I'm posting the collective staff response to stuff except stream tech, Aries will cover that next.
First, thanks to everyone who attended the event or watched at home. NASA was a blast in general. From what we (as the NASA staff) understand, the atmosphere was chill, we stayed mostly on schedule, the space was acceptable if a bit cramped, the hotel rooms and their staff were mostly okay, and the free breakfast was nice.
Now let's discuss some of the cons:
Music during intermissions were chosen from a MonsterCat playlist acquired via HumbleBundle. It was a $1, figured we'd avoid copyrights with it. Initially started with a heavy bass playlist, but switched to a more chill one. Still, a lot of folks found it to be in bad taste and wanted video game music. We will either look into a better playlist that won't trigger any copyright scripts, or focus on uploading local vods to edit/avoid the muting.
MSGA Hats may be in poor taste to some, but we purposefully do not have rules about attire people wear on stream except that it doesn't get the stream banned. The hats may reference MAGA, but that doesn't mean everyone who wears them has that political affiliation.
The event lacked some extra technology such as practice PCs and power strips. Most of the tech was provided by Dark-Aries, Lanayru, lurk, Jymotion, Naegleria, and PvtCB brought his PC and had it setup in the practice room. Others may have brought CRTs, shoutouts to you if so.
In addition to lacking tech, initially the rooms did not have wired internet, even though we confirmed the hotel had quality wired internet in both rooms. The fix for this was to run a ethernet cord from the storage room down the hall. This only reached the stream room, so the practice room had no internet. Our plan had been to hook up a switch to it for general use. This also meant we couldn't setup the stream in the practice room to view it there.
The food choices were great but our original hotel choice had a lot more, especially for the late night. Our plan is to book the next venue sooner so we won't run into these complications, assuming we can get the venue vetted for our needs.
The registration form was supposed to have a spot for additional information regarding attendance, but was one way or another deleted on accident. We also lacked the ability to email folks after they had registered/paid to let them know everything had gone through. We're working to make this possible for next year. Please do not hesitate to ask about moving runs prior to the event - we can make it work.
The stream room had planned to provide more monitors for people in the back to see runs. This didn't happen for some runs until we used one one my monitors (only a 24") and it wasn't an option for races. We will look into getting something to hook into the streaming PC to projector onto so everyone can see from the stream's point of view.
The space in general was good for our size, but for next year we need more. The stream room got very hot when packed, and although that was partly due top the A/C not working properly, there is also a lot of equipment in use. Eventually I went and purchased fans, but it was still warm. It's also clear that we need a third multi-purpose room for board and card games, late night mafia when it can't take place in a lobby or lounge, and just more space in general for setups. Next year we'll look into a bigger stream room and an additional practice-size room. This may raise attendance costs by a bit.
The date of the event was chosen through a google form, and ended up being in May. This combined with our hotel troubles meant that we had already announced the event dates, but wish we could have changed them. A lot of things were closed for Victoria Day, and Anime North was happening at the end of the week which filled up hotels around the area. We plan to move the event to early June, and as mentioned above, book early once the venue is vetted.
Glad it was a blast.
2017 hotel/venue was great in my opinion. If the event was moved to June then we'd have more availability at the first/second choice hotels we were originally looking at. The venue could only be improved, so long as the internet and such are vetted beforehand and the hotel doesn't decide to screw us over.
You're registered, paid, and all good to go.
We can confirm if you tell us which email you used
Yes you'll have access to a PC, but I'm not sure how many there will be. We can make sure you have practice time. You'll have to download the game unless the person's computer you're using already has it. Our hotel internet is solid, so it shouldn't be a big deal.
In the interest of focusing on more on site things to do besides the obvious mafia/werewolf games, darkfox and myself will be hanging out in the general discord voice channel to facilitate some brain storming sessions for ideas on what we'd like to do. We're both in EST, so we figured we'd hang out a few evenings in the next 2 weeks to talk to anyone interested in ideas and will be attending. We will tweet out the day of and inform the discord for whoever is around. Lets discuss ideas in this thread as we update things from our discussions.
Some of the ideas we have currently are: more challenge games (i.e. beezy, fzero gx) local mystery tournament mini-game scoring/mashing/etc. competitions video game scavenger hunt (find things in games as a team against other teams) mini-panels put on the 2nd stream put on by attendees blinzer might have a IRL mario party worked out fighting game tournaments (whatever games people play) mario party tournament (quo has a thread made for this already) puyo puyo or tetris tournament various boardgames PC LAN games if enough folks bring PCs trip's out to places around Toronto (we'd most likely have to take a train/bus for large groups depending on distance. checking with the hotel concierge about options) (ideas for where to go are downtown Toronto, Canada's Wonderland, local arcade, and the big mall nearby)
Since the discussion has turned passive-aggressive and unhealthy, it is now coming to a close. NASA has given an answer to the potential pitch from Stream.me, and that decision has not changed in the week since this thread has been up. Thanks everyone for your time and participation.
After careful consideration as a group, we (as in the "NASA staff") have a summary for why NASA will not be entering into a contract with Stream.me this year.
The money being offered isn't enough to make the switch worth it since it only covers the venue. We're not confident that we could reach their estimate for success at 400 concurrent viewers on their platform given our viewer history. It's an unwanted pressure on the on-site atmosphere.
