12 Takeaways from Gen Con 2018

Post date: Aug 21, 2018 3:13:58 AM

1. What is Gen Con? It’s described as “Four days of gaming” and takes places in Indianapolis, Indiana each August. It recently celebrated its 50^th anniversary.

2. What kind of games? Board games, mostly—I saw one room with old fashioned arcade games. There are games for kids and adults, and at least one game company (Rio) had a big room where you could sit and play games to see what you liked. Of course, this grandma played a lot of games geared for children, such as Monster Factory, where you draw tiles and try to create a monster. Many of the children’s games teach math, build memory, and encourage children to problem solve while having fun.

3. Who goes to Gen Con? We saw young adults, teens, grandmas, young families with babies in strollers, middle aged people, retired people, and people of all races.

4. How big of a deal is it? They sold over 60,000 four-day passes! Gen Con takes over downtown Indianapolis, packing the convention center and Lucas Stadium with people, food trucks, cars dropping off attendees, and lots of people in costume.

5. What kind of people go to Gen Con? It is the nicest crowd you can imagine and a strange sort of High School reunion if all of the theater kids became friends with all of the “Big Bang” cast, the chess club, the PTA, and teachers and staff. They are all excited to be there, and kind to each other.

6. Gen Con works hard to be friendly to people with mobility issues, and we saw a lot of people with walkers, wheelchairs, rollators, crutches, and surgery boots. I saw a double wide stroller with a screen on top for twins. We also saw a number of people on electric scooters they rented to help them navigate the hallways. Even though it is crowded, I found people opening doors and making way for me with my rollator, which made me feel welcome.

7. How do you manage 60,000 people and over 18,000 events? It is run by volunteers – hundreds and hundreds of friendly people in special Tshirts. They use social media, their Gen Con Website to communicate, and of course, there’s an app! Food trucks line up outside the convention center with pizza, noodles, salads, hot dogs, etc. Inside, there were several places to buy food and drink.

10. The overall sense that I get each year is one of collaboration and cooperation, not competition between cosplayers. Each year, we have seen a couple of volunteers walk around with materials to help cosplayers make repairs to costumes, replacing buttons or sewing up loose seams. I’ve also seen cosplayers help each other adjust costumes and head gear. There is a special area in one of the main halls where several dozen cosplayers gather at a time for photo ops and talking with the public.

11. One of the things that impresses me about Gen Con is its focus on giving back, choosing several charities each year. They raised more than $50,000 for The Jack Vasel Memorial Fund and Second Helpings, Inc., the official 2018 charities, pointing out that they have raised more than $300,000 overall for charity.

12. I was overjoyed to see TWO groups doing Voter Registration -- the Indianapolis League of Women Voters and another group. We had to stop and chat!

Last Updated August 12, 2018