Last thing that you might enjoy (especially you Street Fighter fans), Alvin Lee of UDON/Street Fighter/Deadpool fame has donated some beautiful prints to give away to you all. So enjoy the cosplay pictures for now and keep checking back to this page for updates.

Consider this a landing page of sorts for all the MegaCon coverage that will be posted in the days to come. On top of the cosplay above, here are some other nifty items shown at the con:

This past weekend, GameX was taken over by Steam Gear Lab and The League of S.T.E.A.M. for the Steampunk Fair. “Steampunk” mixes Victorian style with science fiction/science fantasy to create a futuristic world run by steam. That seems like a horrible clash of ideas, but somehow, it works. And it’s hot.

See? Hotness. Frankly, I think we should all dress like this all the time.

But I digress. I got the chance to hang out with the people from The League of S.T.E.A.M. on Saturday, and they made me smile. Especially when they whipped out this little contraption, which you can see the guy above (Mr. Crackitus Potts, aka Nick Baumann) wearing on his back:

That, my friends, is a cattle prod. A working cattle prod at that. Perhaps cattle isn’t the right word, though – it’s actually a zombie prod. You can’t see it in this picture, but it’s got a strobe light going and when you hold both ends, a pulse of electricity goes through you as someone cranks the other end. Yes, those are eels in a tank “powering” the contraption. Here’s another look at it, along with some pictures of James and Intern Richard getting zapped:

This zombie zapper brings up a really interesting point – steampunk is so versatile that it can crossover into multiple other genres really easily. We talked to the Steampunkers (I may have just made up that word. Is there an official word for people into steampunk?) about it, and they can fit in at so many different kinds of events. Steampunk can work at ren faires or with pirates. It can go more gothic or more “Old West” based. People extremely into LARP are interested in the weapons and armor; people who just like to cosplay are interested in the costumes. And of course, us gamers love ‘em.

Steampunk also changes how people think about role-playing in general. It isn’t just about running around with huge foam swords and costumes that are duct taped together. Once you get over the negative connotations that come with terms like “cosplay” and “LARP,” you can actually start to play with some really cool stuff. The weapons, costume pieces, and other hand-made items they showed me were incredibly detailed and took hours to create.

If you haven’t checked out any of this kind of stuff before, please do so. This isn’t a new revolution (hello, Final Fantasy fans, let’s take a walk down memory lane to FFIII), but it is one that I daresay is gaining steam. Har har.

Special thanks to all of the people in the Steampunk booth for humoring me as I brought person after person back to the table to be shocked.

The following pics are now from the Photobucket of Latin_Rocker:

Over on the Projectfanboy.com Forums, userSebastianPiccione posted these pictures:

Last, but not least is some from cabridges who posts on the Cosplay.com Froums (his Flickr page)

Saturday started with walking through the fairly far away parking lot with my cousin, wondering if there will be a lot of cosplay or not. I figured, if there was, it will be Ghostbusters for sure, the hype surrounding the video game and another movie in the works made it the focus of costumes (much like Watchmen/Rorschach was the cosplay of choice last Con). I do not hate being right, as the first set we see even before we get into the show was the following group to the right. Right away my worries that there wouldn’t be a lot of cosplay were set aside before even walking in the con because of these ghost fighting nerds.

Entering the con itself felt perfect. Tables were set up so you can wade through the vendors and their mixed goods of comics, anime, manga, toys, clothing, and even something new.. tattooing. I remember FX Show sporting a few booths like this, so it was nice to see MegaCon making sure that they wouldn’t be left out on this, which is definitely it’s own form of art to be appreciated.

Going through the tables you can find a mixture of all the artists and writers, behind them were the independent and amateur tables pimping their products by having booths full of their art all around. Near the food area was fighting with big foam swords and Legos.. yes, there was a full section with Lego building. Getting as far away from geeks with foam violence and the building blocks were the “famous” people signing autographs. Here you could find media guests ranging from D-List to A-List, with people from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Charmed, all the way to wrestling divas like SoCalVal.

