2008 Feedback

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 1:44 pm

Tell us what you thought of this years and any improvements needed. We are here to make sure next years event will be better for the next.

It was great working with Noobie Games, my personal staffs, and the Otakon staffs to make this year run well. No more last minute prizes, Lee is awesome for getting what he could. So yeah next year will be better!

1. Get PA system
2. Staffs need to wear their shirts
3. New tournament format
4. Controller issues
5. Layout of the room
6. Extension cords for PS2

Pryde · Post by **Pryde** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 1:52 am

Honestly, not to take away from the staff. I thought it was a mediocre job at best. It seems the majority of you have never ran a tournament before. Which is understandable. Two things that needed improvements.

1. You guys need Megaphones. Obviously because people don't always hear their names all the time.

2. Pre-printed brackets. Writing on a sheet of paper is kinda messy.

3. Stop matching up people in order the way they signed in. Some times friends sign up one after the other and boom, they play first match against each other.

4. Please try to run the tourney on time. I do know it's almost like impossible and $hit happens.

5. Have some deodorant there please, some people were not smelling too fresh, haha.

Other than that, everything was ok. If needed, you can always have someone who has been to tourneys to run brackets and have one of the staffs supervise them. Some people were upset, because it was not run as advertised. I understand the time constraints and all, but if it came down to that, check inventory, if needed, some players can bring their systems, memory, games, controllers, etc. You know what I mean. Just a bit unorganized, that's all. Over all, fun times, I guess that's all that matters, right? Haha.

Nice meeting you Mike and Viet, thanks for the great time, I really enjoyed my time there. See you guys next year, perhaps I'll even volunteer. =)

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 12:41 pm

Majority of us have ran years worth of tournaments. Unless it was a few where I placed them to run it due to last minute change.

1. We noticed on thursday that the con didn't give us a PA system.

2. It might be but next year all names will be printed out instead of writing down. We might have a pda to save time on reading handwritings.

3. You all eventually have to play each other at some point. Were not gonna lose time changing it all up especially when it's being written. Next year if we grab some pda's we can put them on excel then randomize it.

4. Yeah the on time thing was totally my fault. We had conflicts one after another. It doesn't help much when you only have one station that has the game.

5. We have the rule up if they start to smell they are asked to leave. All you had to do was tell a staff =P

Lol a couple of tournaments I had to grab someone to do it because everyone was running off to the concert and others was like I never played the game so I can't do it. I'm like wtf.. I did have to ask people to bring stuff in last minute. It was a pain for all of us. I had check with people if they brought in the stuff I needed and then turns out when tourney comes it wasn't there.

Yeah we're gonna fix all that stuff for next year. All this was so done last minute it's crazy. It wasn't so bad with only like a month and a half of time to plan all this. This time I have 1 year to get stuff in order.

Yes it was awesome meeting you even tho I don't remember which one you are because I met so many people with my lack of sleep ^^; no offense man. Thanks for the feedback!

Post by **Rappak** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 12:58 pm

Why was DDR on soft pads this year? The arcade machine is so much better and there is usually DDR players to help assist with the maintenance of it. I wasn't able to make my usual rounds into the VG room but that's the one thing that stood out. Was there any of the other music games there too? I didn't see Pop'n at all. It might have been in a corner or hidden somewhere but I didn't see it this year and that was a bit of a disappointment.

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 1:19 pm

Machines cost too much especially from the people we were trying to get it from. There's no vending in our room so that didn't help make it any cheap. Hard pads would of gotten them if we didn't expect that to happen. So soft pads were whats left from 3 years ago.

We did have a pop n music and iidx out most of the time near the DDR setup.

Machines are cool but when you have no budget you take what you can get.

Post by **Rappak** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 1:41 pm

It wasn't in the budget for this year? That's really hard to believe as the machines have been there in years past.

Vyers · Post by **Vyers** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 3:29 pm

Overall I had a good time in the game room this year. the video game staff were very helpful and friendly, but there are a couple issues I had with the way things went.

1) It would be nice if there wasn't a cap for competitors in each tournament. Most of the tournaments had a limit of 32 players, this prevents everyone from entering the tournaments they want to participate in. It was great of the Noobie Games staff to allow everyone in on the Saturday SSBB tourney if they hadn't about 3/4 of the people that wanted to enter wouldn't have been able to. I'd guess that you limit the number of entree's because of time constraints, but it would be great to eliminate the player cap if that's possible

2) both this year and in 2006 things were pretty unorganized on the forums and it was hard to find info on the tournaments. I recall that in 2006 people could sign up online before the con and their names were supposed to be first on the list when the signups opened up on site, when I checked on the signups I found that my name wasn't on any of the of tournaments I signed up for online, and all but 1 were already full. This year the exact tournament times weren't posted until a day or two before the con, and they weren't posted in the tournament schedule thread by the admins. It was initially posted in another thread, I don't recall which one. It was later copied to the tournament schedule thread by a regular user. It would have made more sense for the admins to post it in the tournament schedule thread because that's the first place anyone trying to learn when a tournament starts will look.

