2011 Gen Con -- An Experience to Remember

Each summer tens of thousands of gamers take over a Midwestern American city to experience the “Best Four Days of Gaming,” the Gen Con gaming convention.  Comic book and pop culture fans have San Diego’s Comic Con, Hobby gamers have Gen Con.  In 2001, the convention became so large that outgrew Milwaukee’s large MECCA convention center.   For the past nine years, Gen Con has been held in Indianapolis’ large Indiana Convention Center and they have been filling it to the brim.  Since last year the Indiana Convention Center has doubled in size.  But like the freeways of Southern California, the increase in accessible flow space has quickly been filled with excited gamers.  

Gen Con LLC won’t release official attendance figures until Sunday night, but those who had pre-purchased attendance badges with the expectation of quickly picking them up were in for a surprise.  Both the night before the formal festivities began, and the first morning of the convention, the line to pick up badges extended for blocks.  Wise where those who had their badges Fedexed to them before the show.

The event is filled with PR panels where publishers announce new product, industry pros discuss breaking into the industry, game auctions, two awards celebrations, and game design workshops.   Oh...and there is a ton of game playing going on as well.

In short, it's like Comic Con before Hollywood descended onto the occasion.  It's an event for Hobby Gamers and by Hobby Gamers.  Peter Adkinson, the Owner of Gen Con LLC, is a long time veteran of the gaming industry who says that "in recent years I've hungrily devoured many of the games that might be labeled 'indie RPGs' because I love how their designers are turning upside down so many traditional notions about how RPGs 'have to be.'"  This veteran's quote hits on something amazing.  In a downturned economy, the gaming industry is booming.  While sales figures for many games may be below record levels, there has never been a greater variety of excellent gaming product available for play.  What's more, the Indie Games are growing in their audience and pushing new demographic ground as well as new mechanical ground.

Speaking of Indie Games -- Wednesday Night, the Diana Jones Awards awards celebration was held.  The Diana Jones Awards are an annual award that is won by something that represents "excellence in gaming."  It's a broad award criteria that has allowed for a broad array of prior winners.  People have won the award for their contribution to the community, conventions have won for their charity work, websites have won, and yes games have won.  This year, the excellent Indie Game "Fiasco" 

by Jason Morningstar took home the prize.

Fiasco is inspired by cinematic tales of small time capers gone disastrously wrong – inspired by films like Blood Simple, Fargo, The Way of the Gun, Burn After Reading, and A Simple Plan. You’ll play ordinary people with powerful ambition and poor impulse control. There will be big dreams and flawed execution. It won’t go well for them, to put it mildly, and in the end it will probably all go south in a glorious heap of jealousy, murder, and recrimination. Lives and reputations will be lost, painful wisdom will be gained, and if you are really lucky, your guy just might end up back where he started.

Fiasco is a GM-less game for 3-5 players, designed to be played in a few hours with six-sided dice and no preparation. During a game you will engineer and play out stupid, disastrous situations, usually at the intersection of greed, fear, and lust. It’s like making your own Coen brothers movie, in about the same amount of time it’d take to watch one.

There is much more to report, but I am getting ready to head out to a panel hosted by Margaret Weis Productions where they will be announcing their new game license. They say it is a HUGE license.

Some Thoughts on the 2010 Diana Jones Award

Yesterday, the mysterious and secretive committee behind the Diana Jones Award announced this year's nominees for the prestigious annual award.

One of the things that I really like about Diana Jones short lists is the diversity of the nominees. As usual, this year's list of nominees is an impressive one that combines things that are well known in the hobby as well as those that are more obscure. Also as in prior years, the list is a mix of games that incorporate new ways of infusing narrative experiences in a gaming format, services that benefit the hobby as a whole, excellence in game design, and artistic workmanship.

