"The bus service is perfectly safe," I told her. "It's going to be daylight, and I promise I'll be home by dinner."
"And Sam's going with you?" Mom asked, the frown still burrowing between her eyebrows.
I nodded again. "Absolutely. Safety in numbers, right?"
She opened her mouth to protest again, but as if on cue, the front doorbell rang.
"That's Sam," I shouted, popping up from my stool at the kitchen counter. "Gotta go!"
"Be careful!" Mom called after me as I dropped a quick peck on her cheek and bolted for the front door.
Only, as soon as I pulled the door open and saw Sam standing on my front porch, I froze.
And grinned.
And it was all I could do to not burst out laughing.
Sam was dressed in a pair of white tights and a green tunic, with a long sword made out of tinfoil attached to the Abercrombie belt I'd helped her pick out at the mall last week. On her head was a pointy green hat that looked like the kind Peter Pan would wear. And she had what looked like silly putty on the tips of her ears, molded into tiny elfin points.
"Um…what's this?" I asked.
Sam blinked her eyes—rimmed in thick black eyeliner—at me. "What?"
"The outfit?" I prompted, gesturing to her clothes.
"It's my costume. I'm Link." She paused, looking at my jeans. "Where's yours?"
I shook my head. "I'm going as a reporter. Convincing, no?"
Sam shrugged. "Suit yourself, but you're going to look ridiculous going to Gamer Con in that."
* * *
One bus ride (where Sam got looks ranging from amusement to fear that she'd lost it) and thirty minutes later, Sam and I were at the San Jose Convention Center, a large structure in the center of downtown with a facade painted with geometric graphics that looked like they belonged on a skateboard. We bought our passes in the lobby on the lower level, then looped lanyards with our badges around our necks and made our way to the exhibit halls on the upper level.
My first thought as we stepped off the escalators was that I needed to listen to Sam more often. Everywhere I looked were life-sized video game characters. Kid sized ones. Adult sized ones. I even spotted a couple of service dogs dressed as Pokémon. It was like I'd stepped out of the real world and into an actual video game. I blinked, trying to get my bearings in the alternate reality.
To our left was the main hall where tons of booths lined the walkways, selling everything from vintage cartridge games to posters to stuffed animals of game characters. To the right, across the concourse, a food court had been set up where taco booths and burger stands stood, filled with gamers already downing their breakfast in its various fried forms. And everywhere I looked were posters and banners and signage for games—both in English and in Japanese.
While I obviously wasn't a huge gamer myself, I did own an Xbox and had spent a fair amount of time with my little pink Nintendo DS on long car rides down to visit Dad in LA. I recognized some of the games as old favs, and, I'll admit, amid the fanfare my inner geek started to get a little excited.
I did a quick scan near the entrance to the main hall for Chase but didn't see his tall frame lurking anywhere. I sent him a text, telling him we were going in. Then Sam and I took to the exhibit hall, walking up and down the stalls.
I pulled out my phone, taking pictures of some of the more elaborate costumes, checking out the different items on display, and mentally wording my article.
After two hours of the deafening hum of voices echoing off the domed roof and the constant visual stimulation of bright colors and costumes, my senses were starting to hit overload. Thankfully, Sam and I came to the end of the first row of stalls, finding ourselves at the back of the convention center. Here some of the major game distributors like Electronic Arts, Sony, and Nintendo had large, enclosed booths set up for play, their latest games and systems on display. While they all had a crowd around them, I noticed an enormously long line in front of one booth, VizaSoft Industries.
"What do you think is going on over there?" I asked Sam.
She shrugged. "Let's go check it out."
We followed the line that wound around the front of the large, fully enclosed booth, down a zig-zag of black ropes, and along the back wall of the hall, all the way past the next three rows of stalls. I was starting to get dizzy and wondered if it ever ended when I heard someone call out my name.
"Hartley!"
I turned to find a giant Pikachu waving me down from halfway through the line.
I squinted past the pudgy yellow limbs and pink cheeks, trying to figure how Pikachu knew my name.
"It's me. Ellen!" she called.
Sam and I walked closer, and I recognized her as a girl from my 4th period Spanish class. "Hey, Ellen."
"Wow, I didn't know you were a Gamer Girl!" she said, her eyes big and round behind a pair of glasses.
"I'm covering the event for the school paper," I explained. Even though I mentally tucked her phrase away for later use. "Gamer Girl" had a nice ring to it and would describe the scantily clad cosplayers I'd seen that day to a tee.
"It's something, right? I'm in, like, heaven right now," Ellen said.
Ellen was tall, had brown hair cut into a pixie style and big brown eyes with the kind of long, natural lashes that a fair-skinned blonde like me seriously coveted. We'd gone to different junior highs, so I didn't know her much more than to say hi to. She'd always struck me as the quiet type, but I could tell that something about being in costume was drawing out her inner extrovert.
"What's the line for?" Sam asked, craning to see the beginning of it.
"They're letting people get a sneak peek at Athena's Quest."
I gave her a blank look.
"You know, the new Simon game?"
More blankness on my part.
Ellen rolled her eyes. "Ohmigosh, you don't know Connor Simon?"
I shrugged and looked to Sam, who, by the way, was also bathed in blankness, so I didn't feel too bad at my ignorance. "Sorry. I'm guessing I should?"
"Uh, yeah! He's only like the biggest name in gaming. He's like…like…" She paused, sputtering as she grasped for the right words. "…like the Steve Jobs of games. He's a total rock star."
I glanced down the line. I hadn't noticed before, but almost the entire line of costumed followers were female. And they were all bouncing on their toes the way that Ellen was.
"He's done Hera's Pride, Triumph of Nyx, and the whole Muses of the Gods series," Ellen said, ticking the game titles off on her fingers. "But Athena's Quest?" She paused for emphasis. "This is supposed to be the big breakout epic. I cannot wait!" She giggled, and bounced on her yellow, foam-clad toes again. "You can read all about it on the VizaSoft website," Ellen said, gesturing to the banner hanging above us that advertised the company.
I grabbed my phone and scanned the QR code on the banner. Sam looked over my shoulder as we scrolled through the official press release for the game.
Apparently Connor Simon was being credited with revolutionizing the gaming industry by creating games geared specifically for female users. He'd made a name for himself by leaving out the pink covers and Barbie-style graphics of past girl-geared games, instead creating a line of female warrior centric games with challenging levels and innovative graphics to rival anything the gaming world had seen. Athena's Quest was the crowning jewel in his Ancient Goddesses series. The photos showed Athena as a tall, blonde-haired warrior with striking blue eyes and lithe, long limbs…mostly bare. The game promised an "epic adventure the likes of which players have never seen." It was set to hit stores next month, though preorders had already sold into the millions.