Sega Nerds

Pre-TGS footage

Posted by Graham. Filed under G, Japan, News, Video. Tagged with TGS.

That’s right folks, we have some pre-TGS footage for you.  But please don’t get excited, we are not showing off any games, just some people setting up the day before TGS 2007 is due to commence.

Being the cunning, wily, shrew that I am I managed to get into the Makuhari Messe (the place where TGS is being held) the day before it was due to start…. 

Ok it’s not that cunning, all I did was walk across the street from my hotel (yeah seriously), and I went through the Eastern entrance, which was wide open.  Unfortunately I could not actually get onto the exhibition floors, just in the incredibly long lobby-type area of the centre.

But while I was there, I was able to get some footage of people setting up for the event.  Unfortunately I had to film from behind glass, and the glass had wires in it - so my camera seemed to try and focus on the wires more than the games, which is why the filming looks so blurred.

But it was quite an interesting thing, to see loads of people beavering away for the worlds biggest gaming exhibition.  Surprisingly though, I thought that they neded to do a lot more work before the show starts.  There were still signs to be put up, I saw half-built booths, workmen taping down wires and setting up temporary boards.

I also got to see the main entrance area being set up - with lots of seats for the press coverage, tomorrow, and a big welcoming banner behind a make-shift stage, in the entrance part.

I was tempted to follow a group of ‘booth babes,’ who were being led into the main hall, but there were guards on every entrance to the show (there’s about 8 ways in from the lobby), and I didn’t have a pass, or look like a young Japanese girl, so it would have been a bit of a mission.

Oh and I did lie at the start, I didn’t walk across the street to the centre… there is a walkway connecting my hotel to the centre, so I didn’t even have to hit the street at all!  I also didn’t realise this, but I can see the centre from my hotel window, and the walkway flows just below my room.

So  anyone else plans to attend TGS next year, if it is at the Makuhari Messe again, I suggest you book into the Hotel New Otani Makuhari.  It’s the prime location for the show, but make sure you add ‘Makuhari’ to the end of the name, there are about 50 in Japan, and two others in Tokyo.