Do you like Gaming? Do you like Texas heat in the middle of summer?? If so then Classic Game Fest is for you! I will be attending this year’s convention in Austin Texas and am very excited to bring back all the news and information I can concerning this event. Packed with gaming tournaments, meet and greets with gaming icons, vendors, live music and more Classic Game Fest is sure to satisfy the nerd in all of us. Classic Game fest is held in Austin Texas and is the largest gaming event in Texas.
GUESTS
Notable Gaming Guests at CGF include Nolan Bushnell, Howard Scott Warshaw, David Crane. Gaming would not be where it is today with these 3 people. Nolan Bushnell is known as the “Godfather of Gaming” for good reason, he was Co-Founder of Atari and helped turn it into the juggernaut of gaming that it was in its day. Although, somewhat paradoxically, he also contributed to the oversaturation and low quality of the early 80’s game market leading to the Great Video Game Crash. Howards Scott Warshaw whose successes include hits such as Yar’s Revenge, Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Atari 2600 conversion of Star Castle, will also be in attendance. In the 2014 film Atari: Game Over he is quotes as saying all his games have “a million copies sold apiece”. David Crane Co-Founder of Activision, along with Alan Miller (not in attendance) will be another noteworthy guest and speaker. Cranes most popular achievement in gaming is Pitfall for the Atari 2600, however his career is filled with many notable gaming contributions.
Game Tournaments
Gaming tournaments for staple series like Super Smash Bros.(N64), Halo 2, Street Fighter III, Mortal Kombat and Mario Kart will be held. Tournaments are always a good way to bring in a crowd at a convention and is a fun way to meet new people who share the same hobby as you! Before the advent of easy and fast online gaming this was the only real way to play any kind of competitive multiplayer games on consoles. PC’s did have the advantage in this area for quite a few years and also had the benefit of “easy” to set up LAN parties. No gaming fest would be complete without a tourney of some sort and the line-up at Classic Game Fest this year looks to be very pleasing!
MUSIC
There will also be live music as multiple bands dedicated to retro gaming music have been booked to play over the course of the three day event. Masters of Unlocking, Super Hi-Tops, Descendants of Erdrick, Super MadNES, Super Hero / Super Villain, Super Monster Party, Gross Angel, 88Bit and Bitforce are all scheduled to play and I will get as much coverage as possible to bring back to everyone here at The Game of Nerds! Video Game themed bands are truly a special form of fan dedication. While I think the 16 and 32 bit eras of gaming had the best sounding music in gaming just being able to hear some of the awesome music tracks that you listened to as a gamer in the 80’s and 90’s transformed from a collection of chips and sounds into truly beautiful music is a wonderful trip down memory land and is something any gamer should experience live at least once.
