Welcome to WarGames Con

Herr Fernseher here at WarGames Con. I’ve indentured myself to Brent for free passage to what is proving to be for me a New World of gaming. I’ve never been to a gaming event of this magnitude. It’s a large group. A couple hundred guys, a handful of girls. Even accounting for the fact that this is essentially a room full of guys, there are still a lot more beards than usual. And pants with cargo pockets. There are a few sports jerseys, a few comic T-shirts. A preponderance of the gamer’s physique. Across the conference room , I cannot make out the words, but I see the Old English font on several T-shirts. Even an honest-to-God Christian T-shirt. Oh, wait. Jesus has a word balloon: “Don’t be a dick”? Well…that’s a reasonable translation I guess.

 Here I am giving my right arm to keep some guy's ass out of the frame...

Energy levels are high here before the kickoff event for the conference, the doubles tournament.

While most are socializing leisurely, a few peer studiously into their laptops or stoically muster their forces. Behind some of the stone faces I see nervousness, behind others I see a hunger to win. Before I can settle in, Brent and I discover that someone (surely Not Brent) has left the casualty markers in the other case back at the hotel. I’m dispatched to right the wrong.

Alone in Brent’s car, the tank full of gas and only hours from the Mexican border, I am tempted for a moment to make a run for it. Then I remember the stupid bracelet he had locked onto my ankle as part of my passage agreement. Nothing to do but continue to work off this debt --Holy crap, stop the presses! Even as I type this, a small child stopped to photograph the Stormbuster, the Dyson Pattern Storm Raven sitting on the table in front of me! I think he actually liked it. --Anyway, like I said, this is proving to be a New World of gaming for me.