GenCon 2006 Highlights:
- Got to spend a little bit of time with Valerie Putnam, Scott Tepper, Steve Zamborsky, Brian Yu, Simon Hunt, Chad Ellis (Your Move Games), Mike Zebrowski (FFG), Greg Benage (FFG), Jeff Siadek (Gorilla Games), Zev Shlasinger (Z-Man), Rick Thornquist, Ray Peterson, Mike & Christy Pennisi and Jay Tummelson (RGG) over the course of the weekend, as well as a dozen or so St. Louis gamers that made the trip
- I got to talk with Ron Edwards (Sorcerer RPG) and Jared Sorenson (InSpectres, High Octane) and some other members of the Forge community to talk about indie RPG design. A great bunch of guys, and I'm very interested in pursuing publishing my two own indie RPGs. Sadly, I missed the Indie RPG design forum they were moderating, as I had a scheduled tournament slot at the same time.
- I had submitted a boardgame prototype to Z-Man Games a few months ago. We met at the con, and Zev told me that people had enjoyed playtesting it, and with a few tweaks, Forbidden City (the name of my prototype) he felt it would be a game worth publishing -- he seemed to especially appreciate the end game and the novelty of several of the mechanics and scoring
- I picked up a great new RPG called Hollow Earth Exploration, a pulp adventure / "lands of the lost" sort of thing set in the 1920-30s. Excellent production quality, a premise that I've always enjoyed, and some great, great mechanics. I was very impressed with the product, and am looking forward to more by the company. I especially like their "Ubiquity Dice Pool" approach.
- Thursday night I went out to dinner with Eric Smith, the designer of Pizza Box Football -- his booth was back-to-back with the Goodman Games booth, so we talked quite a bit over the course of the Con. Very nice guy, we talked about game design and sports games all weekend long. They virtually sold out of their entire stock they brought with 'em, which was great to hear.
- 10-12 people recognized me by the large "karate chop" Ynnen avatar name badge I made. Most of them invariably were "Oh, you're the guy who writes those Geeklists" but one was "You're the guy who disses Ticket to Ride" or somesuch.
GenCon 2006 Lowlights:
- I slept through the movie premier for the Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising movie I wrote the module-adaptation of. It was scheduled for 8 PM, so I set my alarm clock for 7:30 so I'd wake up in time. But I set it for 7:30 AM!! Missed the whole damn thing.
- One of Goodman Games' judges had to cancel his trip to GenCon on Tuesday, so we had to juggle time slots to accomodate -- meaning I ran 1 extra slot and had more booth time than expected. Which meant less time to game and hang out.
- I did not get to play a single full game over the entire weekend. I did play 1/4 of one game (essentially one round) of Take Stock, which Simon Hunt (the designer) was demoing. (Editorial Note: Not playing any games was the low-light -- getting to try a demo of Take Stock with Simon was actually pretty nice...)
- I did not get one of the swag bags. As an exhibitor, you usually get one of these bags filled with all the freebies, catalogs and cool promo items. I completely forgot about it until Saturday, by which time they were completely out.
- I did get to meet Dom Crapuchettes, who is fairly thin, curly haired and looks a bit like a librarian. We had planned on getting together for lunch and to talk about Wits & Wagers, as he wanted to discuss several of my observations and opinions about the game. So why was this a lowlight? Sadly, our schedules didn't sync up to go out and grab a bite and talk more.
- This will sadly be the last year that the Tiger Lady makes an appearance at GenCon -- for the last 5 years, she's dressed up in a black leather bikini and otherwise full body tiger paint, ears and tail. She will be missed.
Last edited on 2006-08-15 14:39:13 CST (Total Number of Edits: 3)
Posted Tue Aug 15, 2006 7:38 pm
). Yes, it's too bad we were not able to meet up for food and drinks. It would have been nice to be able to put a personality to your Karate Chop. We'll cross paths next time!