The growth isn't a guarantee given the conditions above. The money isn't a huge issue given we will break even on costs on a relatively cheap attendance fee of $50. The grassroots tech gathering has worked out well so far. We've operated at somewhat of a loss up until this year and are okay with that, with an easy example being Naegleria funding the venue last year(and almost everyone's rooms)
Having more events, such as 2-3 per year, means we'd have to put a lot more time into the events. Staff would need the sort of support like having a full-time job for at least a few members.
Twitch has been working with us to improve the stream. An easy example was them giving us front page multiple times during NASA2016. We hit our peak viewership of 4.5k during that time. We don't have much of a pull since we don't have a charity or esport aspect, but we have a good standing relationship with Twitch.
Even if NASA did enter the contract, there would still be an attendance fee because the venue is only a portion of the marathon's overall costs.
The "strict" rules on Twitch stream behavior have worked fine for our past marathons, so switching based on Terms of Service isn't really a concern. We're fine with the line we're at with our stream behavior.
We're thankful for the offer, but do not think this is the right direction for the event. Please feel free to continue to discuss the options and ask questions.
Reservation info:
Link to reserve online: https://www.holidayinn.com/redirect?path=hd&brandCode=hi&localeCode=en®ionCode=1&hotelCode=YYZOK&_PMID=99801505&GPC=NAS&viewfullsite=true
Our group code is: NAS
For those who will be crossing the border into Canada to attend NASA2017, here is are some helpful links with information about what to expect:
http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/help-aide/faq1-eng.html http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/travel-voyage/checklist-aidememoire-eng.html http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/travel-voyage/declare-eng.html#_s8
In summary: don't bring weapons, drugs, animals, or mass amounts of food with you. You will likely have a harder time reentering your country than getting into Canada, especially for Americans given the current political climate around travel bans.
Do not give the officers a hard time or a bad attitude! This is not the time to make epic memes about haha activate it. The officers have complete discretion over whether or not you will enter the country. Be cooperative, answer their questions honestly, and you won't have any issues. In the case that you are selected for a random search, which in my experience having crossed the border hundreds of times is very rare, so long as you follow the info above, you will not have any problems.
If you are an American and need info on obtaining a passport, I suggest visiting a Walgreens near you: http://photo.walgreens.com/walgreens/storepage/storePageId=Passport-Photos
If you are unsure about bringing any technical equipment, consoles, games, etc. with you for use at NASA, the answer is: Yes, bring it.
Here you can coordinate equipment with NASA staff and others. If you have equipment that can be used for the stream, please note that. We may reach out to you if we are in need of your equipment for the stream.
Hello everyone,
Unfortunately this will not be information on where you can begin to book rooms. We have had a falling out with the Toronto Airport West Hotel, in that when we were finalizing our contract they decided to double the price and move us to a different conference room. This would have easily doubled the price of the attendance fee for everyone, and we felt very off-put by them suddenly pulling the rug out beneath our feet. We are no longer going to be at the TAW.
Do not be alarmed if you already purchased a flight! The dates and airport are staying the same!
So for the past month we have been working diligently to find an alternative hotel venue. At the present, 2 hotels are looking like solid choices:
The first is the Sandman Mississauga which is actually in the same parking lot as the TAW. We are looking at space of 2000sqft at $750/day. We visited this hotel and the staff was very helpful and willing to work with us. The current issue with the Sandman is their Internet is inadequate to sustain our stream (less than 1mb up). We are talking with their ISP rep to see about getting better speeds for our event, but we do not know what that will add to the cost. We have also contacted a private ISP to get a separate line, and asked whether or not the Sandman would be alright with that. We are currently waiting on their response.
The second is the Holiday Inn Oakville. This is accessible through public transportation, about a 20min drive from the airport. We are looking at 2 rooms, about 600sqft each at $500/day each. They also have a larger ballroom at 1200sqft for $1200/day. Their Internet is at roughly 40 up, more than good enough for our stream purposes. We only just recently visited this hotel, but like the Sandman they seem very willing to work with us.
Our goal is to finalize a new hotel venue within this month. On behalf of all the NASA staff, I want to apologize for not having this all situated by now so everyone can book flights and rooms. We thought the TAW was going to be our decision before they changed the contract at the last minute. The TAW is also no longer an option, since they only gave us roughly a week to decide if we were going to accept or not.
FYI the submission deadline has been expanded by a week: until February 8th.
preNASA ended up raising $1,440 of its $4,000 goal.
Assuming 100 attendees for NASA2017 and the price difference of USD to CAD taken right now (12/6/16) means the hotel costs 8575 Canadian Dollars which equals 6456.11 US Dollars. So the registration/attendance fee will be somewhere around $50 USD after what preNASA raised.
So what'd you think of preNASA?
Yes, the event was shifted. I edited the first post to reflect the changes. You'll need to fill out the form again. Sorry for the confusion and inconvenience this may have caused.
There are a fucking million marathons, literally 2+ marathons being held every single weekend this year, and apparently ours needed to be moved because otherwise that weekend would have 3 other events going on.
TheMaster, would you be willing to do a donation bid war between the 2 games or are you set on preferring to run L4D2? We don't really have an extra 45min to throw into your estimate with how the schedule is now to show both games.
I see where you're coming from in that they work the same, but on the face of it the language implies that you can up+a warp - the category makes more sense to those who don't run the game that the category involved no type of warps.
I don't think "deathless" was ever a stipulation of the run category, as for example, you could die to Kraid and start back from the top of his lair and still finish the run without using a death or up+a to warp, even though you died. The same can be true of dying to metroids in Tourian, or Mother Brain.
