Games on Demand

[Graham W]

I wondered if anyone had thoughts about how Games On Demand worked this year?

I have thoughts myself, but I'm in a motel with limited Internet access, so I'll add them to the thread later.

Graham

[Gregor Hutton]

Oh, good idea.

At the start of the convention on Thursday I still didn't know where it was going to be. When I found out it was opposite where they used to have the GenCon Talent Show it was easy to find (for me, maybe harder for first time con attendees?). The first time I visited GoD (Thursday afternoon) it was pretty empty but there were still curious people wandering in. I got a short game in before I had to head back to the trade hall for the close of show (and booth wrap up).

The next time I got to GoD was on, I think, Saturday and it was jumping. Every table was full and I saw Mike Holmes there. John Harper was running a game of 3:16, Graham was doing Poison'd, Malcolm was doing Hot War and I think Darcy was there with Black Cadillacs. There were other games too. The place was packed and everyone was having a great time.

My perception was that once people found it they then had a lot of fun. It was super packed with different games and enthusiastic GMs.

Anyway, that was my take on it.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Graham and also the organizers of GoD,

This isn't feedback, 'cause I was at the booth, but rather an idea for next year.

What do you think about an addition organized from the Forge booth - specifically, that volunteer game-introducers and (if the term is applicable) GMs give me cell phone numbers, and in line with their declared availability, receive "go play!" calls. So if someone wants to play some game at the booth, I call one of the numbers and say, "Can you meet three people there in twenty minutes?" and it goes from there. I'm basing this on the feedback I got from a number of people in demos that they were interested in continuing to play.

The Forge booth will be oriented more toward a 2003 mission, of showcasing the buy-in games rather than fronting a widely-stocked store. This isn't to say that I expect Games on Demand to limit itself in any way, but I am saying that the service I'm talking about will be aimed mainly at the games at the booth.

That said, I also would like to have some kind of handout or flier, made or organized by the GoD guy, which explains what it's for, where it is, and lists any or all of the games that will be readily available (not just those at the booth).

What do you think?

Best, Ron

[Graham W]

So, yeah. I was a Games on Demand GM this year, which basically meant I was Mike's sidekick. Which was fun.

I thought:

1. Games On Demand was difficult to find. Even the GenCon booth across the landing didn't know where it was (whether you asked for "Indie Games Explosion" or "Games On Demand"). Eventually, people got the hang of where it was, which was cool. It didn't help that the GenCon staff were funny about us putting signs up.

2. After a day or so, it worked beautifully. Lots of people turned up wanting to play a game, but not sure what. They were generally open to anything, including playtesting ashcans (I described them, enthusiastically, as "games in development"). Sometimes, they'd ask for a particular game (Misspent Youth, Poison'd), but seemed happy to play other things.

We had more players wanting to play than GMs wanting to run. For the first two days, this meant I ran a lot of games (which I enjoyed). After that, I did a lot of running across to the Forge booth to see who wanted to run a game.

It'd be good, as Ron suggests, to have some communication with the Forge booth and its various spinoffs. When I did get people from exhibition hall, the games were very successful (John Harper did a massive game of 3:16, at the drop of a hat, that went down very well).

3. At the end of the first day, our books suddenly disappeared, and didn't reappear until a couple of days later, when they turned up under a chair. It made it difficult for us to run games: we were limited to those we could remember. We should have a box or something to put them in.

4. I'm unsure whether people went out and bought the games they played. I hope they did. Hard to quantify it. I made an effort to point them towards wherever the games were on sale.

5. The space seemed to work well. We had what was essentially our own room, although other ticketed games had been allocated tables within the space. Still, as a compromise, hard to argue with.

That's all I can think of right now. I'm sure I had more. I'll probably think of other stuff later.

Graham

[Darcy Burgess]

Hey Graham,

You talked about other ticketed games in the room.  Were these games in addition to the scheduled IGE games?

A thought re: storing books.  If I'd known that book storage was an issue, I'd have been happy to schlepp them the 20' to my room.  Next year, it's probably a good idea to find someone who's hotel room is close to the GoD room to act as book caretaker after hours.

Cheers,
Darcy

[Jason Morningstar]

Some thoughts:

I didn't see a lot of generic tickets changing hands.  This worries me because if Gen Con isn't getting anything out of the deal, they may just pull the plug.  I have no idea what the exigencies of Games on Demand are but that seems like a consideration.

From a marketing POV, it'd be great to see some kind of round-trip validation - maybe a 10% off coupon for the game you just played or something.  This would also give booths some valuable feedback on what's getting played and what's generating sales.  Complicated but not impossible to implement.

[ejh]

I played one Game On Demand (thanks Graham!  Thanks Mike for sending us over to Graham!) and the issue of Generic Tickets never came up.  I had bought a few in case I needed them; never ended up using them but I would cheerfully have handed them over.  Darn.

Perhaps other people were in the same situation.  If so, it would be a good idea to ask for tickets from anyone who had them, even nobody was turned away for not having them.

[Ron Edwards]

Huh. So the generic tickets for Games on Demand were ... um, not always collected?

If that's the case, then I need to reconsider one of my ideas, which was to purchase a brick of generic tickets and hand them out with Games on Demand flyers to purchasers. In fact, I'd planned on doing it this year but didn't get organized, and now I'm relieved.

Best, Ron

[Lance D. Allen]

I made a point of purchasing 2-3 generic tickets each time I was going to go hit GoD, and handed them over to SOMEONE before I left, though only in one case was someone actually making a point of collecting them (which was the Fae Noir game, if it matters to anyone)

Whoever's chairing the GoD booth (Mike Holmes, I'm assuming?) needs to make sure that anyone sitting down to run a game in the space takes tickets. Maybe even purchase a bunch of them to sell right there, though that could end up being a losing proposition. Just a thought.

As for book storage, I never thought of it being an issue, personally. I only played in one game with either Graham or Mike, and I brought the book we used (Cell Gamma). For the InSpectres game, someone had it with them, along with character sheets. The Fae Noir GM also came prepared to play. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be a stable of games there to be run by the volunteer GMs. It seems like a good idea to me, but I didn't really realize that it was the intention. I just figured that the books there were the personal property of the people willing to GM games.

[Graham W]

We always should have been collecting generic tickets. From what Ed's saying, I forgot for that game. Bugger.

Graham

[Lance D. Allen]

I think in some cases it may have just been a lack of communication. When I handed my tickets over for the InSpectres game, the GM didn't seem to be entirely sure what to do with them. I wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to do with them, either. Was he supposed to turn the tickets over to Mike or Graham? Was he supposed to go find the Appropriate Authority^(tm) and turn the tickets over to them? In either case, it definitely needs to be spelled out to people sitting down to run a game. If the latter specifically, I think it may need to be reconsidered. Whoever is "on-duty" at GoD should probably collect the tickets and turn them in en masse, which would allow them to keep some accountability of how many tickets are being collected, and simplify the process for someone who dropped in and volunteered to run a game.

I spent less time there than I'd intended originally, but for what time I was there, it was an appreciated resource.