Magic: The Gathering Drive to Work Podcast - #600: Conventions

Episode Date: January 4, 2019

Gaming conventions have played a big role in Magic's history. In this podcast, I talk about many of the key ones that have intersected with Magic.

I'm pulling out a driveway. We all know what that means. It's time for the drive to work. Okay, today I'm going to talk all about conventions. So one of the things that we do in the game industry is we have lots of game conventions. Not all of them are exactly game conventions. Some of them are broader, but games are part of it. And so one of the things that we do is we go to a lot of conventions. Some of them are broader, but games are part of it. And so one of the things that we do is we go to a lot of conventions. We being wizards goes to a lot of conventions. And I personally have been to a lot of conventions. And it dawned on me that there were a lot of interesting focal points in Magic that all sort of revolved around different conventions. So I'm

going to talk about different gaming conventions and the roles Magic interacted with them. So I hope you guys enjoy it. So first up, Gen Con. So Gen Con is a convention, I think it's now held in Indianapolis. It used to be held in Milwaukee. So before Dungeon Dragons was

owned by Wizards of the Coast, it was owned by a company named TSR. I don't know what that stands for. It's a company named TSR. I don't know what that stands for. It's a good trivia question, but I don't. So TSR was in Wisconsin. I think they're in Milwaukee. Anyway, they started a convention, I think it was back in the 70s, as a role-playing convention, but mostly for Dungeon Dragons. But over the years, it sort of grew and became, I mean, at its core, it's a role-playing game convention, but it's become more than just that.

And there's a lot of other games and stuff there. And I think Gen Con is the biggest gaming convention, I think, in the U.S. Anyway, so Gen Con has a bunch of ties to Magic. So let's talk about that okay first in 1993

Gen Con was where magic premiered where it was sold for the first time back in 1993 and I did a whole

podcast where I I did a 20 year 25 year video with Richard Garfield and Peter Atkinson I shared a bunch of stories.

I'm going to do a quick recap of this story. But if you want to hear the longer, drawn-out version of some of these stories, they're in that podcast. But anyway, basically what happened was the convention started on Thursday, and the product had been sent from Belgium to Seattle, and it was being rerouted from Seattle to Milwaukee. And it didn't get there on Thursday when the convention started, and I think it didn't get there until the middle of the day on Friday. And all the people waiting went down to the loading dock to help carry it back so they

could buy it. Anyway, it was a smash hit in 93. It was sort of the hot game of the convention, and Magic made a big, bold start. Interestingly, later that year, my first time seeing Magic was actually at San Diego Comic-Con, which I'll talk about, and then my first time buying Magic was at OrkCon, which is a Los Angeles-based game convention. Anyway, so Gen Con in 93 had the premiere of Magic. So 94 Gen Con was the first world championship was held there. Zach Dolan from the United States defeated Bertrand Lestray of France.

Zach's car broke down on the way to the tournament, but he, out of the hitchhike or something, he somehow got to the tournament, ended up winning and becoming the first world champion. And interestingly, I flew myself to Gen Con 94 because at the time I was writing the puzzles for the duelists, but I wanted to do more. And so I flew myself because I knew Catherine Haynes, the editor-in-chief of the Duelist, was going to be there. And while I was there, I got a chance to meet her. I pitched her on some ideas for some articles. I actually wrote two articles at that GenCon 94. There was one in the Duelist magazine called an MTG-er at Gen Con. That term didn't really stick.

Talking about what it's like to be a Magic Player at Gen Con. And I talked a bit about the World Championships and stuff. And then I also covered the finals of the World Championship. I and Chris Page, who of the East Coast Play Shafters,

I did a whole podcast on the Alpha Play Shafters, which I talked about Chris. He and I transcribed the finals, and then I wrote it up for, there's a thing called the Duelist Convocation Magazine. So the DCI stands for Duelist Convocation International. So originally before it was international,

it was just called Duelist Convocation. And they had, if you were part of it, they sent you this, I'm not sure what it's called, but it was like a black and white, not really a magazine, but like a little mini magazine. It was black and white, though. It wasn't full glossy or anything. And in it, I did the play-by-play of the world championships.

