here and all

[demiurgically_m]

wandering around the internet, am trying to find something that will explain to me exactly what happens at Gencon and Origin. I hear bits and pieces, but I can't find anything that gives me a coherent picture.

bit grumpy making

Comments

[eynowd]

What do you want to know? I haven't been to Origins, but I'm a three time veteran of Gencon (1994, 1999 - both in Milwaukee - and 2005, in Indianapolis).

Basically, early in the year, the organisers put out a call for people who want to run games (this includes companies and organisations such as the RPGA). The people running these things actually mark down which sessions they are prepared to run games in. (As far as I am aware).

A bit later on, all that information is compiled into the event schedule.

Once registration opens, people buy a pass which lets them into the con itself. They then go through the event schedule and look for sessions that they would like to play in. They order tickets for those events and pay for them in advance. People can also buy "generic tickets" which let them join any game on the day that has spare seats available for it.

Now, on the day before the actual start of the con, attendees can pick up their "pack" which has a few goodies in it, as well as their tickets.

Once the con starts, it's much like a ridiculously large version of an Australian con. People go to where their game is scheduled and they play, handing over their tickets to the GM at the beginning of the session.

Sessions are four hours long, and there are four sessions per day, starting at 8am, 12pm, 5pm and 9pm. There's only one scheduled break between sessions, between 4pm and 5pm. (In 94, there wasn't even that). Play usually lasts about three hours of the four, with the rest of the time being taken up with people arriving, doing the administrivia (as necessary), reading character sheets (if applicable) and then packing up and heading to the next session at the end.

There's also the dealers' hall. It's a huge room full of booths where the games companies (and in more recent years, other vendors such as anime sellers and even the makers of the Utilikilts) set up shop. It's usually HUGE, and a lot of games companies hold our new products to debut at Gencon. The lines for such products can be quite long at times). Companies also often host short demo games at their booths, so people can get a rough feel of a game.

There are also a collection of special guests every year, usually the stars from different geek TV shows/movies. You can line up to get their autographs, if you feel like paying for such things. There's often Q&A sessions with some of the stars too (I had fun in 1994 watching John Delancie - who played Q in ST:TNG and ST:DS9 - take the piss out of the rabid trekkers at his Q&A session).

The Saturday of the con is usually sci-fi Saturday, so there's normally a lot more cosplayers that day. You'll see a fair few people wandering around in Star Wars stormtrooper outfits and all that sort of thing.

Games companies often hold seminars about their games, or about the game industry and the like. White Wolf in 05 had an appalling habit of scheduling a four hour seminar that straddled two gaming sessions, so to go to the talk, you had to miss two game slots.

Gencon is big, impersonal, noisy, crowded and often stinky. Although I've never been to Origins, I've heard from multiple sources that Origins is much more personal and social, and Gencon is about the biz.

Other than that, I don't know what else to tell you.

[demiurgically_m]

Thanks Geoff, that's pretty much exactly what I was looking for. My only q is that you say Origins is more personal and social, does that mean it has fewer ppl?

Jacinta

[eynowd]

As far as I remember, yes. I recall Origins has something like 8,000 people over the four days, compared to the 25,000+ for Gencon.

I could be wrong on those figures though.

[demiurgically_m]

wow. That's .... heaps...

[eynowd]

Further to that, here's a photo I took outside the dealer's hall on the first day of Gencon 2005. This is the crowd waiting for the dealer's hall to open at 10am.

[demiurgically_m]

wow, no wonder there's a smell

[eynowd]

That's only day 1. The problem happens later in the con. Some gamers play every session, from 8a to 1am. They only sleep at night, and don't shower for four days.

Now, Indianapolis, in summertime, is quite hot kinda like Macquariecon typically is.

The two situations don't play nicely together.