borrows rules from so many other games it can't be used to play those other games like a deck of cards can. I do like it much better than card games though. I see this best played in a setting with three of more people who just finished a grueling game like Runescape and just want to have a little fun before going home.

The automatic card shuffler is cheap, loud, and the quality of the shuffle is dubious. However seeing as Sarah can't shuffle worth a damn it's a welcome addition to the table.

To purchase Dabong contact John at Astute Games.

Together at the C2E2

Our first trip of the year down Chicago's Lakefront path was pleasantly cool and relatively uncrowded. We were headed to another first for the both of us, our first convention. We'd talked about going to other conventions, but we had been hesitant to take that step. After all we are both still coming to terms with our geeky nature and didn't know if we were ready to be stereotyped at con-goers.

We had to park our bikes a good 15 minutes away from the Con because even though the bike path leads directly to the McCormick place, there is no easy way to reach the main convention hall. We are used to such things. So we braved the cavernous depths of the "Lakeside Hall" until we ran into Captain America, Ramona Flowers, and some Anime guy. Here we go folks.

Sarah was wearing her X-force print comic book dress with a blue shawl and matching Converse. We must have been stopped twenty times by admirers, and everywhere we went we overheard people commenting "that dress is awesome."  Next time we'll be bringing more cards and fliers.

We walked out of a screening of Evangelion 2.2. I'd never seen the original but this was so silly I actually face-palmed.

We received some free comics from Archaia, Mouse Guard being my faviorite. The artwork is so damn cute that it almost eclipses the fact that these poor mice have a daunting task ahead of them. Watching the team up against a snapping turtle moved me more that any overdone adventurers vs dragons scene could.

Dabong! Is a fun easy to learn card game that I would actually like to play again some time. It borrows liberally from almost every other card game out there but it all fits together well and there is a subtle strategy that comes from there being so many parallel rules in play at once. 

Someday all the furniture in our house will be from Geek Chic. I love the fact that the game tables allow you to cover up games in progress so curious cats don't eat your mini's.

Sarah really enjoyed Lady Mechanika. I got issue one signed, and then went and bought issue 0 mostly because I liked the art so much.

Then there was Quidditch. The International Quidditch Association really recreates this fantasy sport in all it's confusing pointless glory. We almost took a dodgeball in the face and I swear to god someone is going to lose an eye. I do admit it's a lot of fun.