I literally, like, here's what he had in his hand, here's what he drew, here's what he played. And at the time, the rules were we weren't allowed to list the deck lists. I would later list the deck lists. I kept them and I later put them in a do list. But at the time, so kind of to know what the decks were, you had, like, I commented every card that got drawn and played so that you could kind of piece the deck together by looking at, you know, it didn't tell you everything, but between the three games, it gave you a pretty good sense of what the decks were doing

and probably most of the deck lists, if not all of the deck lists. The other big Gen Con moment for me was Gen Con of 98. That was where we had the pre-release for Unglued. We were coming out. So Unglued was, in many ways, the first supplemental product at a time in which we didn't really have the verbiage for a supplemental product.

And we didn't quite know what to do with it. We had started doing pre-releases, but we decided because it was a special kind of set, what we would do is at Gen Con, we would have pre-releases all weekend long. So it wasn't one singular pre-release. It was flights. But if you wanted to play this product for the first time, but before it was ever out, like this was the pre-release experience.

And this is prior to people knowing what was in the set. So like this was, if you played the Ungaloo pre-release, you didn't know what the cards did until you opened up the booster pack. We don't really get that anymore. But anyway, and then that was the event that I head-judged dressed as a chicken. The very short story was we were brainstorming ideas. Like, what could we do to make this more of a silly, fun sort of thing? And I suggested that I could head judge dressed as a chicken. And the meeting basically was like,

okay, done with brainstorming. Let's move on to things we're doing. That, we're going to do that. And like me suggesting, I felt like two minutes later, and what happened was they actually got me, we rented a chicken suit from Seattle. We brought it with us. And it had a lot of

dust on it, I guess, because there were like feathers in the costume. And I ended up getting pretty sick. I got bronchitis or something from it. I actually lost my voice by the end of the weekend,

which is not something that happens all that often to me. But regardless of getting sick from the suit, I did enjoy myself immensely. Unglued. Everyone really had fun at the pre-release and

I think I took a lot of pictures with people of me dressed as a chicken. Anyway, that is Gen Con. Gen Con, oh, the other Magic related thing is Peter Ackeson, who was one of the original founders of the company and the CEO for quite a while.

After we got sold to Hasbro, and he ended up leaving and made a lot of money from the sale, he used part of that money to buy Gen Con. And now Peter owns, his company owns Gen Con. So another magic tie between Magic and Gen Con. Okay, another convention. So almost all of these conventions, by the way, are in the summer. That's when most gaming conventions happen.

So the next one I want to talk about is Origins. So Origins is run by Gamma, which is the Game Association Manufacturers of America, I think. And it is basically for people who make games, American companies that make games. And this is... So Gen Con usually is in the same city. It did move from Milwaukee to Indianapolis, but I mean, mostly it's been in the same city. Origins, I think every year is in a different city.

Interestingly, the first time I ever went to Origins was before Magic even came out. Origins was in Las Vegas, and I went to... I took a seminar in game design, and that was my first time ever being at Origins. Okay, so Origins 93 was the first time that Magic cards were seen by the public. So Origins was before Gen Con. It was about a month before Gen Con. Gen Con was August 93 and Origins was like July 93.

And they'd gotten back the test printings meaning the way the printers will work is they'll run off the first batch and they'll send it in to make sure that everything's okay. And so they use those cards to make decks and then they

played with people at the booth and they showed off people could see the cards for the first time and they had decks so you could sit and play the game and it was from that that one of the issues at the time was Wizards had a big shipment coming but they needed to sell more of the product

to pay for the first shipping. And it was at that convention, I also told the story in the podcast with Peter and Richard, about Peter and Richard shooting the video. And that tells the story more drawn out. But the shorter version of the story is that Peter was able to find a distributor that was interested enough in the game that they paid up front. You know, they got a discount to put money up front. And that Peter was able to use that money to finish paying for the shipping to get the first shipment.

