Richard: The second day of Tekko 2021 was more eventful than the first. We still had to go after work, but this time we parked right in the parking lot for the David L. Lawrence Convention Center - boy was this awesome! It wasn't even that much money! I was set to do a panel, so I had packed a bunch of stuff: SNES, Japanese PS2, Famicom, Super Game Boy, controllers, cables, and several games. It was not fun to move all of this stuff, but I wanted the panel to be really cool!
Kaiti: Arriving at the convention center on this day was a bit of a post-work get-ready frenzy. As soon as I was about to give up trying to park in the incredibly convenient actual convention center garage, a parking fairy appeared and granted us one of the closest spaces to the David L. Lawrence entrance. We scrambled inside with just enough time to set up Richard's panel and even attempted a bit of tech support in trying to connect his gear to the projector.
Kaiti: Arriving at the convention center on this day was a bit of a post-work get-ready frenzy. As soon as I was about to give up trying to park in the incredibly convenient actual convention center garage, a parking fairy appeared and granted us one of the closest spaces to the David L. Lawrence entrance. We scrambled inside with just enough time to set up Richard's panel and even attempted a bit of tech support in trying to connect his gear to the projector.
Richard: When we got to the panel room, it took some time to get everything set up. There was a bit of an issue: when I had signed up to do the panel over a year before, I had a laptop. Now I didn't, so I had bought a weird Chromecast thing to broadcast to the projector from my smartphone. Unfortunately, that didn't work, so the huge Powerpoint I had made would not be viewable. I had also brought my own projector, something that I had actually found in the trash one night, for the retrogames. I had been told that the projectors supplied in each room would not work with composite cables, so I felt that I didn't have any other choice. It wasn't the best setup, but I was working with what I had planned.
Richard: As people started to come in, I ate some ramen quickly and began the presentation. I handed out raffle tickets for some special things later. I was worried that the panel would be empty after a confusing event I had tried to do at the last Tekko, but I was, thankfully, wrong. The room was packed! I made a joke about being too "retro" for HDMI cables or laptops, and that set the tone of the panel.
Richard: I have type 1 diabetes, and my blood sugar was actually low. I didn't know, but Kaiti picked up on it really quick because I was acting especially goofy for the presentation. I think this might have been somewhat appealing to the audience, but it was not my intent to appear like a drunk game show host. Thankfully, I was able to correct that with a few lollipops.
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| The first image from the unseen powerpoint |
Richard: During the panel we switched to the better Tekko projector (mine was in the trash for a reason even though I had tested it beforehand), people learned about retrogames from Japan, games were played, and some prizes were won. The audience tried Donald Land on Famicom, Sailor Moon on the Super Famicom, X on the Game Boy, and LSD on the PlayStation! I also did a little tournament with the winner getting a pick from a pile of different titles. Some of the prizes, both before and after the tournament, included Ore no Ryouri on PlayStation, Yu Yu Hakusho 2: Chapter of Fighting on Super Famicom, the Japanese version of Pokémon Blue (a different game than the American title), and a big prize pack of Golgo 13 stuff. My friend Kirk supplied the last of those, and the game store, Warp Zone, donated some cheaper Famicom titles. It was chaotic, but it was fun for me. I hope the audience had fun too!
Kaiti: Richard had been simmering on this panel idea for several years at this point, and it paid off well overall. I was a little worried at the beginning since his blood sugar had clearly dropped right at the start despite eating some ramen I had brought up from the main hall. However, as often occurs, he was able to steady himself with some self-deprecating jokes, a dash of ridiculousity, and a few Dum-Dums (the candy, not the audience!). Many games were played, some in wildly rapid-fire versus mode fashion, all with hilarious and grandiose gameshow host commentary, and a lot of what felt like natural audience participation was borne from an overall silly and fun hour-and-a-half.
Richard: Afterwards we had to take the bags to the car with all of the video games in them. I definitely didn't want to carry that stuff around. We went to the gaming hall to close out the night and played some arcade games. I also took some cosplay pics. Then we went home, and I was excited to go back for a full day on Saturday!
Kaiti: After we packed up and stored Richard's panel contents, I made a beeline for my typical favorite spot at a convention, the gaming hall. It's the only thing that's open late, and usually, you get a chance to play a wide variety of games including import cabinets. After some rounds of an old favorite, Dance Dance Revolution, and some spectating of Pop'n Music and other rhythm games, we did a bit of cosplay admiring and called it a night.
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