I wanted to thank everyone involved in Dreamation for all of their hospitality and warmth. We at Perfect Score had the best time getting to meet so many great people and play so many great games. Dreamation was the first convention of its kind that any of us have ever attended, and we have been completely blown away. We wanted to thank you for taking our cherry with the style and grace that you did.
With that said, Rich and I passed out as soon as we got home. We wanted to apologize if we got in anyone's way, and if we promised that we were going to sit down and interview anyone and were not able to get to you. We had underestimated the sheer amount of time that everyone had invested in the games and some people were a little tough to nail down between game sessions. But if we are allowed to cover any other the Double Exposure conventions, we will get to you.
Once again I am so happy that we were allowed to participate in such a great event and look forward to seeing everyone next time!
DIABOLIK
fun times, excellent con.
I can't wait to hear the podcast for the RPG roundtable. That was some cool shit.
-L
Hey, Diabolik, thanks to all of you guys for comin' out, lugging your stuff, and covering the event. I even appreciate the "evil question" you sprang on me during the interview!
I've got a long list of things I want to post about, but that'll wait. Right now I need to thank everybody who made this con a success. Particulary Becca & Vinnie and the entire Double Exposure staff, for their continuous generousity and support! Also, Tony Lower-Basch deserves a hearty three cheers for his tireless efforts at maintaining the booth, looking after sales and stock, keeping track of the cash, pitching our games and being the central hub of activity & communication. Thanks, Tony!
Also, the con wouldn't have been so great without so many great people. Thanks to all of you for coming, gaming, talking, laughing, chowin' down & clownin' around!
Damn, that was good chili.
Thank you, Mike and Tony. You made it a lot of fun. I suppose next year I'll have to be less truculent and dive in. It's certainly been a blast for two years in a row.
The staff are just incredible (barring the guy who dresses like a Nazi). They're kind, generous, and really want us there. It's just awesome.
... but it's sure hard to beat the chili for a reason to go.
The con staff was very helpful when I needed a place to microwave some food due to my gluten intolerance and I found some really helpful hotel staff who got me set up.
I really like the wall of games where you sign up and see how many gamers are in the sessions you are running.
I am really pleased with how this con has grown, with people going back home and telling their friends what a great time they had. Gen Con is about spectacle and sales and shmoozing but this con is more about gaming and being social.
Were sales decent?
Quote from: glyphmonkey on January 23, 2006, 04:01:24 PM
The staff are just incredible (barring the guy who dresses like a Nazi). They're kind, generous, and really want us there. It's just awesome.
He was at Dexcon too in the exact same get-up. I believe he is meant to be a Warhammer 40K Commissar, but yeah, I had a strong urge to go Old Testament Jew on him.
And if anyone wants to track reactions to the con across the blog-o-sphere, I have a link page here:
http://judd-sonofbert.livejournal.com/163099.html?mode=reply
It is a combination of AP's and just blog and livejournal reactions
Feel free to PM me anything I've missed.
This was easily the most satisfying gaming weekend I've spent in my life, ever. Not just that, but meeting and hanging out with everyone there was enormous fun, and I found that many, many productive thoughts have sprung from the weekend.
Thanks to everyone who made the Indie game experience so fucking awesome throughout. I can't wait to weigh in on the AP.
What can I say? My first con, my first game, my first meetings with these people....oh man.
Let me put it this way: technically, of my three scheduled games, none of them went off. And I still had the best weekend of gaming of my life.
Everybody, thank you. You know who you are.
To nascent/budding/beginning designers: if you can come to this Con, do it. And I don't mean just in the area - if you have the weekend free and the ability to fly, take a train, drive, or swim to get there, it will be worth it. Not only do you pay nothing beyond transportation and parking, you will learn from the best about how to sell, pitch, demo and play your game.
I would count my sales as awesome, mainly because I...uh...had sales! I sold 5 copies of Timestream and traded one, which gives me a net profit of about 15 bucks for the weekend. I have no idea how to guage everyone else's sales, but I'm sure Tony will inform us all.
And everyone who played or ran any indie RPG's should thank Michael Miller for organizing the Indie Explosion.
Michael, at some point I would like to have a phone conversation or some PM's or e-mails about what exactly you did and how it worked.
I also want to thank Michael for being one of the best roleplayers I've known in my (counting) 24 years of gaming. It's just a delight to be at the table with him. His ideas are great.
Plus he does the organize thing good too.
