CGE 2008 - What would you like to see?

[CX2K]

I've heard a lot of great ideas on these forums regarding the show over the past several months so I'd like to start this thread to track any events you'd like to see added to the show.

I can't promise we'll be able to implement all of them but we'll definitely evaluate each idea and see what we can do.

Of course we know the obvious stuff like more alumni, more vendors, etc and we work on these each year, but how about stuff like more cosplay? more bands? new events to the show?

Tell us your ideas and post them here...

disclaimer - no matter how much you ask, Sean Kelly will not be wearing his Papa Smurf outfit anytime soon....

John

[Phosphor Dot Fossils]

Damn, the Papa Smurf thing was #1 on my list!

Seriously, we ought to vary up the panels a bit more. I enjoy the Intellivision and Activision and Atari guys who show up year after year, but it seems like we wind up with the same guys discussing the same things time after time. As much as I was looking forward to the Katz/Kunkel/Worley panel that didn't happen this year, the game journalism panel that resulted was timely, interesting, and something we hadn't seen at CGE before. Some more "themed" panels like that would be a great idea and would let us see the same people perhaps talking about stuff they haven't brought up before. Like Steve Woita and the other guys who are into the casual gaming thing now - get them to talk about what they're doing these days, what that market's like, and how it compares to the Atari days.

That's really the only suggestion. I liked someone else's suggestion about more "conversation areas" in another thread too. But mainly varying up the panels a bit - challenge the speakers and the audience. Even some of the speakers this year seemed to be a little bit at a loss of what to say about their respective systems and/or companies and/or products again. Have a panel that mixes up Atari, Activision & INTV guys, talk about the events that made them realize the crash was real and would change everything, something that crosses the traditional system boundaries. Not saying we can't still have the usual panel topics, but throw some curveballs in there, for us and for them.

[Mayhem]

Actually I have to agree with Earl. This year marked the least number of panels I attended (two - Jay Smith and you guys) because I'd been to the others at least once, if not twice in the past events. Of course this left me more time to play, shop and sell. But still, having different sorts of talks and/or different people taking part would certainly be welcome from me

[Dan Iacovelli]

glenn and my self noticed the lack of Jaguar at this years show.
I would like to see the return of the jagfest @ CGE,even If I do come to 2008
I prob won't be bringing my stuff,but I know glenn would bring his stuff.
(and if songbird come that would be great)
Re: keynotes: if you need somebody to talk about the histrory of Jagfest I'm sure I'll be happy to talk about it.

[ubersaurus]

A keynote panel on prototypes would be interesting-how they get discovered, the whole proto collecting scene, and so on. Another one I'd be interested in-the art of those games. Not even the box/cabinet art necessarily, but the art and graphics involved in the games themselves. I know that they're largely based around the limitations of the machines, but still, I've seen some pretty nice looking stuff in those old games. And the story about the jingle in Pressure Cooker brought this one to mind.

There's an indy band that does a Mega Man based rock opera called The Protomen. Capcom had them played at Comic Con this year, but they seem like they may fit in at CGE as well.

I think someone mentioned at the con that keynotes about the arcade games and arcade game alumni would be fascinating stuff, and I'm keen to agree.

Stealing a few ideas from the local anime con...a cosplay contest could be a larf...winner gets some sort of prize, with the audience as judges of costumes. I think another good idea may be to set up a room with some empty tvs on it that people could bring in systems and games to play on; sort of a "bring your own console" area. And the venerable high score contest never gets old, although I think something to that effect went on last year with the NWC competition.

