13 Lords of Chaos
 

DragonCon 2009!
Did people really cosplay as characters from our Web Based RPGs???

What is DragonCon?
Each year the friendly AE team makes the perilous journey to DragonCon in Atlanta, Georgia. What is it? Imagine a four day long, 40,000 person costume party with games, comics, anime, robot battling, art galleries, vendors, concerts, celebrity guests, and panels on everything from how to swordfight, write novels, make costumes, meet the cast of your favorite TV series…. AND you can go to the AQWorld’s panel and meet US! This was Artix Entertainment’s 5th year publically humiliating ourselves at DragonCon... and here is the story of what happened!

AdventureQuest Cosplay
Cosplayers dressed as character from AdventureQuest, DragonFable, MechQuest and AQWorlds!

The AE Panel
We are a indie web video game company.  We make the games AdventureQuest, DragonFable, MechQuest and our new MMO AdventureQuest Worlds. Web games are not usually seen in the light as off the shelf games -- so you can imagine the incredible feeling of surprise and joy we had in our hearts when the small room was literally overflowing with players of our games. Thank you, thank you, thank you! Some came from all the way from Texas, the UK and even New Zealand  just to be there with us.  (Sunumbrella and Mturf… thank you for the special gifts!)

Kicking off the panel, Cysero plugged his iPhone into the room’s sound system and hit play. “This is a triumph… I’m making a note here… huge success….”, sang a robotic voice. It was the song from the end of Portal. We played it to open our panel last year too.  The crowed started to sing along.  But oh yes, the Cake was a lie. BAM! Cysero Rick-Rolled them…

Artix Entertainment Panel
Cysero kept cracking us up. Thank you all for an incredible time!

We handed everyone newspaper pirate hats and a name tag saying, “My name is Captain Rhubarb.” One by one each staff member stood and introduced themselves as Captain Rhubarb. Everyone in the audience was laughing. It was weird. We went to explain the inside joke – but they all already knew it! During the AQWorlds Beta Captain Rhubarb had accidentally renamed every single player in the game to Captain Rhubarb. The next day everyone (including the staff) had to create a brand new account. We called it “Mulligan day.” It became a holiday. It was also the ultimate ice breaker.

Then we showed a video of the team brutally injuring themselves during a normal day of work at the secret underground lab.  (Because you know how dangerous video game development is) The room was packed and there were people standing in the door and hall because there was no place to sit. Nythera, Safiria, Cysero and I (Artix) squeezed in the table in the front. Everything Cysero said made us laugh. We asked trivia and hurled candy and game prizes at the winners (some survived.) Also we answered questions, but sadly no one threw candy at us for answering them (Wait, did we answer them wrong?) It was so much fun being there with everyone. I only wish all our players could have been there. The week before the panel we asked players on our forums to send us screenshots from AQWorlds and we played them as a slideshow in the background during the panel (next best thing to being there is having your character projected on the screen there!)  

People brought their MechQuest Artbooks to get signed… we also signed left socks (long story). The panel ended the same way they always do – we got kicked out for going WAAAAY over time!  The good news is that the official in charge told us that our panel was one of the more popular events in the MMO track, and the feedback was overwhelmingly positive.   He also offered to help get us exhibitor booth space next year!

Escherion 1st Lord of Chaos Cosplay
Cosplayer as Escherion, the 1st Lord of Chaos from AQWorlds

After the panel was “officially over” we all gathered in the hall. It seemed a shame to not do something fun with all of the people dressed as game characters. So we decided to make a live action mini-game with video footage of them fighting! I am editing this weekend and it should be posted online next week. When J6 and Miltonius found out that people made elaborate costumes based on their characters they were speechless (10g says they were crying with tears of joy…. and then 10g more says Miltonius immediately went to create a new female main character in super skimpy armor. Bad Miltonius! Bad!)


Zorbak goes to Con Photos
Zorbak is our 100% ebil little moglin mascot. Each year he causes terror around DragonCon and gets his photo taken with people in the best costumes and posts it on the “Zorbak goes to Con” website. This year, due to everyone trying to eat him, disintegrate him, blow him up, or decapitate him with lightsabers  we renamed it “Zorbak DIES at Con” and made a video slide show. You can see the video as well as photos from previous years at Http://Zorbak.Battleon.com  


In total we took over 12 Gigabytes of photos and video... what great costumes!

Voltaire Concerts
There are concerts being held all day and night by all sorts of singers and bands at DragonCon. This year, our favorite dark/spooky/gypsy/pirate/goth musician, Voltaire put on three incredible shows! We went to all of them.  Players of AQWorlds may recognize his name from the musical “Friday the 13th Un-live” event where he lead over 32,000 players on haunted ghost ship to an uncharted island. It crashed. Both the boat… and the servers!  

Voltaire visited our panel  and unveiled a secret project to our players.  He showed the top secret prototype of a 8” vinyl AQWorlds Deady collector’s toy! It will have a code with it that will unlock an in-game Deady Pet and it will also give you all of the songs from the un-live event (most likely in the form of musical house items.) We are only going to get 100 of these…. *gulps* .  Meanwhile, you can play our Deady minigame at EbilGames.

