Alberta, CanadaI straight up didn't go because I had no way to get to and stay in St Cathy's for as much money as I had available. It goes without saying that the easier a place is to get to, the more people are going to go and so as many problems as being in Canada solves, going back to the US to make it easier for more people to come might just be a hard pill NASA needs.
I was having a good think about NASA. One of the major advantages of GDQ is the engagement with audience. Reading donations, and active social media presence (both official and unofficial aka GDQ monitor) help get people interested in the marathon. That's some pretty significant draw for people. NASA might benefit from having an analogue to the donations announcer during the marathon, but since donations aren't a thing they would have to be doing something like manning the Twitter account and interacting that way. Invite the audience to tweet at the official twitter and read out some of the not-garbage donations during breaks between games and slow sections during runs if need be. Get the audience involved and interested. Just a thought.
Toronto is a crummy place during winter months. Our southern brethren would freeze their bits off if they don't bring an appropriate arsenal of winter clothing.
Attendee and Runner here. I was there all week and was able to see the marathon from start to finish. Here's my random list of stuff.
Stuff that was Good
-The Venue
The venue was very nice. Its layout worked shockingly well, and it was in a reasonably good spot in town. It was a good facility that did the job it needed to do. I wouldn't hesitate to go to another event there.
-Two Streams
Last year I was pretty unconvinced about having two streams running at the same time. It felt stuck on, almost like an afterthought. When I saw there were two streams this year I was pretty skeptical that this could be made to work. I was even skeptical when I saw how much Open Stream time there was. I was pretty much convinced it was gonna be like last year, and was pretty not impressed. It turned out this was not the case.
Having a second stream allowed a ton of things you could not do on a week-long marathon single stream. I was impressed by the variety of side games, long games that couldn't otherwise be run, and the surprise meme games that just turned out to be stupid fun. The ability of ESA to be flexible and just do random junk is one of its greatest strengths, and the double stream format took that method and ran like hell. Keep doing it.
-The Stream Room
When I got to ESA for the first day, I had heard some horror stories about stream 1 being in the auditorium, and stream 2 being in a closet. It did not bring good feelings. Initially when I saw two couches, and two desks of TVs I was like "they can't be doing that. There's no way there's two streams in one room. That will never work". I was wrong. The techs did an excellent job of making both streams accessible and viewable, even at the same time. Audio was fine, visibility was good, and it made it a lot easier for attendees to watch both streams when there's just too many good games on at once.
I'm also very happy about the practice/gaming area surrounding the whole stream room/auditorium. I spent a lot of hours around the perimeter both practicing my game and watching some game that I wanted to watch on the appropriate screen. You could never, ever, ever do that at AGDQ. It's not gonna happen. It allowed me to feel like I was at the event, participating, and enjoying it in a way that would not be possible without such a layout. Against my expectations, no real problems came up like distraction or information overflow from being able to watch 2 live events while doing my own stuff. This sort of thing may be difficult to maintain as the event scales up, but I implore the staff at least to put as much effort as they can into keeping this in mind.
-Accessibility and Atmosphere
I went to AGDQ, and I went to ESA. I can honestly say I had a lot more fun at ESA. Why? AGDQ was a very stratified, planned event. Staff laid the rules, people followed them (mostly). Things were laid out in a logical manner, and done that way. It worked. ESA was not that. They went in with a plan, and then did stuff that seemed good, or fun. And they were constantly talking with the attendees, being themselves, and including everybody. Flicky came up to us randomly and asked if anyone wanted to commentate the Sonic block. So I got to go up on stage, read donations, and bully Sonic Heroes. I had no idea what business I had being there, but we did it anyway and it turned out really well (I think). And that's just one thing. The entire event was the staff looking for more things to include and have fun with. They did it with runs (Yellow Stream open blocks), they did it with memes (Barney), they did it with people (ME :D), they did it with things (Tompa's Piano), and they did it with the most random of crap possible (Dog chew-toy pigs). A lot of it was fun. Some of it didn't work. Oh well. Even the stuff that didn't work contributed to the atmosphere of the event, and I'm very glad I went.
