Event Highlights

DISCUSSIONS and PANELS

Want to know where videogame artists and musicians get their inspiration? Looking to find out how programmers make those video games tick? Got a question for a videogame remixer? Dying for some intelligent videogame talk with folks that write game articles? Drum up a chat with our special guests at the discussions and get a better idea of what's going on behind the scenes.

24 HOUR GAME ROOM

Our game room has expanded! Tournaments are now held in a separate area so that our huge (10 000 square foot) gameroom can be more populated with freeplay games you love. How many times have you gone to a convention and the game room closed early, or opened late? Well, not at MAGFest! Our game room is open each year for the entire fest! Enjoy your favorite games on dozens of systems around the clock! If you don't see the game you want to play, request it!

• Console Gaming
• Arcade machines
• GBA/Portables Corner
• Tabletop/Card Gaming

MAGFest encourages everyone to bring their TVs, Consoles, Arcade machines. We give your equipment a tag when it comes in so we know it belongs to you, and keep an eye on it to make sure it's taken care of properly while it's in our game room. If you have an arcade machine, please contact the convention chair for possible help with transit.

TOURNAMENTS

Think you've got what it takes to compete? Try your hand at a smattering number of games against people that think they're the best, and find out who really is! The most popular tournament requests include (note we've left a lot of blanks to honor all releases and revisions of games, old and new):

Capcom Vs. SNK 2 Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 Dance Dance Revolution, Beatmania, Para Para Paradise Guilty Gear ____ Halo __ Super Smash Brothers ______ Tekken __ Mario Kart ___ Virtua Fighter __ Trogdor

Magical Drop, Puzzle Fighter, Tetris, Dr. Mario, Tetris Attack Street Fighter: Third Strike Soul Calibur __ F-Zero GX ____craft CounterStrike Unreal Tournament 200_ Doom __, Quake __ Gears of War Challenges Booth: Click here!

MAGFest tries to have tournaments in every game that is asked for available, as long as we don't get overloaded with requests. Be sure to send in your request on our contact page or bring it up in the forums if you don't see a game you want.

Signups for each tournament will be held in the Videogame room during the festival, so be sure to stop by the staff table there and sign up for the games you want to play - if there aren't enough signups for a game, one tournament may be cancelled to make room for another.

24 HOUR LAN ROOM

Just like our game room, our LAN center is open 24 hours! The separate LAN area this year will provide extra juice from the hotel so the power won't go out. This will also be in an area that provides gamers with more gaming privacy, a bit less noise (headphones required), and more room for us to expand if necessary. Our LAN will have a few of our own machines, but we highly recommend bringing a PC with the games you want to play already installed on it so you have a seat! We'll be tagging in the LAN center as well, and PCs can be set up for public or private use at MAGFest.

24 HOUR VIDEO ROOM

With the exception of projector breaks, we'll be running as many videos as we can find! Relive your childhood or discover new series that you didn't know you were missing! Old school and new stuff alike! Don't worry, we'll have Captain N episodes again! And tons more game commercials from our friends at GameAds!

AUCTION

Looking for a rare, well cared for system? Got an arcade machine to sell? Just want to check out what people have to offer? Drop in on the MAGFest auction for a taste of what kind of goodies people want to sell, or let us know at the beginning of the convention if you have something you would like auctioned and we'll get you the details.

COSTUME CONTEST

Wanna wear a costume to MAGFest? Go right ahead! Dressed as your favorite videogame character, you can show off all your costume-making skills to the rest of the crowd, or if you'd like, you can participate in the costume contest, which is just a bit different from most other 'cosplay' events. Judges randomly selected and hijinks aplenty, this ought to be an entertaining show.

Music

CONCERTS

MAGFest, by many, has long been revered as a game music mecca. Video game bands from all over the country have come to play. We guarantee you'll be able to rock out to tons of talented artists and we try to keep this as fresh as possible so you can hear something new each year. In our early years, MAGFest started out with three bands. But we've expanded just a bit, and now we have three nights of concert!