3) Extension cords would have been great for the locked game systems. I play using a stick for PS2 fighters, but I was unable to use it much of the time cause I couldn't access the controller ports. The boxes could only be left unlocked if a video game staff member was present to keep an eye on it. If you had extension cords we would be able to swap out controllers without unlocking the box.

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:05 pm

[quote=Rappak]It wasn't in the budget for this year? That's really hard to believe as the machines have been there in years past.[/quote]

Believe it. Due to issues last year the budget dropped by a lot. I mean A LOT. If you noticed each year with a machine we never went to the same vendor. They always ask for more the next. Making it hard when there aren't many around here to ask.

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:16 pm

Forums stuff was lacked because all staffs in this department weren't hired till like 2 months ago. Not as easy to catch up on things while being rushed. Least this time we know who we are going to work with or potentially will. ^_^

We aren't going to have an extension cord for everything. The bring your own controller was mostly for tournaments usage. Other than that we aren't leaving boxes to be left opened.

Also which tournament thread are you talking about? Everything tournament wise was posted here because I was the one who posted them.

Mikhal · Post by **Mikhal** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:30 pm

1. Get some hdmi/component cables for the TVs. Such a waste seeing 360s and PS3s hooked up via composite cables. You can get some pretty cheap hdmi cables at monoprice.com

2. Extension cables for fighting games. Already mentioned, but might as well mention again. A lot of people (myself included) brought our own sticks/controllers to play on. I'm sure staff gets annoyed from getting asked to to switch out controllers every so often. Looking online, this place has a decent price for them. $25 for 10 of them shipped.

3. A tournament schedule for all days (with rules) should have been up the whole time instead of just the sign up sheets for that particular day. If I hadn't already checked the forums, I'd probably would have missed some of the tourneys earlier in the day.

4. Have a setup for each tournament game on most/all times. Was there no PS3 that had Puzzle Fighter HD besides the one that already had T5:DR running on it? Puzzle Fighter always seems to have no setup for it till the tourney actually starts. I'm sure people would want to play some actual casuals in the game to get ready for the tournament. There was a setup for the original game on Friday, but that doesn't really help much as the quick drops change the gameplay dramatically. Why was Akuma and Devilot banned when the tourney finally started anyways? Thought that was weird but most people wouldn't bother picking them anyways.

5. Multiple setups to make the tournaments run faster. I think this was only done on 3s this year and the tournament went by pretty quickly even though it started late. Next year, I suggest setting up 2 SDTVs dedicated for tournament play (at least for the fighting games). People won't be able to complain about lag this way.

I thinking about joining staff next year. You still going to be running things next year, Mike? If you and Viet are still in it'll make the decision a little easier. :laugh:

Pryde · Post by **Pryde** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 9:12 pm

Hey Mike, just wanted to let you know, I didn't mean it to make it sound like was attacking you. I understand that you guys have a way of running tourneys and I have my way of running tourneys. In my honest opinion, I feel my set up would've been alot more smoother. After all, this is why you did post up this thread for some feed back ^_^ . I've been traveling for tournaments since 2000. That's all. Megaphones is a must man! It'll help either way just to have 1 or 2 lying around. Just my 2 cents.

It doesn't matter if you remember me or not, it's not a big deal. There's a picture of you in the album, thought you might wanna see it.

Pictures from Anime Boston 2008

phylomathsonic · Post by **phylomathsonic** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 9:16 pm

This was my second time at Anime Boston and my second time witnessing the DDR setup and competition. This time around more than last, I feel that the DDR station needed a uniformed staff member to supervise the game. On the convention rules page, rule 13 states that "We will do our best to accommodate as many people as we can as quickly as possible." This should apply to game setups along with function rooms, especially if there are so many interested newcomers to a game.

Instead, what I witnessed on Saturday afternoon was a group of people sitting around, some too scared to speak up to take their turn and some too aggressive to give someone a chance. People were kicked off of their set because of two guys supposedly continuing a tournament that should have been completed hours ago; I say 'supposedly' because the end of said tournament was not administrated by or accompanied by any uniformed staff member.