So in many ways, if Origins hadn't got, well, Gen Con, you know, the reason they were able to have the cards at Gen Con was partially due to the fact that at Origins, once again, remember, Origins is as much a, I mean, the public's allowed inside, but it has a lot of a business aspect to it. And that it was really important to sort of get more distributors on board to get them to buy Magic. Because Magic earlier, like once Magic started going on sale,

it sold like hotcakes, but before it was on sale, before the audience could buy the product, the early part was trying to get distributors to pick it up, for those that don't know. For a lot of Magic, we sell to distributors

and they sell to the individual stores. So the first part about selling the game was getting the distributors to purchase it, and then they had to get the stores to carry it, but without getting the distributors to carry it, we didn't have the money to pay for it. So that proved important. 94 Origins was the first U.S. Nationals, won by Bo Bell. He's from California.

Interestingly, I and my dad actually played in the 94 U.S. Nationals. It's the only U.S. Nationals I ever played in. I'll talk about 95 in a second. So what happened was it was in San Jose. My dad lives in Tahoe, and I lived in L.A. at the time. So he and I met up in San Jose. And so the story I always tell is Steve Bishop. Oh, interestingly, I talk about how a lot of my early magic was convention-oriented.

The first time I saw magic was at San Diego Comic-Con. The first time I purchased magic was, I think it was called OrkCon. And then L.A. has three game conventions, at least they did 20 years ago. One around Memorial Day, one around Labor Day, and one in the winter. And the winter one is the first time I met anybody from Wizards of the Coast. In fact, it was Steve Bishop, the person I'm about to tell the story about. And Steve Bishop, at the time, he was part of the events crew. He ran events, organized play.

He eventually got in charge of it. I don't know if he was in charge of it when I first met him. I don't think he was. But Steve used to wear leather pants. Anyway, he was quite a character. He was the first employee I met from Wizards of the Coast. but Steve used to wear leather pants and anyway he was quite a character he was the first employee I met from Wizards of the Coast I met him at that convention

and the duels had just come out and I had an idea for a puzzle column and so I told Steve about it and he said oh well really what you need to do is contact Catherine Haynes who was the editor of the duelist and so he got me the contact information, I think,

and then I sent it in. And anyway, that led to me getting in The Duelist and all sorts of things. So anyway, that is where I first... So a lot of my early interactions with Magic were all convention-based, interestingly enough. Okay, back to Origins. So 94 Origins was the U.S. Nationals.

So Steve Bishop stands up at the beginning of the tournament and says, okay, for this tournament that's just about to begin, we are not allowing any cards in it that have an expansion symbol. So at the time, Arabian Nights and Antiquities were out and revised, although Corsets didn't have expansion symbols. So if you had a card from Arabian Nights or from Antiquities, you weren't allowed to play it. But, here's the tricky part,

some of the cards got reprinted and revised, and revised didn't have an expansion symbol. So if you had one of the cards that was in one of the Arabian Nights or Antiquities, but was reprinted and revised, you were allowed to have the revised version, but not the version from Arabian Nights or Antiquities. So Bo Bell was playing a discard deck, and he had four of the rack that was in Antiquities. And so he needed, and the rack got reprinted and revised, he needed four racks. My dad, I think, had four. Anyway, my dad traded Bo revised versions for, I'm not sure what the trade was, but anyway, really obscure

trivia, in the winning 94 U.S. National Decks, the four racks in that deck were my dad's that were traded away. Very insignificant, but part of the story. Anyway, so a year later, 95 origins, which was in Philadelphia, we had the 95 U.S. Nationals. That's the one where Mark Justice defeated Henry Stern. Also, the top four was those two plus Mike Long and Pete Lyre, all of which would go on to be Pro Tour players. And that would be the first U.S. team, and they won. It's the first time there was a team competition at all.

