Geek vs Life

I love the smell of conventions in the morning. It has the fresh new car smell. The rooms feel so drab when the media are allowed access half an hour before the rest of the crowds, I understand the “why’s” of it. As a media outlet, we have to have a certain amount of uninterrupted access to the stands and booths, so we can actually do our jobs of reporting. After all, we have to write about what the gamers are going to be waiting in line for, whether it’s to try out Rock Band or the newly released Bioshock.

Gamers got to try out the much anticipated Penny Arcade video game.

Personally, I like it though when the convention goers are present. The crowd abuzz with anticipation of playing new games. The screams of excitement and watching where the people are actually walking to, seeing what they want to play and what they avoid like the plague. Ultimately, when we putting things into perspective, the media as well as the retailers, developers and publishers are there for one sole purpose: cater to the gamers, feel their pulse.

Giving away free t-shirts, games, demos, posters, wall art and collectibles isn’t a bad idea either. For example, no one was heading to the Nvidia booth to find out when their new video card was being released, they headed there in droves to get the limited edition t-shirt, but more importantly, to get a button.

See Nvidia had the brilliant plan to assign a number to everyone who visited their booth and have it printed on a button. Not an individual number mind you. That would made the whole ordeal look more akin to a prison/holocaust/Orwellian scenario. The idea was to give out matching numbers at random to some 30,000+ attendees. Find your matching number and win a prize, simple right? Not so much.

A gloved gamer looks for his match on the wall of numbers.

The convention center became a literal cluster-fuck of “who’s my match”. People set up online forums, created massive databases, erected a wall of names, number and contact info which was being updated daily, if not hourly. People began to walk around with numbers written on boards in hopes of finding their matching partner and winning a chance to spin the Nvidia wheel of prizes. Some people did in fact find their “number mate” and walked away with a video card, but alas most people didn’t fare so well.

So Nvidia, in a stroke of mass marketing genius got more buzz from their match game throughout the convention than most of the other events combined… well apart from Rock Band and keynote speaker Wil Wheaton, but still, that’s debatable, and a story for another post.