Lanefan
Victoria Rules
I've been twice. The first time I stayed out of town and drove in each day. The second time I stayed downtown, a few blocks from the convention centre.
There's pros and cons to both. Staying downtown costs a *lot* more but you can come and go to the con. as you please - it really is pretty much a 24-7 event after Wednesday night - without having to be awake enough to drive. (you think drinking and driving is bad, try sleeping and driving. It's worse.)
I'm going again this year, assuming all remains as it is, and I'm strongly leaning toward staying downtown again.
That said, don't be too put off by the hotel rates you're seeing right now at the hotels' own websites. GenCon book a huge block of rooms for Con attendees - the challenge there is getting at them before everyone else does and-or before their online booking site crashes, as far as I can tell - and the rates for those are less than what you'll see on the hotel sites. (the hotels jack up the rest of their rooms for that week)
If you go to the GenCon site { Gen Con LLC : Home } there's a community forum there with some people who are pretty good about answering questions.
Lanefan
There's pros and cons to both. Staying downtown costs a *lot* more but you can come and go to the con. as you please - it really is pretty much a 24-7 event after Wednesday night - without having to be awake enough to drive. (you think drinking and driving is bad, try sleeping and driving. It's worse.)
I'm going again this year, assuming all remains as it is, and I'm strongly leaning toward staying downtown again.
That said, don't be too put off by the hotel rates you're seeing right now at the hotels' own websites. GenCon book a huge block of rooms for Con attendees - the challenge there is getting at them before everyone else does and-or before their online booking site crashes, as far as I can tell - and the rates for those are less than what you'll see on the hotel sites. (the hotels jack up the rest of their rooms for that week)
If you go to the GenCon site { Gen Con LLC : Home } there's a community forum there with some people who are pretty good about answering questions.
Lanefan