As you may or may not know, since 1999 I've worked at RPGFan. Mostly as a graphic designer, but I've had my hands in most of the site by now. One of the companies whose games we heavily cover - NIS America - holds a press event in the summer. This year it was at the Zebulon Restaurant & Bar in San Francisco. As the closest RPGFan editor to the area, I chose to go and represent the site. The idea was to go Thursday and stay for a long weekend, but I had a better, crazier plan.
I spent most of Thursday in San Francisco, and while I wasn't there very long, I got to see my share of sights, at least those found just east of the Financial District where I was. I checked out the Westfield Centre mall, which seems like a weird thing to do on vacation, but I like going to "normal" places like that just to see how it differs from what I'm used to. And wow, it was a pretty nice mall. Unfortunately it was too classy for even a GameStop, so I mostly just looked at a couple girly stores for a certain someone. I visited the Metreon, which I knew is past its heyday, but didn't know it would be so depressing and pathetic. There were so few people there, I'd often be in an area where I didn't see another soul.
In stark contrast, right outside is the Yerba Buena Gardens, filled with people lounging on the grass, walking, talking and so on. The best part of the Gardens (which is really just a park) is the awesome Martin Luther King Jr. memorial in and around a gorgeous waterfall. Giant pieces of etched glass contained parts of his speeches, and I had to read every one. Whenever I got back to this city, I need to see this again. Maybe at night, cause it seems cool when lit up. The last thing I checked out on the block was the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, an art museum that currently is featuring all manner of creations created from everyday objects - an entire wall of one room is devoted to Frankenstein-ish chairs pieced together from other chairs. And for good measure, my beloved $1500 Optimus keyboards were on display. Still awesome, still over ten times the money any keyboard should ever cost.
I saw some other random but interesting sights, buildings, and my first two story Apple Store with its sexy glass staircase.
The heart of the trip was the NIS event, and it was great. We had the restaurant to ourselves, to the dismay of many people who came by and wanted to just get a drink. The good people of NIS had both an extensive all-you-can-eat spread of food, an open bar (!) and six or so stations set up with their next two releases (Atelier Rorona and Cladun). I played Rorona quite a bit, had uh, seven drinks, including a "Disgaea Special," a drink concocted by NIS' awesome PR person of mysterious ingredients. It tasted like rocket fuel more than anything, yet I oddly wanted another one. Alas, nobody knew what went into making it.
While the event was for the press, NIS held a contest that allowed two "normal" folks into the event to partake in the fun. I ended up spending most of my night with one of these contest winners and her friends. I sadly did not get contact information for them, but they were super awesome people, and made the night that much more enjoyable. Also they gave me a ride back to my hotel to spare me from another $60 cab ride. I <3 you guys, if you're out there.
As the lone attending editor for my site, it was of course up to me to then cover the event, which I did in two ways: first was a spontaneous live stream of everything I could type on our official Twitter account, followed by a more formal article on the site proper. I'm quite proud of both, the former being fun to do, and the latter being possibly the longest article I've penned for the site. It was also written and posted entirely via my iPhone! I started it at the San Francisco Airport as I waited for my plane, finished it up ON said flight, and finally posted it after arriving in Vancouver.
Oh wait, what? Yeah, I also went to Vancouver after only a day in San Fran, though for drastically different reasons. Now, that is the really important story, but it's also highly personal, so I won't be talking about it here, save to say that I love Canada and several individuals in it, and can't wait to go back.
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