These words are from someone who when it comes to conventions, has only experienced a Comic-Con in Puerto Rico, doing media coverage. That specific convention I was not impressed with a lot of things and in my review, I chose to focus on the good aspects the convention has to offer, rather than nitpick at all the bad things and believe you me, there were a lot of bad things. At PAX East I spent a solid four days hitting the floor of the convention, I have to say it was absolu

To help spice up the game selections, the Stack picked a few brand new games along with some impressively old ones. Our friends at Team 17 generously offered the Stack four codes for their cooperative cooking game Overcooked 2, which had released onto Steam and consoles less than two weeks earlier. Guests and Stack members took turns playing the wacky cooking game on the big screen, working together and in two-player teams with…varying results. In the two and a half hours the

The Boston Stack Joins Women in Games to Support Local Developers! Women in Games is a meetup group based in the Boston area dedicated to supporting women in the gaming industry. Their regular monthly meetings are a great place to learn about the local game developers, network with some leaders in the industry, and have a little fun while you’re doing it! As the name suggests, the purpose of the group is to focus on women in games, but it is not now nor has it never been a wo

The Stacks – Boston Stacks Up at the VA by: Tanner Hastings This past Friday, the Boston Stack and the Jamaica Plain VA banded together to hold their second monthly gaming event for local veterans. Attendees had a chance to enjoy refreshments, play games on one of the Stack’s four Xbox Ones, and learn more about Stack-Up and the services provided at the VA! This month, the Boston Stack added a new game to its repertoire: Halo’s Master Chief Collection. The Stacks’ VA contact

The fireworks may no longer be exploding in the skies, but that doesn’t mean the July 4th holiday is over. Coming out of America’s birthday, Stack Director Stephanie Owens along with volunteers from Stack Up gathered together under the roof of Microsoft’s store for a very special event. The flagship store for the company,  the NYC Microsoft Store boasts a secret area where few have access too, but has great power: The eSports and Gaming Studio. Stack Up and DammmitRooster alo

Facebook Cambridge Office Holds First Vetworking Tech Tales Night Over the past year, Facebook’s office in Cambridge has been striving to employ more veterans in their Engineering department. Stack-Up has been following this effort in the Greater Boston area since their Technical Sourcer Sarah first contacted the Boston Stack last June about their first Vetworking event. Since then, Facebook has grown the little get-together/networking event into something so large, it merite

Last Saturday, the Boston Stack joined local nonprofits and federal offices at the 2018 Southeastern Mass. Veterans Expo. Located in Raynham Middle School, the expo hosted a variety of organizations dedicated to serving those who serve our country. As the local branch of a military charity, Stack Lead Dylan Connolly and Media Lead Tanner Hastings manned a table at the expo, sharing Stack-Up’s mission to help veterans through our passion of gaming! The venue got the Boston Sta

The Boston Stack Celebrates Its Most Heavily-Attended Event Outside PAX East! Way back in November, the Boston Stack leads had started planning with their friends at Microsoft to hold a big event in their store at the start of the new year. Microsoft’s community outreach programs state that if any employee volunteers for a local nonprofit, Microsoft will donate an hourly amount of money to that organization, per person. The store’s Game Manager explained that if the Boston St

Last weekend, the Boston Stack decided to try something new for a monthly event. With the opening of the Boston area’s first video game cafe, Co-Lead Hyperion organized a get-together for the Stack to get to know the managers, and to have a little gaming fun! Right across the street from the Babcock Street Green Line stop, the Balance Patch Cafe has over 50 desktops with access to hundreds of single and multiplayer titles from Pacman to PUBG. The cafe also has two VR sets, a

Stacking Up In Boston by Tanner Hastings When you’re deep in the holiday season, it sometimes feels like next October is more than a lifetime away. Unfortunately, the deadline for submitting booth applications for the Boston Festival of Indie Games comes faster than one might think. For aspiring game developers, it’s important to understand just what the Boston FIG committee are looking for, so they can ensure the pet projects they’ve spent hundreds of spare time hours on get

Boston Stacks Up at the Microsoft Store! by Tanner Hastings The Boston chapter of the Stacks on-the-ground Call to Arms event had a bit of a shaky start. Out of the 6 Stack members interested in attending, only 3 (including Ben and myself) managed to make it. There was a bit of miscommunication between us and the store, so we couldn’t secure copies of the new COD WW2 game that released last week, which dissuaded a few potential players from participating. That said, after an

Games and Demos Made Right in the Stack’s Back Yard This past weekend, Stack-Up attended one of New England’s largest conventions for game developers outside of PAX East. The Boston Festival of Indie Games (Boston FIG) has been celebrating the creativity and ingenuity of independent game designers for almost a decade. This year featured almost a hundred upcoming and recently released games, almost all of them created by New Englanders! At MIT’s Johnson Athletic Center, the Bo

Steve went into great detail about what the switch to VR would mean for Rock Band’s gameplay. In the older titles, the player follows musical cues through a series of lines shaped like the neck of a guitar. Hit the associated buttons at the proper time, and the player earns points. Miss the right “notes,” and the performance suffers. This format works well enough when the player’s vision is focused on one angle, but what happens when the player can turn their entire head arou

Boston Stacks Up with Facebook for Veteran Networking Event! Late last week, Facebook’s Boston office held its very first Vetworking Happy Hour. Facebook Boston employees welcomed local veterans to check out one of the social media giant’s newest locations. Boston Stack leader Tanner Hastings checked out the venue on Stack-Up’s behalf, and got a chance to meet some of the great veterans working in the local tech industry! Aside from casual mingling, the event also featured a

This Monday, Natick’s Microsoft store held a Day of Service to celebrate the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The event was designed to help promote nonprofits in the community, so Tanner Hastings and Ben Irr donned their red shirts and represented The Stacks and the Boston Stack. With pamphlets, candy, and swag galore, Ben and Tanner showed participants and passersby what Stack Up’s all about! There were steady waves of interest throughout the event, both for Stack-Up

Stack-Up’s Boston chapter will be holding its first event this Friday, 10-14 at the Natick Mall. With Gears of War 4 finally out on the shelves, it’s time to dust off your Lancer and face your friends in our Gears 4 Tournament! Our friends at the Microsoft Store have provided everything we need to break in the new game, including eight separate game cases to allow 4 vs. 4 matches! Registration for the first round of matches will begin at 5:00pm, which can give you up to an ho