The top board game conventions (and what they offer) (guest: Paula Deming) | Ep 181
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Transcript
Hey everybody, welcome to the Going Analog Show where industry guests come to bring a game and a topic to discuss. And today we are in an airport. I mean at LFGcon, which is a local small con in Burbank that Paula Deming, our special guest today, is here to be a special guest for LFG Con also, which she has a super badge ribbon thing to special official.
We don't have that media physical proof that I'm more special.
It's true. It's true. Although, we did feel special because at this con, we got we got this table reserved for us. If you're watching on YouTube, it's very exciting. Very exciting. All right. So, because Paula is super super welltraveled, she is an actress. She goes to all the cons. She's on so many YouTube shows about games and podcasts, and I can't even list all the things that you do.
That's too much. It's too much.
Too much. What are What do you think people know you best for?
Um, well, I hope they know me best for my sketch comedy series called Things Get Dicey. um comedy about gaming and our hobby. Um and then perhaps they might know me from my tabletop RPG actual plays I'm a part of with uh the glass cannon network where I play a variety of games but also mostly Pathfinder and then the Call of Cthulhu show I'm on called Push the Roll with Ross Bryant. And so those are those are some of the things you might know me from.
I don't know how you have time for all that. That already sounded exhausting. Also, this game is broken. I'm on that. That's You might know that better because if you're listening to this board game podcast, maybe you listen to that board game podcast. And if you don't, you should. This game is broken is super fun.
And now your biggest thing ever showing up on the Going Analog show
that. Yes. And now I will say is my top line. Like what are the things you have done?
Put this at the top of your link.
A guest
on Going Analog. And you have a topic for us today. What is the topic we're going to be talking about later?
Yeah. I well, we're at a convention and we just got back from Gin Con as well. Um, and so I was just thinking about the different kinds of conventions and why you might go to one kind of convention over another kind of convention and kind of like what what we like about the different styles of conventions
and what maybe you're looking for if you haven't been to a con before. So exciting. Um, at LFGcon, I do want to give a shout out to Annie who won our contest. We were handing out a copy of Nature from uh Northstar Games with it's a for the first person who walked up to us and whispered in our ear going analog. So Annie did a great whisper. It was only a tiny bit creepy and she got the game. Yay Annie.
So we have some game picks for today that we want to start off with. Right.
Yeah. So uh hopefully you can hear me again. We're recording right from LFG Con. So, there's going to be some background noise. You can see behind us if you're watching on video, the artist alley. Uh, so there's going to be some activity behind us. Uh, but our game pick, actually, we're happy. I didn't have a box for this when we were originally going to record this, but then we're like, "Oh, they're here at LFG Con." So, Christina ran over to their booth, grabbed this box to borrow. It's just an empty box. Uh, but this is
There was a game in there at one point.
There was a game in there. Yeah, they're they're still demoing it. But, uh, I got to play this a couple of times. This is Whisperwood from Cardboard Alchemy. Uh, and then so this is a a really pretty Oh, I should mention the designers. So Brad Brooks, Aaron McDonald, and Christian Strain, artist Sergio Chase. Maybe
that makes that makes much more sense. Uh, anyways, it's a really beautiful huge thematic Euro game. And then uh so it it's it's almost I was trying to think of how to describe this succinctly and it's too difficult because there's so much going on in this game. Uh, it's a basically a bagu area control game, meaning you're going to put tokens in a bag, you're going to put better tokens in a bag, get rid of some of the crappier ones, so you draw the good tokens. You're moving your druids around the map, and you're trying to control different points of interest. There's these giant uh creatures that are kind of going around, these golems that you're also trying to get their influence and their powers. You can recruit monsters and they have powers and stuff. uh your board that you're putting your little chips on from the bag, those have powers and you can upgrade those powers. It's it's such a big ambitious game. Um when I played a full game, I did one demo and one full game and a full game I was like, there's so many options. I'm like there's certain people that it might be too much and they're just going to be sitting there racking their brain over what to do. But this is I I really liked it because I'm like, man, there's so many different engines you could build, like the creatures that you recruit, the golems, the powers on your board, and I feel like you could go in so many different directions that you could probably play this game a dozen times and do completely different strategies each time. Does the game have um like goals you're trying to meet? Like either like a private scoring objective or like public scoring objectives that could like guide your choices and which thing you go after or is it just kind of really loose and you need to decide what what part of it sounds fun to you?
