This week, at the LA Convention Center, is the Electronic Entertainment Expo (”E3″ in the vernacular). For lovers of video games, a visit to E3 is more fun than being let loose in an arcade with a wheelbarrow full of quarters. All the game companies show up with their new and upcoming games and attempt to outdo each other with the biggest, loudest booth possible. Many booths are themed and feature video footage of the games along with playable demo stations. There are people dressed in costumes, contests, and all kinds of free junk to take home. In short, it is total sensory overload.
As E3 is an industry-only show, the only way for the general public to get in (i.e., those of us who don’t work for game-related companies, or the press), is to know someone on the inside who can get you a pass. This is the situation with which I was presented around this time last year. I had been dying to go to E3 for years. As it turned out, my boss at the time had a contact with a small game company and was able to get himself a pass. When I expressed interest, he suggested I photocopy his pass and he gave me an official badge-holder to put it in. This would effectively allow me to bypass the registration desk and go straight into the expo, as it would appear that I had registered earlier in the day. I set to work.
The badge itself was much like a credit card in size and composition. In order to pull off a convincing forgery, the copy would have to be perfect. Fortunately, our company was renting a ridiculously overpowered color photocopier. I laid the badge meticulously on the copy window and made a pass. The copy was good, but not good enough. I went through nearly a dozen revisions, each time changing color, contrast, and hue ever so subtlely so as to produce the most perfect facsimile possible. I then photocopied the back of the badge (which had some writing and a magnetic stripe on it) and sandwiched the two sides together with a glue-stic™.
Quite happy with my work so far, I soon realized that the surface was not glossy. The clear plastic badge-holder was designed in such a way that only the bottom two thirds of the card would be covered. The top third would be exposed, and a matte finish would give me away. My excitement turned to despair as I pondered whether this was something I would be able to pull off afterall. In my darkest hour, my eyes fell to a roll of packing tape. Clear, glossy packing tape. I carefully applied a layer of this tape over the top of my homemade exhibit pass. Brilliance. A few business cards strategically placed behind the “pass” would keep the top third from bending and giving away its true papery nature. I set my work on a table, and went to bed.
The next day I drove down to the Convention Center and stood in the foyer watching the crowd and how they interacted with the guards at each door. Taking a cue from the others, I marched right into the expo halls like I belonged there. I flashed my phony pass to the guards at every door and never got so much as a second look. I learned that the guards would scrutinize one’s credentials even less when one arrived with a large group of people. I would often time my arrivals into various halls to blend in with large movements of people.
I spent several hours at the show, going from one elaborate booth to another and playing video games until my thumbs and clicky fingers were sore. It was all I had hoped it would be… and more, because it was forbidden.
I have an opportunity to go to the show again this year due to a connection through a coworker. If I can get an afternoon off from work, I’ll be able to go to the show with a legitimate pass with my very own name on it and everything. I wonder if it would be as much fun though. Somehow it just seems… well… a little too easy.
Bye for now.
You, my friend, are one lucky SOB
Enjoy!