The One Game Policy

[Luke]

I've tried to closely follow the threads lead up to GenCon this year, as well as reviewing the threads about last year's booth and the rule about newbies only being allowed to sell a single product surprised me.  Is this a new development? 

This kinda pours a ton of cold water on some of my retailing plans and it sounds like it could possibly infringe on Jason Morningstar's ability to sell Drowning & Falling, which would royally suck.

I realize you folks have a lot on your plate and I apologize if I missed an earlier announcement about this.  I also realize that you have no real responsibility to tell us anything before we really need to know.  Still, I'm having to rethink things yet again now.

I've done the GenCon Forge Booth three times now: 2003, 2004 and 2005. I was a primary sponsor in 2004 and 2005. I am one again this year. I LOVE the Forge booth. And I am actively interested in making it better because each year has had its share of problems. The One Game Policy is one of the ways I am trying to make it better.

Let me explain my reasoning:

• The Forge booth is about mutualism.

• If this is your first year selling your game at the booth, you don't know what you're doing. You might think you do, and you might fit right in, but trust me, you've got to be in the mix to understand. However rewarding it may be, it's fucking chaos, it's hard to navigate, it's taxing and it's hard on the soul.

• Perhaps due to inexperience with the booth, first years are typically the "most selfish." They tend to revel in the energy and squeal, "me, me, me!" to the exclusion of all else and drive the rest of us crazy. Hell, I know I did it. And I've certainly seen it done in the past two years. It can get ugly. At the least, it's taxing to everyone else at the booth. This selfishness includes the "I'll sell all of my games at GenCon" philosophy.

• The primary sponsors and veterans actually like the squealing and revelling from the first years. HOWEVER, it's very rare that any of us can adequately support first years because we don't know the first year games well if at all.

• The more products you have, the harder it gets for us to help you. I have watched a few publishers come through on their first year with a handful of product and leave disappointed. Not only does it hog shelf space, but the "handful of wonderful product" actively hurts your sales. Buh? How? More product is more sales is more money, right? No. If none of the vets can keep your products straight in their befuddled brains, we don't know how to sell you. And we need to have a gut understanding of who you are and what your game is so that in a half-second we can say, "Lovecraft? That guy, right there! Morningstar, this dude wants to demo The Roach!" Now add a football stadium full of screaming people and deprive yourself of sleep and privacy for two days and see if you can do that for thirty companies.

• Limiting first year companies to one product will allow me to include more companies in this year's booth and hence more diverse product overall. I'm sure I don't need to explain why this is good for everyone.

• If you're a first year and you've got more than one game, put them in one volume. You're a versatile, agile little company. You print on demand. You have options.

Feel free to continue to bitch and moan in this thread, but don't count on me changing my mind.

-Luke

[Valamir]

I like this policy alot, actually.  I've been working the booth for awhile now and can agree completely with Luke's assessment above.

In fact the biggest struggle for me as a booth participant is the inherent battle between the Forge Mission and What's Best for the Booth.

See, what would be best for the booth (i.e. as measured by maximum sales volume for as many people as possible) would be to limit the whole thing to a much smaller subset of companies and products.  The biggest obstacle (in terms of stress, chaos, customer disatisfaction, and lower sales) is too many products and too many companies.  It limits your ability to have quality one on one time with customers, it makes customers feel mobbed, its absolutely impossible to keep all of the games straight, it takes alot of extra time and effort to keep the shelves stocked etc. etc. etc.  Best for booth would be fewer companies, fewer products.  Trust me, Ron would sell hella more Sorcerer stuff in an "Adept Press" booth than he does at the "Forge Booth".  (you may be tempted to not believe that, but if you're a veteran of the booth and see how much time Ron* dedicates to stuff other than selling Sorcerer you'd know...* = for Ron substitute any number of other folks including Luke, Vincent...or for that matter me).

But that flies 100% in the face of the entire reason we're doing a Forge Booth to begin with.  The whole purpose of the Forge Booth is to open the flood gates and give the opportunity for maximum indie folks to get exposure at GenCon.  Limit the booth to just a few and we might as well not even have one.  Make the booth about the 10 companies who can generate reliable sales numbers every year and the whole thing becomes...a sell out (for lack of a better turn of phrase).