--
Anyway, once I get some of my schoolwork more under control, I will post more about this, but this was the best of the 4 cons I've ever been to (Dreamation 05, DexCon 05, Gen Con Indy 05, Dreamation 06). Best roleplaying, best GMing, best bullshitting with folks, best room party. The only downside was no Vincent.
I think I managed to massively improve the fun I had doing actual gaming by not playing anything that wasn't IPE-branded.
Wow, there are so many people i want to thank... amongst the the big 4 Tony LB, Jared, Michael, and the DE folks who always make the experience the best for me and my family. Out of my 4 games set up, only 2 went off... i was not too upset about the Pulp Era games, but was a bit disappointed about my "Spookybeans" demo. Sales were as expected, but it gives me motivation to get off my arse and do the total scrap and rewrite of Pulp Era.
Speakling of motivation, being around everyone was like a psychic recharge. I was so inspired by everyone that was there, and a HUGE hats off to Tony LB after our talk on Saturday night I was ready to go home, flip open my lap top and start getting my ideas in order. At Dexcon I plan to put my nose to the rindstone and help out the booth any way I can.
It was great meeting Clinton and Bob Goat, i wish I had more time to chat.
and last was the midnight OctaNe game, I have to say that was the best 2 hours of gaming I have done in months!
Can't wait to see most of you at I-CON in March
Can we discuss how to do to other cons in the eastern U.S. what we have done to Dreamation and Dexcon.
When I came to Dreamation '05 I was leery of cons, having had bad experiences that I think we all here can well imagine. But now that con is not only some of the best gaming I do all year and a place to introduce other gamers to games I dig but a place where I get to see friends who I adore.
How do we Indie Explode on other cons? What are the steps? What needs to happen?
Once again, I had a blast at Dreamation, thanks to the Indie Games Explosion. I'd attended a few cons before, and never really enjoyed them. The IGE has changed that. I'll be going to any con where IGE has a prescence, assuming I can afford the cost and time off from work.
For myself, I had four sessions scheduled: two on Thursday and two on Sunday, to help pad out the IGE offerings on those lightly scheduled days. My Thursday games (DitV and InSpectres) were well attended and loads of fun, while my Sunday games tanked for lack of players. I didn't get to play many indie games due to a big honking two-day LARP and a poker tournament right in the middle of the convention, though I did hop in on the Capes tournament on Sunday, when my Universalis game netted only one player.
I'm thinking that, since many of the attendees just want to try out these "new style'/"Forge-inspired"/"wacky indie" games, it might be a good idea to have a variable slot set up for Saturday night. That way, folks who show an interest in the whole indie RPG thing can show up and select a game from a list of available titles. I know that "someone" tends to become "no one" unless you're willing to do it yourself, so I'll be thinking about how to pull off something like this for next Dreamation.
Judd, I'd be totally down with bringing the IGE to other east coast cons. How about a new thread?
Quote from: Andrew Morris on January 24, 2006, 02:12:39 AM
Judd, I'd be totally down with bringing the IGE to other east coast cons. How about a new thread?
Done. (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=18481.0")
My heartfelt thanks go to Tony and Michael and Vinny and Rebecca for organizing.
yrs--
--Ben
Props to tha IGE. I burned my Living D&D character sheet -- masochism can only go so far, especially when better gaming is two floors down. Looking forward to the next Con with an IGE presence. :)
Ha ha ha! Welcome to the Forge, Blake! It was great playing with you.
As always, we loved having you all join us at Dreamation. It's incredibly satisfying to hear that you had a good time there, and we're looking forward to having everyone join us again for DEXCON in July. :) I'll give that one its own thread, once we here are all sufficiently recovered from this one.
Feedback is welcome, of course. There is always room for improvement, after all. For example, we'll use a larger function room for the party in July (I do hope you'll have one!), after seeing how packed Bridgewater was Saturday evening. We have our own forums now, over at www.dexposure.com, so any suggestions can better reach us as a whole there.
Again, thank you for having such a great presence at Dreamation. You add something very special to our events.
Becca
This being my first real convention experience (I went to Southern Exposure, but spent the entire day talking to this girl I met there, so didn't game at all save for one session of Capes), I must say I came away very pleased. At first, I was unsure of how I would feel or what I should do (ie: should I cling to the one person I knew at the event or should I ditch that person and go off completely on my own?) but as soon as I got there I realized i had nothing to worry about.
