[Deptheads] SoCal Smackdown (Was: Get games up ASAP!)

[thatericn at aol.com]

Hello,

A couple of themes that keep getting brought up are making me grit my teeth.

1) That we are somehow ignoring geographic areas of Southern California. Especially the contention that we are somehow "L.A.-centric." That one really burns me. We search and search (and search some more) for locations that combine space, availability and affordability, and keep basically getting forced back to LAX hotels. 
- Suburban hotels don't have the space
- Big Orange County hotels? Too expensive, unless we want to charge $75
- Convention centers? Not connected with hotels, so two pains-in-the-butt to deal with (unless we want to let attendees fend for themselves), and two separate businesses wanting to get worthwhile return.
It's not like Eric A. commutes from Malibu, Mark from Palos Verdes, and the rest of us heading back to our homes in Santa Monica, Venice, Westchester, Manhattan and Redondo Beaches... For almost ALL of us, O.C. would be closer and more convenient!

2) That there is some blatantly untapped and therefore ignored pool of gamers in Southern California that we have been too dense to identify or too snobby to acknowledge. While different segments of the gaming community have grown, peaked and declined over the decades, attendance has kept a certain baseline, with broad economic factors and broad public perceptions of the convention administrations effecting the trends in attendance. Back during stronger gaming "eras" the higher attendance was not shockingly or amazingly higher than now. Gaming in different forms as a favorite hobby is somewhat generational, and often runs for a varying number of years during an individual's life. People move, people raise families, get interested in sports, change careers, get involved in Renaissance fairs, historical reenacting, ballroom dancing, sailing, motorcycles, or start bands, etc., etc - or get older, and do not get out as much. It would be interesting to see how cable television, computer and home video games and the internet have effected gaming as a hobby.

Thus ends my venting.

Eric N.
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