I tried to coordinate a system of succession before the previously mentioned incursion, and it was easy. Very easy. Anyone with a working soul could do this, and no one was, leaving interested newbies stranded by the words of people who said they were doing an official event.

Please take this into staffing consideration if setting up only one station for such a popular game during next convention. The purpose of the gaming station should go beyond expert show-off material; inexperienced people should get interested in new games in this room without obnoxious, undocumented incursions and a general feeling of confusion.

Also, while I know this specific incident could be reported to a few members at the front of the room, it was an unsettling thing that would have been reduced to he said-she said tattling. The incident did not matter nearly as much as the overall attitude surrounding this setup.

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 9:37 pm

I didn't take it as an attack at all. Just sharing out what happened. It's all good

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 9:58 pm

I was there supervising the final tournament on sunday. The person I asked to run it didn't bother to tell me until later that it was being pushed till then. I would of disqualified them for leaving like that.

Yes staff members will be wearing their shirts while on shift for next year to avoid confusion. There was a staff member usually sitting around there. But he won't be with us next year.

Which staff member did you talk to about this? Whenever there was a problem I would know about it. If people don't speak up at times it just gets ignored. If they did and I didn't know about it well I need to know.

Next years set up will almost be the same. I mean I don't need a staff member to always supervise that station if a bunch of people can't get along. If it happens get someone to find me and I'll deal with it.

Thanks for your feedback. We'll try to avoid situations like this for the future.

TheNerdyFeminist · Post by **TheNerdyFeminist** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 11:54 pm

I actually prefer soft pads to hard ones. I'm used to them, and I hate the arcade platforms, when they're all worn out from being stomped on, they're hard to dance on when they're like that. For me the soft pads are a lot easier.

TheNerdyFeminist · Post by **TheNerdyFeminist** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 11:59 pm

I have some feedback:

Rock Band? I know it's a popular game, but why feature that and not DrumMania/GuitarFreaks? You'd think that an anime convention would feature a Japanese video game instead of its American imitation (DrumMania/GuitarFreaks has been around for almost a decade, Rock Band hasn't even been around for one year).

I'm sick of people ranting and raving of Rock Band when they've never even heard of DM/GF. I have a DrumMania controller, and it's almost an insult when someone sees the controller and asks "OMG U HAF TEH ROK BANDZ?"

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 12:04 am

None of us had it. If I did would of totally put it out.

sulucnumoh · Post by **sulucnumoh** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 11:04 am

Not having enough controllers was my main issue. I didn't get a controller until sunday. Next year i'm bringing my own controllers for the PS3 and Wii. My husband brought his fighting stick but he would've had to leave it. That wasn't happening. Some people abuse sticks. I understand staff didn't want to swap it every time someone wants to use there own controller. But, you need a relay system. Having people just dealing with that specific job. If you have enough staff members to do it. But the most expensive systems were right out in the open. The cheapo systems were locked up. What was with the carpeted tables? Its not a good idea to put systems on carpet. Because of static shock. Puting 2 360 systems super close to each other is just asking for a red ring of death. I also did not like the configuration of the tables. I know its easier to kepp an eye on the stuff. But, There was alot of space you could of used, it got crowded, and it was hard to walk around and see everything that was there. Grouping games with the same genre is an easy fix too. I saw a little of the this year. :thumbup: You should have a free table for people to play there portable systems (example: DS,PSP, GBA, Etc.).They had that in 2006. In 2006, I know most of the staff for game room didn't show up. Justin did the best he could and I hardly noticed that the volunteers did't show for they're shift. Except I was just seeing Justin and this other woman running the whole vg room. I thought that was odd. You should get Justin back. Things would run alot smoother.

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 11:53 am

Justin wasn't a volunteer or a staff. It was great he did things but it wasn't his job to. He didn't want to be on staff. I was in the room almost majority of the con. All the other staffs were sitting right there at the stage table. Noobie Games' staffs were there as well. Next year they will all wear a staff shirt to avoid this. But most of them were there for their shift. I don't see it that it was just Justin and Tiffany doing all the work when my personal staff was around.

We didn't place the tables like that. The company the convention center uses does that so we weren't allowed to set up the way we initially wanted. We can't move the tables unless we pay them more to. Next year we will have it set up by rows so avoid the massive crowds. The carpet thing was part of it. Don't know why it's there it just was and we couldn't do anything about it.

All the expensive systems were mostly Noobie Games and that's how they wanted to leave their systems. Lock boxes can't fit those big systems. As for portable stations for hand helds there was 2 tables set up on the side for it. So we did have it.