Uh a little bit of both, but it does have that. So there are objectives that you could complete. Uh and then so each player board has their own set of objectives. Some of them are in common, like we'll have common objectives, but we won't get in each other's way. Uh, but then there are some that are like, I'm going to draw extra cards. I'm going to slot them into these spots and that's going to be my new objective. So, that could guide you a little bit or like the goss that are wandering around the countryside. Uh, they have different things that they want you to do. So, you might be like you're I forget their names, but like maybe you want to go try to work with one of them and power him up. You might want to do another one and power this other one up. So, uh, it's just really there's a lot going on, but in a very rewarding way. M
now I did do a demo once uh at Dice Tower West. I did a quick uh scripted demo because it's such a big game. They it was hard for them to just say, "Here's 20 minutes. Go play. We're going to teach you it and now go play a bit." So they were like, "Do this, do this, do this."
I walked away from that demo really not liking this game. I'm like I don't get it. I don't know what's the appeal. I just didn't quite understand. So I actually was like, "Nah, not for me." And then luckily uh so the owner of Cardboard Alchemy, Peter Vaughn, uh wanted to do a demo with us in Before You Play. So we played another full game and it walked away from there like complete 180. I'm like, I love this game
before you actually got to play as opposed to just kind of going through the motions where you don't really get the full experience of the game. So
yeah, so that's Whisperwood. Uh when this episode comes out, it's still on Kickstarter. Uh Kickstarter has already started and I believe they funded already, but uh look for it. It's called
Cool.
Yeah. And this is not a paid spot. This is just a game I'm excited about.
And Paula, what game do you have for us on your phone?
On my phone. It's not a phone game. I just didn't bring the box back with me. I played this yesterday at the con and then I went, "Cool. I don't have to uh bring this back again with me." And then and then I forgot that I would be talking about it here. But I have a picture of it on my phone. Ooh yeah, you can you can is it focus? I don't know. You can
Ooh, you can really tell what that is. It's uh it's called Among Cultists.
Maybe if I put it closer to my face, whatever. Um Google it. Among cultists. It's from GDAU Games. It's designed by Stefan Gdau. Um and it is a social deduction thriller is how it's described on the box here. 45 to 90 minutes, four to eight players. And um people who watch my content might know that I am going through a big um board game collection cull
or I'm trying to have a pile of games that are on my shelf of shame that I've never played. And I was like, I really want to play them before I decide if I'm keeping them or not. And so when I knew I was coming to LFGcon and I was going to be playing a game with some people, I was like, "What a great opportunity to play a game from this pile."
Did you get the full eight?
I got full eight. That's amazing.
We have full uh player count. Um which I would never really be able to do in my real life, honestly. Like I'd never have eight people over to play a game. But uh so we played it and it's basically the pitch is if you took the video game Among Us and you kind of mashed it with something like Werewolf or Blood on the Clock Tower kind of in a board game.
Um and so some of you are investigators. You're basically at they don't call it Miscatonic University, but it's basically Mscatonic University which is the the fabled university from Lovecraft lore. Um, and some of you are investigators and one or two of you, depending on the player count, are cultists and you are trying to sabotage what the investigators are trying to do. The investigators are trying to get points. And the way they're getting points is by mechanically, you're putting cards in decks for every room on the board. And then once you have a certain number of cards in the deck, you're able to search that room for books. You shuffle up the deck, you flip over a card. If it's a success, you get the book, the book goes on a shelf, and you have a certain number of books, you get points.
Okay?
So, the cultists are going around trying to put sabotage or fail cards into those decks to make it less likely for you to actually find the books to get the points. They are also going around anytime you walk by anyone,
you trade a what they call a pulse card. The pulse card says whether or not you're living or dead.
Every investigator only has living cards that they can give out. The cultists have dead cards and that's how they kill the investigators. Okay?
So, they might slip you a card and then it goes into your deck and someone can check it later where they shuffle up and they look and they'll be like, "Oh, you're dead." And uh-oh. And if the cultist can kill a certain number of investigators, they win. So, there's a little bit of that social deduction thing going on mixed with kind of like a set collection action economy sort of thing happening. Um, so it's a little bit of a euro mixed with a social deduction. Um, and I thought it was fine.
Okay. Uh, I played it. I'm very happy I played it because I think I would have kept it in my collection for a long time hoping to play it because it looked really cool. I feel like the cover looked like m like a like a modern contemporary like fantasy romance. Oh, you look at the characters. I was like, "Okay,
it does have So, for the people who who can't see it, it is a uh a a dark blue kind of cover with like a portal kind of in the background, very in the background, and then like purple tentacles in the foreground. And then three investigators, a real like
beef cakey looking guy, a like rugged in, you know, type with an eye patch. And then like hot blonde chick um and the nice that's what it is.
