The Dragon*Con 2011 Review

IT IS STORY TIME!!!


Artix Entertainment has been attending Dragon*Con for years… but this year has been, by far, THE BEST! Thank you to all of you who came to spend time with us. (One player even drove all the way down from Canada just to see us!) But you are not reading this page to help our fans calculate their mileage… nope… you came here to see EMBARRASSING PHOTOS of us in real life! This page will not disappoint! Like the voice actors of your favorite animated series, we may not look like characters we play online (well, Cysero comes pretty close!)... but you may be surprised to learn that we are just as kind, friendly and funny in real life as we are online (Except we make WAY MORE puns in real life). We were honored to meet so many great players during the con. We will cherish the memories forever. For those of you we have not met yet... we hope for the chance to hang out and talk about the games in the future too!

One for all and all for one!
Actually they are just fighting over our shiny buttons...

Cosplay

(Dressing up in Costume)

A huge part of the fun of Dragon*Con is dressing up in costume. It is a lot like Halloween for adults, but with less candy and more Storm Trooper conga lines. (This actually happened! They looked pretty clumsy, but were very Force-ful dancers!) The convention is basically a 45,000 person costume party with concerts, panels, games, shopping, famous TV and Movie guest stars and anything geeky and fun that you can imagine. It took place across 5 semi-connected hotels this year. If you have never been to Dragon*Con, PAX, ComicCon or a convention of this size before… well, it is really something you need to experience in person - it is a blast! We got into the spirit this year by dressing up! (Oh man, I cannot believe we are actually showing you this!)

Artix Entertainment at DragonCon
It is ok... laugh :-) We still are!

Thyton's helmWho all was there!?

  • Artix
  • Cysero
  • Galanoth
  • Alina
  • Rolith
  • J6
  • Jemini
  • Nythera
  • Yergen
  • Thyton
  • Neveya
  • Mido
  • Geopetal
  • Korin
  • Samba
  • Desil
  • Memet
  • Safiria
  • Westwind
  • Aelthai
  • Ronin of Dreams
  • Kamui
  • Lyris
  • Zazul
  • Dumoose
  • Llussion
  • Stratos
  • Maegwyn
  • Charfade
  • Nightwraith
  • Cerebrozz
  • and the super healer priestess who has yet to be named.Have any ideas?

 

J6 vs J6But only one of these two J6's can "Draw!"

 

The Artix Entertainment Panel

2 and 1/2 hours of amazing gaming chaos

We were concerned that having an early Friday morning time slot would leave us in an empty room all by ourselves. The majority of people do not arrive at the con until Friday night at the earliest. To our compete shock we had a full room. So, to all of you who came, THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!

ARtix Entertainment Panel at DragonCon2011


Streaming LIVE video is hard... without internet!

After all of the preparing to stream the panel live to the players at home, we were so frustrated that we could not get a working internet connection from the room the panel took place in. (We were surrounded by laptops and routers, but were too deep underground to get signal. We should show the hotel how the Secret Underground Lab gets around those limitations!) However, we did record video of the entire panel and will edit it ASAP! UPDATE: Practel posted his video of the panel of it on YouTube already (weird horizontal video!)

Super Cheesy Video Premieres

We showed a number of cheesy videos. (LOL, how come other video game companies do not show their home movies during their panels?) Xyo's fan video of "Artix and Friends" won the most laughs. Also, it was announced that Xyo's really fun game ". We expect that this game will break a lot of records. Literally.

EbilCorp

Our panel was crashed by an unwelcome guest! Chairman Platinum of EbilCorp (Artix Entertainment's rival company) stormed in and... started recruiting people in our audience! Their ninja-hackers took control of our video equipment and showed this video. There was a showdown afterwards... and the Chairman left (still handing out his business cards).

...We have a feeling this is not the last we will hear of EbilCorp.

DragonFable & MechQuest!

Last week, DragonFable's conclusion of Chapter 1 excited and concerned players. At DragonCon we asked players what they would like to see happen in Chapter 2. We never do anything... "simple." Ideas were pitched for a multiplayer version of DragonFable, a 3D game, a fusion of DragonFable and MechQuest, and more. HOw cool would a game with DRAGONS battling MECHA be!? Based on feedback, Geopetal told everyone that we would be posting a poll on the forums to see what you want to see happen most. She also previewed animation of the upcoming Entropy Class (which looks AMAZING!)

