GenCon 2008: Mazinga’s recap
It’s hard to believe it’s been a week already, but I’ve finally caught up on the sleep I missed from the awesome time Musashi and I had at GenCon 2008. As our esteemed editor in chief mentioned, we were joined by occasional contributor Centurion and his charming significant other Lindsey for a weekend of gaming, carousing and scoping out the newest developments in all kinds of games. We were joined by a record 28,600 unique and over 95,800 turnstile attendees.
This year, your humble staff indulged in gaming to an unprecedented degree. We started Thursday night with a modern-world-setting round of Call of Cthulhu. CoC is one of my all-time favorite RPGs, and it was a pleasure once again to experience the atmosphere of dread the game creates, especially since Musashi and I were denied in our attempts to join a session last year.
But the main gaming feature of the weekend was the marathon sessions of 4th Edition D&D run by none other than Musashi. I’ll confess – though I enjoy the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and Record of Lodoss War (itself loosely based on a Dungeons and Dragons campaign), I tend to prefer modern or science-fiction game settings rather than fantasy, and so until last weekend I hadn’t played D&D in more than 20 years. But I agree totally with Musashi – the 4th edition rules rock. Character creation, combat and dungeon exploration are a snap to pick up, and the game system allows for a tremendous amount of role-playing even while involved in the minutiae of combat.
(And my preference for non-fantasy games aside, let me echo Musashi’s “w00t!” for the Dragon Age preview.)
Of course, we came not just to play but also to suss out some of the cool new developments in gaming, and there were plenty. Musashi mentioned Privateer Press’ cool kaiju-themed collectable miniatures game Monsterpocalypse. I enjoyed it, of course; in fact, I have an even more positive impression of the game, as I was able to attend a demo on Friday, in which I played one-on-one with the representative. The game proved such a sensation that the session Musashi and I attended on Saturday had the representative running three sessions at once, and all the basic sets were sold out, though I did pick up two expansion kits and a copy of a free promotional comic book laying out the game’s storyline.
Several outstanding aspects of the game struck me. The monsters are cleverly designed to represent some of the major themes of kauji flicks – giant defender mecha, flame-breathing lizards, slender Ultraman-style robots, Martian war machines, mammoth mutant monsters and more. I also liked the dice pool system, which cuts down on the bookkeeping considerably – the monster’s action and power points are represented by groups of color-coded dice, which they collect and spend by using their destructive abilities, which in turn grants more power dice.
Another nice touch is the monster’s “ultra form,” which appears when the monster has taken max damage or when the player pays power dice to “hulk out.” The ultra form, represented by a figure cast in translucent plastic, is more powerful, but costs a power die per turn just to maintain. Special attacks can also revert the monster to its original form.
I also attended a demo of Blue Dragon, an English translation of a Japanese role-playing card game (RPCG) based on a console RPG and anime. The Blue Dragon shares with many CCGs the concept of marshalling forces and powers to attack the opponent, but it also embraces the RPG emphasis on combat and leveling up. The player starts out with a basic version of its “shadow,” or mystical player companion. Destroyed or used cards go into an “experience pool,” which the player can tap to level up the shadow. Players can also choose to trash certain cards, without adding them to the experience pool, in order to use certain special abilities. The art on the cards is pleasing 2D anime style, rather than the 3D computer graphics from the game.
One popular game from last year’s con that once again made a big impression was Flying Frog’s zombie board game Last Night on Earth. It features a modular board, enabling variety of setup, and plastic counters representing the heroes and zombie hordes. Player characters are represented by heavy cards, which, together with the event cards for the human and zombie players, feature unique photographic artwork (several of the game designers appear as zombies).
As you might expect, the human characters each have unique abilities, while the zombies are greater in number but slower (though a fallen human character can join their ranks as a faster and tougher “zombie hero!”). The clever combat system makes zombies relatively easy to fend off, but difficult to destroy without a weapon, which adds tension as a surrounded character frantically searches for something useful while holding off the undead. Scenarios can range from your basic kill-the-zombies / kill-the-humans slugfest to defending a central house to gassing up a truck and getting out of Dodge. I eagerly bought the full set (the Growing Hunger expansion was sold out by Saturday) and was pleased to discover the box even includes a soundtrack CD for the game.
The affinity Musashi and I share for Battletech is probably well known among regular readers, so I particularly enjoyed the opportunity to relive old times with a demo of Classic Battletech. (Sadly, I relived an all-too-familiar scenario, having my Enforcer’s leg shot clean off by a Hunchback’s massive autocannon.) The Battletech universe has gone through many iterations – dropping the mecha designs from Robotech, adding new clans and branching out into role-playing and video games – so it’s a pleasure to see the original game system still going strong.
