Know Your Venue Before Bringing A Gaming Convention To Life
Conventions need to be more organized and active than a group of like-minded people at a conference center--even if those people seem to be satisfied by sitting down at a video game. To avoid being put on someone's list of worst conventions, you need to know both your events and your venue in order to be as successful as possible. Although it's difficult to plan everything perfectly for all guests, consider a few inspection and preparation points that can boost your gaming convention to the highest ratings.
Understanding Personal Space And Convenience
At the most basic level, your guests and booth participants will need somewhere to connect game systems and computers in order to play games, watch footage and share the experience with others outside of the convention. Unfortunately, it'll take more than having enough electrical plugs.
Personal space can be a big issue, even if the point of the convention is to get together about games. With a moving mass of participants, their mobile devices and the different events happening throughout your convention, make sure to have safe areas where visitors can spread out and idle. These idling areas need enough electrical plugs for power strips, outlet sharing, sitting areas and personal belongings.
Idling needs to be possible, but you don't want to create too much of a distance. Too much distance can mean long travel times to and from different events, which can frustrate and tire the visitors. Visitors may think twice about going to your convention if it isn't easy to move around while having fun, and you may not be able to rearrange the convention layout in time.
Instead, do a rough walkthrough of where different events will be in relation to where guests should be. This can be achieved by creating a sign-up list.
Sign-ups For Tracking, Not Charging
There may be some events that charge for entry, such as a guest science fiction writer holding a workshop for specific guests. These lists are created as a result of purchasing tickets for access, but the same lists can be used to track your expected number of guests more easily.
The main venue should have the same type of ticket-based tracking to know the general number of guests, but you should enforce sign-ups at every event. You don't need to charge for every event, as a lot of the information and entertainment should be part of the main convention cost. Instead, make sure that your sign-up process includes check marks or a similar option-selecting system for each event.
Grant badges or stickers for each event type, and use that information to decide the location of each event. The location should be planned in relationship to different entrances and rest areas and with other issues such as phone charging in mind.
Although the size of guest groups can change if you allow open admission, you can direct a lot of the guest flow by knowing where they're going ahead of time. A people counter could be used, but can be an expensive technology investment depending on the amount of guests and number of entry areas. For more information, contact 4H Council or a similar organization.