Bungie Fanfest and E3 2002

All out of bubblegum...

May 23-25 2002 by Richard Nickel (Shovelface) and Daniel Barbour (Finn)

Dear Diary, today I killed a man...

Almost watching a man nearly fall to his death has given me a new perspective on life. One second you could be in the top of a palm tree, the next, plummeting 6 stories to the pavement below. Then you might be in an ambulance being rushed to the hospital. After that you may eat some cake.

It occurs to me that I may have been the last person to photograph this man alive. Spooky, no? Well the flash was turned off, so I am not to blame.

As exciting as this all is, it was not to be the highlight of our trip to LA, nor was sneaking into E3 (which involved not only deceit, but theft and other clandestine activities. Thanks Louis and mnemesis for watching our backs).

No, I would have to say that the best part would not even be meeting Steven Speilberg's mom, Leah Adler (she is such a sweet lady) and having Microsoft foot the bill for supper at her restaurant.

The Fanfest avec Bungie!

Definitely worth the flight. It was uber sweet to kill and be killed against and alongside Bungie Staff.

Points:

• Vector40 is hilarious. There was a constant stream of "Stop shooting my face with a shotgun" , and "I warned you not to shoot me in the face with a shotgun!" (these are not actually things he said, but we can't seem to remember direct quotes. So you get the idea: he's funny, we're forgetful).
• Frogblast is really slick. He's very humble and down to earth. It was much fun to battle his greatness, however it was much more productive to team up with him and Pfhor to stick it to the Bungie staff (Jason, Charles, Jaime, and Tyson). They wanted a rematch, which we agreed to.
  
  Sorry guys ;)
• Chucky lives up to the hype for sure. He was a force to be reckoned with even though he had not played in "quite a while". He got some good shots in, we got a few, let's call it a draw.

• Mucho thank-you's go out to mnemesis for being so hospitable and providing not only great company, but transportation.
• Also topping the ol' coolometer is Louis Wu. He helped us procure passes to E3 and also watched our backs as we procured flags from the Marty Army's base.

The single best moment of the weekend:

After decisively kicking some @$$ the Bungie team takes a moment to rest when Jason Jones makes two fists and in a falsetto voice screams , "Anyone else want a piece of Bungie?" (I was informed later that they were not giving away stock...) .

The hardest of the hardcore... a group photo .

Long kept under lock and key, Skeletor dredges out his own photo evidence .

All in all... we didn't take enough pictures. But thanks to Miguel, the staff at Bungie, and everyone else who made it happen. We had a great time and hope to meet up with you guys again.

Hopefully the first of many. To be continued...