Speaking of Robotech, Palladium Books announced its RPG based on the Shadow Chronicles storyline. In a nice touch, the rulebooks are available in a full-sized hardcover edition and a more portable manga-style format. And even non-gaming Robotech fans may welcome the upcoming release of Palladium’s Macross Saga and Masters Saga Sourcebooks, which also are released in manga-sized format.
Massively Multiplayer Online Games were another major presence this year. As I noted earlier, I favor a science-fiction setting, so I was pleased by the return of EVE Online’s booth, which drew a lot of attention from the beautiful graphics it proudly displayed. Staff members from parent company CCP were on hand to detail the recent Empyrean Age expansion, which introduces open warfare between the four main factions. This optional system allows players to join a militia on behalf of their chosen faction as an alternative path to fame, fortune and glory. One new twist in factional warfare is the ability to oppose other players in missions, with one player or team trying to achieve certain objectives and others trying to prevent them (usually by the direct method of destroying the enemies’ spaceships).
EVE Online resembles in some ways one of my favorite pen-and-paper RPGs, Traveller, in that players can design and build ships and compete in starship combat, but can also undertake missions or simply engage in commerce. Characters’ proficiency is also determined more by skills rather than attributes, and skills can be improved even when the player is offline. EVE Online also features a rich back story conveyed in short stories on the Web site and in a recently released novel, also called Empyrean Age.
CCP also publishes White Wolf’s World of Darkness roleplaying system, which includes Vampire: The Requiem, Werewolf: The Forsaken, Mage: The Awakening and others. (White Wolf announced its reboot of the World of Darkness universe at 2004’s GenCon.)
We hope to post an interview with CCP regarding EVE Online, the EVE CCG and White Wolf games soon.
And of course, this year’s con saw the return of perennial favorites like Legends of the Five Rings, HeroClix, Twilight Creations (the fine folks behind the ultra-fun Zombies!!! and its many sequels), Score Entertainment (publishers of the Inu-Yasha and Bleach trading card games) and Bandai.
As usual, cosplay was a big part of the con, and participants portraying everything from fantasy to anime to science fiction characters were there to represent. It isn’t unusual to see someone decked out in Imperial Stormtrooper armor, but this year I spotted someone dressed as a snow trooper from The Empire Strikes Back. My daughters also participated in the cosplay the day they visited. The Seven Year Old dressed as a pixie, while The Nine Year Old cosplayed as Deedlit from Record of Lodoss War, which is now one of her favorite animes.
The crossover between gaming and anime fandom was once again in evidence with a number of anime events. (Amusingly, the official GenCon game book presented the mascot of its anime section using D&D stats.) Several rooms offered anime showings on a constant basis. A perennially amusing favorite, but not for the kids, was the hentai dubbing session. The con’s manga library also returned.
A number of booths offering anime-related merchandise from figurines to wall scrolls to DVDs attracted a lot of attention in the vendor area. Production companies like Media Blasters and Funimation (which was touting the second series of the excellent pirate mercenary anime Black Lagoon as well as the Blu-Ray edition of the excellent Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles movie) were also on hand.
Film presentations included a midnight Thursday showing of the excellent Rankin-Bass production of The Hobbit, which was animated in Japan, and a screening of Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles. Asian film offerings included Machine Girl and Zebraman, plus a screening of the Lone Wolf and Cub series. Two of our favorite films also got a return showing: Captain Blasto, a self-produced film about a nerd who pretends to be a super hero, and the fascinating silent film production of H.P. Lovecraft’s Call of Cthulhu.
Although regular denizens of downtown Indianapolis might look a bit askance at the annual pilgrimage of gamers in T-shirts and backpacks, the business brought by the influx has not escaped the city’s notice, and banners welcoming the convention were a common sight. Here’s a link to coverage in the local fishwrap, which had one of its bloggers attend the con, and offered an online slideshow of the proceedings.
As GenCon has expanded from the yearly D&D gathering to today’s massive marathon, it has embraced new genres, going beyond RPGs and wargames to include GenCon 2008 was yet another landmark gaming event. Although the con’s parent company has endured some financial difficulty, filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, I join legions of gamers in hoping to see the con come back strong next year.
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Nicely done, sir! Had a blast, and thanks for putting me up (or, putting up with me as the case may be) for another year…
And hey, if you’re ever in the neighborhood, I’d be happy to run another 4E game - I run a bi-weekly game at the game store near my place, so feel free to drop in!