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Derek's Soapbox

Updates at the 11th Hour

So it’s about two hours before I fly out to Indy. I’m leaving at the ass-crack of dawn to get in pretty early on Sunday afternoon. I’ll probably be worthless most of the rest of the day but I hope to get to email again tonight. Either way I should be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed come Monday morning. Or at least as much as I ever am in the morning.

 

Anyway, it’s time to get back to this blog, something that has fallen by the wayside of late – along with a number of other things, such as the forums, posting information on the web site and even answering email in many cases. Why? Because I’ve been in the hell of space conflicts.


Some of you may have noticed that a fair number of event locations (mostly events that were in the Omni) have been moved and shuffled around – sometimes more than once. I want to apologize for everyone about the confusion and consternation that may have caused any of y’all, I was trying to do the best I could with a constantly worsening situation. For a while there it seemed like every day I came into work got me another “So Derek… I’ve got some bad news for you. We don’t have this room/it doesn’t fit as many tables as we planned on…”


Needless to say this will not happen next year. I’m sure there will be another big mess, but it won’t be this again if I have anything to say about it.

 

So the past few weeks (seems like an eternity) has been me moving and re-moving events to try to fit into the limited space we have, shifting cells around on a deteriorating Excel sheet and then updating them all in the registration system. Not any fun at all and a system fraught with peril of all kinds.

 

The biggest problem, however, was that meant I had virtually no time for email and certainly no time to visit the forums and actually share a lot of the information I’ve been dying to get out. Video game schedule, anime events, film news, etc., I simply haven’t had time to tell anyone about it. I apologize for that too. These past weeks have been a big personal disappointment in that regard. I went into this year with a list of things I wanted to change and problems I didn’t want to repeat, but some of them came to pass anyone.

 

Either way, I’m gonna take a few minutes now in my half-conscious, stayed-up-all-night-for-my-ealry-morning-flight state and try to share what I can actually manage to articulate in this state. Maybe all of you out there who are actually reading this so close to the convention (all 5 of you) can try to spread the word a little bit and let your friends know what’s up.

 

I’d wanted to share excerpts from the program guide like I did last year, but unfortunately I don’t have easy snippets of the final layouts right now…

 

eGame Arena

The biggest big news to get out is some real details on the eGame Arena. This pet love of mine has been very nebulous and hazy for most of the year – so many things were in flux for so long that it was impossible to really release and reliable information about it.

 

It’s a big change this time around: the eGame Arena isn’t in the hall like it has been in the past, nor is it in a separate room. It’s in the exhibit hall this time, at the back of the new Electronic Exhibits area. That means we’ll basically be operating on exhibit hall hours.

 

Some of you may be say to lost that late-night gaming, but in return you get to play everything for free. You read that right – all events in the eGame Arena are free this year. You don’t need to get a ticket, though like a seminar it will guarantee you a spot if you show up on time. Now you have no excuse not to show up and throw down.

 

I’ve posted the schedule online in PDF form and the events are all also listed in the event system (have been for a few weeks, actually – sorry about not sending out a big notice)

 

Anime Avenue

I’ve talked a bit about this before and there isn’t a whole lot of new news to share, other than to pimp the Gen Con Voice Acting Contest again (you can win a real role in an upcoming production) and to drop that even though I’ve had  to cancel a few shows here and there I should be able to make up for it with some last-minute goodies I got from FUNimation and Geneon (like Hell Girl, the classic Slayers, Ragnarok, Rozen Maiden, and Saiunkoku).

 

We should also have several additional panels and live events too – so you better stop by the Westin event HQ (Anime & Film HQ) for the up-to-date schedule.

 

Film Festival

It took some wrangling, but we did manage to get a special sneak peek at the upcoming Dragonlance animated film – y’all better thank Tracy Hickman something proper for pulling that together for the show. Don’t miss the big event on Thursday at 6 pm in the Westin Grand Ballroom IV & V.

 

We’ve also got sneak peeks a few other films, like some midnight looks on Friday and Saturday at Fantasy Flight’s dark fantasy film Midnight. The creators behind The Force Among Us will also be at the show and I’m still working out some details for Brave New World as well.

 

And that’s before we even get into the always-popular Dead Gentlemen films and all the entrants in our fantastic film festival. So again, don’t forget to stop by the Westin HQ for an updated schedule to see what’s playing when.

 

Wednesday Gaming

Another pet project of mine this year, I haven’t had time to really publicize Wednesday gaming as much as I’d have liked. I’ve still got some stuff to work out for it – but if you’re in Indianapolis on Wednesday night, make sure to swing by the Hyatt. The Stink will be there in Regency A-D and we’ll be using Regency E/F for the special Wednesday gaming.

