Over the weekend I went to the Rooster Teeth Expo (RTX) in Austin, Texas.
I wanted to share a few of my impressions and experiences!
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This was my very first fan convention, and I must say I was taken aback by the sheer volume of people. Obviously different conventions will vary in size but whenever any number of sweaty nerds gather in one location it's going to be a bit of a danger zone. And this was no exception. While the Austin Convention Center is robust, it was not really robust enough to handle crowds of this magnitude.
In on instance, I was waiting for a panel in the main theater where there was a stationary, densely packed mob blocking all entrances to the upstairs area. They were waiting for the panel as I was. It got very claustrophobic, very fast, and I'm sure that shouldn't have passed fire code (and it probably didn't). So, based on how quickly RTX is growing each year, I really don't see how the Austin Convention Center can suit it anymore.
The fans were pretty much as I expected. A lot of nerdy, awkard people wearing Rooster Teeth merchandise and mindlessly shouting their favorite catch phrases for everyone to hear (it's funny when the Achievement Hunter guys say it, not when you say it). There was also a disturbingly large amount of pre-teens gesturing lewdly as they had seen in GTA V. That was certainly an eye opening experience. But for all that, I was extremely impressed with how courteous and nice the vast majority of convention attendees were. I saw minimal line cutting, no fights, and all around good human behavior.
While the autograph line was laughably long, I was lucky enough to happen across a few Rooster Teeth personalities on the streets outside of the convention center, and that was a big thrill. I got to tell Ryan Haywood that I love his name with a fiery passion (because his name is like my name!) and I got to tell Barbara Dunkleman that she was my favorite new character from Red Vs Blue Season 12.
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She has a thick lisp and a crush on Simmons, what's not to like?
The panels themselves were fun, but they were stunted pretty heavily from the fan questions. I should use the term "question" lightly, because most of the big panels had nothing but fawning from the audience. I get that you want to tell them how awesome they are, but if you're at RTX, they know that you think they're awesome. You don't need to tell them that, and you certainly don't need to do that after the last 5 question askers did as well.
It would work much better if the questions were pre-screened. They already field Twitter questions during their live podcasts, it would be easy to accept questions from Twitter, or to have a system where people submit questions ahead of time. This would eliminate so much wasted time and it would allow for a whole lot more actual questions to get answered.
I only attended one panel that was not hosted by Rooster Teeth personnel, and honestly I thought it was the best one I went to. It was put on by Gamer Assault Weekly, and it was actually informative and interesting. And the questions that people asked were actual questions. It was a refreshing change of pace, and given that it was towards the end of my weekend I kind of regretted not going to more low key panels.
The exhibition floor was pretty lively, and it had some pretty cool items. There were several playable games set up, including Dive Kick Addition Edition, which is coming to non-Playstation platforms and features Johnny Gat, and Age of Booty: Tactics ,which is a cool tactical pirate game that involves a king of the hill style. Rooster Teeth is also developing a fighting game based on their series RWBY, and I wasn't able to play it, but it sounds pretty awesome.
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Now featuring Johnny Gat, because Volition is awesome and Iron Galaxy said "Okay!"
So, if I was going to sum up my experience in as few words as possible, I think I'd say that the convention was fun, the Rooster Teeth employees were really gracious and nice, and the other fans didn't interfere with my enjoyment as much as they could have. So I had a good weekend, and I definitely plan on coming back.
Thanks for reading everyone!
If you're reading this as a fellow RTX attendee, I'd love to hear your impressions!
Until next time,
Ryan
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