And even then, 95 Worlds, which was held in Seattle, I did a whole podcast on 95 Worlds. We didn't really have a team competition, but I kept track of all the stats. And so America won. There was no prize, but America won. It was the first time. In fact, they won. won. There was no prize, but America won its first time. In fact, they won America's average

was the cutoff for top eight, because two of them, both Justice and Stern, made the top eight of 95 Nationals. In fact, they both made the semifinals. They were third and fourth, respectively. Okay, so 95 Origins is

the first time we ever filmed a finals. We had cameras there. I was actually the spotter. ever filmed a finals. We had cameras there. I was actually the spotter. I was on stage. The reason I didn't play in 95 Nationals, by the way, was somewhere between 94 and 95, they decided that they wanted my puzzles

to use cards from upcoming sets. Since the magazine came out every two months, that they didn't want to always have to wait for my puzzles to use cards from upcoming sets. Since the magazine came out every two months, that they didn't want to always have to wait for my puzzles to have cards. Like they wanted to make sure that I had the most recent cards, but that meant that I had to work ahead of time. So I had to see cards before they came out. So I used to, they used to send me the God books of the cards. The God books are just a printing of like all nine cards per page that had pictures of all the cards so that I could see all the cards. Um, and this allowed me, um, to make puzzles ahead of time, but because I was seeing, um, stuff ahead of time, I wasn't allowed to play in tournaments. So I started judging. Um,

and so, um, I, in fact, what was one of the judges for 90, uh, sorry, 95 regionals in Los Angeles, the one that, um, Henry actually didn't win that, uh, a guy named Joel Unger won that for 90, sorry, 95 regionals in Los Angeles. The one that, Henry actually didn't win that. A guy named Joel Unger won that. But Mark Justice came in second at that and qualified for a world. And then Henry qualified, I think on pro points, or not pro points, sorry, pro points didn't exist yet, on rating, I think is maybe what he applied on. Anyway, so 95 nationals. Oh, that's also the tournament, have you ever heard this story,

9-5 Nationals, oh, that's also the tournament, have you ever heard this story, where the player meeting lasted three hours where they hashed out how exactly they were going to play. There was a sealed portion and they ended up, the compromise was, it was like a giant, it was just a lot of cards for the sealed portion. Anyway, some of the early tournaments had a lot more quirks to them than later on. So Origins would be the home of U.S. Nationals for many years, five, six years.

Probably the most famous. So if you ever heard me talk about there was a finals between Mike Long and Matt Lindy. Matt Lindy ended up winning. That I have said it was might be my pick for the best match of all time. Just as far as excitement and the crowd and basically for those that don't know the story, and somewhere I've told the longer version, but the real short version is

Mike Long is the person that everyone loves to hate. And Matt Lindy is a young kid who would later on have other top eights. He was a good player, but he was a young kid at this point. And it's the finals. And it's like, who's going to become the U.S. National Champion?

This fresh young upcomer or the evilest man in magic, Mike Long. And so the commentary, Chris Bakula and Brian Weissman were doing the commentary, because at the point I had to do commentary at the Pro Tour, and the audience was this giant room, and then like three football fields away, behind multiple doors in a studio, they were shooting the live action. The audience was watching it far away with the commentators in front of them

live giving commentating. And they did a really good job of setting up that basically the whole, the final game mattered on Mike was playing, I think, Prosperous Bloom. And he had one moment of weakness where if Matt Lindy had the right card at the right moment, it was the one opportunity where he was going to beat him. Mike had to let it down his guard for one turn. And if Matt Lindy had the right card, he was going to beat Mike.

But otherwise, Mike was going to win. And if he won, he was going to beat Mike. But otherwise, Mike was going to win, and if he won, he was going to be the U.S. national champion. And Chris and Brian had done a great job of setting up that was going on. And so when the moment happened on screen, everybody in the moment understood the meaning of the moment. And so the audience screamed so loud when he played the card that...

I'm sorry, when he drew the card. When he drew the card, the audience was so excited and made such a loud noise that Mike Long, you know, three football fields away, realized that he lost the game, that he had the card he needed. Anyway, so Origins, there's lots of stuff in Origins, but those are the major magic events. Let me, let me jump on to some other events. Dragon Con.

