Gen
Con, Oh Gen Con
I
have a love/hate relationship with Gen Con.
Mostly love, though. Gen
Con 2001 will be my 11th Gen Con, a huge
annual game convention held in August in Wisconsin.
Some would say it's the game convention,
at least in the United States.
I
love the huge gathering of like-minded people:
lovers of games and fantasy and sci-fi and
all things related. I love the huge selection
of great new game products, and the fact that
you can meet and talk with game designers.
So,
what's to hate? Well, hate's a strong word,
but for a game industry professional, Gen
Con is a lot of work. For a freelancer (like
myself), it's a lot of people pulling you
in different directions.
This
year, my primary focus is going to be two
different tracks of workshops that I'll be
running. One deals with writing fantasy. I'll
draw on the experience that I had writing
my two novels and various short stories, as
well as the experience I gained at Clarion.
What's Clarion? Well, it's a very cool thing.
Every year, at two different locations (Clarion
East, in Michigan, and Clarion West, in Seattle),
around 17 different aspiring or relatively
new sci-fi and fantasy writers are selected
for an intensive six-week workshop taught
by luminaries like Greg Bear, Octavia Butler,
and Nancy Kress. Like I said, very cool. I
was fortunate to attend Clarion West in 1999.
It was an amazing amount of work (and right
in the middle of writing the DMG), but it
was a great experience.
The
other workshop I'm leading deals with game
design. I'll discuss not only various things
to consider in designing games, but also how
to get published in the game industry.
The
rest of my time will probably be split among
all the various companies that I'm doing work
for (like I said, pulled in a lot of directions).
Primarily, I imagine this will involve hanging
out at the Sword & Sorcery booth in the
Exhibit Hall. If you're looking for me, that's
not a bad place to try (although, realistically,
I won't be there more than an hour a day).
I'm
going to spend a lot of time combing the Exhibit
Hall. It's tough to keep up with all the new
games that have been coming out lately, and
I need to remind myself what's out there.
That'll be fun.
Frankly,
I'm hoping to feel not too overworked and
frazzled at the show this year. In years past,
when I worked for Wizards (and TSR before
them), the company required us to work a lot
of hours running game demos and other duties.
Don't get me wrong -- it's not every day that
you get to play D&D all day long. But
it can get to be a chore by the third day
standing hour after hour, shouting to be heard
above some crazy guy in the next booth with
a gong. You get what I mean. Obviously, this
year I won't have to worry about that. (In
the old days, TSR employees used to refer
to being "trapped in the castle"
-- a reference that you'll only really understand
if you remember the old TSR castle at Gen
Con every year.)
Lastly,
just let me recommend a few things if you're
going to Gen Con:
1.
Get some sleep while you're there.
2.
Take a minute to just look around at the thousands
of people and think about how they all share
so many of your own interests and experiences.
3.
In addition to scheduled games, get into a
pick up game on the spur of the moment at
some point. They're surprisingly fun.
4.
You're going to encounter lots of new people
and interact with them. Don't try to impress
them. Try to make friends.
5.
Get some sleep.
6.
Go to a seminar and hang out. Not only do
you get to chill out for an hour, you get
to hear what some game designer has to say
about something, or find out about the cool
products a game company is working on right
now.
7.
There are lots of lines. These are opportunities,
not hassles. See #2 and #4. But probably not
#5.
8.
Try to get a look at everything in the Exhibit
Hall, at least for a moment. There's lots
of cool stuff in there that you won't see
anywhere else.
9.
If you're in the hotel room near mine, shhhhhh.
10.
If you see me, say "hi." I'll probably
be on my way to something, but I'll say hi
back.
