GenCon 2004: Saturday

Posted by Bryant on August 21, 2004 at 09:58 PM

One day remaining. I can make it, truly I can.

Jason S. clarified that the WoD stuff wasn't supposed to go on sale till Saturday morning; I was overly confused by handwritten signs and general lack of info at the White Wolf booth. Of course, I'm sure the pale pups would have just told me what was up if I'd asked. I hate asking directions, too. Anyhow, I got the core rulebook and Vampire: the Requiem this morning. The mechanics look quite solid; the world is different but not very different, which is a bit disappointing for me but which is also probably the right decision for the market in general.

I found time to spend a little while at the Forge booth. Nice to see Scott and Matt and meet Ralph and say hi to Mike Miller and so on. The No Press RPG Anthology showed up and I got it and it's very cool. I really like the anthology format, because it gives little games a chance, and I think a fair portion of this book will prove usable. Having Pretender in written form alone makes me happy.

Wizkids' Pirates of the Spanish Main is maybe the surprise coolness I'd been looking for. The key element is that once you're done pushing the little plastic cardstock pirate ships around, you can disassemble them and snap them back into the credit card sized cards you started with, so in theory you could carry a fleet around in your wallet, although in practice they'd be a little bulky. Still, they're far more compact than CCG decks.

I played in Bob Karcher's "The Frogs of War" game today; it has been too long since I played Adventure and this scenario was a ton of fun. "You might not realize it's a giant Turk menacing a dentist, but it sounds strange." "I snatch up a loaf of French bread to use as a rudimentary rapier." "The history of this cheese is tainted with murder and insanity, like many other white cheeses." It's really pleasant playing pulp with a bunch of quick-witted players and a snappy GM.

Alas, I subsequently missed out on Four Color al Fresco since I was the only one who showed up at the game. Dan Bongert and woodelf gave me a very nice overview of the game and let me keep all the character sheets, which soothed my sadness somewhat.

Some food notes: the bread pudding at the Ram is literally six inches long, three inches wide, and two inches tall. It's a loaf of bread pudding. It ambushed me and defeated me utterly. The chili at Hard Times Cafe is very convenient to the convention center and very good. There are more convenient places to get breakfast than the Red Eye Cafe, but I liked the Red Eye's coffee and they have wireless.

One con note: the bootleg DVD vendors in the dealer's hall have been shut down. Good for GenCon.