The committee is to be praised for their list this year. The nominees are discussed in the Committee's press release:

The committee of the Diana Jones Award has released the shortlist for its 2010 award. This year the shortlist contains four nominees that in the opinion of the committee exemplify the very best that the world of hobby-gaming has produced in the last twelve months. In alphabetical order, they are:

BOARDGAMEGEEK, a website edited by Scott Alden and Derk Solko; CHAOS IN THE OLD WORLD, a boardgame by Eric Lang, published by Fantasy Flight Games; KAGEMATSU, a role-playing game by Danielle Lewon, published by Cream Alien Games; MONTSEGUR 1244, a role-playing game by Frederik Jensen, published by Thoughtful Games

The winner of the 2010 Diana Jones Award will be announced on the evening of Wednesday 4th August, at the annual Diana Jones Award and Freelancer Party in Indianapolis, the unofficial start of the Gen Con Indygames convention.

ABOUT THE NOMINEES

Boardgamegeek
A website edited by
http://www.boardgamegeek.com

BoardGameGeek is a resource without peer for players of board and card games. Its comprehensive database is a first and best reference for both staunch grognards and casual non-gamers, presenting not only reference data about games but also the reviews, opinions, expansions, photos, and session reports of its membership. The site's internal economy effectively rewards those who continue to make the site broader, deeper, and stronger, and as a result its community is smart, enthusiastic, and steadfast. In 2010, BoardGameGeek celebrates its tenth anniversary, adding longevity to the roll of its merits. In one small corner of human endeavor, BoardGameGeek's exhaustive knowledge base, devoted community, and collaborative bedrock exemplify the absolute best that the Internet has to offer society.

Chaos in the Old World
A board-game by Eric Lang
Published by Fantasy Flight Games
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_minisite.asp?eidm=84

In Eric Lang's Chaos In The Old World, players take the roles of four cruel and hateful gods, competing—and cooperating—to debase and destroy the human world. Lang takes the heart and flesh of the Warhammer cosmos and stretches it as tight as a drumhead across a boardgame that richly evokes the baroque insanity of its source material while remaining elegant and rational in design. Side elements feed game play rather than distracting from it, and each god fulfills its individual character while reinforcing the game's structure as a whole. The basic mechanics repeat and reveal themselves from new angles, channeling competition and fueling flavor as the game builds to its climax. Simultaneously rewarding planning and immersion, Chaos In The Old World masterfully bridges the board-game design gap between European architecture and American art.

Kagematsu
A role-playing game by Danielle Lewon
Published by Cream Alien Games
http://sites.google.com/site/creamaliengames

With Kagematsu, creator published roleplaying games boldly continue their advance into uncharted territory. Set in Japan, the game flips genders on the players, casting men as village women whose efforts to romance the wandering ronin Kagematsu are judged by the woman playing him. The text is lucid and elegant. The game plays to a natural conclusion in four or five hours—resolving the fates of the women, Kagematsu, and the village—with no need to force things along to finish on schedule. And play is lush, anxious, and partakes of great dramatic energy from its tight mechanics and device of gender-reversal.

Montsegur 1244
A role-playing game by Frederik Jensen
Published by Thoughtful Games
http://thoughtfulgames.com/montsegur1244/index.html

Montsegur 1244, by Frederik Jensen, uses actual history to frame a tightly focused game that explores faith, loyalty, and the bonds of kinship. Using the final, brutal siege in the Catholic crusade against the Cathar heresy as a backdrop, players take the roles of true believers trapped in the fortress of Montsegur. As the inevitable endgame draws closer, each player must decide—will their character abandon their faith and recant, or will they burn for what they believe? This single, simple choice drives the entire game. Montsegur1244 succeeds brilliantly in evoking the horror and pathos of the doomed Cathars, and combines the best of Nordic and North American roleplaying traditions. The game is carefully structured where it needs to be and completely freeform where it doesn’t. Elegant, simple mechanics support play that is often surprisingly emotional. The choices players are presented with are impossible to reconcile. The tangled web of family, love, duty and belief only amplify the difficulty of the decision each must eventually make.

