GenCon 2012 Lightning Trip

GenCon 2012 went very quickly for me this year. I was only able to make it for Thursday. Even so, I had a nice time and got several items checked off my to-do list. As you can see in the picture above, the place was PACKED. I'm guessing even more people came for Friday and Saturday. Everyone I talked to said sales were doing very well.

I spent the morning chatting with the AEG folks and pitching a new game to them. I would say it went pretty well, but we'll have to see how it turns out later. I understand that a few copies of Courtier got played at the big shindig Friday night.

Next, I tried to buy 7 Wonders: Cities, but the 200 (!) copies had gone in a matter of minutes after the doors opened. I did buy a copy of Dominion: Dark Ages, which was in adequate supply. So far, I've managed to play four games of this--I like the new cards! Lots of room to explore.

FFG had Star Wars out the wazoo this year. I snapped a pic of their surface of the Death Star setup for X-Wing/Tie Fighter game. Looks pretty snazzy. And, of course, lots of Star Wars costumes:

 

Some balloon artists decided to make a dragon during the con this year. Wow.

I'm not sure what game this is, but what a setup!

Kingdom of Solomon had a pretty low profile at the show. James didn't get a booth, but he did demos in the gaming hall. Hope we sold a few of these . . .

Later in the day, I shuffled around behind Dan from Game Salute as we searched for card sleeves to complete a playable prototype of the upcoming Skyway Robbery (more about this in the weeks to come). We cut the cards and chatted about future plans. I got to demo this once for some friends--it's really starting to come together.

I got to see the Steve Jackson Games people for a few minutes. Andrew Hackard has become quite the celebrity these days, doing a big signing at the booth. Once Ogre clears the docket, perhaps there will be a bit of focus to spare on Revolution!-related products. I've been mentioning this possibility to lots of people in the hopes of creating a groundswell of demand. We'll see . . .

I took a nice break in the afternoon for an early dinner with the couple who backed KoS on Kickstarter at the top level last year. It was great hanging out with them again!

After a few more demos, handshaking and chatting, I headed back to Cincinnati, arriving home about midnight. All in all, it was a worthwhile trip.