It's very urban fantasy. This could be um like the Dresden Files or something, you know.
That's what it reminded me of.
Um
yeah, and you know, we played the game and we had some of those good like social deduction moments, particularly at the end when the cultist won and they were like, "Ah, we did it. We tricked you." And I was tricked. One of the people who I literally defended the whole game as being innocent
was a cultist. Um, but I wanted the game to have more of those moments. I felt like it didn't have quite enough of the social deduction tension that you would typically feel in a game like Werewolf or Blood on the
Blood on the Cloud Tower, any of those style of games.
Um, and so I wanted that to be ramped up a little, but I also wanted the actual like board game part of it where you're moving around the board and collecting books to also have a little more tension. We kept kind of flipping over things to be like, "Oh, does this fish man break in and start to make things messed up for us?" And he never did.
He's like, "Oh, there's this whole thing on the board we could be interacting with. Stupid fish man." And he's just it's actually never being triggered. Um,
so like it was almost really fun, but I felt like both halves of the game that they're trying to put together didn't quite make it for me. And I think it wasn't a bad time. Like it wasn't a bad game.
A good con experience.
Yes. And I had fun playing with the people. I think we all had a good time. Yeah. Experiencing this thing together. But I don't need to play it again. Is that okay to stay on this podcast? I don't need to play it again.
Said it.
No, that's fine. Um,
but if you would like to buy it from me, I'll sell it to you for $20.
Live out that fantasy. Okay. We have brought you on to our show. And we do also do a YouTube board game trivia show. So, you know, I have to write you a question. Okay. And so, excuse my my phone notes here, but you know, as an actress, you of course have an IMDP page. So, your official official. Um, do you remember your very first listing on your IMDP page? That's not the trivia of your question. Just wondering if you remember
my very first listing. Uh, oh, I don't know what because there's some stuff on there that you're like, that's not a real show. You know, like there was a time when everyone was doing a web series and then you could put your web series on IMDb. So, like every web series I did that like 100 people watched is like on my IMDb.
Um, my first one is, am I uncredited in it?
It says you are the bridesmaid if that.
Yes. Uh, it's um it's not insignificant others. It's um Yes. It filmed in Charlotte right before I moved to LA. I am featured background and I cannot for the life of me remember what it's called, but I was a bridesmaid. Took place in the ' 60s or '7s.
First word blood.
Blood.
Shoot. I cannot remember. But Nate Parker was in the movie. I can tell you everything else about it but the name of the movie.
Blood Sign My Name.
Blood Doesn't Sign My Name. Yes.
Obviously. That classic. That classic. that classic that you all saw.
Yes. Yeah. You've also played a lot of blood on the clock tower. So, you must be an expert at blood.
Oh, yes.
I love blood.
And so, you know, there's a lot of games that start with blood uh that are around. And so, I'm going to ask you which of the following is not a real board game that starts with blood.
Great.
Okay. You've got A, Bloodborne.
Yeah.
Okay.
B, Blood Bowl.
Uh-huh.
C Blood Rage.
Mhm.
Or D, Blood Rain. I think it's D. Blood Ray.
So, I have a pile of Kickstarter boxes from the Bloodborne board game. Um, and Blood Rage is a real game. And, um, what was the other one? It I was like, that's real.
Blood Bowl.
Blood Bowl. Yes. Which my partner has started playing and is trying to get me to play.
It's designed for you. This is an easy easy softball. So, you know, you're welcome. Or you just really know blood. You just really know.
I just I'm pretty much an expert in blood. And if you want to see Paula answer more trivia questions, uh, you were on our quiz show, the game quiz show
for a real throwback.
Yeah. So, we had some fun with that. So, look for that. Paula was a guest and we were
I don't remember.
I don't think I did that great. I think it was okay.
You did okay.
I mean, I did like
that was before my hair was red.
So, that's a throwback. See what I used to look like. So for your topic, can you remind us what it is?
Yeah, so we are at a convention right now and like I said at the start, we were very recently at Gin Con and it just got me thinking this convention is very different in vibe than Gin Con and there's a lot of different kinds of conventions. So I want to talk about the different types of conventions, what each one might be like, what's the purpose of them and what do we prefer? Okay.
I think that would be really interesting to talk about. So, that's my long- winded topic,
but I feel like that's great cuz because we have you on me as you are obviously in the board game tabletop space, but tabletop RPGs sort of like a lot of and go to other cons that we might not go to. So, you're the expert. And so, how many cons would you say you end up going to about what every year?