Video effects at the concert will be provided by NO CARRIER who creates unique visuals using NES decks. Combining custom software and circuit bending, he'll light up the stage with an 8-bit barrage of graphical glitches and pure pixel goodness.

NEW YEAR'S EVE EXCLUSIVE

Even though we can't get the whole hotel Wednesday night, we'll still be able to set up registration. So, we're blocking off the Jamspace and LAN areas from last year for a little New Year celebration. If you're coming into MAGFest early, we have a special treat planned. You'll be able to hear Captains of the Chess Team, a band of game industry professionals, play an exclusive east coast show.

THURSDAY NIGHT

(no specific order)

ARMADILLO TANK (PIENESS), ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM, RARE CANDY, THE MEGAS, YEAR 200X

SATURDAY NIGHT

(order subject to change)

SMASH BROS, TEMP SOUND SOLUTIONS, THIS PLACE IS HAUNTED, METROID METAL

FRIDAY NIGHT

(order subject to change)

PLANET SKILL, ARM CANNON, SELECT START, POWERGLOVE

In the past we've booked:

ADVANTAGE, ARMCANNON, EVERYONE (the band), INHERETICS, JENOVA PROJECT, MINIBOSSES, NESKIMOS, ONE-UP MUSHROOMS, PARASPRINTER, POWERGLOVE, SEARCH SNAKE, SELECT START, SHAEL RILEY, SHAWN PHASE / TEMP SOUND SOLUTIONS, SMASH BROTHERS, SPRITE SLOWDOWN (CHROMELODEON), THIS PLACE IS HAUNTED, WAVE THEORY / PLANET SKILL, YEAR 200X

Even if a band ends up not playing, there is a good chance you'll see them at the festival!

JAMSPACE

At M6 we tried something a little different...a concert area where anyone could just come in and pick up an instrument, or bring their own, and jam with their buddies (or even the people already in there). We heard all kinds of things performed live, from OC ReMixes, to Metroid Metal (as a band!), to live rickrolling, to a live chiptune concert from our pal and game composer Virt. This year it will be back and better than ever! We'll be adding more shows with game composers to the room, and get this, we might even be more organized!

VIDEO GAME COMPOSERS AND MUSICIANS

HOWARD DROSSIN

In the golden age of the Sega Genesis, Howard brought us soundtracks for Comix Zone, Sonic 3, Spinball, and Knuckles. He continued, working for Activision and Interplay, and writing music for Vigilante 8 and Baldur's Gate 2. Back in the day, Drossin helped Sega pioneer the sale of video game music in the US with the Sega Tunes series. Howard will be sharing his experience at Sega as well as a few new game music surprises.

JAKE 'VIRT' KAUFMAN

Prepare to rock and eat tacos, because Jake Kaufman is making his return! Always on an adventure, Jake has now relocated to Illinois and is doing Audio Design for Volition (the guys behind Red Faction and Freespace, and Descent for us fogies that remember Parallax). By MAGFest, there will be plenty of stories to tell. Ask him about his new puggle, Nugget!

RICHARD JACQUES

Richard Jacques (pronounced "Jakes"), recently known for his work on Mass Effect, Starship Troopers, Pursuit Force and Headhunter, has a classic background of Saturn music including Sonic R, Sonic 3D Blast, and later titles such as Jet Set Radio and Samba de Amigo. Jacques will not only be participating on several music panels at MAGFest but he'll also be performing live in JamSpace!

LINDA LAW

After wasting eleven years as a mechanical engineer on tasks such as performing structural analysis on 30-foot tall liquid sodium cooling pumps for fast breeder reactors and designing high-speed machinery, Linda started wasting time instead on managing The Fat Man game audio business. For the last 16 years she has been both business and project manager. In 1996 she co-founded Project Bar-B-Q -- an interactive audio think-tank -- establishing its working group process, and is still one of the three principals involved in hosting it. In 2006, she and her partners launched Project Horseshoe, aimed at solving game design's toughest problems. Linda is also the chairperson of the IASIG's Interactive XMF working group and a former chair of that organization. She also plays the bass almost competently for Captains of the Chess Team and will surely shoot you a look if you ask her to solo.