[swlovinist]

I thought this show was good, but dont see attendance getting any better unless the show branches out to other types of gamers. More diversity, more products, more forums involved. Atari 2600 and classic systems are great, but it is the tip of the iceburg to what is out there to collect. Getting some of the niche forums involved more could be great for the show to reel in other markets and generes. Classic Classic consoles were covered, how about contacting Cloud 9 productions(TRS 80 freaks?) C64.com to have Commodore represented? Neo Geo.com for the SNK fans? I am sure that there are some crazy Nes forums. How about the Penny Arcade Forums? Cheap Ass Gamer Forums? Even taking surveys at these forums would be a great idea of adding diversity to the show. There are literally hundreds of other forums that could add to the mix. Why limit ourselves? Cosplay could be a good idea, espically if you had people dress up game related. There are so many other panels and speakers that could be done on Commodore 64, Nintendo, Sega, Turbo Grafx, etc. The problem with sticking with the "ol standby" classics is that most everyone that collects those consoles has been doing it for a long time. Time for some new blood, or I fear that the show will be "stuck"

[Sothy]

the Saturday party was cool but there should be a Friday night party too.
I wound up just getting drunk and learning about Dr Who.
maybe not as big as the main after party but something for dp peeps that are there.

Be cool to have one of the DP chicks model the auction stuff.
Crystal was cool but I dont think she was a gamer and She was blanching a little holding up dirty Odyssey boxes and stuff. Maybe Laura would "ahem" do a star wars theme for the event.

Woulda been cool if PDF had his awesome music played during the show.

The trade room was awesome I found more stuff there than the actual cge booths. maybe that could be expanded upon and advertised a little ahead of time. I mean there was awesome stuff at the actual cge booths but one or 2 were priced like its ebay a week before christmas "COUGHATARI2600.COMCOUGH"

I also tried to say Hi to that John Hardie guy but he didnt say anything. I think he dislikes me or something.

[y-bot]

I would like to see some sort of re-working of the swap room. Maybe it should be part of the main room and I definitely think there should be a limit on how long you can have a table or different rates or something. Several people had swap room tables for the whole show! No offenses to those people but we vendors paid $100 for a table (was there just the one in the corner?) or $300 for a booth in advance. I'd love to see a room that size full of tables for $50 each or at least an area like that. Maybe I'm overestimating the amount of vendors that would come to an event like this but it would be awesome to have 50-100 different vendors of varying quality versus 20 quality booths. Some sort of big-time sponsorship would be nice. It's very hard to get your moneys worth in advertising but maybe someone here is in the field and could provide some tips. Free articles in the newspaper and tv news stories are the best advertising you can get but you have to know someone or be lucky. Again not my field but I know if you send out enough promo packages to the media you'll get some bites. I haven't been to this before but look at all the sponsors:

http://www.pennyarcadeexpo.com/

I think that and Comicon should be models for CGE.

Good luck and I'll see you next year!

y-bot

[ubikuberalles]

First of all I really like this thread you started, John. I appreciate it!

- Flack mentioned in another thread a place for people to sit down. I agree. When CGE was at the plaza there was a catering area with a small number of tables. I used those tables not only for lunch but also to sit down, rest and organize my acquisitions. Those tables were also a great place for visitors to meet and show off their stuff. I remember seeing the portable VCS for the first time when Ben Heckendorn sat down at one of the tables with a few of his friends. The retro-gaming couch was nice but we needed a lot more chairs and tables for people.

- Better distribution of the events schedule. I think you posted the schedule in only two places: under the CGE banner and at the entrance to the main floor (it may have been at other locations but those are the only two I remember). I understand that the final schedule isn't set until just before the show starts but it would have been really nice if you made a couple hundred photocopies of the schedule and distributed it with the program. At the very least you could post it at a bunch more locations than you did. Every time I wanted to figure out when the next speaker was scheduled, I had to run to the entrance and look it up.

- More vendor booths would be nice. You had a lot more space on that floor and I think you could have easily handled ten more booths. I don't know how hard it is to get people to buy a booth and so I understand if 30 or even 40 booths would be unrealistic. However, with more booths you could probably charge less per booth, making it more attractive to vendors.

- Man, it was a LONG walk to get something to eat during the show. Pantechnicon mentioned to me that it would be nice if there was some kind of food vending on the main floor. CGE did something like that at the Plaza. Could you have the Riviera do the same or is it too expensive? Anything to reduce the walk to the Riviera food court would be nice.

