Super Mario Bros. Crossover is a fan game that recreates the original Super Mario Bros. and allows you to play it as characters from other games. You can find much more information about the game on the Super Mario Bros. Crossover Wiki Page. It was created by Jay Pavlina of Exploding Rabbit.
MAGFest X was an absolute blast! Held at the Gaylord National Hotel and Convention Center near Washington DC, the festival was a 4-day whirlwind of videogames, panels and live performances. In 2012, MAGFest was bigger and better in every way — from the massive 24 hour game room and vendor space, to the mind blowing line-up of video game cover bands, chiptune artists, and DJs from all over the world. This was Nophi’s second year tabling at the festival, and we’re already looking forward to next year and beyond!
DAY ONE: THURSDAY, JANUARY 5, 2012
Above: The Lobby at the Gaylord Hotel:
The word of the day for Thursday was “drive.” It’s 11 hours from Nophi’s home in Atlanta, GA to the Gaylord Hotel in National Harbor, MD. Driving the east coast at night is not the most exciting thing in the world, but good music and nervous energy propelled the Nophimobile forward through the night. When we finally arrived, it was after midnight, and the exhibition hall was starting to buzz with sleepless festival-goers looking to settle in for a long weekend of gaming and rocking-the-hell-out.
Above: Beetlechu (Not the Nophimobile). Below: Dinner and breakfast all rolled into one.
Loading in was not easy! Hotel staff was under-informed about festival details, and there was a 90-minute debacle involving the concierge and the loading dock that kept us from reaching our vendor booth til almost 2:00am! Once we were finally loaded in, we set out in search of delicious Japanese snacks and some red-eye arcade time. Megaman, Katamari, Galaga, Dig Dug — sometime around 7:00 am, there may or may not have been sleep…
…to be continued
<- This is the face of pure boozing satsfaction.
Sunday morning broke through the window with no regard for our utter decimation. We were hungry, hung over, busted up and feculent. We somehow managed to scrape together what little physical energy we had left, hose ourselves off and check out. On our way back to the booth, we savaged a pair of delicious meat cookies at the local burgery — inspiring us to start using the term burgin’ to describe when one enjoys something (ex. I’m really burgin’ this new mixtape, brah!)
Knowing we were only going to put in four hours at the booth on Sunday, and that at least half of the population of MAGFest had wandered home with eyes full of seizure patterns and ears rotten with chiptune, we decided to sell CD’s at half price. Sales were relaxed and steady, which gave us much more time for conversing with passers-by and our booth neighbors. This was also the best time to pick up some good deals on NES games and hand-made stuff, so we took advantage of the deals being offered and bagged a few goodies for our personal stashes.
Late afternoon rolled in, and we decided it was time to beat feet and head back to Atlanta. We packed up our wares, said our last round of goodbyes, annexing a previously shopping cart in order to lug our gear out to the parking lot. We were sore — full of meat, booze, nicotine and other essential vitamins. Once at the car, we took one last look at the hotel tower before settling in for the 11 hour hustle that lay ahead, knowing that we wouldn’t see our own skyline till early Monday morning.
We’ll spare you the details of the winding journey home, save to say it was equally vulgar and hysterical as the ride up. We did make a pretty interesting food discovery at our dinner stop though. A North Carolina chain called COOKOUT that served up vinegar barbecue, dogs, burgers, shakes and Cheerwine! We wouldn’t normally endorse a particular restaurant on this site, but the price for 2 very good and very fast meals was about 12 bucks with drinks. The barbecue was outstanding and Matt’s $2.39 milkshake had a whole freaking piece of cheesecake in it. It’s good to see that good things can be had inexpensively. We like to think that Nophi belongs to that school of thought. Local, inexpensive, and delicious.
