In Third Person

Unlike the first two days of the show, there weren’t any must-do events or things we needed to do driving us to the show. Having completed all of that stuff in the last two days, we figured our final day at the expo would be a victory lap of sorts. We’d take on the day as it comes and enjoy what was left at the show.

Because of this, we didn’t rush to get there. We arrived just as the doors were opening. Not the best move. This time, the lineup literally wrapped around the block, and was more than double the length of the line we stood in the day before.

The time it took for us to get in was still far less than my brother’s experience on the first day, but these lineups were pretty ridiculous to the point where the President of Hobby Star Marketing apologized for the delays. It’s good to see them be pro-active about it for next year, but lets get back to Sunday.

The first major event on our list of things to do was to see the William Shatner panel. Before then though, we had some time to kill, where we ended up at the Zellers booth. On that day only, PS3 consoles were 20% off, games were 30% off and accessories were 40% off. Oh. Snap. I’ve made it clear on this very blog that I’ve wanted a PS3 and the potential savings here could be tremendous. My girlfriend, as the voice of reason, talked me out of buying it, at least until later that day. Carrying around all that PS3 stuff would be a pain.

We also tried out Kinect Joy Ride. After seeing it in action on Friday, I was very skeptical about the Kinect as a controller solution. It looked like it had just as much difficulty tracking motions as a Wii remote did. However, in our time playing Kinect Joy Ride, it worked surprisingly well. We turned our imaginary steering wheels and it seemed to work the way we wanted it to, no problem. Sure, I don’t want to pretend to hold an imaginary steering wheel, or thrust my fists in and out to boost, or lean forward to flip my car, but the actual driving worked. I’m still not set to drop $150 on it, but it has at least taken a step forward in justifying its existence to me.

Unlike the Tron presentation the day before, it was a breeze to get into the William Shatner panel. It was located in the largest conference room and there were no lineups. We just walked right in 30 minutes before show time and grabbed decent seats. By the time it started, it was a full house with what seemed to be 1,000 people. I was expecting  something a bit more formal, but it turned out to be just 1 hour of the audience asking questions and William Shatner either answering questions or rambling about whatever he felt like. I’m glad the hour was spent like that instead of something formal, because he’s awesome to listen to. Tells a great story and is really funny.

After that, we both did some shopping. My girlfriend bought an autographed Bill Nye trading card, a t-shirt and some other things. I…went nuts at Zellers. I caved and bought a PS3, extra controller, HDMI cable and Little Big Planet. You’ll absolutely see impressions on all of that in the near future.

The show wrapped up with a visit to Udon’s panel. They do a lot of art for the Street Fighter franchise, including all of the in-game art for Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. While I don’t follow any of their comic work, it was very cool to hear the Udon rep talk about their company and their relationship with the Street Fighter franchise.

Despite a few glitches here and there, Fan Expo 2010 wowed both my girlfriend and I on all three days. It was so cool to be among thousands of people who were all here for very similar reasons. We also accomplished what we wanted to do most at the show and more. Thinking back, I totally forgot to write about the Scrabble tournament we watched and our experience playing Just Dance 2 (which was a lot of fun), among a slew of other memories. I will definitely do this all over again next year.

For now, I think these three posts will do in re-capping my memories. Hopefully in the coming days I can put together a photo post, but I won’t promise you anything. Should the photo post never come, expect a lot more Playstation 3 related content hitting In Third Person real soon!