Origins, much bigger than I thought

[Valamir]

Origins this year felt very small to me.  A number of people I was there with mentioned the same thing.  Perhaps it was the nearly always empty food court that in previous years was packed at all hours.  Perhaps it was the ability to walk the main hall without having to play dodge'em.  Perhaps it was the ability to actually find open gaming tables in the breezeway.  Perhaps it was the fact that many booths I normally would visit were absent this year...to be replaced with more weapons and card salesmen.  Perhaps it was the fact that many of the games I normally play were moved to smaller venues.  Perhaps it was the fact that the gaming auction (the largest such venue in the county) was nearly deserted thanks in large part to E0Bay.

What ever the reason it felt smaller

But now I've discovered that GAMA is claiming to have not just broken, but "smashed" previous attendence records...So I'm left with the following puzzle.  If they truly had record attendence...why did it feel half empty.  Anyone else feel this way...is it really just the replacement of the wargaming crowd I normally affiliate with (Origins used to be the premier wargaming convention) with RPGers and those evil CCGers and larpists to an extent greater than any previous year...

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Ralph,

One reason, and it can't be the whole one, is that the con organizers took care to have wider aisles in the exhibit hall this year. I'm not sure whether this is the first year they did this, but it's a comparatively recent move.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

Yeah, as Ron said, I think it was just arrangement that helped. And other organizational stuff. Not quite the usual chaos.

Still that doesn't explain the open space for gaming, or the food court. Hmmm...

Was that far hall, the one where they did CCGs this year, was that open last year? I think they might just have used more space.

Mike

[Jake Norwood]

Most of the Exhibitors agreed that sales were slower than previous years as well, all the more "shocking" due to the "smashed attendance record."

Part of the "empty" feeling could have also been the fact that there were SO MANY GAMES going on, so that perhaps more people were playing and fewer were shopping.

Just an idea.

Jake

[tdenmark]

Part of the "empty" feeling could have also been the fact that there were SO MANY GAMES going on, so that perhaps more people were playing and fewer were shopping.

I believe you are correct about this.  Scott Bagley, who runs local cons in Norther California, was in charge of of non-RPGA role-playing games for the first time this year.  He was tasked with coordinating around 300 rpg sessions (which in itself would have broken all previous non-RPGA rpg events at Origins), instead he brought the number closer to 750!  An amazing accomplishment.  This means people were actually -playing- games, instead of just wandering the halls (and buying stuff I guess...).

Good for the gamers, but not so good for the vendors I suppose.