[editor's note: for some reason, this report didn't show up in my mailing
list queue--that's why I'm sending it, and not SuperFRED.]
Shane's GenCon Report
GenCon - Indianapolis, IN
8/09/06-8/13/06
Wednesday night - I arrived at 5 PM just to see all of the going-on of the
set up. With the booth set-up, I went to grab dinner at "Champions Sports
Bar". It was there that I began my first demo of GenCon. I demo two games
of Volcano on my table. During the Forum Stink, I was made a "Ninja". I
still have no idea why. I talk to those sitting at my table about what I
did for Looney Labs and the games that are sold. There wasn't room on our
table to play any games. However, the table facing me was playing a game of
Fluxx.
After leaving the Forum Stink and throughout the rest of the night, I was
either demoing Volcano (& handing out business cards) (20?), play people at
Volcano (6 or 7) or playing solitary Volcano (3). I didn't go to bed at all.
Thursday - After losing in the second round in a row at the Settlers of
Catan World Qualifier, I decided to see what help the lab needed. I ran ten
demos of Treehouse before running the Tournament at 6 PM. 24 Treehouse
players were playing for one of the coolest shirts I've seen. Then, proceed
to go to Mayfair Games' booth to complete their "Ribbon Quest". After a
nice lunch at the "Bistro Cafe" (which was literally 100 steps away from
the lunch and had a great meatloaf, mashed potatoes, herbed green beans &
drink for $10), I began to demo two games of Nanofictionary.
After some R&R time, I went back to the labs to moderate some games of
AYAW? Peter & Marc were already starting up the villages. I sold around 50
werewolf ribbons and 10 Little Experiment ribbons. The games were awesome.
We had four villages going on at the same game. During the game I
moderated, Horatio (who is my little yellow keychain frog that stick his
tongue with you squeeze him) was used to mark who died. This brought the
saying "If Horatio is in front of you when you wake up, you are dead."
Humprey (the purple frog keychain) merely enjoyed being squeezed by random
villagers. Some of the "Flying Tricycle" group were in the game I
moderated. They gave me three copies of their "That Werewolf Game" which
had chips instead of cards and seem to work will for the last couple games
that I moderated. After seven games of moderating, I was finally tired and
went to bed around 1:30 AM.
Friday - I continued to run Treehouse and Nanofictionary demo throughout
the morning and gave away the Tree promos, the Gamemaster promo from Nano
and some buttons I made from Cafepress that had the Grand Prize card on it.
When the labs open around noon, I went in to demo Treehouse, Fluxx, Family
Fluxx, and Volcano. At 2 PM, I ran the second Treehouse tournament, which
had 16 players and four on the side learning the game.
After wandering the exbihitor hall, grabbing dinner and losing at Poker, it
was time for more AYAW? When I got near the booth, I saw six villages of
AYAW? with 14 players or more and I heard there was two in front of the
Board Game Ballroom. I sold 30 more AYAW? ribbons and ran six more games
and was ready to leave. One of the AYAW? players, Neil was working on a
LARP version of the game. I gave him some feedback and helped him work it
out. Finally, I went back to the hotel.
Around 2 AM, I woke with a knock on my door. When the door was open, I saw
Daddy-O. He was looking for a place to crash. So, I let him in.
Saturday - During the morning, I demoed some more games of Treehouse and
Nano. During these demoes, I had the line of the con. Bart Janssens said
"There needs to be T-Shirts made saying 'I don't wanna Swap!'." I only
could spend a couple of hours in the labs as I was playing in a Living
Arcanis Battle Interactive. This time I didn't dress in the toga and sword.
When I got back to the lab after getting lost in Indy, I demoed five games
of Nano til about 1:30 AM.
Sunday - The morning was the same as Saturday, demoing Nano and Treehouse.
However, I helped afternoon in the booth instead of the lab. I stayed for
about a hour and "barked" people into the booth, explained games, and ran a
couple of demos of Treehouse.
Post Mortem - GenCon is amazing. Josh did another great job of being the
head lab rabbit. Peter and Marc were awesome organizing the AYAW? game
throughout the weekend.
There was some discussion on what to name what we do at GenCon. The Big
Experiment is Origins. Little Experiments describe general demoing. So, I
offer these suggestions:
* The Simulacra
* Martian Olympics
* The Observation Period
Also, I think it would be really cool if we had a "Looney Lab" badge holder
that had some type of ribbon display for conventions.