-The Pigs
oink oink
Stuff that was not Good
-Stuff Everywhere
Holy crap. Someone desperately needed to make good on the threats to dump stuff in the lake. First day or two, lots of space on tables and people were cleaning them off okay. Every other day of the week is a was an absolute disaster. FlyingFox and I were looking for a place to practice our games the day before, and there was literally not a place. Those spots which were not taken up by people actually doing stuff were hoarded by people who had just left so much crap on the table that it was unfeasible to move it all off. And our group was pretty liberal about moving people's stuff if it was in the way. That kind of behaviour needs to go away.
-Look! A Sleeping Person!
Yeah, I get that everyone needs a nap, but when people are actively looking for spots to sit down, play games, and contribute to the event and can't find any, the sleeping people need to go. We have hotels and mass housing for a reason. Maybe we need a room for at-event napping, but it MUST NOT take up the same space as people who are actually trying to do stuff at the venue. For people who weren't there, there were CONSTANTLY people sleeping in the booths around the perimeter of the stream room, the same booths that were used to set up laptops and game consoles for practice/play/other things people do when they're awake.
-Food Availability
The event has a bit of a conundrum. It's a 24/7 marathon filled with people whose sleeping schedules are totally screwed. But the area around the event is definitely not 24/7. There were a bunch of places open reasonably late, but there were definitely times when it was just really difficult to get food. I also found it was pretty tough to store food that you accumulated over the day, but I had no access to any sort of fridge. Maybe people staying in a different hotel had a better shot at that. The event staff did go out and try to get places to stay open and to do deal with food establishments, but it would definitely help if there was more round-the-clock food availability. Might not be easy, though.
-Base Campers
This is a bit of an offshoot of a previous complaint but it bears a look. There were at least two tables with full power, view of the event, and seating that were taken for the full duration of the event by people who laid down their stuff on day 1, and just left it there 24/7. If people leave their stuff for a night, so be it. Move it off the table, put it somewhere funny, have a laugh, the end.But these people literally took up prime real estate for the full 7 days, and I can guarantee you that only a tiny, tiny portion of that time was used actually doing gaming related stuff. 2/3 of the time they were not even there, and people didn't touch it because they weren't brave enough to disturb someone else's stuff. I have particular for disdain for people like this who are not only willing to take up space that someone else wants to use, but to lay claim for a whole week and waste the vast majority of it.
-Tompa
WHY YOU NO LEARN SONIC MUSIC ON THE PIANO. (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻
Just kidding. Tompa is a beast. Seriously learn Sonic music. Don't make me go up there and do Planet Wisp myself, cuz I'll friggin do it.
Things that could be done
-Increased Table and Power Availability
It's really going to be necessary as the event grows. Implementing measures to keep table campers and sleepers from taking up space would also go a long way to making these two important resources more available
-Runner-only Practice Tables
I'm really leery of this one. I do not like the idea of segregating runners and non-runners, as I feel that one of ESA's strengths is having everyone as one giant amorphous mass of people who just enjoy gaming. But it may become a necessity as the event grows to have an area that only runners who have runs coming up can always go to if they need to practice something.
-Event Sleeping Area
I don't know how much I like this either, but I know that the watermelon room was set up with a ton of air mattresses the night before the event. And a metric ton of sleeping people. Which made it really creepy to walk past that door. But there was so much sleeping and napping that it almost might be advantageous to have a room set up for just this. There certainly seems to be a demand for it.
-Setup Testing Area
It would be really nice if there was a dedicated setup identical to the stream setup where runners who are up in a bit can go to make sure everything is going to work properly. It would be nice to verify any issues beforehand. I wasn't a staff member, so I don't know how many problems this would actually alleviate, but I knew a bunch of runners who were scared their setup would not work. If nothing else, relieving their anxiety would be nice.
-More Pigs
oink oink oink
Great event all around guys. I consider it a serious alternative to a GDQ for events I want to attend. With infinite money and time, I would prefer it. Keep doing what you're doing.
More like maple syrup!
I was able to put in a substantially better time on my Sonic Triple Trouble Tails Any% run. This one is within 2 seconds of the old WR, and about 30 seconds or so off the current one. There's a lot of room to improve, but this run does a good job of showing off some of the weirdness that this game is capable of. I expect to also practice up 100% further in case that gets supported.