The focal point for myself at this event is… the comics. Where I brought many of my own comics to be signed by the likes of Greg Horn (Elektra), Alvin Lee (Street Fighter), Jim Cheung (New Avengers), Jimmy Palmiotti (he does EVERYTHING), and legend of comics Dick Giordano (known for his Batman work). Still drawing to this day, he blew me away by drawing myself a picture of Batman with five minutes (that I now need to find a frame for)

After getting a few things signed, it was time to check out the panel circuit. The first one I attended was “Art of Visual Storytelling”, which included Alvin Lee, Greg Land, and Billy Tan, very well known artists in the comic world. I stayed the full hour and listened in as they had prepared questions to answer as well as taking on audience questions. Check out youtube.com/user/BingeGamerDotNet within the next few days as I will have some video uploaded for any of you aspiring artists who want to hear advice from those already in the game.

As a person who just draws for fun, listening to these guys and the process they go through making the comics was still really interesting. A good example is finding references for artwork, which all three agree they use Google Image search when necessary, but having an extra source of reference is Alvin Lee, who needs only to boot up any Street Fighter game to know what he needs to draw.

Another panel I attended was “Pen & Ink Panel: The Art of Drawing Comics”, which included Brandon Peterson, Sergio Cariello, and Mike Perkins. All three provided not only an informative panel, but Brandon a very amusing guy (next door they seemed to be blasting some random Lady Gaga song to which Brandon broke out in a little dance).

For the most part this panel ran different than the last, with full audience participation with questions and all three guys giving you the straight up info on how they get things done. It was interesting to hear how Photoshop has become basically a necessary tool for all the artists at some point of their drawing, and amusing to hear “get it anyway you can” (ie, piracy doesn’t seem to be frowned upon).

With that, I left the panel, walked about the grounds taking more random pictures of cosplayers, had a nice discussion with Brandon Peterson where my cousin started asking some direct questions regarding Greg Land, I ate a $6 hot dog and drank a $3 Pepsi (which was the cheapest food available, for comparison, a very small plate of chicken and rice was $9), and pretty much my feet were tired and it was time to relax and get ready for the Sunday show. While exiting, it was amusing to see a line full of cosplayers getting ready for some panel that I didn’t know of, so I snapped my last shot of the day.

Coming in on Sunday was a far different experience than the day before. I had to pick up a friend that lived 40 minutes away, I forgot my press pass so had to run home, I basically showed up later than I wanted to… but in the end, I found it didn’t really matter, as Sunday basically full of people who didn’t seem to be ‘feeling it’ anymore. There was very few people in costumes. Some artists had already abandoned their tables and went home. And even the vendors were packing up their comic book boxes for sale and taking them out to their cars.

I did find something for me and my friend to attend though, the Quick Draw Contest, which made the day all worth while. There was a room with around 20-30 people (though some of those people weren’t drawing, they were using a table to play Magic: The Gathering). There were three categories with the topics “Manly”, “Robot/Mech/Electric”, and the last being “Fantasy”. We were given 20 minutes to draw for each category, and basically those were the only rules. Being the bad ass that I am, and having a background in reading Maddox forever, I knew the most manly thing for me to draw was a Pirate Lumberjack. Which I won first prize!

The sad part about this, the prize was some Naruto poster and an anime dvd (despite being Japanese, I am not a fan of anime/manga/big eyes).

Other than the art contest, the day was a dud. The amount of people packing up and heading out set a somber mood in the convention hall. I hit up a few vendors, bought a couple of The Tick comics for a buck each, and ended the day early. Overall, the Saturday more than made up for Sunday. Being a part of the winning crowd during the art contest was also a ray of sunshine for Sunday. Thanks to all the people behind the MegaCon events, having a “Mini” version at a random time of the year is something I would be all for next year as well (just make stricter rules on the artists and vendors to stay until the end of the day, splitting early sucks!)