So how to make the booth most effective/efficient without losing sight of its mission is a struggle we've dealt with every year.  From how to run demos to who gets wall space for posters, to rotating stock for best shelf exposure.  Each year those issues get more complicated and every year we've made improvements.  My snagging a cash register so we could handle the added volume and variety of product was one such improvement (yes, one year all cash was held in an envelope in Jake Norwood's hip pocket).  This year's addition of IPR takes that to a whole new level.

Sharing booth space with Wicked Dead is another really exciting experiment.  I'm thinking that much like the Forge Diaspora into the blogosphere, down the road we may see a similar diaspora at GenCon.  How cool would it be to have 3 or 4 mini Forge Booths set up by companies who got their start at the Forge Booth and now can spin off on their own.  Heck give it a few years and we could potentially take over an entire section of the exhibit hall.

So each year we try some different things to deal with the fact that the more successful we are at furthering the mission of the booth, the harder and less efficient the booth becomes.  Limiting new publishers to one game is an experiment I heartily endorse...at least as a worthwhile experiment.  We'll see in August how effective it is.  Besides, for $160 you're getting the deal of a lifetime anyway.

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

Well it will save me money in printing costs :)  Thanks for the breakdown, Luke.

Peace,

-Troy

[Ben Lehman]

I'm very sad I won't be able to sell Hierarchy and Timestream.

This isn't an argument against policy, or anything.  It's just me expressing my sadness.

yrs--
--Ben

[Luke]

I'm very sad I won't be able to sell Hierarchy and Timestream.

This isn't an argument against policy, or anything.  It's just me expressing my sadness.

yrs--
--Ben

You benefitted mightily by focusing solely on Polaris, so I'm sure you can see the merit of this.

-L

[Ben Lehman]

You benefitted mightily by focusing solely on Polaris, so I'm sure you can see the merit of this.

-L

Well, I did very well with one game on the shelf last year, that's true.  I don't know if I wouldn't have done better with more games on the shelf -- As far as I know, mostly people at the booth have traditionally focused on a single game with maybe a few sidelight products.  Of course, these sidelight products have often been unintended hits (The Big Night last year, for instance), and I'm sorry to see that possibility go.

I'm really interested about the potential of a true multi-game strategy (which is what I'm doing this year.)  Will I do better or worse for it?  I don't honestly know, that's why I'm trying it out.

No amount of talk will give us more shelf-space, though.  I hope that this is a one-year thing, because I think the "I sell a great many small games" type of company is going to only get more common, and I'd like the booth to be welcoming to them.

yrs--
--Ben

P.S.  As to the "many booths vs. one booth" thing, GenCon pricing and placement structuring is such that it just makes more sense for us to all be in one place.  What that does mean is that we'll need to get better at management, both on the floor and in prep.  I'm happy to see moves towards that this year.

[Dav]

Just a quick curiosity.  When you say "one game", do you mean one game, or one product?  Or, to be more succinct, if one were to have, say, five games bound in one book, how does that fly?

Dav

[Luke]

Just a quick curiosity.  When you say "one game", do you mean one game, or one product?  Or, to be more succinct, if one were to have, say, five games bound in one book, how does that fly?

Dav

How about one product. An anthology can be considered a legal loophole.

[Thunder_God]

Technically, couldn't newcomers pony up $200 and sell multiple products?

[Troy_Costisick]

I'm very sad I won't be able to sell Hierarchy and Timestream.

This isn't an argument against policy, or anything.  It's just me expressing my sadness.

yrs--
--Ben

-I'll bring a special signed copy just for you, Ben.  It'll save you the shipping costs at least.  :)

Peace,

-Troy

[Thor Olavsrud]

Technically, couldn't newcomers pony up $200 and sell multiple products?

Hey Guy,

I'm not an expert but I'll field this one. The short answer is no.

The long answer is:

This is not about financial consideration. Veterans are expected to pay more, not because they get to sell multiple products but because they have benefitted in the past and are now expected to bear more of the burden. If my one year at the Forge booth is any indication, it is the rookies that get the greatest consideration at the booth. The veterans will spend as much or more time learning about, pitching and supporting demos of the rookies' games than they will on their own games.

