I'm looking for people on the Forge who went to origins this weekend to report in when they get back and tell us:

1. How was the convention?
2. Did they sell any games?
3. What was the overall tone of the convention as far as RPGs went?

4. What new indie games did you discover for sale in the dealer room?

Paul

1. How was the convention?

Record attendence. For Vendors it was BAD. The hall was never all that busy and everyone except general t-shirt and dice companies (and the big boys) had poor sales. I know Elfin for example came in from Japan and had an awesome booth to sell only 4 main products - yet his sales were so bad I think he cried at my booth. A shame. Everyone else I spoke with that wasn't a big name did aweful as well. Still, some "networking" took place so it wasn't a complete lose if you know how to "schmooze".

2. Did they sell any games?

Sure, but not indies that's for sure. Not many RPG's either. Mostly war/board games.

3. What was the overall tone of the convention as far as RPGs went?

As far as RPG's went and the exhibitor hall, very sad. At least from my point of view.

4. What new indie games did you discover for sale in the dealer room?

Can't remember them, but two or three were to be had. Not many.

GenCon should be a lot better. I think a lot of the RPG people are waiting for that show instead of going to Origins.

James

Many of us indie publishers who were represented by other companies at origins are on pins and needles waiting for the results. James sent me a note describing how he tHINKS my sales went, but I won;t know for sure until he gets back to me after inventory.

In fact, I was wondering just how much information from james' note I can share with the Forge people and with my mailing list. On one hand, it was some interesting tidbits and worth sharing. On the other hand, what james wants to say on the Forge he will say himself and I'm not in a real poition to quote him on anything in particular. I'm a customer, not a journalist, as far as RPGnow and ROGMall is concerned, and I don;t want to say anything that's embarrassing or confidential.

1. How was the convention?
James had it exactly right. Let's just say I'm debating whether I want to go back next year. On Friday, I not only sold nothing, but only FIVE people even seriously looked at any of my wares all day long. I do that on a slow day over the web. Hopefully the schmoozing will pay off - I made some potentially life-saving connections.

2. Did they sell any games?
Yes, but not as many as last year (down 15%) - and not as many as I sold at DragonFlight last year (which has 10% of the attendance, but generated twice the RPG sales). Sales-wise, I was saved by the fact that I was carrying miniatures from DLD Productions and those sold tolerably well.

3. What was the overall tone of the convention as far as RPGs went?
James has got it here again. We had trouble even getting people to sign up for our game sessions, especially when a big event-shuffle caused ten cancellations in our last three games. If I hadn't brought two guys to run pick-up demos all day long in the halls, I think fewer than thirty people would have noticed the game, and fewer than ten would have played. (As it was, they easily got more than 100 people to play).

4. What new indie games did you discover for sale in the dealer room?
Just mine (which arrived from the printer 30 minutes before the exhibit hall opened), but I was so busy, I didn't have much of a chance to move around. I met the Tower Ravens folks (of Universe, TSFRPG infamy). I don't know if either the Children of the Sun or Promised Sands folks count as indie, but I had a chance to talk with them briefly.


On another note, I'm getting really tired of gamers saying "Thank God you're not d20" while store owners say "I'd buy it if it was d20." It just goes to show that convention-goers are not representative of the general public (or that store owners are going to regret this whole d20 thing eventually).

Origins was OK, but it's still no GenCon despite bringing in over 12,000 people this year. Our sales were up 60% over last year, which is good, but likely has more to do with us putting out 20 or so books since this time last year (and releasing Mutants & Masterminds). Had we done our booth like last year, we would have made a profit. However, this year we bought a level one sponsorship and didn't recoup all our money after all the expenes were figured in (airlines, hotels, food, and so on). Nonetheless, the show was a success for us. The money we lost was about what we'd spend on one ad in Dungeon, and for that money we got four days of solid marketing, lots of face to face interaction with the fans, two full page ads (one in the pre-reg book and one in the onsite book) and a prime location (between the Wizkids and WotC booths) with excellent traffic.

We had two new books at the show, Testament and Fang & Fury: A Guidebook to Vampires, and that certainly helped. We sold enough Testament on the first two days that we had to have more shipped up from the warehouse and then sold all those too.

Last year we made four times as much money at GenCon. If that holds true, we'll have a happy July.