 

There’s more as well, actually. The local Indiana RPGA is running their pre-Gen Con events on the third floor in the Cosmopolitan A/B ballroom. With luck, we’ll have a special surprise for Harry Potter fans in Cosmopolitan C/D too, but that’s one of those things I still need to work out at this late hour, so I’m not committing to it yet.

 

Off to the Show

It’s about that time. I gotta finish my last-minute packing and take a crack at a few more emails before I leave. I’m hoping that saying up for almost 24 hours will mean it’ll be super-easy to sleep on the plane… but I can’t say I’m too optimistic. I’m making sure I bring a good book.

Published Aug 12 2007, 01:30 AM by Derek Guder
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Comments

 

davester64 said:

Animated DL sneak peek? Ooh, I can't wait...

August 13, 2007 7:22 PM
 

NascragMan said:

Derek:  Is there anything that can be done about the noise levels in the big RPG rooms?  The noise level is unbearable.  These ballrooms aren't accousitcally designed for that level of noise.

One suggestion:  Ceiling banners.  If a significant number of banners could be hung from the ceiling, something made of a sound absorbent material like cloth or foam, I'd bet it would soak up a lot of noise.

August 29, 2007 5:49 AM
 

Derek Guder said:

Honestly, there's nothing that can reasonably be done other than spreading the RPGs out into more, smaller rooms. And that means being spread out among the hotels and not in the convention center.

There are some options like getting sound-absorbent pipe-and-drape, but that won't be a cheap option by any means. Most of those options simply aren't feasible. Even doing it as ceiling banners would end up costing a pretty penny - not only do many of the hotels have rather complicated (and pretty) ceilings, but that's a lot of footage to pay for.

August 29, 2007 10:48 AM
 

NascragMan said:

Is there any way we could get some actual numbers on pipe and drape and/or banners?  If I had some actual numbers to take to Carole we'd at least be able to discuss options.  Who knows, we might be able to work together on this.

August 30, 2007 7:17 AM
 

Derek Guder said:

I'd sent you guys the info I had on a VERY rough estimate - and that was $700-$1000 to get pipe-and-drape of a sort that would have any effect on sound.

At this point, there's no way to gauge the price - because I have no idea where your events will be yet. When you submit your stuff and we start placing things, we can try to looking into it again then, but I'm gonna warn you again that I'm not particularly optimistic about it. The larger ballrooms will always suffer from a sound problem.

August 30, 2007 4:43 PM
 

NascragMan said:

is that $700-$1000 an annual cost or a one-time cost?  Big difference.

True Dungeon had camo netting over the tops of thier areas.  That would make a big difference I think.

August 31, 2007 5:38 AM
 

Derek Guder said:

It would be an annual cost.

Simple camo netting by itself isn't likely to actually do anything for sound, nor would normal pipe and drape - it needs to be rather thick to actually accomplish something.

Again, it's really too early to actually talk about any specifics - without knowing where your events will be it's impossible to get a reasonable guess of the cost, or if it's even needed.

Just make sure to EMAIL me early in the year when you submit your events and when we go through event placement and we'll look at what we need to do then.

September 5, 2007 9:37 AM
 

NascragMan said:

Thanks for your help Derek.  I'll talk with Carole.

That's a lot of money for a volunteer organization.

September 10, 2007 11:35 AM
 

Derek Guder said:

Yeah, it is. It's a lot of money for <I>any</I> organization to put down for only a few days of use, which is why I mentioned before that dealing with the sound issue isn't going be reasonably priced.

September 10, 2007 11:40 AM

About Derek Guder

I'm an Event Programming Manager here at Gen Con. My pet projects are the anime & flim events, as well as eGame fun-time, but I also supervise overall gaming event (submission, placement badges, etc.).

I've been going to Gen Con for years as a GM for Eden Studios, running demos of WitchCraft and All Flesh Must Be Eaten that I'd written with "Derek the Elder" and the "Man in the Chicken Coat." It was great sitting down with a bunch of strangers, handing them pre-generated characters (each with their own hosts of secrets) and then sitting back to watch the chaos ensue. Ah, those were the days...

I got into convention work at Anime Boston. I was one of the founding members and with a small group of other dedicated fans, we were able to pull off a wildly successful event: in our first year we have almost 4000 attendees show up and had to close registration and turn people away on Saturday morning, mid-way through the convention.

Ever since then I've loved working at a convention. I almost can't even go to a con anymore unless I'm working in one capacity or another - I just don't know what to do with myself.

So now I'm out in Seattle, but I'm an East Coast boy through-and-through. I grew up all over New England and went to school at Boston University. Seattle's beautiful scenery and weather (c'mon, that ain't rain, it's just a damn light misting) still seems a little unnatural. Where's the snow? The humidity? The sudden drops in temperature? Well, maybe I only actually miss the snow.

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