My 3-day trip to New York was amazing, and both Shelly and I came back with twice the load we departed with. The majority of my load came from Saturday, when I went with my brother and the FIT group to attend the Digital Life convention at the Jacob Javits Center. I knew it was going to be a consumer electronics expo, but I wasn’t quite ready for the sheer amount and size of the electronics on one small showroom. There were TVs bigger than both of my monitors put together, computer towers nearly as big and probably three times as heavy, and sexiness emanating from even the lowliest of booths.

Was it as good as the Licensing Expo? Despite both conventions being showcases, they were entirely different breeds. The Licensing Expo had gimmicky free stuff: lots of pins, buttons, stickers, and a couple good items like a Happy Bunny postcard book. Digital Life’s freebies were a lot less plentiful but more useful, things that people would use and remind themselves and others about the product: Microsoft popcorn and playing cards, Lord of the Rings Online trial DVDs, and a Newegg poncho. Being the officer of the MMO club, I felt it was my duty to procure goods for our members, and took a whole nine full-size DVD cases from the piles that were being constantly replenished. It wasn’t until later that I found out that the installer was available online and trial keys could be sent to your email address. Oh wells.

The big notables were the video games. They had computers that ran Bioshock beautifully and still smooth as silk, two DDR arcade machines, dozens of PS3s and 360s, and several unreleased games: Crysis, Guitar Hero 3, Team Fortress 2…the first hour at the convention was really just me going from booth to booth gaping at the live games that were being played on these monster rigs and screens. I’m not so sure I like Guitar Hero 3’s interface, but my opinion might have been soured by the long lines for everything worth playing 🙁 .

But the absolute best part? Totally whooping the Geek Squad’s ass at 3-question computer trivia, and winning a USB hub in the process 😀 . Working as BU tech support finally pays off (well, other than in the literal sense XD).

The last day was spent playing with not one, not two, but three linked Xbox 360s, with three matching televisions, three copies of Halo 3, and 10 controllers (sorry to break the sequence of 3’s). I donned the mantle of SomeRandomGuy so that people could say “Woo, I just killed some random guy!” and “Damnit, some random guy keeps sniping me!” Unfortunately it was more of the former than the latter, but I eked out a spot in the middle of the leaderboard, which is good considering my inexperience with console shooters. Regardless, it was crazy fun for all of us, with lots of jeering and screaming and teabagging. Shelly came back with a 360 of her own, opening up the possibility of four-player Halo 3 co-op with Megan’s 360 😀 . Toss in Bioshock, MMOGS meetings, and RPG games, and I’ve got a lot I want to do and not a lot of time to do it with. College is definitely in full swing.