Last year was my first experience at E3, but this year, I was no longer a rookie; I was a seasoned veteran. Or so I liked to think. But things were a little different this year. At the same time, some things were the same. But let me back up a bit and start at the beginning as I walk you through my adventures at E3 2018, which took place at the Los Angeles Convention Center June 12-14.
I started working at a gaming company in January of last year. That meant I would be able to get a free industry pass to E3. Last year was also the first year that E3 was opened up for non-industry attendees to purchase a Gamer Pass. This year, they changed things up a bit. Although Gamer Passes were still available, there were restricted hours during which those passholders could attend. On Tuesday, the expo was 11:00am-7:00pm, but if you had a Gamer Pass, you could only attend 2:00pm-7:00pm. Then on Wednesday, although the show hours were 9:00am-7:00pm, those with a Gamer Pass could only attend 12:00pm-7:00pm. Thursday was the only day that the show hours were the same for everyone, 9:00am-6:00pm. However, the price of Gamer Passes was still the same as last year: $249 (or $149 if you were lucky enough to purchase one of the first 1,000 passes). Of course, this was a non-issue for me, since I was again attending with an industry pass. My friend @Cheezm0 was also attending with an industry pass. However, my friend @CorgiKohmander was attending with a Gamer Pass.
Being that E3 takes place smack dab in the middle of the week (Tuesday through Thursday), I have to take PTO in order to attend E3. Therefore, like last year, I planned to only attend for one day. Also like last year, I attended on the Wednesday.
I live in Fullerton, which is in Orange County, California, about 35 miles southwest of Los Angeles. During rush hour, the drive would probably take about 2 hours. I’m weird and don’t drive, so I am adept at taking public transportation. I caught the Metrolink train from Fullerton at 7:41am, transferred to the Metro red line at Union Station, then transferred to the blue line, and arrived at the Los Angeles Convention Center (a block away from the train stop) in about an hour.
Along the way, I had logged into the PlayStation Experience app, having remembered about it from last year, when reserving times via the app was how you “get in line” for the various demos that PlayStation was offering at E3. No one in our group was ever successful with reserving a time, because thousands upon thousands of people are trying to make a reservation at the same time, and it basically comes down to luck. But this year, I thought I had an advantage with being able to reserve a time that a large portion of attendees (the Gamer Pass folk) would not be trying to get. However, when 8am rolled around, which was the time reservations opened for the morning sessions, I realized I was unable to take advantage of making reservations for the before noon sessions, as they were all marked as “private” and I couldn’t figure out how to make a selection. So much for my advantage I thought I had. Oh well.
Anyway, so when I got on site I was able to pick up my badge immediately, as there was no line for badge pickup. I checked with Corgi to see where he was, and headed over to meet up with him over at the West Hall. Corgi had arrived early to donate used video games to GameStop, in exchange for a VIP pass that would allow early access for those with a Gamer Pass. Unfortunately, it turned out that the VIP pass only allowed access 30 minutes early – so at 11:30am, not 9:00am.
I didn’t have any solid plans until 10:00am, when my Super Smash Bros. play session was scheduled (I had signed up online about a week prior), so I hung out with Corgi for a bit. There was a PlayStation activation outside of the convention center, so we went over to check it out. However, we soon found out that it didn’t open until 10am. After we figured out that the Nintendo booth was located in West Hall, I went ahead and headed inside so I could get the lay of the land and figure out where I needed to go for Super Smash Bros.
I don’t remember there being any security last year, but this year security was definitely stepped up. I brought my backpack last year, but this year attendees were prohibited from bringing a backpack, and were limited to one small bag. There were two areas you could go through, one if you had no bags, and the other, if you had a bag. Everyone had to go through a metal detector though. I just had a small purse and my camera.
However, before I even got to the metal detectors, I was stopped by a security guard, who said that my camera might be too big, and asked me to step out of line. Um, what? It didn’t even have a detachable lens. It was just a point and shoot with a retractable lens. Sure, a tad larger than most point and shoots, but not professional by any standards. He told me that he would have to get a supervisor to look at it, but seemed more interested in telling me to go over to South Hall to check in my item (for a fee). No, I was not about to do that, and so I asked how to get the supervisor approval. The guy yelled for a supervisor to come over. However, there was a couple who had apparently been asked to step out of line before me to whom the supervisor talked to first. It seemed that the issue was that they had a backpack – which, as I mentioned above, was not allowed, per the new security rules this year. But apparently they had been able to go in and out of the convention center the day before without any problems. There was a bit of back and forth for awhile, and I guess they ended up having to bring their backpack back to their car. Finally, the supervisor got to me. He took one look at my camera and said, “Yeah, that’s fine” and I was allowed back in the line.
