MGC 2025

[GingerOfOz]

Nobody's made a thread yet? Guess it's my turn.

Every year the BitBuilt crew meets up at the Midwest Gaming Classic in Milwaukee. I missed the last couple of years, so I was really looking forward to making it back this year.

This was the GingerOfOz POV for most of the event. I chilled next to Gman, CrazyGadget, Downing, and Froggo for most of the event. I got infected with envy from Froggo's Tad Boy, so I'm ordering parts to make my own.

The Playstacean was a big hit, but needed emergency repairs on the controller a few times. Y2K handled the first surgery, and managed to avoid a malpractice lawsuit.

This is what my setup looked like. We had so many projects in the room that I had to swap out which portables were on display to not take up too much room. The last time I was at MGC, we barely had enough projects to fill up our room, it was cool to have so much in there.

On Saturday night, a crew spent a couple hours setting up 16 player Double Dash for us. That was a ton of fun, it ran flawlessly compared to the last time we tried this years ago. Shoutout to Andy for bringing a bunch of PVMs, it was great to have one for the Playstacean.

Somebody had the only Sega Pluto prototype in existence, so they brought it in for a picture with my own one of a kind console. Too bad my photo is a bit blurry...

We're expecting! CrazyGadget gave birth to a beautiful set of sandwich twins for Cheese and Crash after sneaking them past tighter-than-usual security.

And during the convention, a picture of my setup went viral again and somebody managed to rugpull a few grand from one moron. It's wonderful to see the way my work inspires others.

Anyways, MGC was a ton of fun! I didn't get any photos at the barcade after the convention, but I think playing Killer Queen with everyone might have been my highlight. Hope to see faces both old and new at the next one!

 

[cheese]

This year was super fun, great to see everyone!

After getting @Gman from the airport he helped us catch a wild @Shank to bring to the convention

After a quick ride in the BBVan, we stopped into the convention room. I immediately spotted the kawaii and had to document it's form in the flesh metal. It hadn't been turned on yet, but there were some pretty leds that attracted many a bystander to observe

Once Saturday rolled around, we were packed in and running at full force! The tables had tons to show, we had to do some careful work to tetris it all in there

I even caught a glimpse of a crab man and some of his crab fans at the soldering setup

After my encounter, I decided to take a break and head to the vendor hall, they had loads of cool stuff! Someone even made IRL lootboxes where you could get mysterious items, as long as you had enough rupees

After finding some things, I headed back to the room and was greeted by a familiar fellow coming to check out the games

No pictures of the late night party, I was too busy stuffing my face with smuggled pizza before security decided they wanted a slice! Afterwards, I explored outside for a bit and found this neat looking building, very fancy

Sunday was surprisingly busy, we had people coming much later than previous years. After closing time we packed up and got heading to the barcade, no pictures from me either but I think there might be one floating around out there with some guy who just wanted to buy a slice of pizza but got roped into our group photo

The event just keeps getting bigger every year, it's great to see all of you repeat goers again, and meet the new ones who show up for some good fun! It's only been days but I can't wait for next year already

 

[ShockSlayer]

When visiting MGC, it's important to pack only the essentials.

I love Gming!

Hmm... (This picture nearly 10 years in the making why did it take so long)

I posted this in the WaveWider thread but I'll post it again here, since it was my whole setup. Lots of people tried and subsequently enjoyed my pig. I ran outta business cards, so I feel like everything worked out.

This applies to 100% of what Downing builds, not sure why he only mentioned it here...

This freaky shrimp fella was a lot of fun to break when Ginger wasn't looking. Penance for forcing me to return the shoulder buttons. I briefly had both...

It's unbelievable how small this thing is; wild to experience in person. That one match of Smash I did on it was also literally the ONLY gaming I did during the entire event. Perfection.

I finally went here after years of only seeing the sunglasses pig from a distance. Lo and behold Benheck was already in there sitting at the bar. Seeing him in his natural habitat was truly a rare blessing!

Crashbash (Forum Admin) has a serious obsession with my BIG ASS, and who could blame him?

Doom's parents came up to me and gave me this. I guess he left me a final Link's Awakening meme in his will? I wanted to cry, it's unreal how meaningful this is to me. All I could give them was a hug in return.