[ To see the Cosplay click here and also read my piece on comic artists stealing from other artists ]

Listen live below, get us on iTunes, or download the mp3 here

Show Notes | Topics | Related Links
We have been playing: Cogs (PC), Flower (PSN), Castlevania Symphyony of the Night (PSP), Resident Evil 5 (PS3), Zeus (PC), Peggle (PC), Call of Duty 4 (Xbox 360)

Mike sees Cosplay! (this happens a lot)

Cogs (PC puzzle game) giveaway!

From http://twitter.com/Binge_Gamer:
Giving away Devil May Cry 4 CE (360) bundle See it here http://i41.tinypic.com/o7oe20.jpg Listen how here http://tinyurl.com/d64uge

Fallout 3 DLC Backlash Continues

NEWS:

American McGee sez… Users should be paid for User-Generated Content – So should users who make levels for fun be compensated?

Sony’s Peter Dille blames Piracy for poor PSP sales

Microsoft’s Uber-Announcement for Japan

Lode Runner price mess up leaving gamers angry

Capcom’s Mystery Countdown

Stephen Totilo Leaves MTV for Kotaku

Shadowbane shutting down

Supreme Court Tells Jack Thompson to GTFO

Play as The Joker in Batman: Arkham Asylum… on PS3

Peggle now in WoW

Jim Lee associates himself with Gears of War

My day starts out interesting. There is a Rock Band tournament, and so I must play. My friend has the pictures right now, so I’ll move on until I get those uploaded (if you are interested, my band came in 2nd).

I enjoy talking with comic artists. I met a favorite of mine, Jim Mahfood. Here is a sample of his art that he did for i am 8 bit.

Now on to the cosplay. Let’s start with games, then comics…then the rest. Remember folks, they all can’t be winners!

Meh, so gaming wasn’t FX Show’s thing I guess, so let’s see comics, where I really fell good costumes were represented:

Of course Spock was there (charging $65 a signature btw), so Trekkies were representing.

Now, just the rest:

I have a special note about this last picture, this guy comes to every con. I’ve seen him four times.

Here you can see him from my Destructoid Blog from Megacon 2008

I’m proud and scared to see a kid brought up in the con lifestyle. But I love it, so who am I to judge. I think FX Show is going to be bigger next year. There were lots of deal tables, but lots of variety too. If it had just a tad more video game material, it would be near MegaCon level.

Listen live below, get us on iTunes, or download the mp3 here

Show Notes / Links of Interest:

We have been playing: Guitar Hero World Tour (PS3), Phantasy Star Portable (PSP), Street Fighter IV (PS3), Okami (Wii), Left 4 Dead (PC), MLB 09: The Show (PS3), Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection (PS3), Call of Duty 4 (Xbox 360), Vin Diesel’s The Wheelman Demo (Xbox 360)

Binge Gamer re-launch

Grab a piece of MegaCon swag – Also, George Perez (the comic book artist) is a prick

Mike’s apology to The Behemoth/Castle Crashers – They are soooo not like Namco

NEWS:

MTV, Harmonix & Apple announce The Beatles: Rock Band with a worldwide simultaneous release!

MTV, Warner Music at odds over Rock Band Royalties

N’Gai Croal Leaves Gaming Journalism – Best of luck!

Midway ponders selling MK License – What developer/publisher should get it?

Oh, and Midway may have broken the law

Gibson loses Guitar Hero lawsuit

Wrapping it up: Perry the Intern – The only Xbot who owns a PS3 instead of a 360? – An N4G user thinks so (good stuff). Final Fantasy VII should or shouldn’t be defended?

Sunday, the last day of MegaCon. To wrap up this weekend of nerds in costumes, I ended up browsing more booths/tables and got a few more gifts for you all you gamers who binge. Let’s start the pictures off with cosplay and then some brief coverage of what MegaCon was offering.

After that last picture, you could tell just about all the cosplay was done, so back to booths. One which I walked by caught my eye, a gentleman by the name of Kenny Durkin, you can see his table below.

To occupy my time, I attended a panel/presentation entitled “Year of the Fighting Game” that felt a little unorganized reminding me of VGXPO. Starting late by just minutes, the hosts “The MFK Legend” and “Luminous Kyo” open with Street Fighter IV talk. The audience, not full but still overall well attended, participated openly with the guys on stage, a little parry vs focus attack talk.

