GenCon Sal: Closed for Good

[DonTadow]

Just got the email, didnt see a topic and thought I'd post it.

Anybody surprised by this. I am. I was hoping to go next year. WE had to cancel this year because of our wedding, and now I regret not going to the last one.

Gencon Socal was different. The gamers were a bit too laid back at times, but it was a different experience none the less.

I really thought that if True Dungeon stayed fresh, Gencon Socal would have a good chance of keeping afloat.

I also thought that Gencon bought the E3 name last year. Wasn't they suppose to combine that with Gencon Socal?

What are your thoughts?

 

[jodyjohnson]

http://www.gencon.com/2007/socal/default.aspx

Possible they may try to retool E3 into a more gamer con but could as easily tag onto San Diego Comic Con.

The Star Wars celebration draws off some of the gaming fever as well.

 

[Festivus]

This is really sad for me.

I have attended SoCal for a while now and it was very enjoyable each time I went. I made lots of friends there... friends I looked forward to seeing next year. I will probably never see them again because they came to SoCal from far away and I don't think they would make the trip for a smaller con. They are who I will miss the most.

Secondary will be the booths, while small, it was a chance to probe merchants and buy stuff without paying for shipping costs. I saved all year for Gencon SoCal to buy stuff at the exhibitors hall. It seemed to get smaller every year.

I understand their reasoning, it's a business after all and they need people to attend. I doubt very much that I will ever make it to GenCon Indy, but perhaps for once in my lifetime.

I wish them all the best, and perhaps one of these other west coast conventions will turn into something more than just people running games... which is what GenCon was... so very much more.

 

[Glyfair]

IIRC, this has happened before (with Origins I believe). They added the west coast to their yearly rotation of locations. The first one was successful, but attendance dropped after that.

In this case, I think the December date was just a bad time for a gaming convention.

 

[Greg K]

While I feel bad for Peter (he is a really nice guy), I am not going to miss the con. I had been to all but one and actually prefer our local cons. In fact, I only went to the last one, because a friend had passes and I hoped Green Ronin and a few other companies of interest to me might be there. Two friends, who were attending for their first time, accompanied me and they both swore that the only way they might go back is if they had free passes.

 

[Wycen]

This is sad news. I kinda wish I'd tried harder to get my friends up here in the Bay Area to make the road trip with me, but then again I only really took the whole trip myself just last year. Before was just a few or one day.

 

[T. Foster]

On paper I should've been the ideal attendee for this show -- I live less than an hour's drive from the site, and I used to attend GenCon in Milwaukee every year before I moved from Indiana to California -- but I never went. I was tempted to go down on Saturday this past year but was turned off by the price of admission (no single day passes, no observer/shopper passes -- to get into the door you had to buy a full 4-day pass) and the general lack of "buzz" -- it didn't sound like there was going to be much going on there, certainly not in comparison to the "real" GenCons I attended in the 80s and 90s, and not enough to justify the badge price. I feel kinda lame that for 4 years there was a GenCon just right around the corner that I never bothered to go to and now it's gone, but I blame the con for that more than myself -- I mean, it should've been pretty easy for them to convince me to go, but they never could, so it's no surprise that they couldn't convince enough other people either...

On the plus side, with GenCon SoCal gone, the chance that I'll some day make the trip to GenCon Indy (I do still have family and friends in Indiana, after all) just got a lot greater!

 

[jgbrowning]

Secondary will be the booths, while small, it was a chance to probe merchants and buy stuff without paying for shipping costs. I saved all year for Gencon SoCal to buy stuff at the exhibitors hall. It seemed to get smaller every year.

That's because the prices for a SoCal booth were the same for an Indy booth; except you'd get 1/5 the traffic. We (Expeditious Retreat Press) never went because it didn't make fiscal sense for us to go.

joe b.

 

[Teflon Billy]

I hear what he's saying about a lack of "Buzz"

Gen Con Socal should've drawn me like honey draws a fly, but somehow I could just never get my enthusiasm up for it.

Not sure why exactly, but just look on the board here how much chatter Indy gets and compare it to Socal. I mean, it's not even close.

 

[Glyfair]

Not sure why exactly, but just look on the board here how much chatter Indy gets and compare it to Socal. I mean, it's not even close.

Well, Indy is still the "real GenCon" with the history attached to it. It became the prestige event, and most RPG and hobby game companies build around it. Comparing anything to it is never going to be fair. Especially with a non-established event like SoCal.

In addition, Indy is during the summer when people tend to be free to plan vacations around it. SoCal's timing is such that it will mostly draw local people. Even people who might be free usually are busy with the holidays. Gaming companies are probably doubly concerned, since it usually takes up a couple of weeks of their employees time during the holiday season.