With my second GenCon in the books, and my routine somewhat recovered, I thought I'd take a few minutes and offer my thoughts on the event.
The USTA held 6 events this year: 3 Learn to Play/Casual events, 2 Swiss/Round Robin tournament qualifiers, and a Double Elimination finals containing the top 4 from each qualifier. All events were successful! We had a good turnout, no issues with equipment or people, and all who attended seemed to enjoy themselves. We welcome feedback about these events so that we can continue to cater to what the community wants. We have already received some tips for next year and will try to work those in to our plans.
We were lucky to have Greater than Games as our major sponsor this year. They provided the means to offer bigger prizes and, just as importantly, if not more so, they let us hold the finals in their demo room. While the play hall is nice for visibility, it lacks the professionalism and the reduced ambient noise that the demo room offers.
Being a bigger company than Cheapass Games means that GtG was able to advertise more at the convention. It was extremely nice to see Tak in big, bold letters in the main corridor at the convention, where 70,000 walked by throughout the long weekend. This kind of publicity should help our small game grow in popularity quicker than the word of mouth advertising we have been relying on.
I got to see my puzzles in print after happening upon the Game Trade Magazine booth! This was exciting, as I have only seen the pdf proofs up until now.
Outside of the Tak events, I crammed in as much fun as I could. I participated in a one-off D&D session, survived the True Dungeon, stayed up way too late, played some new games, walked the exhibition hall, and made a couple crafted items for my kids. Even though I overbooked this year and had to skip 3 of my events because of reasons like eating, I regret nothing. I would rather pack it to bursting than waste time during this once a year happening.
The most amazing part of GenCon: the people that attend. It is incredible to be able to interact with such nice people that, while they may not share your exact interests, are willing to listen to you babble on about them...and then tell you about their interests with such passion that it makes you want to go out right now and try it. If you have never been, I highly recommend looking into it next year!
P.S. Here's a White-to-Move Tinue puzzle from one of the tournament qualifiers that I chanced upon:
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