Elves, warlocks, mech’s and every character from Overwatch descended upon Melbourne for the weekend that was the three day Video Gaming and pop culture extravaganza PAX Australia 2019.

Every major gaming platform had a presence.

PlayStation showcasing some up and comings with a heavy influence on the reboot of their MediEvil.

Activision kitted out with a very impressive Call of Duty: Modern Warfare stand while Nintendo’s large footprint in the main hall had a swag on Switch’s ready with their latest and greatest.

Xbox showcased Gears 5 as queues of game playing fans lined up for a hands on the newest chapter of the epic and long running series.

Even THQNordic kitted the main hall out with their soon to be released reboot of Destroy All Humans and a title that I am eagerly awaiting, Biomutant.

Myself and Darren from STG roamed the expansive Melbourne Convention Center aiming for hands-on’s aswell as some exclusive stuff.

Our mates at Riot Games took care of us and in a closed briefing introduced their up and coming card battle game Legends of Runeterra.

A title that places the hottest and fav characters from the League of Legends lore and combines both strategy and old fashioned table top game play in a fierce battle against live opponents and A.I.

Legends of Runeterra has been built to accommodate newcomers to the card battle scene with an easy tutorial and even easier pick up and play.

NVIDIA took us in to a showcase for their ray-tracing work.

The first game to exclusively and fully make use of ray-tracing was CONTROL. NVIDIA applied this real-world-like effect to Minecraft and wow – what a huge difference it makes.

If you’re not too sure what ray-tracing is, it is a lighting and shadow physical and particle effect that is built in for developers of video games to use, making reflections, the said lighting and shadows and even textures becoming almost 4D (4 Dimensional).

Blurring the lines even further between reality and gaming.

Intel could be found in two places at PAX Australia. An entire floor was decked out with screens and NUCs for live friendlies and matches. Closer to the main hall was the Intel dome where their were PC’s on show with some very out of this world cases.

The NUC arena also had a stats board which displayed the combined computing power of all NUCs that were on the floor… this resulted in Teraflops of computing prowess.

PAX Australia 2019 was massively huge. Cosplayers all round and the entire Convention Center filled with stages, gaming rooms, developer talks, diversity gaming and of course merch.

I was personally surprised that the merchandise areas (other than EB Games’s gigantic presence) was bigger. But it was varied enough, from pop culture goodness, through to comics, table top gaming items and more.

PAX AUS 2019 is Australia’s biggest video gaming event and clearly I can see why this statement is absolutely true.

The conclusion of the Expo on Monday the 14th of October 2019 left myself both happily exhausted and eagerly awaiting some private time with titles that were previewed, especially and overall Legends of Runeterra!

PAX Australia 2019 – truly epic.

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It’s April 2019 which can only mean one thing, New Zealand’s Wellington Armageddon Expo (or Wellygeddon to many) was here and bombarded you with cosplay, shops and entertainment at every turn, just the way we like it.

Being the first of the year’s Armageddon Expos, there’s always a certain excitement by default as you’re eager to be reunited with your fellow crazy nerds and lovers of entertainment.

This year, I opted to take the expo at my own pace, going around the oval outer ring of Westpac Stadium and simply wait to view the shops if they were overcrowded. I do mention every year that I’m not a fan of the location because it forces you in a particular direction like an escalator, but hey, it is what it is and it’ll grow on me eventually.

Artists alley was a highlight for me this year and I loved seeing various artists showcasing their talents. I picked up a few business cards along the way to check out more of their collections on various social media or websites later too. If there’s one thing to say about Expos is that it’s hard to decide what to buy sometimes when you’re put on the spot!

I had my eyes set on looking for and purchasing a dagger prop. I’d seen a range of them at the previous Auckland Armageddon and regretted not purchasing one then. At least I knew it wasn’t too long until the next Armageddon Expo, an event I love and appreciate its continued strong presence here in New Zealand.

Celebrities and panels weren’t my target this time round, but I constantly noted fans queuing up for signings, photographs or both this time round. Wellygeddon 2019 was the first-time selfies were available (for a price) to be used in conjunction with autographs. As I observed, the selfies seemed to be doing wonders for fans who loved the more intimate and casual interaction as opposed to a professional photo (though as I can concur, having a professional photo with a celebrity is epic).

Rules have also changed for cosplayers this time round due to the mass shooting in Christchurch last month. Costumes mimicking realism (e.g. an outfit that could be found in everyday life like military or weapons), was banned. As the folks at Armageddon mentioned, there are plenty more appropriate costumes to choose from out there and it was great to see those attending both respecting this new rule and still going full out for their cosplay too.

Wellygeddon has started to move in a new direction for me and I’m loving how my focus has shifted over the years. Perhaps that’s due to what is being shown or maybe just me. No matter what though, I’ll still be attending no doubt for years to come, eager to get pop culture goodness in the country’s capital city.

*Image credit: Armageddon Expo.

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Get your senses ready for a pop culture overload.

Ready Player One is an adaption from Ernest Cline’s novel of the same name and Directed / Produced by Stephen Spielberg, where in the year 2045 humans escape from their real world into the virtual reality ‘game’ called the Oasis (Ontologically Anthropocentric Sensory Immersive Simulation) created by the late programming genius  James Halliday (Mark Rylance) and former business partner and only friend Ogden Morrow (Simon Pegg).

Set in the year 2045 the Oasis is a virtual world in which players can create their own utopia, having their own avatar and bringing in anything that they can imagine from the real world. Within the game players will amount (or lose) virtual coins. This enables them to cash in on beteer gear to play with in many of the virtual stores found in Oasis (much like an RPG).

