Re: [BNW] From Origins, the latest from Mr. Forbeck (sorta)

[The White Crow <whytcrow@io.com>]

>According to the report, Mr. F is hoping to hear some news by December 
>concerning a pickup of "Brave New World" by an unnamed publisher. If it 
>doesn't happen, he will consider an alternative, like maybe 
>self-publishing or something else.

That's quite a long time to wait to find out anything.

>Incidentally, the games went well at Origins. If any of you are RPGA 
>Network members, and have influence on what plays at conventions, request 
>the BNW tournament "Snuff Club." And I found a great series of superhero 
>miniatures from Lance & Laser called "Living Legends"...they even had a 
>contemporary Private Eye and slinkly Secretary in their line.

I had terrible luck with the games I played in, personally.  The Snuff Club 
was fun, but I'd misread my booklet or somehow something got screwed up and 
I was registered for it twice.  One other game was canceled for the slot I 
chose, and all the other slots were filled.  I went to another game and 
instead of a game, it was a playtest discussion, with the adventure being 
run in a different slot.

So I ended up really only playing in one game.  I ran four, which I 
personally think went rather well, so I'm happy with that.

>What didn't go well at Origins was the rest of the con. The only food 
>available was in the food court; there  was no McDonalds anywhere near the 
>convention center, although the in-mall food court had a Subway and a 
>couple of good independent fast food stands. The "three blocks from the 
>convention center to your hotel" turned out to be like five blocks as 
>measured in contemporary physical reality, plus three blocks inside the 
>convention center itself to get to the gaming area. Compared even to a 
>small town like Orlando, Columbus OH is hicksville. At noontime, you could 
>have a Bomber explode herself in most of the buildings downtown and no one 
>would be hurt.

As for food, they had a food service in the convention center itself 
(rather mediocre food, but it was still there).  There was a Wendy's about 
3 blocks from the convention center, and perhaps a dozen more expensive 
resteraunts otherwise nearby.  (Which, I admit, were a bit pricier than I 
wanted most of the time).  North Market was 3 blocks away, which I never 
made it to personally but apparently has some good stuff.

I can't comment on hotel-to-con.center distance, b/c I stayed in the Hyatt. 
:)  But I did want to point out that there was lots more food options and 
really, they aren't the con's fault.

Columbus is a very beautiful city -- I had a friend take me on a tour, and 
yes, there were very few folks enjoying the unseasonbly good 
weather.  (From what I understand, hot and humid is generally the order of 
things).  German Villiage has a wonderful book store, among the rest of its 
neat history, there's a neat park on the riverside that has medival-style 
statues of mythic beasts (a place I'd live in if I...um...lived in Columbus).

>I had a chance to speak to the Significant Other of artist Phil Foglio 
>(whose book "Girl Genius" is great, funny steampunk, and whose 
>"XXXenophile" is amusing, human-centric and non-exploitative porn). She 
>said they did half the business as the previous year's con. I mention this 
>not to knock a convention, but to provide a basis for others of you to 
>judge what happens at next year's Origins. I don't plan to be there, 
>partially due to my iffy experiences there.

Never been to Origings before myself, but I heard similar commentary from 
many people about it being small.  And then I hear that there were 
somethign like 10K people there.  ???  I did pick up some delightful 
products (such as El Hazard by Guardians of Order and Chrononauts by Looney 
Labs), poked at lots of things, found some incredibly cheap Pikachu/Digimon 
toys for my son (he's 9, what do you expect?), and generally had lots of fun.

The only thing I missed that I wish I could've gotten to do was meet Matt 
in person.

I don't know if it is a con I'd generally want to go to on a regular basis 
-- much of it focuses on board/war games and while I like board games a 
lot, I'm not going to a con to play them.  Although if I continue to write 
for Grey Ghost Press, then I'll probably be at Origins next year anyway, 
again playing booth slave for Wizard's Attic and pointing people to the man 
in the hat with a Kiwi bird on top.

However, that assumes I survive GenCon. ;)

Jennifer
--
The White Crow
Author:  The Deryni Roleplaying Game (Coming Nov. 2001, Grey Ghost Press)
My RPG pages:  http://www.io.com/~whytcrow/
Living Writing: A Column at http://www.free-epress.com/columns/index.htm