I walked around for a bit in the West Hall, just looking at the big booths: PlayStation and Nintendo. At the PlayStation booth, there was a huge screen where you could watch their various announcements. They had several stations where you could stand in line to play different games, including Spider-Man, for which there was an elaborate display. There was also a statue of Norman Reedus’s Death Stranding character, so I took a picture with it since there was no wait.
Foot traffic seemed relatively light compared to last year. Of course, that was because the Gamer Pass attendees hadn’t been allowed in yet. But there were still lines everywhere.
I found where I was supposed to get in line for the Super Smash Bros. demo, but they were holding a sign for those who signed up for the 9:00am-9:45am session. I was still a bit early. So I walked around some more. The Walking Dead booth was pretty cool. They had people dressed as walkers (zombies) who would just wander the general area of the booth. If you weren’t paying attention, you might turn around and discover a walker staring you in the face!
I went back to the Nintendo booth shortly after 9:45am to see if they had changed the sign, but they hadn’t. So I went ahead and asked what I should do if I have a 10:00am appointment. They said I could go ahead and get in line! So they scanned my mobile ticket and I joined the line. When I had signed up online for the session, there were two options: For Fun (non-competitive) and For Glory (competitive). I signed up for non-competitive.
#SuperSmashBros #E3 #E32018 https://t.co/8TMMQpNyhM
— GB Reviews (@gb_reviews) June 13, 2018
The wait wasn’t too bad, maybe 10-15 minutes. I got paired up with the guy who was in line in front of me, who was also there alone. We were told that we would get to play 4 rounds. I had played Super Smash Bros. on the Wii U over the weekend, just to re-familiarize myself with the game — which I hadn’t played since high school on the Nintendo 64! I found that I liked the character Lucina. As you probably heard, the new Super Smash Bros. would have every character that had ever been in the game. However, you wouldn’t have access to all of them at first. You would have to unlock them. I looked for Lucina, but she was unavailable. There were quite a few characters to choose from though. Josh’s favorite character is Link, so I played him at first. I let the guy I was playing against choose the arenas, though he made sure to check with me each time to see if I was okay with it. Of course, we started off with the new ones first, beginning with the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild stage. The first match was pretty close, and I lost in sudden death. The second round, I played as Zelda and won! (I suspect that my opponent let me win that one.) I lost the third and fourth rounds, which I played as Pit and Bayonetta, respectively. When we finished, we were given a cool little Super Smash Bros. logo pin. Afterward, when I tweeted my results, one of my Twitter friends, @ScottytheWise, who writes for the Friends of CC blog, figured out that we had in fact played against each other without knowing it! So that was funny. We never ran into each other again though, unfortunately.
I texted Corgi to see what he was up to. He was in line for the VIP entrance, but mentioned that Cheezmo and Sully were at the Funko booth, so I headed over to the South Hall, where that booth was located. However, I didn’t see either of them, so I walked around for a bit. A little while later I walked back over there and found Cheezmo! I also met Cheezmo’s friend Trevor, who hung out with us for most of the rest of the day. Soon Corgi was let in a little after 11:30am on his VIP Gamer Pass, and we all stood in line together for the Funko booth — which apparently didn’t open until 12:00pm. Sully walked by and we spoke with him briefly before he had to go up and work the booth. I ended up buying 3 Funko Pops: the Halo Master Chief with active camo, the Sonic the Hedgehog – Super Shadow (1500 pc LE), and the Cuphead – Glow-in-the-dark Legendary Chalice (1500 pc LE). Look for these in a giveaway coming soon!
We then wandered around looking at the various booths, such as Ubisoft and Capcom/Resident Evil 2. The line was capped at Bethesda, as well as for Division 2 at the Mixer booth. But we did take a selfie with Josh Stein (@steinekin), the Mixer Community Manager.
