MGC 2009 - Great show, once again!

cowsgoquack101 · Post by **cowsgoquack101** » Tue Dec 16, 2008 12:45 pm

I'm going to try my hardest to make it this year. If anyone can help me get there I'll do whatever I can to compensate for my troubles.

DK · Post by DK » Tue Dec 16, 2008 2:06 pm

Kyo wrote:damn you americans and your not being in the same country or continent as us germans-ness

Or the UK

Post by **SpongeBuell** » Tue Dec 16, 2008 2:23 pm

Metallica Man X wrote:
SpongeBuell wrote:
Metallica Man X wrote:
marshallh wrote:Just the incentive I need to get off my butt and finish a few things
Sounds like a cool idea.
Yeah, same here. I must make an attempt to make it this time around, even if I must drive myself (I seriously HATE driving). Last time I was gonna go until all my friends but one who were gonna go with decided to get drunk the previous night, and as a result, we had no car for the trip...
Are you anywhere near I-94? I'll be swinging in from Eau Claire, happy to give you a ride if you want
Actually yes, I live fairly close to I-94!

A ride would be really really nice, not just because I hate driving, but it'd also be nice to go with someone who knows exactly were they're going, lol.

If the crew decides to go, and not drink this time around, perhaps you could stop around anyway, so we can follow you.

Sounds good... where are you from, anyway?

Metallica Man X · Post by **Metallica Man X** » Tue Dec 16, 2008 5:38 pm

A little town called New Lisbon.

Although small, it's not too hard to miss..just hang a right from the intersection, and in about 30 seconds, boom, you're in town. lol.

I'll give ya actual directions when the time comes.

goatdan2 · Post by **goatdan2** » Wed Dec 17, 2008 9:46 pm

Hey all,

This is Dan Loosen from the Midwest Gaming Classic here. I figured that I would join up here to try to help answer questions that people have so that you can get the answers quickly and for the world to see...

All right, so here are the details:

First, just to sort of clarify about what the space is. We will have an area -- not 100% confirmed where just yet, although 99% sure in the museum "room" somewhere -- that will be set up to allow people to show off their stuff. The main objective is to be able to share with one another what you are doing and also share with the general public what things can be created. As I said to Ben when we were talking about this idea, I love what he does because it is something that is fully related to gaming, but is so unique.

The space is free because of this unique-ness. We try to ensure that people that are contributing to the overall quality and depth of the show get space for free to do stuff. Also, just in case anyone is wondering, we will still have to ask for everyone to purchase tickets as normal. If you buy them now, it is $20 for both days. At the show, Saturday is now a $15 ticket, so you save $5 by purchasing now. The truth is that we put all of the money that we "make" each year back into the show to improve it (and doing new things like the benheck.com Experience

), so we have to ask that people do still pay to get in.

Now that I've said that, to answer the question about performing mods and hacks of stuff at the show for pay.

Because the tables are not paid for, it would be unfair to our vendors to allow people to put out stuff for sale and to sell it in a totally free area. However, I completely understand why people would want to sell their stuff or perform quick mods at the show. So here is what I propose:

First of all, any mods must not make any impact with the systems functionality in playing different types of media. In other words, you can't modify a SNES to play import games, or a XBox to store "backup" copies of games on the harddrive to play, or anything like that. If you are wondering if it is something that may be questionable, it is, and you can't do that.

I would be fine with people offering the service of modding Atari 2600 AV "while you wait" or Colecovision AV, or battery mods and so on. In fact, I think it would be pretty cool to add. But what I will say is that if you guys decide to go this route, I want to work with you to come up with a percentage that would go to the show. This wouldn't be the main function of the booth, so I don't want to charge for it as if it was a vendor area specifically, but it would only be fair to vendors if there is some sort of charge. The same would apply to selling anything at the tables like portables or mods.

At the end of the weekend, if the "percentage" that the show gets is higher than what a table or tables (depending on how it is set up) would cost, then you guys would keep everything above and beyond that.

As for name badges, uhm, yes and no. What we could do is create them for anyone who wishes to get one, but there would be a bit of an additional cost to them. The reason behind this is because we are going to be producing special event Lanyards this year, and we are incurring a cost to do so. The plan has been that we would be selling the Lanyards at the show for probably $3 or $4, so we could do a special nametag for whomever wishes to get one for probably $4 - $6 when all prices are taken into consideration.

So I think that's that. I think there are some great things that could be done with this area -- the more Ben and I talked about it, the more excited we both got with the possibilities. If you've got any more questions that I can help answer, I'll try to stop back from time to time to keep up with them!