As unorganized as it felt at first, this was good presentation and amusing hearing so many people in one room talk badly about my precious first person shooters, even shit talking Left 4 Dead. No MK vs DC love. Lots of excitement over King of Fighters XII, GameTrailers videos were played on a big screen, even I have to admit the game is looking beautiful. Around the time the topic of Tekken got skipped over for Guilty Gear talk I headed out.

That is when I found one of my last cosplayer pictures. This character I had seen done about 10 times by now, and felt it amusing to see him playing Mario Kart.

Also going on in the gaming corner, a little surprise game called “Tatsunoko vs. Capcom” that I really don’t see hitting stateside soon, so keep modding your Wii’s people.

I noticed people playing card games, not unusual. Video games, also not unusual. However, the Lego’s being in full effect was weird.

Oddness was taken to another level when I see a sign claiming dodgeball when clearly people are just trying to kill each other with foam.

And thus ends MegaCon 2009.

Except for all that swag I have to give away…. including Kenny Durkin’s very iam8bit’ish bad ass Donkey Kong drawing..

How will I give it away. I’ll figure out something easy. (Like this)

I woke up late for today’s event (had a mini-Megacon-afterparty the night before), but I did still manage to snap a great amount of pictures (with a way better camera to boot, apologies for blurry pics from Day 1).

Video games were not the majority of cosplay going on Saturday, comics really took the cake, but first up is the gamer love:

Sometime during the day I passed by an independent artist table with a Nintendo all-star-Smash Bros inspired poster and a nerdy guy and gal at the table. I figured I hadn’t really grabbed any swag for you peeps, and hoped that I could smooth talk the fine lady into drawing something for a viewer here on Binge Gamer… no such luck, instead the duo of Mia “rocketshoes” Paluzzi and Matt Tichenor came through with poster that any Nintendo fan would appreciate big time plus a t-shirt to boot. To win that, click here.

(Click the above image to see that huge ass signed poster in it’s full glory)

Much like recent trips to EA’s Champions of Gaming and Otronicon events, I will post full thoughts on the day but I will leave it at the end so you can enjoy some good old video game cosplay first. Remember folks, they can’t all be winners (this is just Friday’s batch, I will be posting Saturday and Sunday asap, so look for those two posts coming up soon, as well as some sweet swag which I haven’t figured out how to give away just yet).

Now some quick notes about Megacon this year. Friday was far busier than I thought it would be, with a lot more costumed fans than I have noticed in the past. The big comic book names were doing what they do best, signing comics, talking to fans (between Friday and Saturday I must have talked with Brandon Peterson for at least a half hour). I did notice something different about this con than others I have gone to, straight up spam tables. I understand booths can be bought by any merchant, but when Sprint and “Happy Feet” get involved, it sort of sucks the geek right out of you.

UPDATE: Don’t forget to vote for YOUR favorite on the sidebar… Binge Gamer fan fave gets major bragging rights!

FEMALE CATEGORY:

Toni, Sailor Moon
She should have won, or at least been top three. Sucks going first. - AB
I’m with Allison — I like the Rebecca outfit, but Toni here was totally snubbed – JW

Sam, Naruto from Naruto

Kelsey, Rebecca from Resident Evil

Diomira, Makita from Red Star
She actually spoke some Russian, came as a character no one knew yet was decked out, loved it. – MM

Rosemary, Baroness from GI Joe

Karina, Zack from Final Fantasy VII

Abby, Moochu (or Miltank!?) from Pokemon
My favorite costume, despite at first I honestly thought she was from Viva Pinata – MM
Dude, me too. I liked her better when I thought that. - AB
Make that three. – JW

Tori, Navi from Zelda

Brianna, Saphira from Black Cat

MALE CATEGORY:

Greg as Raccoon Mario
Guy was in character ALL DAY.. no exaggeration – MM

Michael, Kankuro from Naruto

Robby, Mario from Dr. Mario
*cues The Lonely Man* – JW

Brian, Skull Kid from The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask
I was considering cropping this picture to just the Mask… but… – MM