- PDF's comments about the speakers was dead on. A good balance of topics about the past, present and future of gaming would attract more attendees. I've seen all the talks about gaming past and I avoided the talks that seem to be a repeat of past CGE talks (Atari and Intellivision programmers, for example). I admit I've become a jaded CGE attendee and I wanted to see something new. A talk on the present state of gaming would be cool. A talk on the future of gaming - both modern and retro gaming - would spark my interest greatly. If you lack ideas for topics, just use the various topics that are hot on this very board: violence in gaming, the ethics of distributing the code for rare prototypes, emulators, marketing strategies of various companies and so on. I think a good brainstorming session could bring up all sorts of exciting topics. The hard part, of course, would be finding someone who would be willing to talk about it.

- The Friday night before the show I went over to the CGE floor to look for a sign or notice telling me when the show would start. I couldn't find one and had to get on the internet to find out. A simple sign at the entrance noting this fact would have been nice (if there was one then I'm sorry I missed it).

I have yet to attend a bad CGE and I don't want the organizers think I'm bashing the show in any way. CGE is the best gaming show out there and your willingness to listen to new ideas is very encouraging and shows me why you are the best.

[DreamTR]

I think there should be more tournaments...those were not highlighted as much, maybe branch off to more fighting game stuff in the Neo Classic era, which is known to drive in traffic (www.shoryuken.com).

I don't agree with a "minimum" charge for the Swap Room myself, I think it was fine the way it was because some people really only have 10-12 items for sale, and it would make no sense for them to spend $50. The $5 an hour deal is pretty good, and there were definitely wide varieties of vendors in the Swap Room for only a limited amount of time, which made it pretty important to go in there periodically throughout the show.

I know this sounds bizarre, but I think there should be a longer auction per CGE; mainly because there is so much demand/people that want to see it, with the items. This one was 2.5 hours, and I am not too sure John wants to sit up there all night, but it's definitely a great part of the show. As always, I love CGE and will attend and support it again anyway I can next year!

[swlovinist]

I definately see an imbalance between the $100 vendor table fees and the $5 swap room charges. I know of at least one vendor that noticed this and will not be getting a table next year due to this imbalance. I agree with Y-bot on this one. If I was a vendor, then what is my incentive to get a table next year? Hell, if am going to sell games, I should just rent a swap table all day and save money. I think somewhere in the middle needs to be drawn. I think that merging the swap tables the other room might be a good idea. Upping the table fee and promoting the tables would be a great way of bringing in new blood. You might get some more business if this is done that way. Maybe just a cheaper flat fee for tables for everyone. Also I want to second the idea of chairs and food.

[Mayhem]

Indeed, it got mentioned in passing why people were all day in the swap room, because it was a lot cheaper than having a table in the main area. So maybe a limit of two hours maximum per day is required, or something similar?

- Man, it was a LONG walk to get something to eat during the show. Pantechnicon mentioned to me that it would be nice if there was some kind of food vending on the main floor. CGE did something like that at the Plaza. Could you have the Riviera do the same or is it too expensive? Anything to reduce the walk to the Riviera food court would be nice.

That's probably why there wasn't concessions, it would take business away from the food court. But yeah the walk did suck the third time I had to do it...

[CX2K]

Just some thoughts to share on the swap room....

We are aware of the Swap Room scenario and have already looked at changes to the formula. It was actually supposed to be $10 an hour this year but I think we may have inadvertently posted $5 somewhere so we had to honor that. Next year will be at least $15 per hour with the possibility of a 2 hour maximum. Also, the ability to stay when others are waiting to get in will be removed. ie. if there are people waiting for a table and your hour is up, then you'll have to leave and sign up for another opening.

The bottom line is that we want to keep it affordable to the casual person who only has a few items but want to push the all-day sellers into taking a table on the main floor. At $15 an hour, someone would pay $120 for all day on Sat vs. $100 for a table on the main floor for the weekend.