Um, I definitely don't go to as many as some content creators who I feel like are at like a convention every month. That's too much for me. But I would say I go to
four or five conventions a year probably.
I I think on average. Yeah.
All right. And then So, yeah. What how do you categorize the types of cons that you go to?
I think there are um playing cons. And I feel like this what we're at right now, LFGCON, is like a playing con. It's it's less about seeing you're not going to get a new game released at a convention like this. um you're mostly going to be sitting in a room and playing games with people, which is great.
Um then you have like the like buying cons, more like consumer cons, and I feel like that's like a Gen Con or an Essen. Um where like kind of the point is here's a new game.
There's not a lot of open play space, but you can demo and you can purchase. And a lot of people go to those, I think, to buy games.
Yeah. So like Gen Con's the largest con in North America for board games. And then Essenfield is in Germany, which we haven't been to, but largest con you should go. I
we'll we'll kick off with this if it's okay, but like when I first my first time I went to SN, I've been three times. Um and the first time I was like, am I going to like this? Because it's all about new releases. It's all about buying games. I was like, am I going to be able to demo games? I love to demo games.
Am I going to be able to demo? Am I going to be able to play anything or am I just going to walk by stuff and go, "Well, I could buy that."
But I loved it. I came away from my first Essen, like this is my new favorite convention.
Oh, because there's it's huge. It's like seven giant halls of games and so many things there, particularly as North American gamers. Um, a lot of games that we would not see here because they are uh European publishers who don't have um North American distribution or Yeah. And so you're going to get to see games that you normally wouldn't.
And you can demo games. Like every booth has a spot where you can sit down and you can demo. And that first year I went, I demoed a ton of games. Um, and you know, at Gen Con, you may not know, at Gen Con, the way they do demos usually in the vendor hall is you walk over and they might let you play 5 minutes of the game
or they might go, "Let me just give you an overview of the game." Yeah.
And that's it. at Essen, they'll have a table and they'll explain the game to you and then they just let you play it.
Okay. Yeah, I can you can sit and play like the full game in a lot of these booths. Um, and I was like, "This is awesome."
Uh, so yeah, I think Essen's very cool. I think
How many suitcases did you leave Essen with?
Uh, I try not to take home with me too many things. Um, so I tried to be really good at Essence and not bring back too much. I I have just started being like maybe I'll bring a small empty check on like check uh or carry on bag. What a carry
and I can like later like I can like carry it with me and then like fill it with games to take home or like I'll bring like an expandable duffel bag that'll like fold up when I first fly and then I can put all my clothes in it to go home to put games in on the way back. But I try not to bring back a ton of games.
And was a language barrier a problem for you
at Essen? It really isn't. They are at most booths you can sit down and say, "Hey, may I have an English? Do you have someone who can demo me the game in English?" And most of them will have someone who can speak in English for you.
Um, not always. And there were a couple of times when I would just be like, "Oh, all they have here are the German rules." And I just used Google Translate to try and like
translate them. But that so a small barrier, but honestly, not not that much. There are tons of international people at something like Essen and we are lucky as English speakers. Um, and there are obviously a lot of reasons for why this is the case, but
um, English tends to be the language that people from a lot of different countries speak to each other with because it's the one that they all learned.
And so it can be kind of the default. You know, you sit down at a table and you might have someone from Germany and Denmark and France and America and we'll all just speak English at the table.
So, that's nice for me.
Um, and then you very politely say thank you to everyone who speaks English to you.
Um, so instead of like seven halls, do you feel like you saw the whole con while you're there?
Okay. But you just sort of like pick and choose and just see where you ended up.
Yeah. Well, something like at Essen is they really organize based on category. So, they'll have one hall that is um kind of more of like the mass market games and they'll have another hall that is all of the small indie publishers. They'll have a whole one this whole half of the hall is just Asian publishers. So, if you know, oh, I want to check out um what is plate doing right now or Korea board games like they're going to be in this section. You go there. Then they have their like I think they call it their like strategy hall where it's all of the more like strategy level like something that might be nominated for the spiel
in its strategy category um would be in there. So, and that's going to be the busiest hall
cuz that's the one that all the like the real like die hard
going to the con are going to want to
want to go into. Um, and so the halls are all kind of organized by the kind of game and so that can help you like plan as opposed to something like Gen Con where you have one hall and it's just everything's just kind of everywhere and you're just walking around and hoping to see
something that you like. our interesting international con. We went to Tokyo Game Market. Oh, back a couple years ago. Yeah. It was like pretty amazing. But we we did have a language barrier, but you know, they were super super friendly. And what I think was like such an interesting vibe is everything is so much more personalized and small and people are like handmaking maybe 60 copies of a game. they sell out, they will leave. Another person will take their booth. And it's just like, so you never know what you're going to see. You might never see it there again. And I remember we first walked in, I was like, "Ooh, this looks fun. There's this really cool looking game with like like some sort of dexterity magnet crap situation going on." But it was like the very first game I saw. And she was like, "We'll come back. Let's go look around. We'll come back." And when we came back, it was gone.