ABOUT THE AWARD
The Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming was founded and first awarded in 2001. It is presented annually to the person, product, company, event or any other thing that has, in the opinion of its mostly anonymous committee of games industry alumni, luminaries and illuminati, best demonstrated the quality of 'excellence' in the world of hobby-gaming in the previous year. The winner of the Award receives the Diana Jones trophy.

Past winners include industry figures Peter Adkison and Jordan Weisman, the role-playing games Nobilis, Sorcerer, and My Life with Master, and the board-game Ticket to Ride. The 2009 winner was the card-game Dominion designed by Donald X. Vaccarino and published by Rio Grande Games.

This is the tenth year of the Award.

CONTACT
For more information, see the website www.dianajonesaward.org or contact
the committee directly: committee@dianajonesaward.orgthe committee directly: committee@dianajonesaward.org

As I wrote above, this is indeed a list filled with games and services worthy of nomination. It is also a list that deserves some commentary.

First, the nomination of Boardgamegeek seems to be a gimme at first glance. The website has been a hub for hobby board gaming enthusiasts for the past decade and is an invaluable resource for players and collectors. I wish the site was more user friendly with regard to helping me find news on upcoming games. When one has limited time, paging through the site can become a tad bit of a chore -- a pleasurable chore filled with new and exciting information, but a chore none the less.

That's just at first glance. At deeper glance one realizes that the committee ought to have nominated GeekDo, the website that is the descendant of Boardgamegeek. It contains all of the BGG pages, but now includes areas for role playing game and video game collectors as well. The site has moved beyond boardgaming and has become the best representation of the gaming hobby as a whole.

Chaos in the Old World is a marvel. The game proved that it was still possible, and desirable, for a company to make a board game based upon a miniature game's setting. Back in the 80s-90s Games Workshop produced scads of wonderful games like Warrior Knights, Blood Royale, Doom of the Eldar, Battle for Armageddon. Some of these were board games with no relation to GW's miniatures lines, but some where and these were quality media tie-in games. When Fantasy Flight Games announced they had an agreement with GW to produce games based on Warhammer, and 40k, intellectual property, the hobby rejoiced knowing that some great games were going to be re-published. What they didn't know was that FFG had creators like Eric Lang and Jeff Tidball who would be designing new and wonderful games to add to the pantheon of the GW boxed board game. Lang's Chaos in the Old World is one of the best games of deities doing battle every designed, it is also one of the best media tie-in games produced.

I had never heard of Kagematsu. After reading the reasoning behind the nomination and visiting the website, I immediately purchased the game. This is a beautiful looking game, the component design alone is art, with an intriguing premise. I don't think my regular gaming group will have any interest in the game, but I will love reading it. I don't know how vital the "gender reversal" elements of play are, I think that the shifting of what constitutes protagonist player roles is in and of itself intriguing. Playing the villagers instead of the adventuring hero is a greatly overlooked focus.

Montsegur 1244 is the Grey Ranks of this year's nomination group. The game takes the final days of the Crusade against the Cathars and puts the players in the role of the besieged heretics. Throughout play, the players explore the emotions and consequences of choosing religious faith over life itself. The game combines tragedy and a powerful historic setting, like Grey Ranks, and I look forward to reading more about this product. I am also a fan of the movement in games that attempts to structure play that is educational and emotionally powerful. These are the games that make claims like "games can change the world" less laughable than people might otherwise think and that return play to the "sacred" sphere it originated from.

There is a company that I would have lobbied for were I a member of the Diana Jones Committee because it meets quite a few of the standards exhibited by past and present Diana Jones nominees. I would have added Victory Point Games to the list. Victory Point Games is a DIY gaming company that is affiliated with a game design program at a Southern California university. The company not only makes a wide array of games covering a wide array of play styles, but they have it as a motto that he who plays should design. A key goal of the company is to turn its customers into game designers. There are only three other companies/institutions that I think can make a strong claim to that goal: Wolfgang Baur, Robin Laws, and the folks at Gameplaywright.

Any company that has as a central goal turning its customers into designers is definitely thinking about the future of the hobby in ways that deserve recognition. Maybe the committee will consider Victory Point Games next year.