Justin · Post by **Justin** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 4:27 pm

Appreciate the shout-out, but yeah, I did relatively little but man that one Wii for 10 hours Friday and helped a few congoers with minor irks when I saw it. Really, it was mostly Mike, Viet, Alex, Long and the NG crew pulling their weight. Especially Alex who was powering through the weekend on little sleep.

Every year, things happen that some people don't agree with. Most congoers don't realize it, but I'm sure Mike and his crew were doing their best given the situation.

My own gripes are well known at this point. No point in dredging them up in public.

brie84 · Post by **brie84** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 8:17 pm

It was my first big con...and about 80% of it I was in the game room. I had a good time...all I ask for is more PF next time...
I'm glad I brought my copy in...I think it got a good response...I just need to find my memory card to keep all the characters unlocked...

ALSO it was a pleasure to watch Eric S. get pwned in the Puzzle Fighter tourney...I would have just liked the HD version set up for a little practice before the tourney...other than that it was good

The staff rocked, the games rocked, AB all together rocked...next year will be better

Kurai Ryu · Post by **Kurai Ryu** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 11:03 pm

HDMI cables or Standard Definition TV's. HighDef don't mean squat if you're playing on a laggy TV, especially for tourney play. (Just in case you haven't heard it enough times) I'm not going into the prizes, because I know why they were what they were, lol. Let's just say they were way better than last year's Calanders.

To be completely honest, I hated the atmosphere this year. The space was kick ass! But it just couldn't top being in a dim-lit room with balcony view and trance music playing in the bg. I understand why it didn't happen this year, but I really felt the hard floor and warehouse lights were a HUGE step down.

Big props to Long, DeMarcus, and Manny. You guys were bustin' ass.

As previously stated, run brackets properly. etc. etc. Did I mention the TVs were crap?

MachoZ · Post by **MachoZ** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 12:16 pm

Now that we are back in South Florida (lots of stops on the way bacl ^_^) I will post some info in response to what Mike has been posting.

First thanks to all of you guys who continue to give us positive feedback we all learn from it and continue to improve what we do.

Lets see where to start...ah, Tourney brackets. I run WCG Tournaments and MLG Tourneys here in our stores. We have a software that allows us to place names and it randomly creates brackets. Sometimes this software is a little cumbersome, so I keep life simple and only report that top 4 winning names. the hand written on our side never slowed down the Tourneys and they all run on-time. Sunday was the exception as sign up and start was roughly the same time.

We did allow more then the standard 32 players to compete. While Mike's team was maintaining time constraints. To allow everyone in on the tourneys run on the AB side would have hurt their timelines of their tourneys.

We ran only 5 Tourneys, and repeated them everyday to make sure the whole of the con that was there to compete, whether for prizes or bragging rights, could compete.

but thats because we only ran those tourneys and had break time inbetween them to compensate for overflow.

whats next. we will be from now on, whether in AB or other cons, running our Tourneys from PDA's I have 4 that will go out utilizing bracket software, so essentially this is for our benefit, it will keep things going smoothly, eventhough my staff is trained in a simple bracketing system that makes life easy, the PDA's will allow us to take more information at the sign up.

LAG...the great issue.

While I do hear a lot of you. I can say with assurance the only game I experience lag on our equipment was only the Tekken 5 DR, which we expected as I told Mike, I did test it as it was requested on the forum and it definitely has lag. this was not due to our LCD's by the way - not Plasma TV. I also tested them on EDTV's LCD and Plasma, SDTV's, Digital 30" CRT's. regular Copmposite CRT's. and this game for whatever purpose lags on them all.

I don't want to challenge anyones opinion on this matter as it can be technical or some of you have keen eysight and potentially pick up the movement faster then others. but essentially on paper, 8ms LCD's do not lag for any type of play.

I was very fortunate to work with Mike Pham, the Viet Cong and Master Long! If I could I would take them with me everywhere, they were an excellent crew of people that strived (pre-con, and during) to make this a great game room.

They were unable to get Arcade Machines, we will help them do this next year. No Promises, it all depends on the pricing of this equipment I can get for them but we have access to 19 machines. DDR, Initial D, etc. same goes for the PC's for next year. I will work closely with Mike and Lee to make it happen.

We will also bring them more consoles to fill in the extra TV's they had on the first island.

what else has been posted on this forum as a concern. hmmm.

Ah yes cables. We did have HDMI and Component cables on some of our equipment. we will have them all consistent at the next AB.

the Room setup. yeah the convention center has a labor union and we are not allowed to move those tables (Risers). So I didnt want to give Lee or Mike or the Con a headache by making them move the tables.