So yeah,
she's This was years ago. She's still
bringing Let go of it. But a lot of the booths we would ask, oh, you know, are English rules available? So then, like, you know, they would give those to us or then, um, they would just try to, you know, sort of gesture you through how to play it. And they're just so interesting and weird. And I love that part about Tokyo Game.
There was one game I asked the guy, it's like, "Are there English rules?" He's like, "No, but if you email me, I'll send them to you."
Ghosted me. I emailed him two times.
I bought this game cuz you said you were going to email me the English rules.
We just made up our own rules for that. Yeah, but there's like so like interesting cuz I feel like Japanese games can have like such quirky themes. I remember I bought this programming game where like you program your moves because you move your cat to try to go and get golden fish, but there was a truck that dropped a whole bunch of tires throughout the town. So, you have to avoid the tires.
It was like so random and I love that.
That's so fun.
So, yeah. At something like Tokyo Games Market, is there much of an open play kind of area or is that a convention you go to to buy games?
It is like a buying game. Yeah. And then a lot of people will sort of take their loot and then like you know there was like a you know convention food area, food court stuff and they just go to it. But it is like a buying market and then um yeah very different companies had the biggest booths for you know compared to what we see at Gen Con. So it's really cool.
Yeah. Like we took our game after we bought a few. We sat in the food court and just played. But there's no set kind of this is the gaming area for everybody. You're not going there to meet to play games.
Yeah. But we we sort of last minute decided to go. So we had no idea we're doing. We were waiting in the wrong line for like an hour and a half. And
No, it wasn't last minute. We we planned ahead. We just didn't know what we were doing.
Yeah. Okay. That's fair. That's fair. We just didn't know where.
We knew ahead of time. We we planned by accident cuz we were already going to Japan and we're like, "Oh, be we'll be there at the same time. You have to go." Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. So glad we did it.
Yeah. So, it's funny you said you like a spiel because you get to play full games. I actually like Gen Con because uh I don't like when they're just like I'm just going to give you an overview because for me it's still hard to understand. Is it fun? Sometimes you're like, "Oh, that sounds fun." But there's sometimes like I don't really know how that game's going to play. But I like the demos where they're like, "We're going to give you one or two rounds of this game." So I'm like, "Okay, I don't have to sit here for an hour or two hours. I just get to sample some games and
it's not uh foolproof I should say. I don't know. It's like because once in a while you'll play games like that demo was really great and then you go home play the full game you're like that was not as fun as I thought
and vice versa. There's demos I played where I'm like that wasn't that like whisper for example but then when I play the full game I'm like that was great. So you never really know but I do like there are definitely a lot of times where I've just like sampled a little bit. I'm like great I don't need to buy that game or sampled it. I like that game, bought it, and I I ended up being happy about it.
I think it depends on when what you go to like Gen Con for, right? When we were just consumers and we weren't doing any media, like we did we did do all those demos and then we would just sit down in the open hall and game or like there were like other open gaming places. So, we did do a lot of gaming and then I think we just got busier and doing less of the gaming at Gen Con. For us, our playing cons are when I get super excited. So my favorite one is BGcon in Dallas BG Conf. So that's my favorite.
I've never been to a BGC con, but I've heard that they're really, really fun because it is just like go and play games
and they probably have a really good lending library.
It is the best. It is the biggest lending library. So it's like, oh, I've never played this game. That was like 3 years ago. Awesome. I can go and get it. Or, you know, they they take all the hot games from Essen cuz it's about a month after Essen or so usually. And then there's like a whole hot games room where it's all set up. You have the rules and then like some cheat sheets and stuff and you can just go and teach yourself the game which we did for several games last year and and I was really excited. So
cool. Yeah.
So when we first started Yeah. like Christine said like Jen Kana was like this is amazing but then we had so many industry friends like you got to go to BGcon and they always call out that one specifically.
