Rock, Paper, Shotgun

By John Walker on June 5th, 2011 at 4:06 pm.

Sunday 5th June, 7am:

Woo! E3! There’s nothing better! If you enjoy heat like being in the core of the sun, volume levels as if a thrash metal band and their sub woofers have been installed in your brain, and so many people that genocide starts to look like a merciful choice, it’s the place for you!

Thus once more I arrive into LA, ready to face the thrills, spills, and potential of seeing Hulk Hogan, to gather information about PC games. For you. I do this for you. It’s your fault. So in the coming week you can expect RPS to be bursting with all the exciting announcements, freshest trailers, and worst puns. And I’m going to entertain myself by writing this diary on occasion. It will contain NO useful information. You have been warned.

LA is a strange place. Sorry if you live here, but really, you’re this close to San Francisco and you’re living here? No excuses. If you remember my last trip out to E3, in 2009, you might recall my adventures with ants. Well RPS is two years further down the line now, we’ve ads sold on a system slightly better than, “How much would you like to pay?”, and things have upscaled. I’m staying in a hotel room that so far has no other insectoid guests! It’s also twice as far from the LA Convention Center, because I in no way learned my lesson and didn’t book before April, and thus this time I’m not even within walking distance. This year my biggest obstacle will be: BUSES.

That and a show schedule that looks so frightening I want to cry each time I open the Google Calendar. It’s literally physically impossible to complete, unless every booth happens to occupy the exact same physical space via some sort of multi-dimensional system. They have those in LA now, right? I mean, they’ve got 4G phone networks, which once again makes it feel like being a visitor from the past. Fortunately we also have the assistance of the extremely fine (and tall) Dan Grilopoulolopolous, who will be dashing around, gathering information, and hopefully joining up with me at the end of the days for high fives and hugs.

So my plan for the week, since you asked:

Sunday: Buy clothes for my wedding.
Monday: EA conference. Hopefully I’ll be liveblogging this if I can find some software, and they have any wifi. Leave WordPress liveblogging tips in the comments! Then dinner with a mystery guest. Looks more likely that I’ll be live-tweeting it.
Tuesday: E3 begins proper at 12. Spend the morning figuring out the buses.
Wednesday: E3 insanity all day.
Thursday: More E3, and fly home.
Friday: Die of tiredness.

What can I tell you about what’s happened so far? Airport, plane, customs, shuttle cab thing, hotel, fourteen minutes of sleep, now. There was an excellent LA welcome at the hotel. Lovely girl on reception delivering the full CA experience. Confused at how the hotel was sold out, I explained that the convention means every single hotel in town is the same. And that this one, 900 miles from the Center, was the closest available at the end of April. “I was like…” she said midway through one of my sentences, before picking up this thought again at the end. “I was like… HUH?” You were?! “I was like… what’s going on?” she continued. She still didn’t seem to know, so I told her again. “I was like… HUH?!” she responded. And then, brilliantly, “You were like… wow!” I was! She was right! I love California.

It’s important to note that the History Channel, once famed for showing only documentaries about Hitler, now seems to have abandoned boring old history for its content, and instead shows only Ice Road Truckers. It’s technically history, because it’s not live. It’s better than documentaries about Hitler. Also, A&E – a channel that justifies its existence by making Glades – makes some of the most specific minority documentaries that make daytime BBC1 look shameful. There’s a fly-on-the-wall documentary show about traffic wardens. Not TRAFFIC WARDENS EXTREME where they have terrifying fights with armed gangs. Just a guy going around handing out $30 parking violation tickets, sometimes with the owner complaining that they “only popped inside for a minute.” But best has to be a show about people who buy abandoned storage lockers, and then see if they can make a profit on the contents. But presented as if it’s a thrilling, life-changing race to the death.

But now 8am has finally rolled around and breakfast is open! I’m the best at PC gaming news.