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The Reactor 2005
There are many words
that are synonymous with the word disaster, however "The Reactor" has
taken that word to a new level. Let us begin with "The Purple Hotel,"
yes, that is actually the name of the venue which The Reactor was held
at. The entire outside was painted in the most gaudy pastel purple you
can think of. Driving in, our entire car had this sinking feeling,
similar to that feeling you get when driving through a seedy part of
down town, that ”close the windows or the evil might seep into your car”
feeling. Walking into the hotel we realized the sinking feeling was
justified. The entire place already had a weird odor and didn't seem
well kept at all. On top of that the layout of the hotel was pretty
questionable as well. At the very least though we had our reservations
and were able to do early check in. After the long night before hand,
sleep was a blessing.
Friday afternoon
troubles began. While the convention was getting into full swing there
was just very little to do aside from sit in the lobby and shit around
with people. For the majority of the afternoon I sat in the nice leather
chairs in the lobby wondering when events would get started. During that
period I heard of at least three incidents where the hotel had lost or
cancelled peoples reservations without notification. Fortunately for
them the hotel had not yet filled up and they were able to
semi-accommodate a few people, but that was just the beginning. As the
day rolled on more and more people had their rooms mysteriously go
missing. I counted at least 12 groups in the time I was sitting there,
four of which I knew personally and spent a chunk of Friday night
looking for rooms for them. The hotel had no excuse and no way to
compensate, except to suggest people drive a mile down to the nearest
Holiday Inn and spend 250$, nearly double the cost of a room at the con.
Needless to say it was ridiculous and there was no excuse for that level
of disorganization. The hotel had obviously double booked a lot of
people.
As Friday night got
on opening ceremonies began and I swear by then the entire hotel had
already turned into a bar. There were drunks wandering about and the
halls were thick with cigarette smoke. Once again though there were very
few things of interest going on, save the parties. For an average
convention go-er this would have been a major let down, however for a
"party convention" this was key. There was always a party and boozing
going on somewhere and they weren't hard to find.
Parties lasted deep
into the night until sometime around 3am, when if you timed it right you
could look out the window and see an assortment of emergency vehicles.
Multiple police vehicles, fire trucks and ambulances filled the fire
lane of the hotel, many of which were responding to separate incidents.
Ranging from minor injuries to alcohol poisoning to a person pulling a
fire alarm on the fourth floor and then spraying the hallway with the
fire extinguisher. By this time another event had began in the lobby
though, Couch-Con. An assortment of people so bored they decided to make
up a convention in the middle of The Reactor. For the most part it was
just a bunch of people sitting around talking and playing Apples to
Apples. However the fact that there were anywhere from ten to thirty
people there at any given time says a lot about Reactor's event list.
Saturday morning and
afternoon was pretty much a bust. A lot of sitting around and recovering
from alcohol induced headaches for the majority of the attendees.
However once again like clock work, around 6pm the drinking began again.
The cosplay contest started up and all hell broke loose again. I must
say though, for all those complaining about the cosplay contest being a
joke, look at "Reactors" reputation. If you came to this convention
expecting a serious competition based on costume making skill, you are
either an idiot or don't research conventions you attend well enough. By
the time cosplay idol had rolled around the majority of The Reactor's
staff had given up on doing their jobs and instead decided to host
private "staff only" parties in convention space. Soon after you would
have been extremely hard pressed to find a staff member who really cared
anymore.
Couch-con started up
again and it didn't take long for people to gather in the lobby. The
"den of sin" opened and as expected it was a bust. There were little to
no people in there and even less attractive ones, eventually the "hot
body contest" was moved to the dance. However raunchy it was, it seemed
that the crowd at least enjoyed it, at least the majority of them did. I
know I did. Gotta say though, in my opinion, RikkuX totally deserved to
win that over the stripper nurses. But it's all good. A few people were
perturbed the "rave" was interrupted for this event, but hey, I think in
the end we were all winners.
By this time the
parties were in full swing and everyone seemed to be having fun, one way
or another. At least those who came to party and hang out seemed to be
having fun. Once the dance started to die down the den of sin picked up,
while it was still mostly tame and not horribly entertaining, it at
least picked up and had a few people in there.
Sunday was pretty
much a clean up day. Staff seemed mostly scattered and there wasn't a
whole lot to do, aside from wake up, shove your crap in the car and head
home. Which is pretty much exactly what we did. Luckily for us we got
out and were packed before all the problems started. It seems that at
11:55 the hotel did a key card wipe, changing all the digital key locks
on all the hotel rooms. Nobody could get into their room. Needless to
say the front desk was a mob scene. We left soon afterwards to avoid
getting caught in Chicago traffic too badly.
In the end Reactor
was exactly what I expected, a party convention. If you are looking for
a serious convention, with real events this convention isn't for you.
However if you are looking to hang out with good friends, meet some fun
people, party hardcore and drink yourself under this is the place to be.
My only major complaint would have been the incidents regarding the
hotel. It's hard to make me hate a place to sleep, but purple hotel, you
get an awesome rating of "worse then incest scat porn."
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