MapleSEA Press Release

I’m a happy little bastard. Barry, Jon and I started from our homes at 10am, and to go all the way to Taman Connaught, which we have the faintest idea where, doesn’t seem to be enough time. We had to trainhop 3 different train services (KTM, Putra LRT, Star LRT) and finally the coveted taxi from the Bandar Tun Razak station.

We were initially in doubt as the venue of this press release is at KopiTime Cafe (sounds dubious) at Giant Superstore (sounds equally dubious). But when we reached the cafe, its lovely traditional ambience was liven up with the MapleStory posters plastered and hanged around. Woot.

It started at about 12.30pm, and we listened to speeches, followed by a presentation of promotional videos. It was a GOOD experience I can tell you. We were the youngest there (duh), and the rest were all older reporters and photographers. A Q&A session followed the presentation, and it’s nice to see how the reporters shoot their questions while jotting down furiously, either on their notepad or PDA. Wow. I didn’t pass up the chance to ask a question on paying for Cash items via Paypal :) (which was a yes, btw).
And one of the best parts was, we were treated to free lunch! The nasi lemak was obviously excellent, even me who didn’t like the food because of its spicyness, thought it was gooooooood. Simply because it wasn’t that spicy XD Sotong, drumstick, potato layered with sambal... good. Good.

I soon discovered during lunch that probably most of them are from gaming magazines (“This is Simon from PCGamer”, I overheard a fat lady reporter telling her friend). A male young reporter asked us whether we’re from Low Yat. O_O Why Low Yat? >_> “No, we’re from Hidden Street.” Blank look. “It’s an online English database website for MapleStory.” More filler talk ensued and he then talked in hushed whispers with his colleagues, probably saying how freaking young we were to be invited.

After the lunch, there was an official launch by opening some huge box, revealing two extremely cute monster plushies! I so darned wanted the Yeti, but secretly hoping one of us would at least get something. And Barry did. THE YETI!!! cries Oh the irony XD

Good for him. There were prepaid cards to be won but obviously the two of us weren’t that lucky. >_>" And then it was announced that Mr. Addison K., Managing Director of AsiaSoft (responsible for bringing this particular online game to South-East Asia) would like to have a personal talk to the players of MapleStory.

I jumped on it as it was a good chance to ask in-game related questions with the big shot himself. So the three of us went along inside the cafe (the whole venue was outside it, actually) and discovered the man talking to his colleagues/peers. He noticed us, hushed us to the corner with a single table, and started talking and asking us about the game.

This was probably the best part of the entire frigging press release. It wasn’t awkward at all, as he was really warm and friendly and his boyish enthusiasm coupled by this profesionalism really lightens up the entire interview/conversation. It lasted for almost an hour, talking animatedly non-stop, and he jotted down our in-game names and levels, and gave us his cards so that we can contact him personally if there are anything we want.

In fact, he mentioned something like should Hidden Street want to organise any in-game events, we can discuss it with him so WE can come up with something. MapleSEA can supply the prizes XD Love the guy. Was speechless. Really.

Of course, earlier on he didn’t know we were from HS but merely assumed we were enthusiastic players. When we finally mentioned that we were from HS (after asking some copyright question), he gushed that he didn’t expect us to be so young and asked for our ages. To be personally recognised by this bigshot, honcho, [insert suitable description] feels really great. “One of the biggest Maple site.” Woot. I’m… delirious XD

He also asked if we’d like to take a photo. At first I thought he meant snap a shot of himself, but realised later he meant group photo XD

The exclusive talk/interview had to end, as all things have to. And we left feeling pretty happy. Happy. Happy isn’t even the right word. Euphoric. Yep.

The adventure comes after that, when we walked (yep, walked) from the place all the way to the station before Bandar Tun Razak. In the end we hitched a taxi instead XD Took 3-4 fucking hours to reach home as it was raining, some train at KTM had an accident and delayed..and we took the wrong train..had to backtrack..finally all the way back home by bus.

Like Jon said, it was an adventure. It was. To be in the heart of journalism for a day, to be siding along reporters and photographers of reputable magazines and possibly newspapers… is a dream come true alright.