The veterans already know each other's old games. If someone wants to ask about it, they can tell that person all about what it is, how it plays, and what they've done with it.

Rookies are being asked to put their efforts behind one and only one product because the veterans are not familiar with their games. The veterans are expected to get to know each other's new games and the rookies' games so they can set up potential customers with demos of games they are most likely to enjoy.

The more new games there are, the harder that spirit of mutualism becomes.

[Jonathan Walton]

Thanks for the explanation, Luke.  I totally understand why such a move is justified.  I guess I'm looking at this from 2-3 major concerns:

1) If I'd known earlier about this, I might have pushed harder to split the cost of a seperate booth with some other fine people (we can skip the discussion on how foolish or wise this idea is because, believe me, Ben and I have already covered all this ground, multiple times, in fevered discussion/arguments; to summerize, I've very pro Booth-diasporization,while Ben thinks we should all stay together).

2) If we have to bite the bullet about shelf space and being able to pitch all the booth products, we should ALL have to bite the bullet.  Sure, limit newcomers to 1 product, but limit oldtimers to 2-3, say, or 1 product and it's associated supplements (like BW or Sorcerer).  I don't think that's too much to ask, honestly.  Sure, I'd love to be able to sell every indie game ever written (especially Nighttime Animals Save the World!), but that sounds like it's just not feasible.  If people are in a situation like Wicked Dead, with a bunch of unrelated short games, wouldn't it be better for them to have an associated booth or partial-booth with all their stuff together?  That's what I'm mentally planning for myself, for next year.

3) Speaking personally, I'm not worried about making a ton of sales or making my investment back.  At this point in time, this is a vanity press for me, not a small secondary career or a real publishing venture.  I just want to get my products (all my products) into the hands of people who want them.  Maybe focusing on one product will help me do that better, though.  I suppose we'll find out.

Also, making a "Special GenCon Anthology" doesn't work for me, because my main product, Push, is already an anthology (a journal, really) featuring pieces by lots of fun people.  Shoehorning a few of my own short games into the book would make it 50% Jonathan, 50% Other People, which is not what the journal is about.

[Luke]

Hi Jon,

1) Ben is correct. Because we may feel like we're the most important center of the world evar, but if we don't stick together we will be sentenced to the most obscure corner of GenCon imaginable. And I don't know about you, but I'm not interested in having Porn Baseball Cards and Blaring Speakers of Self-Published Computer Strategy Game as neighbors any more.

2) I know, it sucks to be the little guy. You and all the first years will get over it. Next year when you come back, and you know what you're doing, you'll have license to go to town.

3) I said these exact same words myself just four short years ago. I did, I swear. But you gotta remember a couple of things: Getting your product into people's hands means selling it. Selling means charging money for it. Charging money means making money. People want to buy your game. And, lastly, the booth at GenCon is not a coffee house, a book store or anything else like that. It's a bull market in which you try to convince jaded gamers everywhere why they should buy your game. GenCon is for selling. I know, it sounds dirty. I hated it in 2003 when Ralph and Ron pounded that into my head. But I have learned my lesson. It's too big and crazy to be for anything else. One way or another, at GenCon, getting your game into people's hands means selling it.

4) The Forge booth is unique because we encourage people to sit with us and play our games. Can Push be demoed? In the past we've noted that products that cannot be demoed do not sell as well as those that can be and are demoed. Thus less "hands into" and stuff.

That said, you should come and join us at the booth this year. It's shaping up to be a wild time and I think you'd enjoy yourself and perhaps be better armed if you ever did decided to strike out on your own.

-Luke

[Brennan Taylor]

Just a quick note in support of Luke, here. I am already freaking out about shelf space just based on the number of people posting to the Game Designer thread.

[TonyLB]

Even setting aside the physical shelf-space, I worry about the metaphorical shelf-space in all of our brains.  Even at last GenCon I felt like I wasn't doing a good enough job of pitching certain games (Sweet Dreams, for instance, I couldn't get a bead on, and I didn't even try to learn Infinite Armies, because Greg so clearly had it under control).  When I already feel like I'm playing catch-up the idea of adding dozens more is pretty intimidating.