There's also Paxu that I feel like sits in between
right in the middle. I agree. Yeah. Yeah. So, you've been to PEX?
I love PAX Unplugged. It's one of my favorite conventions. One, because I think the food options at PAX Unplugged are the best of uh just about any convention because right outside the convention center is uh the Reading Terminal Market, which is just like a bunch of food stalls. Um and then it's also right there in like Chinatown. So, like you have to go eat dim sum while you're there. Like I just think the food and packs unplugged is the best. And it is like you can see new releases there. Um and it's got actually a really good open play space with a lending library. Um there are events if you want to see like panels or shows that's happening. It is a nice big size but it's not as big and overwhelming as Gin Con. I think for me Pats Unplugged is a really good con. That's a nice like in the middle.
You can get a little bit of everything experience there.
Yeah. I think I I've only been once and I actually didn't quite like it because I felt like I now if I someone were to ask me like if I could only go to one convention a year, I'm like probably packs you so you can experience a pretty decent sized exhibitor hall. And what's nice about the exhibitor hall, it's not crowded like
they give you room. They actually give you room in the hall spaces between the
space everything out much better. So that
it smells better then.
Yes, I think so. Yes. Um and then but the for me what was displaying is like the open play area at least when I went it closed at midnight.
Oh yes. Yeah. It doesn't Yeah.
Yeah. So the convention hall is like you're out like you're kicking you out and they were the first time I went I was with some friends and I'm like what do we do now? Like where do we go? We do
at midnight go to bed is you go to bed. You got to sleep at a convention too.
No no midnight's a little early I think at a convention. So
crazy. I'm like 10:00. I'm like I'm in bed. Forget this.
No. Yeah. I We went to found a food court, an empty food court, right? It was closed down, but they were like, "No, you can't go there." So, eventually we just like left and went to a hotel and played games in our lobby, which a lot of people do at all conventions and things like that. Uh, but I kind of wish because you might be in the middle of a game and there's people actively kicking you out. They're like, "You got to go. They're not letting you like go ahead and finish your game of Ark Nova and
go ahead and sit here for three more hours while you finish that game." Meanwhile, at BGcon, for example, their open play is open 24 hours. 24 hours. So, one time Christina, she was excited.
Brilliant idea.
Didn't even get a hotel room.
No, we did go.
I actually play.
Yeah. I end up working during the day and then going to to do some work, but and then like and then going to play. And so, Marine expansion for Arknova had just come out and Arnova is her favorite game.
It's my favorite game. And I hadn't played the expansion yet. So, I found some friends, but none of them were free until 12:30 uh a.m. And then we were like, "Do you think we could do it? Let's do Yeah, let's just do it. Let's just do it." And then we played, you know, it was 2 and 1/2 hours. It was fine. We got done. It's not so bad.
I was very excited.
Starting a heavy Euro game with a new expansion they haven't played at 12:30 a.m.
That's perfect.
Yeah. But we we also did that at Gen Con. Uh
Oh, that was the worst experience.
It's the year Root came out. Uh, our friend Laura was like, I read the instructions. We play and I'm like, I don't think this is a good idea because I played that company leader game's previous game, Vast was very asymmetrical, right? And roots asymmetrical. I'm like, it's not learning one game. It's four people learning a game of their own game that have to interact with each other.
She's like, it has a scripted beginning. I learned I was like, I'll be fine. I'm like, all right, I trust you. And it was a mistake.
So, we just never trusted Laura again.
That was it.
Well, and she it wasn't her. It's just the game was not that kind of game you want to start that. So that was another game we started around after midnight around 3:00 a.m. Uh Laura kind of read the table like we're all tired, we don't want to go. She just like king made Christina to win.
I was going to win anyway. It was fine. We're
like let's just let's just go and then and then we left and then so that was and then it was like a crazy night after cuz that's when all the bars let out and
we discovered stuff we didn't know about the indie bar scene, I guess. So we we walked home at that time like 20ome bars all let out at the same time. Police were actually stationed everywhere.
There were at least two fights. We walked by.
We saw people getting pepper sprayed. Uh it was like a small ri like literally like a small riot scene.
Crazy.
Yeah. But police are just waiting cuz you're like there's hundreds and hundreds of drunk people all going out.
So that's a hot tip for Gen Con.
Don't go out 3 3:00 a.m. at Gen Con
unless you want to get into a street fight. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. I have thoughts on Indianapolis as the location for Jincom, but this is not I don't think this is the podcast at 10, so it's
I'm already asleep at that point in time. Uh yeah, forget it.
