Once again, the Pinoyxbox community participated in what would be the sequel to last year's GX-Con 2007, ANICON 2008, held at SM Megamall Megatrade Hall 3. An event focused on Anime, Cosplay and Console Gaming, PINOYXBOX @ Anicon 2008 proved to be truly "Bigger, Better, and more BADASS" than last year's GX-Con 2007. (Quote stolen from Gears of War lead developer CliffyB ;) )
The Pinoyxbox booth had a massive playing area with 6 LCD TVs thanks to Gamehopper and Brico (British Continental : http://www.britishcontinental.ltd.uk/ ):
1 47" LCD TV
5 37" LCD TVs
With 5 LCD TVs on stands and 1 LCD TV set up on a table top. Pinoyxbox highlighted the Xbox 360's very best titles in existence:
ROCKBAND 2
Devil May Cry 4
Tales of Vesperia
Racedriver: Grid
Naruto: Rise of a Ninja
Soulcalibur IV
The Pinoyxbox community wholeheartedly lent their equipment, game consoles and other gear to players from all walks of life. Rockband 2 was a huge hit at the convention, with a massive crowd of both game players and onlookers alike. Pinoyxbox had Rockband 2 set up with the song license pack to let songs from Rockband 1 be available for play, resulting in a never-ending playlist of songs for people at Anicon 2008 to enjoy.
Aside from letting people play with various Xbox 360 games, Pinoyxbox also successfully held two major gaming tournaments: A Racedriver : Grid "Fastest Time" tournament and a Soulcalibur IV tournament.
The results for the Racedriver: Grid tournament are as follows:
Game Settings [Just posting these in case anyone out there is interested to beat our 1st, 2nd and 3rd Place Winners]:
Car Region: Japan
Car Type: Any Pro-Tuned car
Game Mode: Grid World > View Cars > Japan > Select Car > Test Drive
Ghost Car: OFF
Driving Assists: Default is ALL ON, but players can set this as they please
Controls: Default is PRESET 1, but players are allowed to customize their controls
Race Track Specifications:
Track Region: Japan
Track Select: Okutama
Track Type: Grand Circuit
Car Specification: Any Japanese, Pro-Tuned Car starting from class C (Classes C, D, E are selectable).
Number of Laps: 5
WINNERS' CIRCLE
1st Place, Racedriver GRID Champion:
Timothy Lacbay (Teejay)
Time: 1:45:45
Prize: Infinite Undiscovery, Brothers in Arms
2nd Place:
Aldo Izon (GhostOfSparta)
Time: 1:48:10
Prize: Warhammer Battle March
3rd Place:
Kevin Chan
Time: 1:50:16
Prize: 1 20 piece D Skins CD/DVD Protectors
The biggest tournament at the Anicon 2008 was indeed the Pinoyxbox Soulcalibur IV tournament. It's so huge that it requires its own blog post which I'll be writing momentarily. I will, for now say that, the turnout for the Soulcalibur IV tournament was absolutely incredible and unprecedented, we had a whopping 51 players signing up to play at the tournament. If we had even more resources at our disposal we would probably have been able to let everyone join the games. It was very, very successful, and the level of play shown by the players was surprisingly impressive. Perhaps one major factor for this is that Soulcalibur is familiar to Filipino gamers---local arcades do have the game and a lot of people are familiar with the mechanics and the characters. Again, it deserves its own blog post so I'm saving that for later.
We met a lot of different gamers from all walks of life, and enjoyed talking about games with many of our booth's visitors. I met some people who didn't even know certain games were already available, like Devil May Cry 4, Rockband 2 or even Soulcalibur 4 (some of the SC players who joined the tourney were SC1,2,3 veterans). That's a given, because we're living in a country that's unsupported for all of the major console platforms, and game companies do not have major advertising for their games here.
At the end of the day, the Pinoyxbox booth at ANICON 2008 was an incredible success. We at Pinoyxbox introduced to the Filipino gamers how much fun gaming on the Xbox 360 platform can be; how they do have a diverse lineup of games to choose from when they game on the Xbox 360. I think we successfully erased the notion that the Xbox platform is something only for first-person shooters--that's a stigma that the Microsoft Xbox brand has had with Filipino gamers for a long time now. We showed them a lot of the games that interest them---games like Tales of Vesperia, Soulcalibur 4 and Devil May Cry 4, for instance---games that have a unique Asian feel, with characters and stories that the Filipino gamers can relate with. I certainly hope we've reached out to the cosplayers in the crowd to come up with a new set of costume ideas for next year's series of cosplay conventions! The games we exhibited will certainly provide them with a lot of great inspiration :)
Thanks to the volunteers and participants from Pinoyxbox.com for making this event a huge success....thanks for contributing not just your equipment and gaming items, but also your time and your efforts to help us manage the booth and control the crowd. Thanks goes out as well to our sponsors Gamehopper, Brico and Gamecore, who helped create the console gaming booth of our dreams. Thanks to their help, we were able to reach out to many Filipino gamers and let them experience what it must be like to be at one of those big gaming conventions in those officially supported countries, even if it's only for one day. Thanks to Dennis Uy and the rest of the organizers of Anicon 2008 for inviting us, for giving us free booth space at SM Megamall Megatrade Hall 3, for giving us a very, very large area to set up our LCD TVs and accomodate players, and for giving Pinoyxbox (what is arguably) the best spot in the convention area. Pinoyxbox's booth was situated in the middle of the convention area, with our LCD TVs in full view of players who just entered the hall. I think this was a major contributing factor which caused our booth to become so crowded, so quickly! Despite our attempts to put a lot of space for players, it got thick real fast! But it was never too uncomfortable for us there. In fact, I'd say it made the atmosphere at our booth even more welcoming and more festive!
