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Video Games Live

7 June 2008, 21:55 | Review, Personal

When I was young, my mother had (and still owns) several cassettes tapes of classical music. These were the first albums I knew of. Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin, these were the first artists I remember knowing. The Blue Danube was the song I listened to over and over again.

Then I went to the symphony, suddenly the music wasn’t coming out of an old cassette player any more, nor was it accompanied by beach noises It was in front of me. All those instruments. This is how it was made.

When I was young, my mother bought me a Super Nintendo for Christmas. Mario, Starfox, Zelda, these were the first video games I remember knowing. Super Mario World was the game I played over and over again.

Then I went to Video Games Live..

Hype (6/10)
Coming into this, I knew what VGL was. I had not, however, looked at any of the many youtube videos of the event. I thought it would be fun, like a symphony outing, but if someone had killed the first violin, and she bled childhood nostalgia.

Front Lobby (7/10)
Wow. I didn’t realize there were this many nerds. Surely you always imagined that Winnipeg had this many dorks in it, in the same way you imagine the number googol. You’ve never seen that many, but its there. Unlike googol, this many dorks in one room is dangerous. The smell is harmful to adults, and deadly to small children and animals. There was a costume contest, which, until I star in my own game, I will not enter. There were various newly released games, like Guitar Hero: Rock Band Edition, and Matt Damon: The Video Game . I didn’t really look around, there were lines everywhere, I wasn’t sure whether or not I was standing in one, or what I was in line for.

Gameplay (10/10)
There are certain behaviors during a symphony performance. Never clap until the conductor lowers his hands is a good example of one. This was the most rambunctious, loud, out of control crow, I have ever seen during a symphony performance. Cheering for there favorite game, yelling out inside jokes (“Leroy Jenkins!” during WOW segments), and jumping out of their seats for Martin Leung It was so awesome. I joined right in. It was more like a rock concert than a symphony performance. Tommy Tallarico joined in on the fun during the MGS medley, where he came in underneath Snake’s trademark cardboard box. Later on, he played with the symphony using his Spiderman guitar.

Visuals (10/10)
The visuals were really well done. A projector sitting above the symphony, and four pillars of lights surrounding them. The really power came from the creative use of color and gobo’s, which would change to match the current game being played. Halo was quite neat, so was the finale (One Winged Angel).

One thing I noticed is that there was way to much Mario Sunshine in the Mario visual, no warcraft 2 in the warcraft visual, and too many pre-rendered cinematics when it came to the strategy games in general. EPIC RUSHING IS EXCITING TOO!!

Replay Value (10/10)
I will definably go again. VGL has a large repertoire, and the whole show will be different. Not only that, but I would take my mother and sister to this. It’s just alot of fun. Symphony people, video game people, everyone knows at least some of these games.

Overall: 11/10. (out of 10. Not an average.)