OVERCLOCKED REMIX, MUSIC COMMUNITY

OverClocked ReMix is back again. They will do Q&A and undoubtedly talk about Street Fighter II HD Remix, bringing the presentations, prizes, and tips on ReMixing you've come to love. Site personalities like Andrew Aversa (zircon), David Lloyd (djpretzel), Jill Goldin (pixietricks), Larry Oji (Liontamer), and a bunch more ReMixers will be present. Now to prepare JamSpace for an OCR takeover once again....

GEORGE 'THE FAT MAN' SANGER

First you'll argue with us that George Sanger is not fat, but his repertoire of game work is! Possibly best known as a frontrunner for PC game soundtracks, George has been credited for 7th Guest, Castles, Maniac Mansion, Master of Orion, Might and Magic 3, Ultima Underworld, Wing Commander, and Zombies Ate My Neighbors. Wow!

MARC SCHAEFGEN

Marc Schaefgen has been kicking around the industry for 16 years, graduating from Origin University in 1993 with a Bachelor's Degree in the Audio Arts. Teaming up with another former member of Origin they founded Midian, an audio production company specializing in game scores and sound design. A couple of years later, he hooked up with then Iguana Entertainment, which became Acclaim Studios. Before the demise of Acclaim, Marc took an opportunity to work with some former colleagues from Acclaim to head up the one man audio department for Inevitable Entertainment. Inevitable quickly grew and was acquired by Midway in the fall of 2004. With that came about much positive change and the Midway Studios-Austin audio team continues to grow and forge ahead into the challenges of next generation console audio development.

SCOTT SNYDER

Starting out performing questionable audio experiments in his friends basement "lab" with a Teac 4 track and an Arp Axxe, Scott moved on to creating music and sound design for radio, television, and video games. His work can be heard on everything from giant robot smashing Slave Zero to offroad racing excitement on Test Drive Offroad 2 to role playing adventure on Neverwinter Nights to super hero smashing in The Incredible Hulk. Armed with a guitar and a passing knowledge of MIDI, Scott is also imbued with the power of ROCK as he takes the message of "Geeks Rule!" to the world with The Captains Of The Chess Team.

TOMMY TALLARICO

Tommy Tallarico is known for doing a lot of composing and sound design on classic and modern titles alike. Early on, he wrote soundtracks to popular titles such as Cool Spot, Earthworm Jim, and Global Gladiators, and later moved on to do soundtracks for MDK, Tomorrow Never Dies, Maximo, and Advent Rising. Lately, Tommy runs his own videogame concert series, Video Games Live, which incorporates orchestration and participation from a variety of video game composers in the industry.

Film

THE ANGRY VIDEO GAME NERD

The Angry Video Game Nerd has been yelling at games since 2004 and he's made quite the name for himself. Part of our group guest ScrewAttack and also founder of Cinemassacre, his own venture, James Rolfe will be present to answer all of your questions about the series and play video games angrily. Surprises await!

DARK MAZE STUDIOS

Dark Maze Studios is another micro-budget independent film studio that produces high-quality entertainment on a Hollywood-pocketchange budget. They're coming out from Champaign, IL to show you their first feature-length film, Press Start. It's a videogame parody guest-starring Mortal Kombat actors Daniel & Carlos Pesina and a score by Jake Kaufman (aka virt), who you already know. There are tons of hilarious references and you're sure to love it!

FARGATE PRODUCTIONS

These dudes are five friends with a near obsessive devotion to video games. Their current projects include various anime/gaming convention documentaries, as well as some short films based on a select few video games (Ex: Pitfall).

MAIN MOON PRODUCTIONS

Main Moon Productions; the diverse entertainment company from Cincinnati Ohio joins MAGFest for it's third and biggest year yet. Not only will the moon crew be selling all kinds of MMP swag and original artwork; but will debut it's most ambitious project yet...Donkey Kong: The Musical & Other Weird Cartoons. MMP is sure to delight both vidiots and fans of fine cinema alike! It's better than an infinite amount of pizza!