But you are right about PEX unplugs food scene. It's like cuz Gen Con you have to like walk out of the convention to get some food. BGC con actually it's in a hotel and they have limited hotel food options. But what's nice is it's in Dallas. So for us, we get an excuse like we're going out for barbecue tonight. We're going downstairs for food that we don't get in California as often or as good.
And of course, I do have to plug that we always do our live board game quiz show at Con. So that's always exciting. And you could like compete that way
and get prizes.
And prizes. Yes.
But I do I went from Gen Con being my favorite. I'm like I love the sampling. I love the demos. I love being able to see all these new games to slowly shipping over the years. to now align with Christina which is BGC con is now my favorite
way and I always have the right opinion just takes you some time to figure it out.
Yeah.
Yeah. It's just cuz they have the the big library and so many industry people go so you get to also see a lot of people that you don't normally get to see. Um now LFGcon uh we were both here last year. You were here last year, right?
No, this is my first time. I wasn't able I was at another event
the weekend that they did it last year. So this is my first LFG Con.
Okay. Um yeah,
I quite I'm excited about because I came last year
and we had the showrunners on our podcast right after.
If you look for roughly a year ago, uh one of the people who there's three different game stores that came together to run this. Uh one of them Dustin Dustin came on our show and talked about LFG Con, but it's in Burbank. It's a little bit more local, but for me, there's a couple of big LA conventions. There's Strategic Con and they have three of those a year. And then LG Con's now up and coming, but it's still small enough that it's like it's not super crowded. Uh it's not kind of crazy. It's very spacious.
It's grown from last year, which is great. We were talking to people who last year was like, "Oh, there's a lot of rooms today." And then it was like pretty full LA yesterday.
Yesterday I was like, "Wow, there are people at every like it's not like, oh no, where are we going to go?" But I was like, "Oh, there are people here. I am so excited to see what happens with this convention and how it's going to grow and that it's so gameplay focused and that it's so local to me. And I am so I'm just really enthusiastic about what this is going to be in my life. I hope for like the next 10 years, you know, like
Yeah, it's it's definitely I like it better than strategic because they're open play area. They have one main player that's kind of in the basement and it's very dark and then a little dingy almost. It just feels like like you're in the back rooms or something.
Go to your mom's basement gamers.
Yeah, that's a strategic kind of.
Yeah, this is more like a traditional hotel like big bright conference rooms. So, uh yeah, I hope this time does well. But I've been we we were we originally weren't going to come but then they invited us as media. We're like, okay, it's close enough. It's about 45 minutes away from us. But what was nice is coming like two week Gen Con was two weeks ago, three weeks ago. Now we were like we have all these games we need to play now. We have a full weekend to just catch up on
with other people and play. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's what's great about local cons. Like we host a lot at wherever we're living. So we end up having a lot of people to game with, but I think local cons are great for um oo I have this big game that is hard to find the right number of people for. And then you come to this con, you can arrange things ahead of time or meet people and put up a sign that says like players wanted. Um, and it seems really great for that. So, uh, I know a lot of people look forward to strategic cons and like cons like this for that. I think we went to a local one back in the Bay called Kublaon once that was very similar. So,
Mhm. Yeah.
I also think
cons are a great excuse to travel as well. And I have recently I just kind of want to shout out a few things because I've recently been incredibly lucky to get to travel to a lot of interesting places for a convention. And so now I'm like, "Hey, are you looking for an excuse to go to XYZ place?
This convention is happening there. That's your excuse to go to Iceland." Um, so I was just at a convention in Iceland. It is a uh a retreat style. It was in a hotel. you. We basically had the whole hotel to ourselves. It was like 200 people or something. Wow. And they even did like meals for us. So, the meals were part of it. We just I never had to leave the hotel. I ate food at the hotel from like the hotel kitchen and I played games and the spil is what it's called. I was like, "Wait, what's the name of it? Shilven." And um it was it was so fun. So, if you want to go to Iceland, you should look at that. Is it a consumer like people could go to or is it an industry?
No, no, no, no. It's all just like regular old people. Um, it's just board game retreat. You must be an old person. Um,
yeah, just for anyone who loves games to go and just play games for like 3 days and then
do a trip to Iceland. Yeah.