[CX2K]

You guys have some great ideas. Please keep them coming!

Some more thoughts....

We agree closer food would be better. You might think that it would be as simple as telling the Riviera to go ahead and sell food. Actually, they require a minimum amount sold and if that isn't met guess who "eats" the rest (Couldn't resist). That's why we only did food at the Plaza one or two years before we stopped.

Things like seating will be better next year and we can chalk it up to being a growing pain of being in a new hotel. Many of the things we can now implement simply were hard to figure out without ever having been here before with a completely set-up show floor. Very hard to imagine what a room will look like when it's completely empty.

A longer auction would be fun. There seems to be a lot of items coming in and we hate having to limit it to 2 items per person. However it is a bit of a catch-22. I can probably keep going as long as someone keeps the Corona coming. On the other hand, you might get to a point where I just pass out from all the Corona. I felt like I was getting a little punchy at the end of this one.

Your comments on vendors, keynotes, show information, etc. are all valid and will be worked on for next year.

How about some new things? An art contest? Scavenger Hunt? Bring back Videogame Jeopardy which hasn't been seen since roughly 2002 (You ready Sniderman?). Keep those ideas coming.

John

[Sniderman]

Bring back Videogame Jeopardy which hasn't been seen since roughly 2002 (You ready Sniderman?).

Absolutely.

[ubikuberalles]

An art contest or art exhibition would be cool. Especially if we could see firsthand some of the cross stitching and bead work that has been posted on this board.

Perhaps, at the show, some of the artists could talk about their work or about gaming artwork in general?

Videogame jeopardy would be great! I remember it from years ago and that was fun to watch.

I liked the T-shirt toss from the skybox. Continuing that tradition would be great. If the skybox could be used for something else during the show, that would be cool. (I can't think of anything at the moment).

[swlovinist]

Great Idea on the swap room changes. Is there any way that items for the auction could be on display for a longer period of time? I think that this would only benifit the auction, as people would be able to observe more in detail things that they are going to bid hundreds(and thousands) of dollars on.

[Lady Jaye]

Videogame Jeopardy is certainly something I'd love to participate to!

And if you need a female volunteer to present the auction prizes...

[ubersaurus]

A couple more keynote ideas...maybe something on handhelds? I'm thinking the old dedicated ones from the 70s and 80s, but getting someone from the early 90s NOA might bring out some interested Game Boy stories.

I'd also be interested in some of the "players" from the genesis era Sega of America, to talk about their experiences there...as well as what went wrong with Saturn.

Or maybe something involved with the marketing of games? There have been some memorable tv and magazine ads over the years, culminating with the ARGs used to sell Halo and Gun. Although I'm not sure how easy it would be to get anyone involved with that particular field, it would be an interesting keynote.

A homebrewers keynote would be a real fascinating listen as well. Homebrewed games, adaptors, accessories, and portable consoles all come to mind.

Art contest would be really cool, I saw some nice craftwork at the last expo.

[evg2000]

First off, I'm not complaining, if I where a vendor paying good money for a table, only to have people selling stuff for 50%-75% cheaper than what I'm selling stuff for I would be upset also.

I don't know that it should be a swap room if the rates are $15+ an hour as there won't be any swapping going on (has there been any i the last few years?)

I personally won't be selling anything at $15+ per hour, based on the prices I sold things for, and what I paid for them I think I cleared about $200, which I then spent on the vendors in the main hall.

Since I do spend about 3 - 4 hours in the swap room between Sat and Sun, if I don't bring things to sell that will be more time for me to have fun! Also, it will be a lot easier to go through the airport.

Maybe do away with the swap room entirely, and make it a room where people can kick back and talk, play games, do whatever. That would take care of the swap room controversy and add a place for people to talk, no don't try and charge $5.00 to go in the room and talk

Whatever you guys decide to do, there will be people upset, but no matter what you guys do a great job!

thanks,
Charles