Korins Army

Korin talked about the new interface he put into MechQuest last week and how his team was going to streamline the game and make it easy to follow from level 1... all the way to level 100.

Korin

 

VOLTAIRE!

We had another surprise visit... and this one was AWESOME!!! It was so unbelievably Voltairecool of Voltaire to come to our panel and ROCKED the audience with a few of songs from the AQWorlds themed album, Spooky Songs for Creepy Kids (Read a review)! (He also gave away prizes from his stash of his remaining Deady and Urkor Malravenos quees. Notice: We have less than 50 Urkors left on HeroMart.) Later that night Voltaire would go on to perform in front of an audience of 4,000 DragonCon attendees... so you can only imagine how the players and team felt that he came just to play and hang out with us. Thank you Voltaire! (and a shout out to Mars too!) Anytime you want us to come and play our games during one of your concerts, we are THERE!

Oh, nearly forgot... Voltaire just released a new album, titled after a FaceBook fan's response to his question, "how to you describe Voltaire's music." His answer to what Voltaire's music is like.. and the official name of the album is... "Riding a Black Unicorn Down the Side of an Erupting Volcano While Drinking from a Chalice Filled with the Laughter of Small Children" is now available for pre-order from Voltaire.net. (Recommended for Ages 15+.)

One awesome player even made and wore a Deady dress!

Deady Cosplayer

Ponies and Ponies and Ponies and.... *cries* Ponies

During the panel, Rolith officially announced and demonstrated his and Jemini's new.. um... official Artix Entertainment game... (it hurts my hands typing this) Pony vs Pony! The game launched late Friday night and is NOW LIVE at www.PonyVsPony.com

Pony Panel

Over 11,000 ponies were created during the first two days of DragonCon. Jemini's art is adorably cute and Rolith's game has been called addictive by girls of all ages and a surprisingly large (and growing) number of fearless boys (who are apparently called bronies "Bro-nees") and like torturing my twitter account by sharing names like Prince Starlight Magic. *shudder*

Jedi Barbie

Rolith pulled non-stop all nighters the week leading up to the con. He worked on the game on the bus. During our party. And used every last second up to the start of the panel to finish it in time to release at Dragon*con. For this, Rolith has earned a massive amount of respect from us. Way to go Rolith! This week, they are expanding the game, increasing the level cap, and soon they will be releasing storyline mode. Isn’t it enough that you can battle WITH ponies, Rolith!? Now you want to turn our players INTO ponies?!!!

Ran out of time at panel!? HOW!?

We have a tradition of running out of time at our panels. With all the candy-throwing, prize-giving, video-watching, and Cysero (Pronounced: Sis-Er-Oh) wise-cracking jokes it is easy to eat up an hour in the blink of an eye. Which is why they gave us 2.5 hours this year. Sure enough... when it came time to PUNT TWILLY for our grand prize (the life size replica of the DragonBlade) we were completely out of time and already bleeding over into whoever was supposed to have the room next's time. (Maybe we should not have shown all of those SUPER-cheesy videos... both to save time and any possibility of an acting career.) So Cysero in a flash of brilliance got us an area in the table top gaming room and started the first ever AdventureQuest Worlds Battle On Battle Cards tournament.

Cysero and Artix

Card Game Tournament!

1st ever AdventureQuest Worlds Battle On Battle Cards Tournament

The battle to win the life size replica DragonBlade was intense. In the first round... one player drew a natural "Paladin Combo" in his starting hand which he played to deal 9001 damage on his first turn.(CRAZY!) What really made everyone laugh was when we saw his DragonCon badge... he chose Artix as his "DragonCon name" (Just like online, everyone has a real name and a custom name) How fitting!

