Saturday, July 11, 2009

Video Games Live: Wow!!


If you are looking for something to do with the family, and anyone at all plays or likes video games, this is the show to go to: Video Games Live!

We just saw this show last night, at WolfTrap in Vienna, VA.
It was absolutely fabulous. Big Cheers to game composers Tommy Tallarico and Jack Wall for making this happen. Their site has more info and upcoming Dates.


The really neat thing is that it wasn't just great music. They included game clips, which really made the music come to life, as well as introductions by some of the game designers. They try to pull in anyone local in the industry, so Sid Meier, creator of the Civilization series, was at our concert to speak about CivIV.

They did a Skype link to do a live interview with the man -- Ralph Baer -- who invented the ping-pong video game in 1969. He's 89 now, and he seemed to get a kick out of being interviewed from the concert. Before 'calling' him they showed the video of him and his partner Bill playing the game. I had seen that video before, but following it up with a live interview with him really brought it home.

They also had some interactive segments. A costume contest, a Space Invaders game, and a Guitar Hero contest. Guitar Hero was amazing. For those of you who don't know it, Guitar Hero a console game where you play 'fake' instruments that attach to the console. On the harder settings, it is HARD. 'Zak' from the audience got up there on stage and won a laptop by getting 200,000 points on expert mode, in front of a screaming audience. It was really amazing. I can't even get by on 'easy' mode playing guitar, so I was impressed.

If you want to get an idea of what the whole thing was like, one guy video taped pretty much the whole thing, in NY. It's 7 pieces on YouTube, starting with them walking into the venue and entering the Guitar Hero contest.

All I can say is that when this show comes back someday, WE ARE THERE!

1 comment:

Pish Posh, @imakeagoodhat said...

They're coming back next April to Bethesda. Gives me time to save up. :)