SupaNova Brisbane 08 - Afterparty

Game Event from Yug - Tuesday, 22 April 2008 @ 2:41am

What can I say, I love to throw a good party.

With less than a weeks notice, a flyer was sent around to all the local game developers (and posted on AustralianGamer) about a planned SupaNova gamers after-party to be held at my place on the Saturday night.

For those unaware, I live in Fortitude Valley - the entertainment district of Brisbane, and my balcony is larger than the size of my actual apartment - which isn't that small. The entertainment consisted of a poker table and setup in the terrace downstairs, old school Super Nintendo hooked up to the TV downstairs, Xbox 360 in the bedroom, a PS2 with guitar hero and a Wii with Smash Bros Brawl setup on the projector on the balcony, loud music, and a surprisingly large scale BBQ effort. What was unexpected however, was the rain.

After leaving SupaNova early to prepare the party (re: go to the pub), I arrived home with Matt, SniperXtreme, Yahtzee and the Matt B from THQ. As reassuring as the guys were regarding the weather (i.e. not at all), I decided in a last minute panic to drive to Bunnings with the intention of buying a small marquee to at least keep the poker table downstairs covered.

Arriving 5 minutes before close, I grabbed a cheap 3m x 3m one and hurried back. Unfortunately, it turns out my terrace area was 2.4 metres wide, not to mention the marquee I'd purchased wasn't even waterproof. Not to fear, as you'd be amazed what a group of drunk desperate guys are capable of, and we managed to MacGyver it up so it fit well enough ... although it would never be usable again.



As the scattered showers and sunshine battled back and forth all afternoon, there was a point where everything was setup and I just sat down, grabbed a drink, and decided that whatever happened happened.

Thankfully, what happened was the rain finally stopped just as the bulk of people started arriving, which meant that by 9pm the party was in full swing.

The majority of people were developers, most having endured a full day at SupaNova and keen for a bit of stress relief. There were people from THQ Studio Australia, Krome Studios, Sega Creative Assembly, Pandemic, Half Brick, Fuzzyeyes, Three Blokes. A few forum members (teashades, ZNMS), the Space-Meat boys (SniperXtreme and Edgecrusher), internet celebrity Yathzee, and a few of my non-gaming mates who were keen to play some poker.



Matt played chef for the night, and with the exception of running out of gas halfway through, it was actually a great feed, by the end pretty much all the food cooked was gone. There was enough booze going around to kill a small horse, and by the end most of that was gone as well (with the exception of half a bottle of jagermeister).

Big props have to go out to Heather from Krome for coming dressed up in the cosplay outfit she had worn to Supanova that day. She was definitely the most colourful person at the party, but strangely seemed to fit in quite normally.



At one point the complex fire alarm went off, but the music was too loud to hear it, and I only realised it had gone off when I went downstairs to let JB (ex-Auranite) and his girlfriend in only to find them surrounded by a bunch of firemen meandering around in the entrance.

I think a special mention also has to go to Rob from Pandemic, who's tireless efforts yelling at random girls on the street below reaped impressive results, and towards the end of the night the hot female ratio was surprisingly high.



The party ended in the early hours, another fun get together of developers and gamers that will no doubt be repeated in the future. If you're reading this and kicking yourself for missing the party, serves you right for not reading the site more often!