So Dragon Con is an invention in Atlanta. Uh, it's not just gaming. It is a little more, uh, a lot of geeky type things, uh, as fantasy and science fiction elements. And, uh, it's a larger than, it's not just a game convention, but gaming is a big part of it. and it's a larger, it's not just a game convention, but gaming's a big part of it.

Dragon Con is probably most famous for, 94 Dragon Con had a special card, a promo card, called the Lathni Dragon. And it was the only place you could get the Lathni Dragon. It wasn't, and the outroar over the Lathni Dragon made us make a rule where we don't give away unique cards at events. We will do unique cards that you have to buy products to get. You have to buy Planeswalker Packs or Commander Decks or the Buy a Box.

You have to buy actual magic products to get unique stuff. But we no longer say, oh, well, you have to travel to this one city at this one place to go get this thing. We do do exclusives, but they are alternate versions of existing cards. They're not unique cards that you would have to go to a location. And DragonCon is the place where that happened. DragonCon is also my favorite Magic story. I know I've told this before, but since we're talking convention stories, I'm going to tell it because it's my favorite story.

So it is late night at DragonCon. It is like 1 a.m. in the morning. And there is a middle-aged woman reading a book in the middle of the gaming room. The room at 1 a.m., there's still people playing because there's obviously people playing games at 1 a.m. at DragonCon. But she's kind of in a section that no one's at. She's by herself. She's reading a book. And, well, gaming has come a far way since 1994,

and there's a lot more women playing. At the time, in 1994, seeing a middle-aged woman in the middle of the gaming convention, the gaming room at DragonCon, was a little bit of a thing you didn't see all that much. So I walked up to her to say hello, and she saw I was wearing a magic shirt. And she asked, she goes, oh, do you play magic or whatever? And I'm like, oh, I work on magic.

I'm one of the people that makes magic. And so she told me this story about her two sons. Her youngest son, she said, look, my youngest son is very smart. He's always been, he's had trouble at school because he just gets things so quickly that nothing keeps his attention. And then finally he started playing magic. And that magic really was something that was bigger than he could wrap his brain around. And it really sort of let him focus. And it was something that challenged him. And he always had been socially awkward. And it really, for the first time, allowed him to start making friends. And he started had been socially awkward and it really for the first time allowed him to start

making friends and he started building a social network and gaining confidence and it really brought him out of his shell and it really um helps his son and then his older brother noticed that his younger brother was playing this game so he wanted to learn about it so he learned and she said my older son you know has dyslexia and has some learning issues, but he was determined to keep up with his brother. And so he got really invested in the game, and it was helping his reading so much that his teacher contacted me and said, what are you doing? I'm seeing this rapid improvement.

And so I showed him the game, and so they started a club at the school, and they're playing Magic at the school now, and all these kids are playing. And anyway, the reason I'm even here is I said to my sons, if you guys do well in school as a reward, I'll take you to Dragon Con. I think they lived in Atlanta. And, you know, obviously they had

and she was there. And she said, look, you know, I don't know, as someone who makes the game, I don't know if you know quite how important the game has been to me and my family, but it has changed our lives. It really, it took my son and brought him out and gave him a social life. My other son had taught him to read.

It really helped my family, and I want to thank you for that. And then she asked me if she could give me a hug, and I said she could. Anyway, that really, that, the reason that story always speaks to me is it really made me understand for the first time the importance of what the game means to people and kind of how it can be a positive role and how it really can be a source of good. So anyway, the reason I bring up that story is it really spoke to me and it definitely, I don't know, it really, it's one of my interactions that most has kind of changed

how I thought about my job. So anyway, I like to share that story. Okay, next comic. San Diego Comic-Con. So San Diego Comic-Con is something that I used to go to long before Magic existed. It's the place I first saw in 93. I was asking about Magic

because people used to come to my store where I worked. I used to work at the Gamekeeper. And I first heard about Magic because people were coming into our game store looking for it. But we didn't have it. So I was looking for it at the same time at Comic-Con. Nobody had it for sale, but I did find someone who had a deck. And so for the first time ever, I could look through a deck and touch the cards. And I was enamored.