As we walked by the AT&T booth, a booth worker called us over to ask if we were interested in trying out their holo-station — saying it was only about a 10 minute wait. We decided sure, why not? The booth was positioned in front of the eSports arena, and they had us sit in the chairs they had out in front of the stage. Before we took our seats, we each got to spin a wheel (virtually) on a tablet. I won a container of caffeinated mints, while Corgi and Trevor won a $10 gift card for… something, and Cheezmo won a pop socket with the AT&T logo. While we waited, two teams were brought out on stage to play a game live. The two teams were called the Immortals and the Dino Riders. Eventually, our turns came up, and we each were separated into different cubicles. A hololens was fitted on my head, and the booth worker explained what I was seeing. It was basically an AR demonstration, and I was able to see a hologram of Trevor, who was in a separate cubicle. It was a bit pixelated, as you see on the photo they emailed me later, but the booth worker explained that it was due to the limitations of the setup they were allowed at the show. Also, you had to look up and down to see the other person’s whole body, but again, the booth worker explained that it was because their booth was so small, and that if it was a larger space, you would be able to more easily see their whole body.
Another elaborate booth was Jurassic World Evolution. I would have liked to walk through that, but the line was really long.
We were getting hungry by this point, so we decided to go in search of food. Trevor had parked in meter parking, so he had to go refill the meter before his time expired. Corgi, Cheezmo, and I were reluctant to exit the convention center because we all had our Funko bags, and the rule was that you were only allowed one bag (we each had at least 2), so we didn’t want to get stuck outside. It was a bit on the late side for lunch, so the food truck lines weren’t too bad, but we still looked for the shortest line — which was a BBQ stand. It was hot outside, though, and the sun was beating down on us, so we went back into the convention center food court area to eat. Luckily, we found a table and were able to sit down and eat comfortably. Trevor soon found us, but he had to head off for his Super Smash Bros. session he had signed up for — which was the competitive option! Corgi had also signed up for a Super Smash Bros. session, but he accidentally signed up for competitive, so decided not to go, despite our coaxing.
So, Corgi, Cheezmo, and I went back to wander in South Hall. We found ourselves at the highly interactive Fortnite booth — which we soon discovered had lots of free goodies –popcorn, fresh baked chocolate chip cookies (you had to be quick, because each batch disappeared in seconds after coming out of the oven!), Fortnite cups complete with lid and straw that you could fill up with water, and even llama head popsicles! They also had a lot of interactive activities, which we noticed had pretty short lines. There was one where you were in front of a green screen and you could make a video where it looked like you were hang gliding. There was also another activity where you “boogie” but Corgi and I aren’t much for dancing, so we were just going to watch Cheezmo do that one. However, Cheezmo pointed out that you just do what the character is doing on screen, so Corgi and I decided to join Cheezmo and make a group video. There were several different “dances” you could choose from, so we chose a relatively simple one. Your arms were supposed to be raised in the air, but the guy had positioned me slightly in front of Corgi and Cheezmo, so he told me to put my arms more to the side, so as not to block their faces. It was silly, but fun.
Then around the corner, we saw a mechanical Fortnite llama — and there were only a couple people in line. Cheezmo was all excited to try it, and Corgi was up for trying it too. I, on the other hand, wasn’t really interested, and was content to just watch those guys ride the llama. However, the weight limit was 220 lbs. — which both Corgi and Cheezmo exceeded. They turned to me and said that I was their only hope. Initially, I refused. But then I decided to step out of my comfort zone once more and take one for the team. I signed the electronic waiver and only had to wait behind 2 people before it was my turn. As I hopped on the llama and it started up, Cheezmo and a few other guys I didn’t know began chanting my name, “Violet! Violet! Violet!” I lasted for all of about 3 seconds before the llama flung me off! Ah well, at least I tried. It’s harder than it looks, and I had never tried riding a mechanical bull or anything before. I asked Cheezmo if he knew those guys, but he said nope! So it was just some random strangers. Hilarious!
We walked around the South Hall a bit more, but decided to head over to West Hall, since Corgi hadn’t even been in there yet. As we were heading that way, the guys saw that Funko had posted their location in the South Hall, by the IndieCade booth, where they were giving away a Social Media Freddy Funko. So we hurried over there, and happened to run into Trevor along the way (who had actually scored a Social Media Freddy Funko earlier in the day). When we got there, they had already gotten a winner — but they had one more left, and Corgi was the winner, yay!
We then continued on our way, just walking around the seeing the booths. The PlayStation area was much more packed than it had been that morning, as it had been easy to walk through then, but more difficult to do so at this point. We soon left that area and walked around for a bit and chatted. But it was soon time for me to leave to catch my train, and so I said my goodbyes.
I felt like I had a good, full day of fun at E3, but I still felt like I was missing out on a lot. I never even made it over to the Microsoft Theater, where the XBox booth was located this year. And I’ve still never set foot in the E3 Coliseum. Maybe next year I’ll take two days of PTO so that I can experience more.
You can view more of my pictures from E3 2018 in the photo gallery below.
Cool photos!