Um I was just at a lovely gaming event in Denmark called Festival and that is uh board games and role playing games and it's all all run by volunteers for the last 40 years. Everyone there is a volunteer. It's incredible and so different especially as an American to go in and see a bunch of people who give up their time just to make this lovely gaming community run. And then I got to see Denmark which was an incredible country. Um, you can go to Mega XPC Con in Mexico City. Um, which has a very like Dice Tower kind of feel to it. Uh, smaller vendor hall, lots of open play area. Um, and Mexico City is a very cool city. Um,
so you can go there, you know, like
there's so many things you can do and see in other places. And if you're looking for an excuse and you're a gamer, check out what conventions are happening in those areas and go and experience them and they'll be thrilled to have someone who's traveled so far to see their country and play games.
You'll be the special VIP guest.
Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, that's my quickfire like here's a bunch of
Oh, that's awesome.
things I've been to that I think you should consider going to. Yeah. I I was thinking if you mentioned Dice Tower because the other one we pretty semi-regularly go to I think is Dice Tower West.
Yes.
But that's another one where
in Vegas.
It's in Vegas. So there's it's a destination kind of thing because everyone has something they want to do in Vegas whether it's like a show or food or anything like that or some gambling. The only
losing all your money,
prostitutes, strippers,
safe for work show,
shooting machine guns out in the desert. Um,
but
Oh, the kiss putt putt golf.
Mhm. Kiss the band.
Yep. The the uh the main problem there is if you're going there with the mindset of playing games. I have friends who are like they were out distracted. They're out like drinking and gambling till like 3:00 in the morning and then they don't they every day of Dice West they start showing up in the morning later and later Robbie. But anyway,
yeah. So, uh so that's fun. But uh before we wrap up like what's your one bucket list convention in the world if one that you haven't been to that you would like to go to? Um, oh, I've been able to go to so many that I'm really like feel very lucky um to be able to attend. Um, there is um I think it's called is it AB Con? It's in an African country and I want to look up now which one it is cuz I want to know. And I was like, how cool would it be to go again to have a reason to be like, I got to visit Africa and I went
for this.
That's your next like travel one.
Yeah. And like to me that's what makes it a um a like a bucket list kind of thing. Like I haven't been able to go. I just want to
Well, while you're looking that up know where it is.
I think for us the obvious one is besides that's the obvious one. And I've always been curious about Origins because I've heard great things.
I've also never been to Origins. I think that I've heard good things. We should go together. And then, you know, the other one I'll suggest domestically for Paula is BG Conf. So, you know,
I do want to go to I do really want to go.
You also know a lot of people that
would be fun. Origins would be fun. Tokyo Games Market would be incredible to get to go to. And again, then I'm like, and now I'm in Japan.
Yeah. Like
and then another one I would love to do one of the board game cruises someday like BGG also does a board game BG at sea
uh because then it's like I don't know about being on a boat the whole time playing board games but like in between those excursions where they like okay now we're going to go spend half a day somewhere in a new town or a new city. That sounds really cool.
They do it different places of the world each time. Let's see. So that'd be really cool. I'd be down.
Okay.
Okay. What's up with your AB Con?
Uh, it is put on by uh the Nigerian Television Authority,
the African Board Games Convention, AB Con. Uh, the largest and oldest gathering of tabletop game lovers, enthusiasts, designers, publishers, and manufacturers in subsaharan Africa. I believe it takes place in Nigeria.
Okay.
Um, so
I didn't even know about that. So now you heard about it also. Thanks for joining us. What should people watch you on and pay attention? What what's coming up for you, Apollo? Yeah. Well, you know, if you're not already watching my stuff on YouTube, I'd love for you to come over to my YouTube channel. It is youtube.com/pa deming or you can just type in things get dicey into YouTube and it'll pull up there. I have comedy sketches. I'm doing a lot of board game playthroughs with my friend. She has been on one or two of them
where I've been declared the best friend.
Yes, it it's true. It's true.
Self-declared by
self-declared very much. Very much so. Um, yeah, I'm doing a lot of stuff that I think is fun there. I'm experimenting with different kinds of content and just trying to keep it like fun and entertaining. Um, and would love to see more people checking it out. And
you have to see her skits.
They're amazing. Very, very funny.
Thank you. More to come. More. There is a slate of uh comedy sketches I want to make as we go into the end of the year here. So hopefully I can get my act together to do it. They're just so much work. Um, but I have so many ideas and I have things I I want to do and make. So stay tuned because it's coming. It's coming.
All right. Thanks for joining us again. And you know, if you see us at a con, say hi. Um, shout out to Jeff who said hi. We played a game with him today who listens to us. So, hi. Um, and thanks to our amazing editor, Mike Zipkin. Now you can stop listening and go play a game. Bye
bye.