Lastly, a big THANK YOU goes out to all the game players who visited our booth and made our game demonstrations and tournaments very successful. Thanks everyone! Until we meet again :D
The Pinoyxbox booth had a massive playing area with 6 LCD TVs thanks to Gamehopper and Brico (British Continental : http://www.britishcontinental.ltd.uk/ ):
1 47" LCD TV
5 37" LCD TVs
With 5 LCD TVs on stands and 1 LCD TV set up on a table top. Pinoyxbox highlighted the Xbox 360's very best titles in existence:
ROCKBAND 2
Devil May Cry 4
Tales of Vesperia
Racedriver: Grid
Naruto: Rise of a Ninja
Soulcalibur IV
The Pinoyxbox community wholeheartedly lent their equipment, game consoles and other gear to players from all walks of life. Rockband 2 was a huge hit at the convention, with a massive crowd of both game players and onlookers alike. Pinoyxbox had Rockband 2 set up with the song license pack to let songs from Rockband 1 be available for play, resulting in a never-ending playlist of songs for people at Anicon 2008 to enjoy.
Aside from letting people play with various Xbox 360 games, Pinoyxbox also successfully held two major gaming tournaments: A Racedriver : Grid "Fastest Time" tournament and a Soulcalibur IV tournament.
The results for the Racedriver: Grid tournament are as follows:
Game Settings [Just posting these in case anyone out there is interested to beat our 1st, 2nd and 3rd Place Winners]:
Car Region: Japan
Car Type: Any Pro-Tuned car
Game Mode: Grid World > View Cars > Japan > Select Car > Test Drive
Ghost Car: OFF
Driving Assists: Default is ALL ON, but players can set this as they please
Controls: Default is PRESET 1, but players are allowed to customize their controls
Race Track Specifications:
Track Region: Japan
Track Select: Okutama
Track Type: Grand Circuit
Car Specification: Any Japanese, Pro-Tuned Car starting from class C (Classes C, D, E are selectable).
Number of Laps: 5
WINNERS' CIRCLE
1st Place, Racedriver GRID Champion:
Timothy Lacbay (Teejay)
Time: 1:45:45
Prize: Infinite Undiscovery, Brothers in Arms
2nd Place:
Aldo Izon (GhostOfSparta)
Time: 1:48:10
Prize: Warhammer Battle March
3rd Place:
Kevin Chan
Time: 1:50:16
Prize: 1 20 piece D Skins CD/DVD Protectors
The biggest tournament at the Anicon 2008 was indeed the Pinoyxbox Soulcalibur IV tournament. It's so huge that it requires its own blog post which I'll be writing momentarily. I will, for now say that, the turnout for the Soulcalibur IV tournament was absolutely incredible and unprecedented, we had a whopping 51 players signing up to play at the tournament. If we had even more resources at our disposal we would probably have been able to let everyone join the games. It was very, very successful, and the level of play shown by the players was surprisingly impressive. Perhaps one major factor for this is that Soulcalibur is familiar to Filipino gamers---local arcades do have the game and a lot of people are familiar with the mechanics and the characters. Again, it deserves its own blog post so I'm saving that for later.
We met a lot of different gamers from all walks of life, and enjoyed talking about games with many of our booth's visitors. I met some people who didn't even know certain games were already available, like Devil May Cry 4, Rockband 2 or even Soulcalibur 4 (some of the SC players who joined the tourney were SC1,2,3 veterans). That's a given, because we're living in a country that's unsupported for all of the major console platforms, and game companies do not have major advertising for their games here.
At the end of the day, the Pinoyxbox booth at ANICON 2008 was an incredible success. We at Pinoyxbox introduced to the Filipino gamers how much fun gaming on the Xbox 360 platform can be; how they do have a diverse lineup of games to choose from when they game on the Xbox 360. I think we successfully erased the notion that the Xbox platform is something only for first-person shooters--that's a stigma that the Microsoft Xbox brand has had with Filipino gamers for a long time now. We showed them a lot of the games that interest them---games like Tales of Vesperia, Soulcalibur 4 and Devil May Cry 4, for instance---games that have a unique Asian feel, with characters and stories that the Filipino gamers can relate with. I certainly hope we've reached out to the cosplayers in the crowd to come up with a new set of costume ideas for next year's series of cosplay conventions! The games we exhibited will certainly provide them with a lot of great inspiration :)
Thanks to the volunteers and participants from Pinoyxbox.com for making this event a huge success....thanks for contributing not just your equipment and gaming items, but also your time and your efforts to help us manage the booth and control the crowd. Thanks goes out as well to our sponsors Gamehopper, Brico and Gamecore, who helped create the console gaming booth of our dreams. Thanks to their help, we were able to reach out to many Filipino gamers and let them experience what it must be like to be at one of those big gaming conventions in those officially supported countries, even if it's only for one day. Thanks to Dennis Uy and the rest of the organizers of Anicon 2008 for inviting us, for giving us free booth space at SM Megamall Megatrade Hall 3, for giving us a very, very large area to set up our LCD TVs and accomodate players, and for giving Pinoyxbox (what is arguably) the best spot in the convention area. Pinoyxbox's booth was situated in the middle of the convention area, with our LCD TVs in full view of players who just entered the hall. I think this was a major contributing factor which caused our booth to become so crowded, so quickly! Despite our attempts to put a lot of space for players, it got thick real fast! But it was never too uncomfortable for us there. In fact, I'd say it made the atmosphere at our booth even more welcoming and more festive!Lastly, a big THANK YOU goes out to all the game players who visited our booth and made our game demonstrations and tournaments very successful. Thanks everyone! Until we meet again :D