24/7 Player

Today we received news from Lucasfilm and Reed Exhibitions that Star Wars Celebration V is finally dated! Not only that but tickets go on sale soon!

This year’s Celebration will celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Star Wars : Episode V The Empire Strikes Back.

Star Wars Celebration V will take place on August 12-15, 2010 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Florida. The official website is up and gives details as well as the official Twitter and Facebook page.

Tickets will go on sale starting Thursday, December 10. They tend to sell out fast. I went to a previous celebration and had a BLAST. It’s a must-con for Star Wars fans young and old.

“We’re going to have a blast commemorating the 30th anniversary of fan-favorite The Empire Strikes Back as we welcome an entire new generation of fans watching our animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars,” said Steve Sansweet, Lucasfilm’s head of Fan Relations. “There’s no doubt that Star Wars Celebration V in Orlando will be the ‘must attend’ event for Star Wars fans of all ages and from all parts of the galaxy,” he added. “We’re also very excited to launch our partnership with Reed PopGroup, which has shown great expertise in running large, fun-filled events that satisfy fans, show participants, and exhibitors. We’re expecting the biggest and best Celebration to date.”

Here is the ticket information:
Tickets will be available starting Thursday, Dec. 10 via www.starwarscelebration.com. Pre-sale Adult Four-Day Passes are $120; Kids Four-Day Passes are $50; pre-sale Thursday, Friday, and Sunday Passes are $45; Saturday Passes are $50; and Kids One-Day Passes are $25. Children under six years old are admitted free.
Limited VIP Packages are expected to be available in early 2010, with details to be announced on the website. Single or Four-Day Passes already purchased can be upgraded to VIP status as long as supplies last!
Special hotel rates and other travel information will be announced on the website.

So who can I stay with? ^_^

Posted on December 3rd, 2009 at 12:47pm by GamingAngel
Filed Under: Angels on the Go, Lucasfilm, Orange County Convention Center, Star Wars Celebration, Star Wars Celebration V, Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, StarWars

Over the weekend I had the chance to go and check out a big event that Nintendo held at their flagship Nintendo Store in Rockefeller center for the New Super Mario Bros. Wii game. And it was quite the event! They had taken over the area in front of the store and set up a few tented areas (the weather was cold and rainy unfortunately) which had an area that was a museum that you entered via warp pipe, a DJ playing music and a demo area set up with several Wii systems, TVs and allowing four people to play the game together at once. Inside of the store on the upper level they were holding a tournament to win some cool prizes.

The first thing I checked out was the museum. It was filled with all kinds of nostalgic memorabilia from previous Mario games. There were some pretty cool things there like an old Nintendo magazine, some Super Mario Bros. Super Show VHS tapes (still in the shrink wrap!!), bed sheets and comforter, costumes and a cassette tape holder among the collection. There were also two TVs set up at the end of the museum that were playing all of the commercials from the older ones to the one for this game. All in all it was a pretty cool trip down memory lane.

After that I played a bit with the game itself. I had a chance to play it at Big Apple Comic Con so I just played a different level than before. It’s a really fun game, and I have to say that the multiplayer is probably what will make this game so popular. Players one and two play as Mario and Luigi while players three and four play different colored Toads. You see all of the enemies and friendly characters you know from previous games, albeit as jazzed up 3-D versions. The general play style will be nothing new to players of previous games, but in general is pretty easy to pick up. One cool thing is if a team-mate dies they can be resurrected by a player still living as they fly by in a bubble. Once popped, the other player can jump back into the game. This can also lead to some funny and frustrating deaths if this is done in more precarious situations.

Afterwards I decided to go and warm up by going inside and checking out the festivities there. I got to take a picture with Mario, then headed upstairs to where all of the action was. The tournament was in full swing and getting near the end by the time I had arrived to the event but it was fun to watch all of the people who were really into the game. There were definitely some good players there!

For another fun activity to do, there was a photography area set up with a giant backdrop of one of the levels where you could take your picture with various props from the mushroom kingdom. I of course had to go and do this, and I dragged my guest with me to take the photo. Of course I claimed the Mario hat and we had fun posing for a picture!

All in all Nintendo did a great job yet again holding a fun event for the New Super Mario Bros. game. You can get the game now in stores and online! You can also check out all of the images from this event on the Gaming Angels Flickr page here.

Posted on November 18th, 2009 at 2:27am by stealthyslyth
Filed Under: Angels on the Go, Console Platforms, Games, Luigi, Mario, Nintendo, Video game, Wii, new-super-mario-bros

A-Kon (Dallas, TX)
A fan-run anime convention that takes place in the Dallas/Ft Worth area.

Anime Expo (Los Angeles, CA)
The largest anime/manga event in the US, Anime Expo runs annually in Los Angeles, bringing artist, voice talent and musical performances together for a wonderful weekend of fun.

Anime North (Toronto, ON)
One of Canada’s largest anime conventions, Anime North takes place at the end of May. They also raise funds for the Hospital for Sick Children Foundation.

DragonCon (Atlanta, GA)
DragonCon is one of the largest scifi/fantasy and pop culture convention in the US. It spans four hotels and three days of cosplay, panels, and offers a variety of guests. One of the guests for 2010 is popular author Laurell K Hamilton.

GenCon (Indianapolis)
GenCon is one of the largest gaming events in the world. Everything from computer and console games to table top and roleplaying games are featured every summer at the event.

Kansas City Game Fair (Kansas City, MO)
The Kansas City Game Fair is a small convention that combines three events in one, ShaunCon: Kansas City’s own role-playing convention, Blockhead! a board game convention and BorderWars (HAHMGS – Heart of America Historical Miniatures Gaming Society).