It was really exciting. I would later buy it at Orcon, but that's the first time I saw it. I was enamored. It was really exciting. I would later buy it at Orcon, but that's the first time I saw it. I think 94 is the first time that I hung out at the booth and got to meet more people. It might be the first time I met some R&D. Both 94 and 95, I helped out at the booth when I was there. Wizards had a booth back then.

And then once I started working at Wizards, I would start flying out. So in the early years, we would go. Then at some point, we stopped. Wizards stopped going to San Diego Comic-Con for a while. Anyway, my friend Michael, Michael Ryan, the one who co-created the Weatherlight Saga with me, many years ago, I don't know, like 12 years ago, he was going for his job, and he had a hotel room.

He's like, hey, come with me. I already got a hotel room. You can stay in my hotel room. And I went down. I had a blast. And then I started going every year. And at some point I went to Elaine Chase, who at the time was the brand manager, now is the vice president of Magic Brand. And I said, do you mind if I run a magic panel? And she said, fine. And then for a bunch of years, we'd send down a whole bunch of people, and our magic panels had like four or five people on them. And then we cut back, so I said,

well, I'm going to go anyway. Do you mind if I just run a solo panel? They said, fine. So I've been running a solo panel for the last four or so years. But anyway, San Diego Comic-Con, we started doing a magic exclusive there. We've done the exclusive there for five or so years.

Usually what they are is usually they're Planeswalker cards, but I mean pre-existing ones just with new treatments on them. We've tried, some of the early ones

were this weird black treatment for like black on black. And then we did some other ones where they were stylistic. When we did Shadows of Innistrad, it was the Gatewatch

as zombies with Liliana controlling them. Then with Amonkhet, it was kind of a hieroglyphic sort of looking thing. Then with Dominaria, it was the Gatewatch posing in front of stained glass where the stained glass represented characters that were in the same color as them,

that there was a thematic tie to them. But anyway, San Diego Comic-Con has definitely been a place where, you know, once again, it is not a game convention. It is a comics convention with a lot of pop culture aspects, but there's a gaming component of it.

And there's always events run. Sometimes we've run events in stores, fronts. Now we tend to run it in usually the Marriott, or yeah, usually it's the Marriott, the next door, the thing next door. We have a big gaming area. But that is San Diego Comic-Con. Next, PAX.

PAX stands for Penny Arcade Expo. So that, now they call, PAX is spread out. Originally there was just one PAX. It was in Seattle. And now they call it PAX. They called it PAX Prime for a while. Now I think they call it PAX is spread out. Originally, there was just one PAX. It was in Seattle. And now they call it PAX. They called it PAX Prime for a while. Now I think they call it PAX West. There's a PAX East that is in Boston, I believe.

There's a PAX South that I think is in Austin. And there's a PAX Australia, I believe. At least they've had a PAX Australia. Anyway, there's now a bunch of different PAXs. PAX is more centered on video games. I mean, it's a gaming convention, but it's more geared toward video games, although there's some tabletop there,

and we're there. I mean, also, we obviously have a video game component with Magic the Gathering Arena and Magic the Gathering Online. Anyway, PAX has fluctuated. In the early days, we had a booth. Then we started doing a thing where we had a party. And for many years, we had a party.

And then we'd reveal the new set at the party because the timing worked out where it was the right time to start showing off things about the fall set. So for many years, we had a party. Then for a few years, we sort of took over a giant space, uh, for Rise of the Eldrazi. The world championship was there. Um, and we, uh, we had a giant Eldrazi bursting out of the, of the convention hall and smashing a police car. Uh, and, um, we had a big show where we broadcast live. I was on air with Will Whedon talking about

Rise of the not Rise of the Odrazi Battle for Zendikar and there was we had a bunch of magic celebrities that you could play magic with. I was one of them

and we were playing the Odrazi you had to beat us and then the next year for Kaladesh we rented out a whole theater and we had a big show that we aired online where I introduced all the Kaladesh mechanics. Uh, and there's a, there was a big show. It wasn't just me, but I did the mechanics part.

