Nancy & Quentin at NYCC 2009
Ninja February 9th, 2009
Hello everyone! We were asked by our dear friends at NvP to blog about our experience at the 2009 New York Comic Con (our very first!). NYCC is the one of the biggest pop culture conventions in America, held at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City. It attracts fans and creators of everything from comics, film and television, and even video games.
We got there on that Saturday, and boy was it packed! After getting our pre-registered passes, we entered the main hall where most of the exhibits were located. The front half of the hall consisted of booths showcasing mostly commercial properties: video games, local comic book stores, and specialty toy and apparel.
Many new video games were being demoed or previewed, including F.E.A.R. 2, Warhammer Online, Prototype, Marvel Alliance 2, and Ready 2 Rumble. From the comic book/apparel side, I saw was a black T-shirt that read: “I am Ninja (you can’t see me).” Since we were on a budget, we spent all of our morning in this area, carefully planning what we might get from these different vendors.
After exploring the hall that morning, we broke for lunch. We didn’t plan anything ahead of time, but we wish we had. Food was expensive, the lines were long, and we sat on the floor because there were no more seats in the dining area.
After eating lunch, we decided to explore the other half of the convention hall. Not only did we find specialty items such as animal hats and art supplies, but we found our favorite section of the day – Artist Alley!
It was here that amazing artists gathered and sold some of their work (and they autographed them for us too!). Booth after booth, we saw the works of well-known artists and even the up and coming ones. We ended up purchasing many posters and artworks from here. For those who like drawing fantasy art, there was a portfolio review for illustrating jobs at Wizard of the Coast.
We had brought with us our Venture Bros and Robot Chicken DVDs, because we had heard that the creators of these shows were going to be there. Well… both times we were late to the panel and were not allowed in. In order to get autographs, you needed to be in the panel by the time they started. Maybe next time.
Towards the end of the day, we went to Wizards of the Coast booth and demoed a game of Magic: The Gathering to get a MTG promo card.
It turns out that in order to get the promo card, you needed to demo ALL of the WOTC games. We really wanted the card, so we did all of it – even the Dungeons and Dragons game. Though we are card game and board game type people, it was certainly refreshing to see the mechanics of a roleplaying game at work. The game now incorporates a board, miniatures to run around with, and a sheet of paper displaying the stats and abilities of your character.
One of the last things we saw was the Marvel booth. There was a huge crowd waiting for freebies.
As much as we wanted to wait, we were exhausted from all the walking. We had a lot of things to carry out too, including those dastardly Adult Swim DVD’s that we did not get signed. It was good thing EA gave us poster holders, as that kept most of our great posters from crimping all throughout that day.
All in all, it was an awesome event. We were really glad that we got to experience it. =)
Sincerely,
N&Q
Related link
+ Relive New York Comic Con 2009 through photos here
. In addition, Soto’s exhibition, Turning in Circles is still on display.
