1. Cleanliness: the sad truth of a gathering of nerds is that sterotypes exist for a reason. More than once I was assailed by a usually young man surrounded by a cloud of stank. This morphs from annoyance to torture when you are herded into a under-ventilated room to steam for hours while waiting for a panel. Wash. Somewhere. Also, brush your teeth or use mouthwash. Mouth rot wafting over a shoulder in line is a gag-inducing experience.
Pro-tip: carry deodorant, travel-size mouthwash or gum, baby-wipes, a spare shirt and socks in a back-pack or duffel. If you can smell you, other people can too.
2. Santize: Travel-size hand sanitizers are cheap and easy to find and the convention site has hand-sanitzer dispensers EVERYWHERE. There is no such thing as too often and if you shake hands, offer the person you greeted a squirt. My wife came with a bag full of bottles and we used half in 3 days.
Pro-tip: touch exit/entrances with any part other than your hands if possible. When you finish with a controller, santize immediately and if you have wipes,do a solid and wipe down the controller.
3. Plan for plans to fall apart: PAX Prime is filled to the brim with things to do, to the point one could spend a day playing magic or tabletop games ALONE. There are tons of panels of varying size and popularity and endless opportunities to explore, meet people, and play games. Lines may be too long, #paxnaps make occur, or something better may wander along.
Pro-tip: Walk the convention hall, get comfortable with the general location of halls and if you are able to go for more than one day, scout under-travelled areas for future exploration.
4. Prioritze: The big panels are worth seeing once, but the lines can be up to 2 hours or more, sometimes outdoors, sometimes in rooms too small for the amount of people. They will also be availble (usually) as a podcast within a week. Check out the smaller panels. Depending on the presenters it may be a dud but it may also be a gem. Your time and inconvenience have value and it applies to line-ups for panels and games.
Pro-tip: Vendors will OFTEN have high-profile, long-wait-at-their-own-booth games, available for demos, with virtually little or no lines. I played ME 3 within 20 minutes of the floor opening not at the ME booth but at Microsoft's.
5. Try something new: This year most of the big games were either on the verge of being released this fall or are so far out that all the demo's are hand's off. While playing Mass Effect 3 was awesome, waiting in line for 2 hours was not (see #4). We checked out a ton of smaller games and indie games, and were excited to talk to the developers.
Pro-tip: there is rarely a line at an indie game and the developers are nervous and delighted to talk about their work. If you have ANY interest in making games, these guys are happy to talk tech.
6. Read the fine print: Most if not all of the hotels offered group rates with PAX charge for wireless access in the room. This charge is defined BY DEVICE that registers against the login site.At $11/day/device these charges can add up quickly.
Pro-tip: spoof your devices to have all the same MAC address or create a private VPN within your room to avoid insane overages.
PAX is a remarkable event. It celebrates the best of diverse community and lives by a single rule: don't be a dick.
Can't wait till next year.
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