Um, and also the world championship was there that year as well. Um, recently we haven't done quite as much. Um, I'll get to Hascon in a second. Hascon was the following year, and that ended up pulling a lot of our resources. But anyway, PAX is still something that we do panels there. I mean, we kind of go up and down how much we do there, depending on what other stuff's going on.

But it's definitely, because it's in our backyard, Magic usually has a presence. We usually have a booth. But it is sort of how much we do there depends upon a lot of other factors. Which gets us to HazCon. Oh, by the way, so some of these,

I have done podcasts on some of the early worlds which took place at GenCon. Every year that I've gone to San Diego Comic Con since I've had my panel, not panel, since I've had my podcast, my panels are older than podcasts since I've had my panel. Not panel. Since I've had my podcast. My panels are older than podcasts. I've done a podcast on San Diego Comic-Con every year.

PAX. Every year that we did a major thing at it that I was at, I did a podcast on PAX. And HazCon. So 2017 was the first HazCon. So HazCon was a convention that Hasbro put together that's Hasbro properties. I'm not going to remember all off the top of my head. But beside Magic and Dungeon Dragons, which obviously is Wizards, there is Transformers. There is Nerf.

There's My Little Pony. There is Nerf. There's My Little Pony. There is Easy Bake Oven and Star Wars. And they have the Marvel license. And I don't know. There's lots and lots of different things for all different ages. The interesting thing about HasCon is most conventions are a little bit more focused. Like, it's for this group. And this is like, oh, there's lots of different games and things that different people

might appreciate. You know, the kids might like My Little Pony or Easy Bake Oven or Nerf or whatever. And the adults might like Magic or Dungeon Dragons or Transformers or Marvel. You know, and that there's this sort of things that cross-generational. And so, like, families would come to this event. So it was a really different kind of convention. It's, I mean, I've been at a lot of conventions. And the interesting thing is, like, if you ever heard me talk about VidCon, which is not really a gaming convention, but my daughter and I go,

and I've done a bunch of podcasts on it. VidCon's filled up with teenage girls. That is not normal for a lot of the gaming conventions I go to. So, HasCon has a lot of little kids. That's something that you don't normally see

at most gaming conventions. You'll see some kids, but not usually teenagers you see. You don't tend to see younger kids. And there are a lot of younger kids at HasCon. Anyway, so we did, it was the first time that you could play uh what it's one of the master sets

uh i'm blanking on which whatever the master set with the time um we did a um we celebrated it was the beginning of our birthday celebrations we had a big party with with five cakes um once again if you listen to my hascon i go into much greater detail. But anyway, it was definitely a lot of fun, and there were a lot of events, and I got to meet a lot of people, and one of the interesting things for me is, the farther I go from Seattle, the more there are people that

I've never met before. Like, in Seattle, most of the people who are Magic players in Seattle at some point have run into me, or a lot of them have, just because I go to events, and, you know, it's not that odd to run into me at a Magic event, although back when we had the larger pre-releases

that would be easier to see me. But anyway, people in Seattle, it's not that odd to have seen me. But when you go to the other side of the country, I meet a lot of Magic players that I've never met before. So, it's a lot of fun, real exciting. And, HazCon, the second HazCon, first HazCon was in 2017.

I think it's every other year. So the next HazCon is 2019. And I'll officially announce that I am going to HazCon in 2019. So if you are going to be there, I will be there. So hopefully I'll meet you. It definitely is a fun

convention. If you want to listen more about it, I did a whole podcast on it. I didn't know quite what to expect. And actually, going into it, I was nervous that it might not all work out so well. And it ended up actually going great. It was a wonderful event.