Diana Jones Awards Committee Announces the 2009 Shortlist

Among the awards given out in the gaming universe, none is as enigmatic as the Diana Jones Award. Since 2001, the award has been handed out to a worthy winner selected by the anonymous Diana Jones Award Committee, which is made up of "games-industry alumni and illuminati". The award is dedicated to rewarding "the person, product, company, event or any other thing that has, in the opinion of its mostly anonymous committee of games industry luminaries, best demonstrated the quality of “excellence” in the world of hobby-gaming in the previous year."

The award bucks the continuing trend of "people's choice" awards that dominate the hobby today, from the Ennies to the more democratic than ever Origin Awards. The Diana Jones Award isn't about popularity, it is about "excellence." What excellence is as a variable is known only to the secret cabal who votes for the Diana Jones Award, but in past years the winners have come from very different corners of the gaming hobby.

Last year the award was given out to two recipients (there was a tie):

1. Grey Ranks -- an independant rpg where players take on the role of youths during the 1944 Warsaw Uprising. In this case excellence referred to the way the game used simulation as a powerful presentation of history and for pushing the art of narrative storytelling to a new level.
2. Open Design -- Wolfgang Baur's efforts at creating a game design community supported by patrons involved in the creation process was awarded for its contribution to the hobby.

In 2006, the award went not to a game but to a Convention Charity Auction. Excellence can be defined in many ways, but certainly promoting your hobby through good works certainly qualifies.

This year's short list includes one real surprise and others that fit within what many would view as a "standard" view of gaming excellence, which is to say the list includes some very fun games. The other nominee is "Jeepform," a style of role playing that would make the "role playing is an artform" advocates of the early days of the hobby very proud.

This year's list is as follows:

• Dominion, a card game by Donald X. Vaccarino (published by Rio Grande Games)
• Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition, a role-playing game by Rob Heinsoo, Mike Mearls, and James Wyatt (published by Wizards of the Coast)
• Jeepform, a game-style from Scandinavia (fostered by the Vi åker jeep collective)
• Mouse Guard, a role-playing game by Luke Crane (published by Archaia Studios Press)
• Sweet Agatha, a mystery game by Kevin Allen Jr (self-published)

The winner of the 2009 Award will be announced on Wednesday 12th August, at the annual Diana Jones Award and Freelancer Party in Indianapolis, the unofficial start of the Gen Con Indy convention.

About the Award
The Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming was founded and first awarded in 2001. It is presented annually to the person, product, company, event or any other thing that has, in the opinion of its mostly anonymous committee of games industry luminaries, best demonstrated the quality of “excellence” in the world of hobby-gaming in the previous year. The winner of the Award receives the Diana Jones trophy.

The short-list and eventual winner are chosen by the Diana Jones Committee, a mostly anonymous group of games-industry alumni and illuminati.

Past winners include Peter Adkison, Jordan Weisman, the role-playing games Nobilis, Sorcerer, and My Life with Master, and the board-game Ticket to Ride. This is the ninth year of the Award.

My personal hope is that 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons (4e) will win the day, but I wouldn't place any money on it. I believe that 4e has done something that has become rare in role playing games today. It has attempted to create a rules set that appeals to new gamers, it is an active attempt to bring new people into the hobby with an elegant system that remains exciting throughout long term campaign play. To do this the game incorporated elements from the Burning Wheel system (the skill challenge system is very similar to the resolution system for BW), the Savage Worlds game system (4e was designed to be played with minimal preparation, helping those who have less time to play still have an opportunity for deep play), Feng Shui (the inclusion of minion rules for those pests who should be easily dispatched), and Trading Card Games (the inclusion of a unified tag system which are coherent and consistent). The game is a marvel to play and is very much on the cutting edge of game design and community promotion, don't even get me into how the Organized Play elements of 4e help small store to promote the hobby. 4e is a unified effort to promote role playing as a hobby.

All the others are good games that push gaming innovations in different ways and deserve consideration.