Origen - Day 2

Saturday 19.11

Fruits, cereal and coffee (lots of it) gets me going, and I spend some time relaxing by the pool (still a bit confused by the fact that I'm in LA, I decide to drink one beer just to celebrate the lovely morning :)

I check the beach and get something to eat from Burger King at the Santa Monica Mall with others and most of us get into sightseeing tour at 1pm. We go check Venice Beach, Rodeo Drive, Hollywood sign, Hollywood boulevard and all the nice places one "must see" while in LA. After a short rest, the winners gather to cocktail party by the pool and the rest of the evening goes by chatting, drinking, smoking and eating (all-in-all, very nice party).

Origen - Day 1

Friday 18.11

After 20+ hours of traveling and about 16 hours of sitting in a plane, I arrive in LA. There's a nice XBox representative with Origen sign waiting for me and the others arriving at the same time. I'm the first who got through immigration/passport control, so I wait for a bit... At this point my internal clock is at 1am, so I'm a bit tired. After the short wait, I put the tiredness aside as the stretched Hummer arrives to take us to the hotel.

We empty the champagne (two bottles) on the way and get to the Viceroy hotel after a pleasant 40 minute or so ride. I check in the hotel, and get a warm welcome from the XBox crew member. After receiving my survival kit of caffeinated goodies and info about the upcoming event, I get some sleep before meeting the other winners and the rest of the staff.

The whole evening goes quickly chatting to others, drinking some beverages and finally hitting back to the room for some desperately needed sleep (somewhere between 10-11pm local time, so well in the morning in Finland at that point)

Jet lag makes me sleep well, but also knocks me out of it at 5am or so... I spent the early hours watching quality TV, including Rocky 2 :)

Origen - Zero Hour TOP Lists

Zero Hour TOP5 Games:
(1) Condemned: Criminal Origins
(2) PGR3
(3) Geometry Wars: Evolved (XBox Live Arcade game)
(4) Need for Speed: Most Wanted
(5) King Kong

I didn't play games like Gun, Dead or Alive 4, Quake 4, Call of Duty 2, any of the "EA Sports" games, and many others, so the top list above is nothing but a quick impressions about the games I played.

You might notice Perfect Dark Zero or Kameo are not in my "top" list. I think both are really good games, but I didn't spend that much time playing these two, as I'm planning to do so at home and also getting a** whooped for two hours in PD0 multiplayer matches wasn't a pleasant feeling :)

Other games I played (to extent worth mentioning):

Perfect Dark Zero
Kameo: Elements of Power
Ridge Racer 6

Zero Hour TOP4 Main Event Moments:
(1) The Opening of the Event
(2) Oblivion Demo
(3) Gears of War Demo
(4) XBOX 360 Launch

Zero Hour TOP1 Disappointments:
(1) I missed to see Frag Dolls :( *sniff*

Origen - XBox Zero Hour

I was one of the lucky European (Origen) winners who won a trip to LA and to XBox Zero Hour, also known as Origen. I'll be posting some info about the event here, at least in a form of links to interesting stuff online now that the event is in the past and XBox 360 is available to everyone in US (and for us in Europe as well in just couple of weeks)...