The overall organization of everything made it easy for me to locate all the games I registered to play, and everyone was so wonderful and friendly! Of course, it didn't hurt my excitement when my first game of the night was Andrew's DiTV session with all the GMs - it was great to finally see/meet the people that certain friends of mine kept talking my ear off about. And when, at the end of the four days, Emily Care Boss told me it felt like she's known me forever, I thought I died and went to heaven (Emily, you're awesome).
The games themselves were also phenomenal. I, of course, was one of the lucky people to be a part of Judd's PTA - The Hare and the Hound game, and the rest of the games I played were just slightly under that one in their awesomeness.
I definitely will be attending more conventions in the future and cannot wait to once again see all the fabulous people I met at Dreamation.
There is nothing quite so nerve-wracking as having Tony grinning across the table at you while you're trying to teach a group of people how to play Capes. It was a great weekend even though the only games I was involved in were the ones I ran (the other ones were all full up).
But the biggest thing I came away from Dreamation with was the fact that all these indie game designers weren't these superhumanly smart gamer-philosophers like I'd imagined them, they were geeks like me. And that's not meant to be insulting, it was actually really inspiring. I'm hoping next year I'll be running a game I've written.
It was a lot of fun, and it was great meeting everyone.
Krista, I wish I'd gotten a chance to really meet you. Your experience at Dreamation was exactly like mine last year: total ambivalence that turned to happiness as soon as I realized that passion and artistry — not to mention the niceness — of the people involved. Welcome to the Forge!
Quote from: Bret Gillan on January 25, 2006, 10:21:05 AM
But the biggest thing I came away from Dreamation with was the fact that not all of these indie game designers weren't these superhumanly smart gamer-philosophers like I'd imagined them
Added "not all of" to the above quote.
And it was great to meet folks and play games (for once). Who knows? This RPG thing might be okay after all.
You guys rock.
Me, Annelisa and Russ had a great time at this con. We made some new contacts, made some new friends and became better friends with some of you.
Highlights include: Having rare face-to-face business meetings with various book teams, using Luke Crane as an art media and having unexpected, life-giving Pho with Sorensen. Also, it was awesome that our location was an alternate home base for the Indie RPG collective from time to time. Very very cool.
A huge thanks for the fun time to Double Exposure, Luke, Jared, Brennan, Judd, Clinton, Joshua and many others.
I look forward to being able to do this again. Hopefully soon.
Jenn, it was great seeing you and meeting Annelisa. Your table was a great hangout spot. Too bad about the video games. I understand that was an issue with the IPE a couple of years back, too.
... but where, oh where did you get Pho? I almost killed a man* for his sandwich, so desperate was I for decent food.
* The sandwich turned out not to be worth it.
Quote from: Jared A. Sorensen on January 25, 2006, 10:29:24 AM
And it was great to meet folks
...who were plotting to kill me for my dice bag.
Seriously, that shit is hot.
Just wanted to let you all know that the first tricklings of Dreamation coverage are upon our site. Visit www.perfectscorepodcast.com (http://www.perfectscorepodcast.com) or www.pscore.net (http://www.pscore.net). The television will have the information, but after 20 seconds it will load another "channel" but you can hit the shownotes link for all the Dreamation coverage so far.
The stuff that is up right now is our recap as to what we did at the CON, and the Roundtable audio is up.
Video is going well, just taking time with 8+ hours of footage to cut and edit, but we will have it soon.
DIABOLIK
Krista, welcome home! : ) I'm glad this Con was your introduction to the scene--it's only my second, but it was a sweet, sweet time and a truly fabulous example. I had so much fun I'm still smouldering from all the good runs I got to be in. PtA, Capes, Carry, my game and Kat's awesome Everway LARP. Watching was as good as playing this Con: Face of Angels, With Great Power, Princes in the Kingdom, Shock and the insane masterpiece of Jared running Lacuna.
So many great folks--seeing you, Krista, and Andrew, meeting Jonathan, Brett, Jenn & Annelisa, rocking the romantic house with Elizabeth, Shawn & Michele, getting to hang with Nathan & get a sneak peek at Carry, getting to know Kat, Michael & Michelle. And the inimitable Alexander (hi sweetie!). And all the other fabulous folks I met & got to spend more time with: Clinton (!!), Luke, Tony, Jared, Keith, Lisa and everyone.
Boyo. Let's do it again, mates. Next year, Vincent & Meg are coming. Let's see about the rest of the crew.
best,
Em