Video Games Live

[CaptHayfever]

I went to it tonight. Rock on.

And now, an overview:

Pre-show:
The lobby of the Fox Theater was cram-jam-slam-packed between the always present concession stands, the larger-than-normal souvenir stand, the people dressed for the costume contest, and the 3 gaming stations (2 Guitar Hero III consoles & a Galaxian cabinet). Interesting stuff. I got some pictures of folks, but you won't see them until I finish the roll of film.
The costume contest was won by a preteen girl dressed as a pirhana plant, pipe & all.

Right before tuning, we were treated to a music video of a song I've never heard & can't remember the name of, but the video was basically a live-action Ms. Pac-Man.

Concert:
Conductor: Jack Wall
Host: Tommy Tallarico

The orchestra was made entirely of St. Louis-area musicians & vocalists, many of whom had never heard the music they would be playing until this week. Apparently that's what the VGL tour does at every venue; I didn't know this previously. There were two sets, each a little over an hour long, but fortunately they started right on time. Solid Snake made a couple calls to introduce Tommy in each act. Remembering the exact order would be ridiculous of me, but I can tell you most of what was played.

Medley
--They opened with Pong, Dragon's Lair, Space Ace, Asteroids, Elevator Action, Centipede, Ghosts 'N Goblins, & at least 3 other games I didn't recognize all mashed together.

Metal Gear Solid (w/ pretaped intro from Kojima)
--Mixing themes & footage from all of the games, while a faceless guard was stalked onstage by Tommy in a cardboard box.

Space Invaders
--An overweight audience member got picked to come play the big screen for a chance at a 5000-game tabletop cabinet. He was given a firing button, and to move his ship, he had to walk back & forth for 2 minutes while the orchestra scored the game. The guy lost his last life with 6 seconds & roughly 10 invaders left.

Frogger
--A middle-aged male & a young female were called up to play Frogger against each other, again with the orchestra's accompaniment. The elder player lost within 30 seconds (of the given 90). The girl completed the stage with only two deaths & 20 seconds remaining.

Kingdom Hearts
--Square wouldn't allow their footage to be used, but Disney would. The screen displayed each Disney-owned KH character in their earliest incarnation, ending with Steamboat Willie (the only appearance of Mickey in the montage). Oddly enough, save for Mickey, the two characters with the fewest appearances were Donald & Goofy.

Final Fantasy
--Again, no footage, but instead we just saw a camera closeup of the solo pianist, Martin Leung (the blindfolded guy from YouTube), playing a medley of his own arrangement.

Tetris
--First appearance: Near the beginning, the orchestra played the arcade theme (I think it was in the opening medley).
--Second appearance: After Final Fantasy, Leung played "Korobeiniki" solo.

Super Mario Bros. (pretaped intro by Kondo)
--Part 1: The orchestra played a mix of the music from SMB1, footage of every non-handheld Mario game, including sports, karts, & Smash.
--Part 2: Leung played his blindfold mix...blindfolded, camera on him.
--Part 3: Leung played the Yoshi's Island music from SMW, camera on him.

The Legend of Zelda (pretaped intro by Kondo)
--Actually the most disappointing part of the show, the piece had 4 movements, 3 of which were just the main series theme, & 2 of which were identical arrangements. The footage came from every non-handheld, non CDi Zelda game.

Sonic the Hedgehog (pretaped intro by Naka)
--The selection was basically just the end credits arrangement from Sonic 1 with the boss music spliced in, but the footage spanned almost every Sonic game but the newest few.

Medal of Honor
--Instead of gameplay or cutscenes, we saw authentic WWII newsreel footage from the History Channel. Jack was psyched about this one.

God of War (pretaped intro by Jaffe)
--With footage from both games.

Civilization IV
--A few of the other songs had brief soprano parts, & lots had choral parts, but only this one had a male vocal solo, and a long one at that.

Myst
--I don't know enough about Myst to tell you what all was in there.

Tron
--With footage from the movie & both games. Tommy was psyched about this one.

Warcraft
--With footage from both the adventure & MMO incarnations.

Starcraft II
--Yup, VGL got the scoop on this one.

Halo
--The "official" finale, featuring Tommy on guitar, with footage from all 3 games, & a live Master Chief running through with a flag.

ENCORE: "One Winged Angel"
--Also featuring Tommy on guitar. No footage again, but lots of closeups on different parts of the orchestra, Jack, & Tommy all going nuts.

Post-show:
Afterwards, the joint was still cram-jam-slam-packed.
Martin, Jack, Tommy, & Master Chief had a meet-&-greet in the lobby. I got my program autographed. The Chief almost took out the t-shirt rack when he tripped on the main staircase.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

[Serial Miller]

Sounds awesome. You really should play Myst sometime, though, Capt. Especially considering how awesome the music is, in it.

[Wyborn]

Well that's interesting stuff. So is there two big old videogame concerts going around? I heard that TML went to "Play" the other night in Seattle - this a different thing?

[CaptHayfever]

Yup. VGL started in 2005, Play! in 2006.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"