Next Year we will have them setup the space in a long line with the command center in the middle this will create no crumple spaces. We will also project onto screens some of the major games being played so the audience won't bunch up onto the players as well as bring Stachion roping (roping used to create space for lines, like in banks) to keep the people not playing from sitting on top of them as well.

with the proposal of Arcades, the potential of them coming with us next year, place them wrapped around the columns in the space. and use the second set of columns to place tabling for PC's still allowing the back space for the TTG and TCG gamers.

this would make the best use of a large space. but oh noes! where will the Hackie sackers go! All this is academic at this point, it is what is being talked about for the future. We will work hard to make sure all your voices are heard.

and with that I think I covered most of the questions you gave Mike...hmm, if I missed any - I will repost.

Thanks again AB, you guys were a lot of fun to serve.

Manny Camacho
Vice President, Noobie Games

Kurai Ryu · Post by **Kurai Ryu** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 3:15 pm

VF5 also experienced lag. >.> also, Tekken 5.0 (which was meant for ps2) as well.

Bamboozle · Post by **Bamboozle** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 11:26 am

[quote=Kurai Ryu]
To be completely honest, I hated the atmosphere this year. The space was kick ass! But it just couldn't top being in a dim-lit room with balcony view and trance music playing in the bg. I understand why it didn't happen this year, but I really felt the hard floor and warehouse lights were a HUGE step down. [/quote]

Agree with everything, "but" the trance music last year sucked. I couldn't stand being in that room for more than 30 min. it was WAY to loud, i couldn't even talk to my gf who was standing right next to me. Maybe if it was brought back but quiter so I could at least hear myself think. This isnt the dance room...

No big complaints really other than what was already mentioned. I was friggin over at one wii helping unlock characters in brawl thinking it was for the tourney "someone said it was" then I come to find out the tourney was already going on and my name was already called. grr. Manny let me play tho when I told him the situation.

Maybe try to spread out the tables a little more considering the amount of space. Allowing tourney viewers to breath more and let passerbys get through easily.

sulucnumoh · Post by **sulucnumoh** » Tue Apr 01, 2008 1:07 pm

[quote] Appreciate the shout-out, but yeah, I did relatively little but man that one Wii for 10 hours Friday and helped a few congoers with minor irks when I saw it. Really, it was mostly Mike, Viet, Alex, Long and the NG crew pulling their weight. Especially Alex who was powering through the weekend on little sleep.

Every year, things happen that some people don't agree with. Most congoers don't realize it, but I'm sure Mike and his crew were doing their best given the situation.

My own gripes are well known at this point. No point in dredging them up in public. [/quote]

Don't mind me Justin. I just like to address the issues that were bugging me. One thing this year I liked was no one could smoke in the VG room. Thank God!!! (figure of speech) AHah, smoke free envirorment.

VXxed · Post by **VXxed** » Wed Jan 14, 2009 5:56 pm

One that really bugged me was the size of the room that VG was in. Way too massive...2007's room was really great. I hope 2009 takes place in that room.

Also, since people are most likely going to DEMAND Rock Band and such, try to put them in different corners of the rooms so that they don't heavily interfere with each other..?

Fullmetalninja126 · Post by **Fullmetalninja126** » Wed Jan 14, 2009 6:09 pm

[quote=VXxed]One that really bugged me was the size of the room that VG was in. Way too massive...2007's room was really great. I hope 2009 takes place in that room.

Also, since people are most likely going to DEMAND Rock Band and such, try to put them in different corners of the rooms so that they don't heavily interfere with each other..?[/quote]

i 2nd this room too big

And rock band off on its own not at the end of a table

LegendofMyth · Post by **LegendofMyth** » Wed Jan 14, 2009 9:35 pm

I also liked the game room in '07, but I know that it could not accomadate rockband as it's too noisy.
The problem with DDR last year bedsides the soft mats was that all the " pro" players would hog the mats.

I know this is highely unethical, but have you ever though of hooking a laptop(in a lock box of course) up to a bigscreen running Stepmania, and then just use metal pads?

Kaede · Post by **Kaede** » Wed Jan 14, 2009 9:39 pm

Yeah it lags and not accurate if you wanted to play as a tournament. On its own might as well just play it on a system than burn a laptop. Even with the lock box it overheats.

FatalMatt · Post by **FatalMatt** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 11:40 am

This time work with a company that will actually pay out it's prizes. Noobie games still owes me 275$ and they "went out of bussiness" or something. Really Lame. Hire decent people next time.