Over the weekend (Nov. 3-4) Blizzard Entertainment hosted their 11th annual BlizzCon at the Anaheim Convention Center.

The gaming community is strong and close, so it was no surprise the sold out event had attendees from all over the world. Each one with anticipation for whatever new information, character releases and/or product they were able to demo.

This year BlizzCon expanded, placing Hearthstone and it’s fans on the lower level of Hall E, while upstairs housed the pin purchasing and trading. After first the concept of pin trading was confusing, until discovering the purchaser had no idea which one was inside until it’s opened. Because of this some gamers are on a big search for a pin they’d like to add to their collection and this event creates the perfect setting for that.

It’s hard not to be impressed with the elaborate and detailed costumes of the cosplayers, showing their devotion to their favorite game. A family fully dressed as different members of World of Warcraft, explained the process to get ready took six hours each day and another one taking everything off, no including the time it took to make their one of a kind costumes.

It wouldn’t be a proper BlizzCon without a massive tournament, thus there were several, Overwatch World Cup, World of Warcraft Arena Championships, Hearthstone Dungeon Run, Heroes of the Storm and StarCraft II Global Championships. Each had a full audience watching and going crazy with scream when their team did made good moves or advanced to the next round.

The prize pool for Overwatch alone was $500,000- who ever said video games will get you nowhere?