Long Beach Comic Con (Long Beach, CA)
2009 was the first year for the Long Beach Comic Con. It was attended by guests such as Stan Lee, Jeph Loeb, Seth Green and Eric Roberts.

New York Anime Festival & New York Comic Con (New York City, NY)
In 2010, NYAF and New York Comic Con will be taking place at the same time, in the same convention hall. Purchasing a pass will grant you access to both cons and you can experience the best both events have to offer.

Otafest (Calgary, AB)
A small and very community oriented anime and manga convention in Calgary, Otafest is a growing anime con run by an amazing group of dedicated volunteers.

Otakon (Baltimore, MD)
Otakon started out as a small college run convention but soon grew too large and has moved to Baltimore. The event attracts over 20,000 attendees and focuses on anime, manga and Japanese culture.

PAX East (Boston, MA)
PAX East 2010 will be the inaugural event for this eastern expansion for PAX. This first event is scheduled for March 26-28.

PAX West (Seattle, WA)
The original PAX site, PAX West offers one of the finest “For the Fans” gaming experiences. This is truly a community based event.

Sakura Con (Seattle, WA)
Seattle’s Japanese cultural festival, SakuraCon is one of the largest anime conventions in the Western US. It is held in the Spring and sponsored by the Asia Northwest Cultural Education Association.

San Diego Comic Con (San Diego, CA)
While the primary focus of SDCC has been comic books, science fiction and fantasy, it has grown to embrace more pop culture, anime/manga, and gaming. It is the second largest traditional convention in the world.

SIEGECon (Atlanta, GA)
SIEGE is an industry event for aspiring game industry students, graduates and local industry professionals to network and learn from each other over the course of an educational and fun-filled weekend of activities.

Video Games Live (Worldwide)
VGL is a musical event, touring the globe to bring video game fans orchestral versions of their favourite video game music. It is a celebration of the culture of video games, and is supported buy the gaming industry.

Yaoi-Con (San Mateo, CA)
Yaoi-Con is a convention focused on the “yaoi” (male-male relationship) anime and manga scene. Due to the nature of the material, attendees must be 18 years of age or older with ID.

Posted on November 15th, 2009 at 3:07am by Yukino
Filed Under: Angels on the Go, Conventions, Los Angeles, Otakon, Popular culture, San Diego Comic-Con International, anime, anime expo, fantasy, new-york-city, sci-fi

Back row: Tweaker, Randy, John, Sam, Pete, Spike
Front row: Danger, Hamtastic, Bubba

Sorry to keep you in suspense, but I would just like to say: WE WIN GAMES!

The community team’s Bubba got us a 3x multiplier, so, of course, we nominated him our MVP and he held the trophy in our group pictures. Then we all took turns holding it and posing… or in Hammie’s case, hamming it up. There was a chorus of “Holla!”s and “Multiball!!”s for the rest of the night.

The final score was 398 Community, 341 Wizards. It was literally down to our IPA draft, the final tournament. The community took 12-12, narrowing our gap, with a 62 WotC, 56 Community score. Fortunately, Bubba and his 3x multiplier gave us more than enough points to take it all!

Of course we had to celebrate our victory with even more Magic involving a 14-pack pool for a sealed gaming session. These packs consisted of 10 more all-foil 8th Edition boosters from the night before and 4 Zendikar packs. After we were all tired enough to go to bed, we divided the remaining rares by rolling a d20 for order and picking while the uncommons and commons were sorted into equal piles and we chose the ones we wanted.

This was a VERY rewarding trip overall, and not just because I got to hold a shiny trophy. I’ve grown as a Magic player, I met some amazing people, and met the wonderful team of Wizards of the Coast, in part. I actually decided to start over on my own Magic Online account to keep playing and improving. You can find me on MTGO as Ashling.

And, just for the rest of the team: MULTIBALL!

(in order: Sam, Spike, Tweaker, Pete, Bubba, Danger, Hamtastic)

//

Posted on November 9th, 2009 at 10:30pm by RenoChan
Filed Under: Angels on the Go

So here we are, Day 2. We are the underdogs, the “Good Guys” as dubbed by ourselves and the community. We all arrived at breakfast pretty well rested and ready to take on the day. We ate and talked a lot about magic, including how our addition of Multiball would affect things. Multiball was something thrown at us mostly to boost scores. Our last member, John, arrived late last night, so we became a team of 9, as it wouldn’t be fair to just kick Randy out. The multiball round was a multiplier. If the multiball player won 3 games, we would get a 3x score modifier. For 2 wins it was 2x, while for 1 win, it was 1.5x. The first round was MOMIR basic while the rest of us played Unified Standard Construction.

Unfortunately, the Standard format didn’t go so well. I had a lot of issues with my edited deck as some of the key components were missing which caused me, in part, to go 0-4 for the round. The others did fairly well, but there were some issues with decks and, let’s face it, the Wizards team knows what they’re doing. I did get the chance to talk to both Adrianna and Tolena between matches. These two ladies were amazing. Adrianna even got other WotC members to come and check out my deck, including the lead of R&D, which was just amazing. By the end of all 4 rounds the Community was still down quite a bit.

Then we had lunch. Yukino seemed especially interested in this subject on twitter (<3), so I figured I’d share. We had tacos, chips, sodas, and other tasty deserts. Somehow during the 3rd round of Standard, sodas and candy managed to show up with the water bottles, chips, trail mix and granola bars. It was nice because we got to relax and prepare for the draft.

Of course the draft is what it all came down to. It went well. We were in two different groups for the draft. It went really well and we took 12 of the 24 rounds. Bubba got us a 3x modifier on our score, so it was looking good. Results will come later, as soon as we get them.

Posted on November 9th, 2009 at 5:30pm by RenoChan
Filed Under: Angels on the Go, Games, Trading Card Games, Video game, magic-the-gathering, wizards-of-the-coast