Message:The big show was this weekend.
I arrived back from the Con today to catch the weekly Better Games session. Long drive.
The crowds are back to Indianapolis. The product overflows the shelves. The customer base is now eagerly buying the slickly produced board game products post world's most deadly pandemic in the history of everything (MDPHOE).
Gone are most of the pamplets replaced by $150 board games. Lots of flower, bird, cute animal, and abstract games. Cards remain big. Marvel, the Boys, and the magic clones. Zombies, mutants, and robots as bad guys are big. The few "war" games are out there as always but not many. I was running with some WW2 board gamers but the pickings were slim.
The dealer's hall seemed smaller than usual ... just compressed in space (perhaps an illusion). The shoppers were dense. The noise was a roar. It never seemed to slow. Good for the sellers. Hard to demo.
The convention stretched into the arena as before but it didn't seem to spread the people. They were everywhere.
Parking was better (probably due to the Lyft and Uber).
Food seemed less packed by a small amount but that may be just the preferences of the audience has changed.
Good times. Exhausting. Gaming was fair.
Yours,
IronConrad
07-Aug-2023