The Free Play room had fewer games but a better selection of quality games, so in my opinion it all evened out. I brought two games, both worked flawlessly the whole time. I tried to sell them, even with below-average pricing (according to Pinside) but no takers. Oh well.
The EB Lounge is great as always.
The West Mass / SNH club room was awesome. Great selection of games and that crew knows how to run a tournament. They ran THREE! These guys pretty much get my MVP award. Andrew I think his name is? Well done, take a bow!
Good selection of forums.
The vendor hall was lacking, yes, but at least it was replaced with a boatload of games you could play and purchase. A NIB Rush pro would cost 6800 + tax + shipping, or you could get one there for 6000-6200 total if you said the right things.
The main tournament sponsored by The Sanctum was incredible yet again. Jim knows how to run em and the volunteer crew was equally awesome. Thanks to all who helped with that.
The Rush tribute band Limelight was AWESOME! I don't see many people talking about this but that's as close to Rush as I'll ever get. I took a video and posted it and people in the comments thought it was actually Rush because it was so good.
We (wife and I) had a room in the annex building on the top floor. Smelly hallways and stairways, but our AC worked. Room was run down and filthy-looking. My only real complaint about the weekend, probably.
I get the LE pass every year but I found it too expensive this time around. I usually buy two but this time I brought two games instead. Saved $550 that way. The check-in process was simple and the people running that area did a fantastic job.
Actually, I couldn't find the give-away thing for the people who brought games. The schedule didn't show a location or time, just "Sunday Morning" and that was it. I looked around and finally somebody told me I had missed it. I'd like to see this fixed in the future. I wasn't the only one who was left searching.
I love the location at Sturbridge. It's right next door to a large liquor/beer store. The crew I went with tailgated all 4 days, it was great. Walkable distance to fast food and if you put in a little effort you can get better food a tad further away. We had stuff delivered too. Plus it's right off the highway. Gotta love that.
All in all it was either my favorite Pintastic or close to it. I would very much like to see more vendors next year, and it'd be great if they updated their rooms or something. It's 20k per room but you can also charge $50 more per day so that pays for itself in 2 years at 50% capacity. I don't get why they don't do that.