Deady 8 inch Vinyl Toy
Zorbak says, “Nhah, nhah… you’re stuck in that box!”

Twitter Contest !
Cysero showed me how to Twitter on my iPhone…. and boy does he regret it. We had multiple vehicles driving us to and from DragonCon. So I started a contest on Twitter called “The Great DragonCon Race.”  To keep things safe we did not tell the drivers we were racing. Only the players on Twitter knew! In the middle of the race it changed from being a onetime contest to a DragonCon weekend long series of contests where players earned points. Their reward?  Fun, satisfaction, and a mention on the design notes. One contest was, “What did Jemini dress as to the AE Panel?” with possible answers A.) Hanna Montana Borg  B.) Jedi Barbie  C.) Ninja Cinderella  (Please go ahead and choose one now, the question will be answered later.)  For the final contest, players wagered their earned points on an anything goes final “Race BACK to the Secret Underground Lab” and <announcer voice> THE WINNERS ARE…..

Beowolve_AE – 1st Place with 220 Points
YamiKakyuu – 2nd Place with 175 Points
DragonYugi - 3rd Place with 170 Points

To everyone who wagered ALL their points in the final contest – you have my utmost respect. THAT is how to play! I would like to thank everyone for playing and for keeping me company on the trip. I hope you had fun. You can follow me on twitter at Http://www.twitter.com/artixkrieger/

Dawn Look-alike Contest 2009 Winner
One of DragonCon’s yearly events is the Dawn look-alike contest.  Girls dress up as all different styles of the popular comic character, Dawn, by artist Joseph Michael’s Linsner. It is amazing the amount of work they put into their costumes.  With contestants like the famous costume maker & model Yaya Han, the competition is pretty steep! Which is why it WAS SO AWESOME when our friend Carlye won!!!!!  (For those of you in the contest... she was in Team Galanoth’s vehical on the drive up and Team Zorbak on the way home.)

Dawn
Congratulations to our friend Carlye for winning 1st place!
Is Zorbak actually smiling in that photo?

Jemini’s Maxim Photo
Jemini is our talented artist who works on MechQuest and DragonFable. The answer to the question above was B.) Jedi Barbie! She looked so cute and cool that Maxim magazine put her photo up on their website in the Girls of Dragon Con. Way to go Jemini!

Jemini on Maxim
Way to go Jemini!

Thank you for a great DragonCon!
We all agree that this was the best DragonCon ever and our best Panel of all time! We cannot thank those of you who came to see and support us enough. It was a very special time that we will treasure in our hearts forever. To everyone that was unable to come this year, we missed you and hope that we get a chance to meet you soon! Thank you all for making this possible! We hope you enjoyed the video, photos and stories….

Favorite moments and crazy stuff

  • Ronon from Stargate (Jason Momoa) pretended he was throwing up on Artix in the elevator
  • The total number of sleep hours across the entire crew was a prime number under 10
  • Releasing DragonFable.com’s DeathKnight release from our cell phones.
  • Cysero gave a Sock Dragon Pet to players who attended the panel
  • Meeting team members Maegwyn and Pae in person for the first time
  • Following a “Roving Rave” around the streets of Atlanta. Two guys with giant subwoofers strapped on to their backs lead an army of dancing geeks to awesomeness.
  • Machinima panels! Watching hilarious and some serious movies made with video game actors.
  • Seeing our first ArcAttack show where two giant tesla coiled hurled lightning bolts at people dancing in a cage to techno music!
  • Our first One-Eyed Doll concert! … and cleaning the Hyatt Regency ballroom in exchange for just one more song. Cysero and the gang hung out with the band after the show – uh oh, do I sense a new live event in our future?

Alien vs Zorbak
If Zorbak kept dying... was Artix ressurecting him?

Zorbak, "Ooooh! Alien! Take your picture with me!"
*zorbak dies*
Artix, "I will save you!" <rez>
Zorbak, "Meh! Hey.. YOU with the lightsaber, take your picture with me."
*zorbak dies*
Artix, "I will save you!" <rez>
Zorbak, "You know... on second thought, this is a bad idea.... oooh a look at the fangs on that monster! Hey can you take a...! <CRUNCH>"
*zorbak dies*
Artix, "I will save you!" <rez>

Before we start planning for next year's con it is time for AdventureQuest World’s 1st Birthday in October. We are going to be throwing a party bigger than anyone has ever seen... a special event with new items, maps, monsters, ultra rare items – and you are officially invited!

Battle on!
Artix & the AE Team

P.S.  Do not forget to keep a lookout for that live-action video minigame that we are going to post!
P.P.S. Here is the list of everyone on our team who attended:  Artix, Galanoth, Cysero, Safiria, Nythera, Thyton, Jemini, Rolith, Zazul, Alac, Beleen, Triniaggie, Korin, Maegwyn, Aelthai, Pae and Westwind!
P.P.P.S Hope to see you there next year!

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