Microsoft Launches Xbox 360: Journalists Consume Free Food And Booze

It was the official Singapore launch of the Xbox 360 and Microsoft pulled out the stops. I wouldn’t say they pulled out all of them, since this is an island of 4+ million people, and so marketwise, it’s not a huge percentage of their global earnings, but since the south east Aisa regional HQ is here, I guess they felt they needed to make the effort. It was an event that was open to both the public and the press, though only the press got to enjoy the free food when they received stickers in the shape of the expanding green circles that signifies the 360 logo. Putting one of these stickers upon your person meant that the hired help was authorized to give you as much finger food, Coke, or Heineken as you wanted.

On the whole the event was the usual run of the mill turgid gathering. The public was more amusing, because… well, they weren’t “industry” and so for them getting a chance to see the Xbox 360 at long last was kind of interesting because they were so genuinely happy to be there. The “industry” on the other hand, in this case, people from advertising, media, television, whoever, were either too busy networking to care about anything going on around them, or, if you happened to be me, so exposed to the Xbox 360 as a result of having access to it in an office for a couple of weeks that it was extremely underwhelming to see games you’d just been playing four hours earlier.

The event took place at a building adorably named the Red Dot Museum, a former police station that has now been painted red, at least on one side, and turned into an exhibition space for design (the government’s new agends is to promote the idea that there are people here with talent in visual design, rather than just a bunch of bureaucrats) and offices for design agencies. The launch was presided over by Her Cuteness Denise Keller, an MTV VJ person, and had events such as a couple of Chinese girls dropped by bungie cord from the ceiling to simulate the athletic intrigue of Perfect Dark Zero, a girl dressed AS Joanna Dark of Perfect Dark Zero fame, and Denise Keller herself parroting the script given to her that Joanna Dark is in fact the number one babe in video game-dom.

Loud music, rotating lights, huge crowds, and lots of industry people in business attire trying to pretend they were being casual but actually on the make to network and advance their personal agendas made the whole affair one of those ugly little gatherings I have grown to loathe and detest over the years, so I didn’t even manage to last ’till the end of it. Having the Wife and a few friends there made it marginallyh tolerable, but at the end of the day, my personal truism still reigns: I Hate This Shit, and I left once I couldn’t stomach it anymore. There’s just something about too many people pretending to care, pretending to smile and exchanging business cards while pretending they’re all great friends that makes me want to stick my head ina toilet bowl and vomit out all the pretense I’ve been soaking in.

I’m sure other people actually enjoy these kinds of outings, but I just don’t have the personality type for it. I’ve always done parties incredibly, INCREDIBLY badly, and have occasionally left people so unhappy with my behavior that they’re actually angry with me after they decide to cut their losses and get me out of there before I start calling people hypocrites. I’m much happier at a genuine press conference, or better yet, an industry event where developers and others who actually make games and care about them are there to talk with. Usually when I meet people at such events, like the World Cyber Games last year, the first thing that comes out my mouth is, “I hate all this hype and marketing, pr shit” and whoever I’m supposed to interview usually lights up at that point and we get a classic geek/nerd rapport going.