Matt, Ichigo from Bleach

Voki, Zexion Kingdom Hearts 2

Mike, Big Boss from Metal Gear Solid
Raccoon Mario was awesome, but this was just plain the shit. – JW

GROUPS:

Bravo, Margie, and Pooh, Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood
I couldn’t figure out who the guy with the fish was, thought it was the Animal Crossing kid – MM
I didn’t care who the guy with the fish frog was, frankly. Loved Sonic and Knuckles and their theatrics, though – JW

Allison and Warren, Anna and King from Tekken
They were great in costume, and they were even more amazing to just talk with. Also, King is Air Force, which gives him extra credit in my book – JW

Elizabeth and Frank, The Ice Climbers
The Ice Climbers were definitely my favorites! -AB

Ashley and Casey, Riku and Roxas from Kingdom Hearts 2

Katie and Adam, Kumatora and Ness from Earthbound

Click to enlarge a huge ass picture of all the contestants (so huge that I had to combine two pics… go photoshop!)

Some people who deserved to get seen though they didn’t make it to the competition but still showed up to the XPO in full garb:

“L” Tetrimino from Tetris and Mr. Game & Watch from Smash Bros
I just have to explain this one. I wanted a photo of that Tetris piece. I am a Tetris nut. Then this little kid pops up and steals the thunder. We could not stop cracking up, he announced many times that “I am Mr. Game & Watch” while doing the proper pose. This kid is a guranteed bad ass when he is older. – MM
What Mike said. – JW

Ness
Better than the Ness that entered the competition. – MM

A Zombie and Rebecca from Resident Evil
I know Rebecca was already entered, but had to show the zombie some love here. – MM

UBCS from Resident Evil

Sorry if we spelled your name wrong, let us correct it for you and also shoot us an email if you want us to link to your myspace/blog/site.

Anyways, let us know what you think of the new format in this week’s “w31rd p0ll”: Do You Prefer the New w31rd Format, or the Old?

t3h w31rd:
-Destructoid
The first two sentences of this Craig’s List post says it all: “Do you love to play Super Mario Brothers on the Classic Nintendo System? Do you like to get tagged from behind while you do it?” If you want to know more about this guy’s sick and unusual fetish, I implore you to click the link and read for yourself — the crazy son of a bitch gets detailed about what he plans to do, and how far you have to get in the game before he does it.

-Joystiq
Punch-Out! with bongos? That’s just too damn crazy. But a guy figured out how to do it, and to his eternal credit… it looks like it’d kick ass. Except the acting. The acting is fucking atrocious.

-Xbox Family
In 2006, some guy sent his Xbox 360 to Microsoft to be repaired. In 2008, said Xbox 360 was finally returned. The big slap in the face? Microsoft still sent him the one month of free Xbox LIVE.

-Ripten
You ever see something that just blew your mind so completely that you didn’t know what to say? Yeah, this is “Super Chuck Norris Bros.”, and you can download the demo HERE. Just remember, kids: “Chuck Norris needs no sissy flowers. Chuck Norris needs a chainsaw.”.

-Kotaku
This large-busted Morrigan statue is pretty nice.

-Kotaku
This large-busted Kokoro statue is pretty nice.

-Tomopop
This large-busted Lara Croft statue action figure is pretty nice.

-Destructoid
A vibrator… for your Wiimote… instead of making cheap jokes or sly sexual inuendo over the fact that nerd crush #1 Colette Bennett reported it, I’ll simply say this: The Trans Vibrator beat you to it.

-JoBlo
The guys at JoBlo got really bored, and decided to kill an afternoon by reenacting scenes from some of the greatest films ever made (and “I Am Legend”) — using GTA IV.

How awesome is that?

-Destructoid
Hot cosplay chicks in skimpy costumes. Enjoy.

And now, kids, it’s time to give out the weekly awards. First up, is our recipient of the weekly Lager of… wait, he’s a kid… can’t advocate underage drinking… wait, I have the answer!