PBC PRODUCTIONS

PBC Productions brought us The New Adventures of Captain S last year, which managed to get a lot of attention and even some crazy fanboyism at anime conventions. This year they've got a few surprises. For one, they'll be talking about where the series is headed and also some of their new projects. Also, due to joining forces with ScrewAttack, you'll get to see them at the meetup.

X-STRIKE STUDIOS

X-Strike brought you River City Rumble, Silent Horror, Project: Snake, and Nth Mile, and Resident Horror showed last year at MAGFest in pre-production form. X-Strike will be doing panels on Horror Games+Movies and showing some more unreleased project clips at their Q&A panel.

YU-GI-OH: THE ABRIDGED SERIES

For the past 2 years, this hilarious anime parody series has been storming the web and is now arriving at MAGFest to pretend they actually know what they are talking about when it comes to games or music. Kroze, Ren and others of the site staff will be around to talk about the site and series and their new webcomic spinoff, Fluffy Doom! Come watch them make fools of themselves, and there might even be a surprise appearance from LittleKuriboh himself! (Sanity not included... especially around Kroze)

Developers, Artists, and More!

APPLEGEEKS, ARTIST

Do you love your Apple? Well? DO YOU? But how much do you love your Apple? We think Ananth and Hawk would love to hear about it, but be careful, they may put your love in perspective. PS. Ghost Recon.

BENJAMIN HECKENDORN AKA "BENHECK"

Born October 19th, 1975, Ben Heckendorn is one of the world’s most renowned videogame modders. His most popular projects include the Xbox 360 laptop and a variety of modified gaming controllers, such as ones for single-handed use and even putting Sony PS3 Sixaxis guts inside of an Xbox 360 controller. Currently Ben is working on rolling out a production version of his “Access Controller”, filming his independent film “Possumus Woman”, and a host of other assorted projects. He'll be doing a modding workshop this year at MAGFest.

ERIC RUTH AKA DJ POTATOE

Still a part of Flavor Grenade Studios, DJ Potatoe's setting up next to the gameroom again, and he's got more new projects to show. The creator of The Angry Video Game Nerd's Angry Video Game (say that three times fast) and Return of the Space Cowboy, Eric will have his portfolio on display and a new album for sale (including some tracks previously performed at MAGFest). Check out his website for some downloadable fun!

GAME REFUGE, GAME DESIGNERS

Developers of the new Arctic Stud Poker Run and classic games such as Arch Rivals, General Chaos, Rampage, Xenophobe, and others, Brian Colin from Game Refuge will be visiting and sharing a little bit of the past, present and future with us, not to mention some free games! Brian handles things such as Game Design and Art Direction so you'll be able to ask him all sorts of stuff about the company and the games, and probably catch a game or two with him if he's not too busy.

PARADOX LOST, ARTIST

Artistry, gamery, and eggplantery will all be present along with Paradox Lost. Come talk to Dave Lister at his table and meet him at his panel!

ROBERT ALDRICH, AUTHOR

Robert Aldrich's Videogame- and Anime-inspired projects paint a vivid, imaginative picture for any gamer. He'll be at M6 to talk about his work and host a few videogame discussions, and probably a trivia contest!

SCREWATTACK, GAMER FANDOM COMMUNITY

ScrewAttack! They're a bunch of G1's and gamer nerds from all over the place. ScrewAttack ties together PBC Productions' Captain S, the SideScrollers podcast with Tom and Craig, and James, the Angry Video Game Nerd, and of course you'll get to meet them all at MAGFest at their first ever eastcoast meetup!

VIRTUAL FOOLS, JOURNALISTS

These guys take humorous (and critical) looks at the wide world of entertainment. As self proclaimed 'video game scholars,' they attempt to assess video games in aesthetic, academic, cultural and societal terms.