Gen-Con Twenty Ten, Baby

Well, that time of year has come and gone again. The time of year when nerds descend upon our fair Circle City. The time of year when you can find humongous posters of goblins, trolls, and dragons hanging from the rafters of the Ram brewery downtown. The time of year when it's odd to NOT see a zombie, vampire, or elf taking a leisurely stroll down the sidewalks of Indianapolis. The time of year when I eat too much greasy food, and have to hope that my stomach can recover within a three day period, knowing it's not likely to happen.

It's Gen-Con, baby!

Gen-Con, for the uninitiated, is a convention that is centered around gaming. All types of gaming. Boardgames. Role-playing games. Video games. Miniatures games. Card games. Game-related media, such as artwork and shirts. Basically, it's Nerdfest. And it's really, really cool.

Gen-Con started in Milwaukee, but moved to Indianapolis a few years back. It's the largest or 2nd largest convention held at the Convention Center, and is the only convention held there that is open 24 hours a day. It lasts Thursday thru Sunday, and takes up the entire convention center. There were thirty thousand people there this year. Yes, I said "thousand".

This was our 3rd year of attending, and to say that the first time we went blew us away would be like saying that in the grand scheme of the universe, a piece of sand is "kinda small". We were astounded by what we saw. People were dressed up in ALL sorts of costumes from comic book heroes and villains to Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) characters to Star Wars/Star Trek to just about anything you can think of. Getting through the exhibit hall was like trying to see just how many squirming fish you could fit in to a box; and the "fish" analogy also works because it could be used to describe the odor of some of the people there. Remember when I said it's open 24/7 for the four days? Yeah, some people REALLY take advantage of that, and DON'T take advantage of the free shower that comes complimentary with every hotel room reservation.

We mostly went, and continue to go, for the boardgames. We're not roleplayers; we've never played pen-and-paper D&D, or any other RPG. The video games are cool to see, but lining up to play them would mean waiting in line for approximately 8 years. And that was something I wasn't willing to do with so much other cool stuff to see. Some of the cooler things you can do there include getting demonstrations of games put on by the publisher, or if you're lucky, designer of the game (nothing like learning the rules from the guy who made the game), playing games that haven't been released yet (and supplying your input on the mechanics of the game, how it plays, etc), and getting to play games you've never played before, either in what they call the Library, or just pulling up a chair next to some fellow nerds playing something that looks cool and playing with them. One of our friends who goes, Corey, and I have a running joke that began the first year we went together: "That game looks cool". And that was pretty much the only criteria we had for a game. We didn't care how long it took, how boring it might be, or if you had to sacrifice a goat mid-game; if it looked cool, we were in. So ever since then, if we walk by a game, we look at each other and say "Hey Corey(Matt)....that game looks cool". Re-reading that, it's decidedly funnier if you're there though.

Did I mention there were costumes? OH MAN are there costumes. Great ones, terrible ones, ones that make sense, some that don't, some that fit the people wearing them pretty well, and some who have the costume approximately 8x smaller than they should be. You see lots of women in corsets, and a few of them REALLY don't need to be. Corsets are not designed for 350+ pound women. Seriously. We saw a lot of "Link" from Zelda people this year. Most were bad, but some were pretty good. What's odd is that they were all women (for those not in the Zelda-know, Link was a guy). So I found that confusing. We saw some Stormtrooper's from Star Wars wearing Kilts; apparently robots need a breeze from time to time too. There were plenty of scantily clad women; most didn't look as good as they thought they did, though. There were some pretty freaking sweet costumes though, as always, and I'll try to get some links shortly.

Oh, and if you've never watched The Guild, and have any appreciation for humor regarding online roleplaying games, PLEASE watch it. And most of the characters from that web-show were at Gen-Con. So that was pretty cool to see better-than-pseudo celebrities! (Plus, the red-head is REALLY cute!)

The first time we went, we met two friends of ours that we have "met" playing a computer game online. The last two years we've invited both of them to stay at our house, and that's been a lot of fun. Corey brings a ton of games, I have a number, and the four of us (Corey, the other friend Jed, Kriste, and myself) play as many games as we can in 3 1/2 days. We shipped the kids off (Henry to Kriste's folks, and Jack to mine), so we had more freedom to do what we wanted when and where we wanted. It was almost like we were grown-ups again! We played long games, short games, fantasy-themed games, an Incan-themed game, board games, card games, war games, and even a horse game. Yes, I said "horse game". And it was pretty fun, so shut it!

The biggest problem with Gen-Con is that I get a "gamer's high", and have a TON of fun for 3 1/2 days, then the other 361 1/2 days of the year, I go through withdrawal. We've met a couple of people in-town who play games, so hopefully we'll get together with them more often. And I'm trying to trick our neighbors in to playing, too, because they've really become some of our best friends. We play outside with them most days, because our kids are all the same age, so I'm hoping that I can finagle them in to playing, either via tomfoolery or shenanigans; I've not yet decided which will be more successful. Suggestions are welcome.

So yeah. We played some great games, hung out with good friends, ate some good food, stayed up too late at night, and just had a fantastic 4 days last week. Just twelve short months until we do it all again. And I can't wait.

EDIT:
Kriste put up some pics of the 'Con here!!!