The winner of this week’s “Apple Juice” of Excellence is YouTube user “fartbuttface”… okay, so he’s not winning the lager based on his YouTube handle. Mr. Buttface here has taken the time and effort to painfully and meticulously recreate almost every weapon from the Halo franchise.

When I first saw this, I wasn’t sure whether I should award him the Lager or the new one, the Bitch Slap. But then I realized that while this may seem terribly pathetic on the surface, you have to take into account that the kid can’t be any older than thirteen. Combine that with the fact that the workmanship on the weapons is absolutely insane (considering that he made them all out of cardboard and styrofoam), and I can’t help but be impressed.

Now if he could just fix his costume, he wouldn’t look like such a damn doofus.

Now, ladies and gents, it’s time to give out the first ever “Bitch Slap of Justice”:

This one is a real killer. You see, there is this guy who loves Pac-Man. I mean, really loves Pac-Man. So much so that he BURNED IT INTO HIS FLESH!

I guess the dumbshit used an industrial etching machine to pull this incredibly retarded feat off, getting past the machine’s safety device by using a magnet and a die. Kind of like a D&D Macgyver. But do you know what makes this all the better?

The fucking retards video taped it.

…The video may not be for the squeamish… I guess I should have said that before. Either way, while I won’t comment for either Allison or Mike, I certainly hope everybody who has taken part in this ridiculous feat gets terrible skin cancer. It’d serve them right for etching images into their skin with a fucking lazer.

See you next week, kids — and remember to vote.

HOMEPAGE VIDEO: Angry girlfriend smashes her boyfriend’s “Nintendo Xbox

E3 hasn’t even passed and already Capcom is prepped to rock your socks off at this year’s Comic-Con. So what do they have planned? Well, for starters you’ll be able to get your dirty mits on the following games:

Oh, and I almost forgot that Capcom will also have a 20′ x 20′ boxing ring where they’ll be holding a Street Fighter IV tournament on ten arcade cabinets. If you’re dense and haven’t figured it out yet: If you’re going to Comic-Con, you’re may very well be one of the few people outside Japan who’ve actually played Street Fighter IV. If you don’t find that awesome, then there’s just no helping you.

But that’s not all that’s going to be happening with Capcom this year. Not by a long shot. In addition to all the kick ass games (and Neopets) they’ll be showing off, they also have a couple of movies in the works. Of course, we all know about the Street Fighter movie starring the absurdly hot Kristen Kreuk, who will be at Comic-Con to promote the movie along with Justin Marks. But Capcom also promises to show you lucky bastards an exclusive new trailer for the CG animated feature Resident Evil: Degeneration.

Other celebrities who’ll be rockin’ the Capcom house at Comic-Con include:

My God, they’ve brought fictional characters to life! Warlocks! WARLOCKS! …sorry, had a moment.

Anyways, there are going to be a ton of events going on at the Capcom booth for Comic-Con 08. Amongst those events will be the aforementioned Street Fighter IV tournament. If you want in the tourney, be sure to register as soon as you get in the motherfuckin’ building because spots are going to go fast. The tournaments will begin every morning of Comic-Con at 11am PST, as well as at 3pm on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with Sunday’s tournament being for the grand tamale.

The winner will be getting a “limited edition Street Fighter IV Chun-Li action figure” — no word as to whether or not her hands are the size of a small dog.

Also, if you’re a Cosplayer seek help you’ll be interested to know that Capcom will be holding a Cosplay Parade and Contest, with the winner being personally chosen by Yoshinoro Ono. If he picks you, you’ll both be whisked away to a tropical island, where he will love you like no man has loved you before because let’s face facts — a chick is going to win. Also, the actual grand prize is a Chun-Li statue.

Finally, panels. Comic-Con wouldn’t be complete without there being nine bajillion panels, and Capcom will be holding three of their own. The full schedule for the panels breaks down as so:

There you go. If you’re going to Comic-Con, stop by the Capcom booth to play some Street Fighter IV, listen in on an informative panel, shop around the Capcom store, or… hell, stare at Kristen Kreuk for all I care, just be there!

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