Random Dialogue: GenCon Indy 2004
Dialogue, 2004-08-25

City of Villains

The only big news to come out of the con was the revelation that City of Villains would have two new staff members attached to the game. As the press release mentioned, Cryptic Studios has hired Zeb Cook and Shane Hensley to work on the design and writing for CoV. Dave Cook is an amazing guy. The Planescapes setting for Dungeons and Dragons was a really unique twist on the idea. Back in the day, that was about one of the weirdest games on the market, with truly original design, writing, and artwork. If you've ever played Deadlands you know that Shane Hensley is a creative powerhouse as well. The "Weird West" roleplaying game is another original and entertaining game. Between the two of these guys, City of Villains should be quite a piece of work. I was there when the Statesman made the announcement to an appreciative crowd, and you can check it out yourself if you'd like to.

Part 1 (50 Megs)
Part 2 (13 Megs)

Dungeons and Dragons 30th Anniversary

Wizards of the Coast went all out this year in celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Dungeons and Dragons RPG. There was a huge party where they gave away free totebags and posters (though not to me, sadly). There were seminars, live dungeoncrawling events, and lots of hype about the new Eberron setting, which I've discussed in a previous Random Dialogue. With a rules fix as recent as last year, D&D is a fresh, exciting part of the roleplaying industry again.

GURPS 4th Edition

Another old warhorse of the gaming industry got a facelift this year, with Steve Jackson games releasing their newest edition of the GURPS rules set. While GURPS books have always been a staple part of a gamer's collection, I've always had trouble actually finding people who *played* the game. The new rules set is sleeker, simpler, and much more intuitive. (I also got a t-shirt!) At the same time the GURPS system is still the most flexible rules set out there, leaving the playing field wide open for whatever vista or setting a GM and his players want to take on.

Star Wars Galaxies: Jump to Lightspeed and Everquest II

SOE's booth was dominated by large screen monitors allowing folks to play in the Everquest II Beta. I took a hafling for a spin, and it wasn't terrible. I didn't really have enough time to get into much, but the portion of the tutorial I checked out was easy to follow. The voiceovers really made more of a difference than I was expecting. I've gotten so used to playing MMOGs basically without sound, because that element of the game isn't very important. It'll be interesting to see what things are like there when I get my crack at it later this year. Galaxies, on the other hand, wasn't even in the SOE booth. I had to head over to the nVidia booth to play Jump to Lightspeed. The brief time I had behind the controls of a YT-3100 was, I will admit, fun. It was not, however, "I'll take you back despite the way you've treated me" wrong. And in light of recent events, I'm very glad I am cured of the SWG bug.

World of Warcraft

WoW's only appearance at the con was through a pair of PC's at the nVidia booth. PCs with very, very long lines. The servers were (as you may have heard) up and down the entire length of the convention thanks to the new Hunter Patch, but there were still people in line at all hours of the convention waiting for their chance to check out Azeroth. Listening to people talk about the game around the booth, it's obvious that even with all the info that has come out about World of Warcraft, folks are still waiting with baited breathe for it's release. If you're one of those people, come back on Friday for the next MMORPGDot World of Warcraft Beta Journal.

Dark Age of Camelot

Mythic's game occupied a pair of nVidia booth PCs as well. There, they were showing off recent changes to the game through the realms war expansions and free releases. Other folks got a chance to look at art and animations from the upcoming Catacombs expansion to Dark Age of Camelot. The Mythic employees there seemed most amused, and had a steady stream of folks checking out DAoC all week long. They also held a shindig on Wednesday night that I couldn't make it to, thanks to my freaking hotel. (/fist of fury at the Marriot) If any of you Mythic folks are reading this, I look forward to meeting you in the future.

Overall Impressions

GenCon is one of the few times every year when a large portion of the tabletop gaming community comes together under one roof. Not only is being a dork socially acceptable there, chances are good that your dorkitude will be inversly proportional to your cool factor. Shouting a python quote at a crowd will get you a chorus of responses, as opposed to dull looks. You can make bad jokes about dice, dragons, or chainmail and have an appreciative laugh from passers by. And, as every year, the costumes get more intricate and interesting. This year I saw several people cosplaying as characters from City of Heroes, and at least one rasta Troll from World of Warcraft. This year was a reassuring sign that the massive games that were spawned from the tabletop setting are, to one degree or another, coming home to roost. Though GenCon-SoCal is far and away a more MMOG-friendly environment, I hope that GenCon-Indy will continue to see visitors from the Massive industry in years to come.

One last note: our Editor-in-Chief, Ekim, is going to be taking an absence from the site for a little while. Luckily, the reason for his time off is very good news. Ekim is now the proud father of a beautiful baby girl! Everyone and RPGDot and MMORPGDot sends well wishes and happy times to Ekim and his wife. In the meantime, I'm going to be steering the boat until the captain comes back. Feel free to harass me if you have any questions or concerns. And congrats again to Ekim!