The Mana Chronicles

This past weekend, Aaron and I ventured up the great Northwest (Seattle to be exact) for Penny Arcade Expo. Harry from Aksys Games joined us at our booth and brought along with him some consoles loaded with BlazBlue and arcade sticks. To say the least, PAX was EPIC.

On each day we gave out thousands of Mana Energy Potion and Health Energy Potion samples, hosted BlazBlue tournaments and freeplay, and gave away tons of Mana/BlazBlue swag.



We also sponsored the AION Launch Party (bottles of Mana for everyone :D), which took place at the Space Needle. Aaron and I were extremely impressed with the event, but especially with the food. By the end of the evening, between the number of cheese-filled mushrooms Aaron ate alongside my demolishing the shrimp/cracker things and prosciutto-wrapped asparagus, we had done quite a bit of damage.

Aaron got some hands-on time with Left 4 Dead 2 ("Same thing as L4D: Still awesome"), Mass Effect 2 ("Awesome graphics" - Still playing Mass Effect at home), and also gave the NVIDIA 3D Goggles a shot. I got to play the game I have been waiting ages for: StarCraft 2. In an epic Protoss v. Protoss matchup, I checked out the new units, gameplay and graphics. Thankfully the hot-keys were pretty much the same, which made the crossover pretty easy and allowed me to come out victorious! Now just to wait for the game's launch...

The BlazBlue tournaments were a huge success with stiff competition coming from all areas of the US. The professional players made themselves known in the match-ups, and some unknowns also came to the forefront during the semifinals. Overall, pretty frakkin' impressive.

The winners of the BlazBlue Tournament each day were:

Day 1: Veteru (who also walked away with Aaron's exclusive Mana Energy Potion hoodie)

Day 2: Phil J.

Day 3: Tom L.


Aaron also started "mastering" Nu during the BlazBlue freeplay, so if anyone is up for a cheap button spamming matchup, you can add his gamertag to your XBL: wintersynth

Thanks to everyone who went to PAX and stopped by!