Palad Card Combo

The games were intense! I applaud everyone's good spirit. The final battle came down between two players with 1 health left each. The final blow was dealt by the 2nd place winner... who accidentally killed himself with a card that also did damage to the person using it O_O When the dust settled we had a winner! Now... this is where things get weird. The winner had a choice between the DragonBlade or the 2011 calendar with Chronomancer class. The winner already had the class and wanted to get it for his friend too -- so he choose the calendar (The 2nd place winner received the sword.) But then... LOL... with Cysero and I standing RIGHT THERE... the winner sold the 2011 Calendar to ANOTHER player for $182.... $182!?!?!?!? (the entire contents of his wallet.) O_O. We all stood there in shock with our jaws dropped. (We did think it was pretty cool of him to give $20 of his take to the 2nd place winner)

DragonBlade Winner

*Still laughing* When the winner and his friend stopped by the Fan booth again, they were COMPLETELY decked out in cool looking steam punk goggles, hats, and weapontry that they had bought with their, um, winnings.

The AE Fan Booth

Hanging out with players, the team and "soon-to-be-players"

Why have we never done this before!? The fan table accounts for most of our favorite memories from the convention. We took a lot of pictures with people who stopped by.

At the fan table

Badges, Ribbons and Buttons

Jemini made Day 1,2 and 3 ribbons for people who came back to our fan table each day. It turned into a race by Sunday as we started running out of ribbons.

DragonCon Badges

 

A MARIAGE PROPOSAL!?

Is proposing at Dragon*Con becoming a tradition?

Who could forget when Rolith proposed to Alina both in game and in person at Dragon*Con last year? This year... the tradition of geeky fan-filled romance continues!

When Cronic007, a long time player who came to see us at D*C, told us that his Father was going to propose we were happy. When he politely asked us to help be a part of it... we were quick to come up with a plan! We dressed his father up in my armor and got two of the biggest, baddest costumed villains to kidnap his fiance-to-be. In front of a filled room of on-lookers, the Father bravely rescued the maiden (slaying the Klingons with a lightsaber.... hey! You work with what you got!) looting the ring and dropping to one knee. The entire crowd got teary-eyed and applauded with cheer. It was a magical moment....

Marriage Proposal
Congratulations you two!

She was so caught off-guard by being carried away by two giant Klingon warriors that she did not even get to put down her drink. I would like to make a special thank you to.... (um, OK, I have no idea how to spell these Klingon names).... who followed me all the way from three hotels over to play their important role in this special moment. Oh... yes, we have this on video. (I have not seen or edited the footage... yet!)

PARTY x2

100 boxes of pizza were harmed in the making of this convention

We threw 2 pizza parties in our suite at the top of the Marriott. I do not know how many people came... but during the second one there were so many that our party was declared a fire hazard (lol, not kidding) and we were kicked out of the suite and 2 connected rooms and forced to relocate on the spacious 10th floor lounge where we ate more pizza, played battle cards, drew and had light saber *coughs* I mean energy blade duels. Also, I spent a healthy amount of time teaching the proper "warrior handshake" and running an epic game of DerpQuest (Would you like us to share the rules with you, too?)

Nythera and J6

It was cool how our players spanned all ages and... well... I guess when you make something for everyone, your player base is literally everyone! We are very grateful for the new and old friends we got to spend time with. From sock signing to that rumor that Cysero told everyone (that if you stole one of Zazul's mustache hairs he would tell you what was in the /house Zazul in game. Players actually tried to sneak up behind him at the fan table on Saturday!)

Thank you for the memories

 

Thank you!

During the convention we had a lot of time to think and be thankful for what we have been building together. Seeing other people, face to face, who care about the games as much as we do... well, it just makes what we are doing feel even more special. We are thinking about ALL of the fans and how grateful we are for what they have made possible here at AE. We know a lot of people who wanted to come were not able to make it. Hopefully we will get to meet many more of you as our gaming community grows! :-) Maybe we can get big enough that we can afford to go on a non-stop convention tour around the world.... oh man that would be fun. We are going to need to get wings and jet engines for the BattleBus. Until then, it is time to put 100% of our focus back onto the games! (only 2 more days until the new Friday release!)

Battle on!
OMG you guys are so weird. But keep it up... we like you that way.

BATTLE ON!!!!!!!!

P.S. I also got to meet Paul and Storm and Jonathan Coulton in person! (...and, oddly enough, Jonathan Coulton somehow already heard who we were talking to for the 2011 AdventureQuest Worlds birthday celebration event on 10/10! Dunn dunnn dunnnnnnnn! O_O)

P.P.S. I will be posting more pictures on the official Artix Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/ArtixKrieger

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