Website · Post by **Life of Brian** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 9:07 am

I think that all sounds extremely fair, Mr. Loosen. Thank you!

thewizdawg · Post by **thewizdawg** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 7:10 pm

How about a "science fair" type setup for anybody who wants to share their mods. Maybe a description about the mod and some diagrams or pictures. Then maybe the folks in attendance could judge the most creative or mind blowing and the winner gets a prize or a ribbon or something.

goatdan2 · Post by **goatdan2** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 11:34 pm

thewizdawg wrote:How about a "science fair" type setup for anybody who wants to share their mods. Maybe a description about the mod and some diagrams or pictures. Then maybe the folks in attendance could judge the most creative or mind blowing and the winner gets a prize or a ribbon or something.

I like this idea. From doing something similar in years past and knowing how it works, might I suggest a couple things:

1) If you guys want to do this, I'll provide an engraved trophy to the winner. It won't be anything huge, but we could name it something like the "2008 Midwest Gaming Classic benheck experience mod of the year" or something. I'd be happy to do such a thing.
2) While I like the science fair type idea, and would suggest doing something like that, the only people that should vote on it are benheck.com members. Reasoning is simple -- if the person knows exactly what they are voting for, the winner is generally better. We do something similar with pinball, and one year we had everyone vote and the results were stupid. Last year, only the people that brought machines could vote, and the results were much better.
3) The rewarding of this should be done at some point during the day on either Saturday or Sunday so that by the end of the day, the winner can have their trophy by their creation.
4) We can put a picture of the winner with their creation up on the MGC web site and keep a database of it for each year. I hope to eventually update the 'past shows' section of the site with a lot more of this stuff... it's just hard to find the time!

DJ711 · Post by **DJ711** » Thu Dec 25, 2008 11:57 am

sounds awesome, its too bad I can't go

ShockSlayer · Post by **ShockSlayer** » Thu Dec 25, 2008 8:56 pm

Soooo...uhhhhh... what are the dates again? I have SAT's March 23, I might be able to reschedule them, but I could probably make it if I rounded up some cash. How much for a round trip plane tickit from Goose Creek, SC?

SS

Post by **SpongeBuell** » Fri Dec 26, 2008 9:04 pm

ShockSlayer wrote:Soooo...uhhhhh... what are the dates again? I have SAT's March 23, I might be able to reschedule them, but I could probably make it if I rounded up some cash. How much for a round trip plane tickit from Goose Creek, SC?

SS

As far as I can tell, Goose Creek doesn't have an airport with commercial flights. Charleston does, however. Looks like Charleston to Milwaukee would run about $200 round trip, $250 for decent flight times, which is actually pretty good.

For those planning on flying and would like a ride from me, please let me know ASAP. Right now really is the best time to buy, airfares are at an all-time low, and I'd like to coordinate things to combine trips if possible. I can also help with finding decent prices

ShockSlayer · Post by **ShockSlayer** » Fri Dec 26, 2008 9:26 pm

Hey, that sounds pretty good! I might actually get to go! Gotta go sell stuff on the trading post!

SS

EDIT: Hey, what agent did you use? Do you think you could PM me a link?!

EDIT2: I noticed that I never did get any confirmation on what dates things will be happening. Or what day you'll be at the airport, spongey!

SS

Website · Post by **Life of Brian** » Fri Dec 26, 2008 11:42 pm

Hmm, March 21 falls within my spring break, and now that there's the "benheck.com experience" thing I think I'd like to go... I'm getting married at the end of January so maybe that can be our first road trip together! I'll get back to you guys on that one.

Creebo · Post by **Creebo** » Sat Dec 27, 2008 12:05 am

Hmm let's see, March 21st, that's my brother's golden birthday and it's on a Saturday... hmm... all the partying will happen at night SO COUNT ME IN WOOT! Only live an hour from the convention so it's something I can defiantly NOT pass up. Cya'll there!

Post by **SpongeBuell** » Sat Dec 27, 2008 12:25 am

ShockSlayer wrote:Hey, that sounds pretty good! I might actually get to go! Gotta go sell stuff on the trading post!

SS

EDIT: Hey, what agent did you use? Do you think you could PM me a link?!

EDIT2: I noticed that I never did get any confirmation on what dates things will be happening. Or what day you'll be at the airport, spongey!

SS

I think you'll find the PM I sent you takes care of things nicely enough

. As for the agent used, my secret weapon is kayak.com. It not only checks all the major airlines, but also the sites that check the major airlines (orbitz, etc). Plus, it has a snazzy interface to fine tune the flight options based on time, price, etc.