So I flew over the Melbourne this weekend to attend the first ever PAX to take place outside the united states. It was my first time in Australia as well, and I had a blast catching up with old friends and doing all sorts of Nerdy things.
You can definitely tell that this is the first time the organizers were handling something as large as PAX. All though the venue was large in size many other facilities there were under equipped.
For example there was only one door for you to access the venue, pick up your badge and go through security. Meaning that on the first day you had to go through long lines such as these.
But that’s not the worst part, the number one reason for me to attend PAX was because of the very interesting talk schedule that was packed with renowned game developers from Australia and overseas. However the halls weren’t enough for the number of people that wanted to attend the panels, so that means that you had to queue again most of the time hours in advance if you wanted a chance of getting in.
Needless to say, I couldn’t attend most of the talks there, especially the one by Ron Gilbert which I heard was available for a BBQ party with the attendees the next day, weather wasn’t that pleasant though 😉
The thing that stands out the most however is that the Australian game development scene is mostly indie nowadays, while there was representations from big companies at the exhibition hall, they were eclipsed by the interest of the attendees in what’s happening in the indie scene. There were definitely some interesting projects there, which is hopeful for the Australian dev scene given that the AAA companies aren’t developing in that country as much anymore.
Overall, I had fun, and I hope it would be better organized for PAX 2014 … bigger Halls PLEASE!
Fawzi Mesmar 