Okay, so I've talked about a lot of conventions in the United States. But I'm going to talk talked about a lot of conventions in the United States, but I'm going to talk about one convention that is not in the United States. Essenspiel, which is, I think, the largest gaming convention in the world, I think. Maybe there's one in Asia I don't know about, but it's the largest in Europe for sure, and it's bigger than Gen Con, which is the largest in the U.S. So it's in Germany. So the thing about Germany is gaming is to Germany kind of what movies are to the U.S.

Like everybody almost in Germany games. It's just part of the culture. That Germany, games are a really big part of German culture. For those that know that there's a lot of games that come out of Germany, a lot of German board games. For those that know, there's a lot of games that come out of Germany, a lot of German board games. Like Settlers of Catan, for example, is a really famous German game that ended up coming over and becoming a big hit in the U.S.

In fact, when I first played Settlers of Catan, it was in German because it didn't yet exist. Richard used to play a lot of German games with us after hours, and I got introduced to a lot of German games through Richard. One of which was, we called it Siedler. It was like Siedler der Katan, because it's a German name. So I called it Siedler for many

years before. Even now, sometimes, instead of saying Siedler, I'll say Siedler, because that's how I learned about it. Anyway, Essen is this giant game convention. And in the early days, Richard used to always go to it, and usually people would go to it.

Peter and Richard and stuff would go. But I'd never been to Essen, and that one of my goals had always been that I wanted to go to Essen. Like, it was one of the conventions that I wanted to go. And then, in 2007, I don't remember how it happened, but we decided to hold what ended up being the last Magic Invitational

at Essen. And it's when Tiago Chan won. Snapcaster Mage came from it. But anyway, I finally got a chance to go. And, you know, the event ran all three or four days of

Essen. But we had plenty of time to walk around and it was huge. And there was like, it was such a big gaming convention that there were sections, like this is this kind of game, this is that kind of game. There was a whole section on family games. I bought a bunch of games that I brought

home that my family played a lot of. In fact, there's a game that Richard introduced us to, which we just call The Ghost Game. It's whatever Midnight Party is in German. I forget the name. It's Midnight Party is the name, but it's in German. I don't think the game's ever come to the U.S.

And the idea is you're at a party, and then this ghost comes out, and you have to hide in rooms and not let the ghost get you. Anyway, Richard introduced us to the game, and I bought it at Essen and brought it home for my kids, and we played it many a time. I bought it at Essen and brought it home for my kids, and we played it many a time. But anyway, so Essen, we had the first, well, I think the Magic Invitational, we had held the Magic Invitational at many Grand Prixs before. So, but I think Essen was the only, well, sorry. The previous three years, we had actually held the Magic Invitational at E3.

The electronics... What is it? It's the Electronic Entertainment Expo, which is in Los Angeles. And it's mostly about video games. But we were... Magic Online was the thing. And so to promote Magic Online, for three years,

we had the Magic Invitational at E3. And then it ended up moving to... Did it move to Essen next? Anyway, eventually it went to Essen. The last one was at Essen. I think it was E3 for three years, then it went to Essen. And Essen was the last year. But anyway, Essen is definitely something where, early on, when Magic started spreading to other countries that I know Essen,

I'm not sure whether it was 93 Essen or 94 Essen. I can't remember when Essen is. Magic was a big hit. The first Essen that magic was at was a big hit. And a lot of the other, it's how they got a lot of the other countries. Because in other countries, we have different distributors, and those countries sell it,

and so I know Essendon was really important in the early days of helping to get Magic more international, and getting us, because we obviously now, we're in 11 languages, and we're in a lot of different places. Anyway, guys, I'm now driving up to work.

That is just a bunch of conventions and how they all connected to magic so I think conventions are a big part of the gaming world and

there's no surprise that a lot of big events happen at conventions you know that when I like when I tell stories about famous magic events a lot of them

just were at conventions because the conventions are a big part of the gaming world. So anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed my trip through the many gaming conventions

and how they tie into magic. But, I'm now at work. So we all know what that means. It means it's the end of my drive to work. So instead of

talking magic, it's time for me to be making magic. Hope you guys enjoyed today's show and I'll see you next time. Bye-bye.