A young player called Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan) with his eventual friend and Oasis legend, Art3mis / Samantha Cook (Olivia Cooke) begin following the breadcrumbs left by Halliday in the Oasis to find three Easter Eggs. Three keys, which when found will allow the holder of the three keys to own the Oasis.

After Halliday’s death, he left clues to the whereabouts of the three keys in this ever expanding virtual Universe.

Initially players joined the Oasis specifically to find these keys, but as the years went on the interest subsided and players just began playing the game, or any game that they created within the cyber world.

Wade, desperate to escape to escape his troubled home life (most players entered into the Oasis to escape reality) works out the cryptic clues left by Halliday and begins his adventure for the keys.

But, of course, he is not the only one.

A former intern of Hallidays, Nolan Sorrento (Ben Mendelsohn), CEO of Online Industries (IOI) also seeks the Easter Eggs (keys) using an army of debt incurred players called Sixers.

Nolan is scrupulous in his company’s quest for the keys, wanting to gain full ownership of the Oasis for IOI and completely monetize it.

Ready Player One is a mix of real world and CGI and portrays a totally immersive and beautifully generated game world.

There are so many pop-culture references from 70’s, 80’s, 90’s and present Scifi, horror, comics, video gaming and Spielberg films. So much infact that you’re likely to only notice a portion of them in a first watch of the film.

Ready Player One is film that you will not see just once, it’s one that you will want to see over and over and in years to come will be a pop culture classic in its own right, much like other Spielberg films.

Five stars is not enough for Ready Player One.

The post Ready Player One (Warner Bros. – 2018) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

New Zealand’s Armageddon Expo does it again with a four day action packed extravaganza on games, comics, anime/manga, cosplay and a whole host of other pop culture experiences for fans of all ages and from all walks of life.

Back in Auckland for its 20th year over the Labour Day weekend, the Expo did not disappoint. With a fantastic line-up of guests, hands on gaming experiences, cosplay competitions and all-round good fun, the Expo did well to remind us just how awesome an event of this kind is to Kiwis, home to some wonderfully nerdy gamers, exuberantly geeky comic book enthusiasts and lively anime and manga fans.

I managed to secure a media pass to the expo to gather some intel on behalf of Shane the Gamer, and by intel I mean let my inner nerd run wild and go crazy like a kid in a candy store (which I did).

The first night was tame with plenty of breathing room and empty spaces to roam about freely. My first stop was, naturally, the Mighty Ape stand to look out for deals on comics/graphic novels, of which, there was one that I really, really wanted but thought I’d sleep on it before throwing all my money away. Sadly, this was a mistake because both copies I saw on the first night was gone by the morning of the very next day.

Oh well, back to my tale on my Armageddon adventure.  After taking a photo with a giant sized Vault Boy from the Bethesda Fallout games, I made my way across the anime/manga stands and perused through some neat titles, mentally cataloging them in my head for future review ideas and then found my way to the Microsoft Xbox area which was phenomenally huge!

Xbox has really gone all out this half of the year and rightly so with some amazing exclusive titles coming out in the coming weeks. As a huge Tomb Raider fan and as the proud owner of a newly acquired Xbox One console (the Halo 5 version, which is quite possibly the prettiest and sleekest piece of tech I own), it was jaw dropping to see the huge Rise of the Tomb Raider area dedicated to some pre-release gameplay. I managed to have a go on the game at XONZ and boy was it fantastic! I really, and I mean really, can’t wait to get my hands on a copy of Rise of the Tomb Raider.

Tomb Raider was not the only massive game being promoted. Other big hits included Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six, Tom Clancy’s The Division and Fallout 4. What gave me a bit of a thrill was seeing yet another Vault Boy on display. Taking another picture meant that there will now be a trend of taking Vault Boy photos whenever I see one.

Next up was the Sony PlayStation stand which was rocking bright coloured lights, good music playing in the background and a fantastic giant sized Star Wars: Battlefront poster.

I have to admit that the PlayStation stand drew me in visually. What caught my eye was the Uncharted 4 exclusive preview section which was closed off for VIPs only on the first night.

Slightly disappointed, I decided to wait in line to try out the much anticipated PlayStation VR headset. In an interesting twist of fate, I was pulled out of my line and thrust into the Uncharted 4 preview room to view some gameplay along with a select group of VIPs (it all happened so fast I still can’t believe how I ended up there). Needless to say, along with Rise of the Tomb Raider, Uncharted 4 is on my must acquire and play list.

I wouldn’t be a true geek if I didn’t go on the hunt for some new (and very, very old) comics.

In true expo attendee fashion, I searched high and low and found a particular exhibitor who was selling pre-1980s rare and collectible comics. I was in heaven!  Everything from the very first Amazing Spider-Man comic to the first appearance of Wolverine in the Incredible Hulk comic was on sale. Despite being slack-jawed at the sight of such precious gems, my heart did sink a little upon looking at the prices. I suppose I should have known that these fine comics would be selling for upwards of $500.

All in all my first experience of the Auckland Armageddon Expo after a nine year break was as expected: amazing!

Events such as this, with excellent experiences put forth by the likes of Xbox and PlayStation truly makes me feel at home and one with my fellow pop culture aficionados. Here’s to next year!

*For more pop culture, gaming, movies/anime and comic reviews, geek rantings and event coverage, check out my personal blog HERE. 

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