Over the holiday weekend I had the good fortune to attend the Origins game convention in
downtown Columbus. This annual event is kind of a massive
gathering of gaming enthusiasts from around the word, attracting some
10,000 visitors a year to Columbus. The convention offers sessions
on the game industry itself (e.g., how to get a game published, how to
improve a game’s design, etc.), opportunities to play various games
(everything from Monopoly to computer games to Dungeons and Dragons, and
many more you’ve never heard of), and the chance to buy games and
game-related merchandise. If you enjoy playing games, especially
the non-computer variety (though video games are represented there),
you’ll find something to interest you at Origins.
Waiting in Line for Badges
Waiting in Line for
Tickets
As for myself I went down after work on
Thursday, June 30. I spent the better part of two hours in line
getting my convention badge and signing up for tickets to various events
I wanted to take part in. I then spent 6pm to 10pm playing Car
Wars with other attendees at the Rogue Judges area in the
miniatures gaming room (Exhibit Hall C of the convention center).
We had a good time. The Rogue Judges gamemasters are a personable
bunch, who clearly enjoy the games they host, and who try to maintain a
delicate balance between adherence to the rules and a sense
of logic/fairness. The unfortunate part of this game
experience, to me, was that a young boy who either wasn’t aware of the
rules or chose to ignore them won the game. I’m pretty certain
that (intentionally or not) he was cheating a fair amount of the
game. I noticed a couple of the other players calling him on
things he was doing, but he managed to “squeak by”
somehow. He made maneuvers with his car that I didn’t think were
legal, managed somehow not to get destroyed in spite of having no armor
on one side of his car, and I’m pretty sure fired more than once in the
same round. Still, as I said, my brother and I had a good time in
the game overall even considering this one player. I want to make
it clear that I don’t hold Rogue Judges responsible for what the kid was
doing. They had 16 players to cope with, all of whom needed their
assistance at different times, and there was no way they could keep
track of who had and hadn’t shot, who had and hadn’t turned,
etc.
Car Wars
Car Wars
Car Wars
On Friday, I played Injurius Games – Keep What You Kill
that Red Shirt Games
hosted. The guys at Red Shirt are really a class act, in my
opinion. They know the rules to the game, administer the rules
fairly and impartially, keep things moving, keep them fun, cater to new
players without making them feel like idiots, and generally uphold the
highest standards of “gamemastering”. I have never
walked away from a Red Shirt game (and I’ve played several) feeling like
it was anything but a positive, fun experience. That’s probably
why I’ve subsequently sought out and bought every game I’ve ever played
with their people during the last couple of years. Friday evening
I played another round of Car Wars with the Rogue Judges crew.
This time the game went perfectly, everyone played by the rules, and a
good time was had by all. The only hitch in the whole game was the
amount of time it took the gamemasters to sort out a multi-car collision
and the resultant damage. But given that it was a complicated
crash and they wanted to determine the outcome logically and fairly
(which I believe they did), it was a great experience. Rogue
Judges seem to be another good bunch of GMs and I wouldn’t hesitate to
sign up for their games in the future.
Injurius Games Ready to Begin
Injurius Games Underway
Saturday my step-son Austin, my brother, and I
all went to Origins. We took a brief walk through the vendor area
in Exhibit Hall D. Austin enjoyed watching the live action RPG
chess game and battle demonstrations with foam weaponry, seeing all the
games and costumes, etc. So did I. Around noon, we took part
in the “Reaper Paint and Take” session, where you could
receive a free figure and paint. Believe it or not, this was the
second or third time I’d ever tried to paint a figure, and those didn’t
really count because they were mostly one-color spray jobs. I
think I did pretty well for a first attempt, painting a dragon hatching
from its egg.
After the painting, we played Sudden Death -
Red Shirt Smash (a.k.a., Astrosmash) with the gang at Red Shirt
Games. As mentioned earlier, it was a great experience as I
expected. Austin, who had never played any miniatures game before,
loved it – in large part because the Red Shirt GM (Rob, I believe) and
other players were patient with him and taught him what he needed to
know. We lost, but still had fun.
Silent Death
Silent Death
After dinner, we came back to check out
“Barbie’s Bad Hair Day”. We got back too late for me to
actually take part in it, but I watched for a few minutes to get the
flavor of it. The gist of the game is that Barbie’s hair
looks really bad, so she’s gone postal. She’s in the top of her dream
house with a rifle, ready to shoot anyone in the yard out front.
In the yard are several groups of her fellow toys, including the stuffed
animals and the GI Joes. The animals want to sneak a fashion
magazine into the house that tells her “bad hair” is in.
The Joes, it appears, want to take her out military style.
On our
way out, we stopped to play a demonstration game of Mayfair’s Pirates
Cove, run by the folks at bigboxgames.com. They
played a 10-minute video for us, showing the basic play of the game,
then let us sit with some other folks and play a game of it. We
all agreed that it was a fun game to play. At $37.46 plus $9
shipping, I’m not sure I’ll be buying it any time soon, though. It
wasn’t much more strategic or detailed than something like Risk, and
didn’t strike me as being worth that kind of money. Still, if I
find it cheaply somewhere (say $20-25) I would pick it up.
Sunday
I spent most of my time in the dealer room, picking up some bargain bin
games and miniatures, some not-really-bargain T-shirts and a polo shirt,
and some decently-priced computer games from Matrix Games. After
that, we headed home and called it a day (and “a
convention”).
While in some ways I didn’t quite have as much
fun as I did at Origins 2004, overall I did have a good time
there. I got to play Car Wars for the first time this year, and
played a couple of favorites from last year (Injurius Games and Silent
Death). I ended up buying more shirts and miniatures this year
than actual games, though I did pick up two games (Spammers and
something else that was $1) as well as three video games (Starshatter,
Reach for the Stars, and one other).
As it always is with
“Origins weekend”, it was all over way too quickly to suit me,
but as always it was a good time.
admin Games columbus, con, convention, discussion, expo, exposition, game, game convention, gaming, miniatures, oh, ohio, Origins, origins 2005, origins convention, report, review, rpg, show