All in all, it was a pretty good time. I enjoyed seeing everyone again and while our time together may have been fleeting, it was no less meaningful.

 

[DoctorDalek]

Most of my pictures are from Sunday at Up Down (barcade). I missed out on this last year, but this year the Sunday post-con shenanigans fell right on my birthday! Unfortunately, most of my free tokens didn't go towards Hydro Thunder as one cabinet was completely down and another had some obvious issues with the 3dfx Voodoo GPU.

Still, Kamp and I got to enjoy some Time Crisis II (this was actually tortuous, our legs/feet were very very tired after the con)

Red Orange vs. Blue Killer Queen with all 10 spots filled!

The mythical pizza slice dude

The boys playin some multiplayer GoldenEye goodness

Sadly, no real find from the vendor hall for me this year. I got a couple of hats and tshirts, but I was really on the hunt for some PC big box games. I only saw a handful at one booth and the prices were to high for my taste (I saw a sealed copy of The Incredible Machine box by Hock Wah Yeo that was priced at something like $400).

Overall, a great weekend. I've been going to MGC since ~2007 when it was at the Olympia resort in Oconomowoc. Back then I got a great condition SNES, controller, and SMW for $25 and an OG Xbox with controllers and HD AV pak for $20. Yeah, get off my lawn!

It's pretty nuts how it's grown from two ballrooms and a hallway to taking over the convention center for the weekend. I was happy to see there was a bigger representation of the indie scene with a couple of areas where you could demo games and talk to the devs.

Next year's experience may be a bit different for me if things go according to plan, but this Sunday made me really appreciate my BitBuilt friends and will certainly be the peak of 2026 as well!

 

[YveltalGriffin]

This MGC was STACKED!!! I met so many cool people for the first time this year! Redherring32, ShockSlayer, Ginger, Froggo, Trevor, JacksonS, Bentomo, ttsgeb, Dustin, Libby... the list goes on and on!

The calm before the storm on Friday:

Trevor's Flippydrive setup was pretty sweet.

So was Ginger's! Loved the PS2 Eclipse's d-pad-- indistinguishable from a Vita's, something not even the GPD Win 4 managed to achieve. Also, we reunited @Nikoil's Juicy Green and Opaque Purple NGCPs!

I had the honor of displaying @Lazr's epic Wii U Mini! CubeVGA was also present.

Andy's Chi-town CRT Delivery Service

Saturday was really busy. Overall con attendance must've been higher than usual, cause it was nonstop the whole weekend.

Ben Heck was blown away by @Redherring32's builds.

When he saw Tinytendo, he said, "OK, this is the most nuts thing here!"

@HackerBilly scored a bunch of DS's for 10 bucks a pop!

One was bedazzled, with idol stickers inside. Gorgeous.

Saw these replica Vectrex controllers, Color TV Games, and a Loopy. (thanks for the pizza loopy @loopj)

The 8-player Smash Ultimate setup in the gaming hall seemed permanently occupied by kids playing Steve. No, I'm not salty about it...

Mario Kart DD LAN took some work to set up, but it was totally worth it!!!

Loved the vibe at Up-Down. Great music and game selection. Killer Queen rocks.

Like cheese, I also went to the Milwaukee Art Museum. Been meaning to check out the Quadracci Pavilion for a long time. It's just so cool! Unfortunately, the museum is closed on Mondays.

Already looking forward to the next meat-up!

 

[Bubberiffic]

You guys rock!
I had a blast talking about pigs with @ShockSlayer
Also the image of you on my CRT Mini is great!

 

[Stitches]

Chosen One spotted

 

[Shank]

MGC was a blast. I was so busy I forgot to take photos.

I did take this photo though, which I think truly encapsulated the spirit of Midwest Gaming Classic.

 

[CrazyGadget]

MGC 2025.... it felt like it was over as quickly as it started, even with the added day!

Starting the weekend off RIGHT!

Some cool Fun Centers / Demo Stations I saw over the weekend:

Other cool things I saw around the vendor and arcade halls:

Pictures from our room:

I didn't really get any pics of UpDown, but it seems like everyone else has my back on that part!

Here are my hauls from this year:

I am already jonesing for next MGC