SRGE 2016

The video for the event is taking a bit longer than expected. The preview render times are somewhere around an hour or two, so I won’t be able to get it in on time.

Before the trip I spent a great deal of time trying to drive a tiny car that could barely shift. My parents thought they were helping me, and guilt tripped me into using the car. I won’t go into details, but it ended up rolling down a hill, and into someones yard, while also blocking traffic. The police were friendly, and able to get the car parked. After that incident, I walked a lot, and it was easier than trying to lift my leg.

The day after my parents arrived from their trip, I left for Seattle. Actually my stay was in Bremerton, which is either a 2 hour drive away from Seattle, or a pleasant ferry ride. I chose the ferry ride. I first had to get my car to Bremerton, which meant going through an hour or so of traffic from Bellevue to Tacoma. That was a very long, and annoying drive. Luckily the view was great.

Bremerton is gorgeous. I took pictures of several flowers, and scared some lady who thought I was checking a house out for nefarious deeds. The cute cats on the road did not enter into her mind. She made sure to take my picture of me, and tell the lady who owned the cats. It added an extra sense of thrill to my adventure.

Seattle Retro Gaming Expo was being held at the exposition hall in the Seattle Center. That means the place that has the space needle. I took the ferry the first day, then had to figure out where the monorail was, then found out they only took cash. The biggest problem was that from the ferry to the monorail was an uphill walk.

At the Seattle Center I was able to find out directions, and go to the proper location. It was actually in a weird spot, so you shouldn’t feel bad for not knowing where it was. It was next to the giant water fountain and you needed to take specific stairs to get to it. I got lost using a map and other knowledge.

When I arrived, I soon realized the hall was the same location as previous NorthWest Pinball and Arcade Shows. I had heard horror stories about the hill from the loading dock to the show floor. It is long, and fairly steep. If an arcade tipped, there wouldn’t be much to stop it.

We joked that we needed to ride wagons down and see who can make it the furthest.

As it turned out, we only had three volunteers -including me- for set up. What should have taken us an hour took us several. It didn’t help that some of the needed power cords or RGB set ups were missing. We wouldn’t know this until after setting up tables, and TV’s for the event.

The original design for the event had one long line for the consoles, but it turned out we couldn’t plug everything in that way. So we moved the tables around for a new set up, and then discovered the missing cords. After a few hours of work, we decided that someone in the morning could deal with it.

I was offered a ride from the volunteer coordinator, and it actually took longer to drive to the ferry than walk. Traffic was that bad.

The next day it seems the problem had been solved, because some of the TV’s didn’t have consoles hooked up to them at all.

I spent a lot of time hanging out, chatting with folks, and playing games. There were several Indie games set up, and they had chairs to sit on. If you spend a lot of time on your feet walking a single room hallway, that chair becomes really nice. I will have a separate article on the games, but they are all fun.

We had a volunteer lounge, which was an empty room with chairs and a table. It doesn’t sound like much, and it really isn’t. On the other hand, it was a great place to chat. We got snacks there as well.

The entire hall was a single room, so we could hear the various speakers at any time during the show. Metal Jesus Rocks showed up, along with Chris Kohler, and my personal favorite was actively hacking old NES games. They changed Mario to Kirby and the fireballs to pacman with a few quick steps.

Near the end of the day the crowds began to leave and we had a videogame contest. Near the end one of the runners asked if I wanted to join in because they were down some players. I got second in the first round I was in -F Zero GX on the most difficult stage- and then lost the next one. I had not played Killer Instinct since I was about 10, and could not remember a single move.

“Hi, I’m Haus, and I will be losing to you today.”

Apparently I was pulled into the contest soon enough that I ended up placing, and getting a prize. It was an Amiibo for Splatoon. By coincidence, that is something I actually wanted.

The next day as pretty much the same, I rode the ferry, got there, walked around a lot, played games, and chatted with folks. My buddy Adam showed up, and apparently won a contest. I suspect he was the only entrant. He also commented that some of the games were fakes. This was surprising on two parts. The first is that Chris Kohler had just spoken about it, and two that anyone would be selling something like that. I admit, i think I have a fake Donkey Kong Country, it only loads a little bit on my SNES. This is annoying in many many ways.

The highlight was a walk through the Seattle Center to canvas people to the game. I looked for anyone playing Pokemon Go or who seemed nerdy. I took pictures of the amazing flowers, and cool spots in the area. One of my favorites was a playground that likely replaced the amusement park. It is way cool and artsy, and I felt jealous of every child playing in it.

I got a couple games for about $8 total. Mark of Kri was about a dollar, and Tony Hawk Underground and Wasteland were $3 a piece. I now have all of the Tony Hawks from the PS1 and PS2 era. I have to admit, Wasteland sort of sucks. The level design is just weird, and trying to combo or do anything is awkward. The story mode is pretty dumb, but at least the level design is a little better.

Take down was way faster. We had the crew there, and I pulled in some folks who knew their stuff. Within an hour of the show ending we were done, and eating cake. Heck, I ended up chatting with a friend for an hour before we realized that we had finished.

The next day I left, and took some pictures of a garden near the place I stayed. It was an open garden, and had some amazing flowers in it.

My usual gassing up area was closed, as were all the other pumps in Ellensburg. I filled up at some random stop with a pretty low price on gas. Later that day I looked in the mirror and saw a sun burn. I knew it had to be from that gas station.