| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Strahd Von Zarovich |
Posted - 04 May 2003 : 13:07:07
Hi all,
Today I received an email from Peter Adkison of Gencon LLC. I have included the mail below:-
Thanks for writing regarding your thoughts for Gen Con Europe.
Let me respond to some of you comments:
Hi there. I was sent a mail today with some information that you had posted. I just wondered if this is true and not some ruse?
It’s true. It’s not a ruse!
I always thought that the move to Europe in general might have been a bad move, as there is a massive core of gamers predominantly in the UK. But to pull out UK too could prove damaging to the gaming industry. Gencon has been THE gaming event in the UK for many many years, and will be sorely missed. It is the only real event where people can get together to share there enthusiasm for the gaming that they love. I know that there are other smaller organizations over the UK that hold insignificant competition based events, but there is nothing that can replace Gencon.
Well, please realize that Gen Con UK is *not* going away. It’s just not going to be managed by us. Instead, we’re looking for a UK-based event management organization to take over the running of the show, under license. So, there will still be a Gen Con UK.
In fact, for the UK gaming scene, this announcement should be *good news*, not bad news, because it means that there will be a Gen Con UK *instead* of a Gen Con Europe that’s located in Amsterdam.
I remember sitting in at your seminar at Gencon in 2002, and you stated that you knew that you was not going to make any profit over the next couple of years. If there was a significant reduction in attendance that probably was down to the time of the year. The Easter holiday is a major holiday to the British people. As you are aware there are many people who have grown up with gaming and now have families, and Easter is a time when they would rather spend time with their families. It would be nice if Gencon would be an event over here that whole families could attend, but in reality it does not have enough scope yet to accommodate every ones tastes.
Yup, holding the show on Easter turned out to be a mistake.
The other main problem I could have seen was that you were basing all of your operations from the US, with no European management structure, which left with you will little or no support over here, except that from volunteers.
Yup, that’s a problem too, which is why we’re licensing the show to a UK company. Gen Con [fill-in-the-blank] needs to be managed by people based in that country, with deep connections in that country. We’ve already been approached by a couple of organizations who are interested in doing this, so I’m confident something will come out of all this.
I still feel that Gencon could continue to grow in the UK. It would obviously take the right planning, and trying to bring in a new generation besides all of us old folk ;-) With more sponsorship from companies, a more modest location, centralized in the UK instead of London, a big push on more guests of honour, and you could have something to be proud of.
I agree. But I think a local company could do that better than we could, especially with some of the other initiatives that we have on our plates. It’s a matter of focusing in areas where we’re strongest and getting help in the other areas.
I hope we don't see the last of Gencon in the UK, it would be a sad time for many. I also hope that someone does not just buy the license and stick it on their tournament based convention, and end up being something that Gencon is not.
You have not seen the last of Gen Con in the UK.
Peter Adkison
Owner/CEO, Gen Con LLC
"The best four days in gaming!"
www.gencon.com
I hope this settles some of your thoughts regarding the cancellation notice the other day.
Strahd Von Zarovich
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| 2 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Mournblade |
Posted - 12 May 2003 : 21:54:00
One of my friends Don Daley used to Edit the Punisher books and Transformers for Marvel comics. He was the drummer in a band for other marvel editors called the unlicensed crew. When Marvel got rid of them, Nel Yomtov, Don Daley, etc. They renamed their band Corporate AXE.
Seems like that is going down alot these days. I am glad I am a teacher.
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| Lord Rad |
Posted - 12 May 2003 : 19:13:15
So what do you all (Europeans especially) think to this then?!
Im very saddened by this news! Very dissapointed  
Ive been going to GENCON since about 1992 and love the experience, each year has just got better and better. All this time TSR ran GENCON and did a good job, IMO. Then WotC took over and made it even better...... then WotC hand it over to another company (GENCON LLC) headed by non other that Peter Adkison (ex-CEO of WotC), who disregarded the plea's of last years GENCON attendees to NOT run GENCON on a major British public holiday (being Easter!!) and subsequently pulls the plug, no doubt due to poor attendance figures!
Talk about giving up far too easily!!! Im disgusted that this one single attempt has meant the end of a very major RPG event!  |
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