News

As you might have known, our IRC provider pulled the rug out from under us a while back, and our ability to get our users into CoNchat directly from the site has been broken since while I took turns looking for a new option and forgetting about the project entirely. No longer! I've just deployed the fix - it's not quite as nice as the old way but it will work well for most users and will allow you to chat directly from the site without visiting another page should you so desire.

Of course, as before, if you're a logged-in user, your username will be pre-populated in our chat form so that everyone knows who you are as soon as you join. I look forward to seeing some of you visit again or for the first time now that everything's up and going again!

Source: CoNChat

If you're reading this, you've probably already seen the new CoN feature that we timed for the big Final Fantasy XV news of the week. We know that navigating our content can sometimes be daunting as a player, as there is so much of it, so we spent some time looking at how to best improve the user experience of our guides and forums.

The result, as you've no doubt guessed by now, is Boco Buddy! We've analyzed the usage patterns of the site so that Boco can provide to you on the fly (if you'll pardon the pun!) tips on how to find what you're looking for on CoN, as well as helpful suggestions for content you might have missed. He even works in the forums!

So, please, give him a try and let us know what you think. He's here to help!

I've been utterly awful at keeping up with fanart this year - perhaps there's a volunteer opportunity for one of you readers out there - but thanks to a burst of energy, the CoNvent Calendar is returning for its second year! Every day from now until Christmas, we'll have a new fanart published to our calendar page. If you're a CoN member, you can visit each one and rate it; if you've rated all of the pieces by the end of the year, you'll get a limited-edition CoN award for your account! Start here, with the first day's art, from new CoN artist thirteenthangel.

To follow along, check the calendar page every day, watch the Fanart Commentary forum, or follow us on Facebook or Twitter! Happy Holidays!

I just got an email from Squenix discussing their offerings at PAX East this year. The company does have a sizable footprint on the show floor, as well as the panels mentioned in our last podcast and more, but today's email detailed some new information regarding activities and events coming this weekend.

With Type-0 coming out in just a couple weeks, it makes sense that it will be playable now, and so it shall be. Folks who play the game on the show floor will also get a poster splitting between Ace and Noctis; the poster is similar or even identical to the ones that you might have seen in your local game store.

Additionally, the Final Fantasy XIV panel on Saturday will be livestreamed. Feel free to look through the crowd for yours truly. This panel, as a reminder, will be an overview of the upcoming Heavensward expansion and might talk further about the future of the MMO as well.

There's also going to be a Life Is Strange panel on Friday afternoon. If you've tried this game, you might be interested to know that the panel will discuss not just the development of the game, but also will release some new details about the second chapter in the episodic game. Unfortunately, this one I won't be able to make.

Finally, for Tomb Raider and cosplay fans, there's a chance to get a limited edition Rise of the Tomb Raider poster on the show floor. A cosplayer by the name of Jenn Croft, who has portrayed Lara Croft for a decade and a half, will be at the con and folks who get themselves all selfied up with her will get a chance at the poster. Square Enix will also be hosting a cosplay meetup Saturday afternoon; unfortunately, it looks like they're doing it at the exact same time as the Final Fantasy XV panel, so I will have to figure something out.

In case it's not clear from the rest of this post, I am still planning on being there for Saturday, March 7. I'll be spending a lot of time on the show floor, so if you or anyone you know will also be in attendance, reach out to me on the CoN Facebook or Twitter to find out where I can be found.

The schedule for panel discussions at PAX East 2015 was recently announced, and a couple of them this year are of particular interest to CoN readers. On Saturday at lunchtime, Naoki Yoshida, producer and director of Final Fantasy XIV, will spend an hour discussing the first expansion pack to A Realm Reborn, titled "Heavensward." As described on the official site:

"Join FINAL FANTASY XIV Producer/Director Naoki Yoshida as he takes the stage to discuss details on the first expansion - Heavensward. Also, Yoshida has a habit of announcing things he shouldn't, so you won't want to miss this! (We'll keep the PR team distracted so they won't interfere.)"

Later in the day, a second panel will feature Square Enix personnel, this time "Behind the Game Designs of Final Fantasy XV." The two lead game designers of the upcoming flagship title will discuss the process of designing the latest game in the core Final Fantasy series; again, from the official PAX site:

"Join two of FINAL FANTASY XV's lead game designers, Wan Hazmer and Prasert Prasertvithyakarn, as they share their experiences working on one of the most anticipated games of all time. Hazmer and Prasertvithyakarn are attending PAX EAST from SQUARE ENIX's Tokyo Studios where they work in tandem to bring FINAL FANTASY XV to life. Fans will also be in for a treat with additional information revealed on the upcoming title, FINAL FANTASY TYPE-0 HD!"

Of particular interest to readers here, by the way: yours truly will be in attendance that day, and I plan to visit both these panels as well as the Square Enix booth, where I plan to collect both photos and experiences around Squenix games (to share with you) and hopefully swag (which I won't). If you have requests of things to look for, or just want to see a bit of the show floor, let me know.

Source: PAX East Schedule

It has nuns! No, it's just a pun! Ugh. Shoot me.

I'd been thinking about advent calendars recently because they're fun and it's that time of year. Some folks have LEGO ones, some (like me, blessedly) have them full of beer. For this holiday season, we're doing our own filled with fanart. It's not fancy yet, though hopefully I can work on that sometime before the calendar's all open - for now, though, we'll be adding a new fanart each day from now until Christmas, and logged-in users who place a vote on all of them before the end of the year will get a limited edition award on their account.

Here's the first, from one of the many new fanartists we've found recently, Aena. Vote on it now below!

Edited to add, the CoNvent Calendar page is now live - you can now see the calendar fanart as it's added so you can see all the things for which you want to vote. That link's below too!

Source: "Terra" by Aena, CoNvent Calendar 2014