GameCamp

GameCamp 5 is done and gone

James Wallis — Tue, 15 May 2012 00:06:56 +0000

Well, that seemed to go well.

It’s always hard, as an event organiser, to judge how an event has gone and how attendees have seen it. Things that cause us a lot of stress on the day—the fact the huge bean-bags weren’t delivered, for example—are invisible to 99% of the people present. But it felt like GameCamp 5 went well. People were having a good time. Tweets were overwhelmingly positive, and blog entries have been too.

We logged something over 220 people through the door. People reported that it felt like fewer, but that’s probably because we were managing the space a lot better so there was less crowding and congestion than at GameCamp 4. It was our second event at London South Bank University’s Keyworth Centre and I think we addressed all the criticisms that had been raised after the first one. There are still a few problems to be ironed out before the next GameCamp, but they’re comparatively minor.

If you’ve got any photos of the event, we would really like to get copies of them. You can email them to us, or send us a link to wherever they’re posted online.

The GameCamp committee extends its grateful thanks to:

You, if you came. An unconference is all about its participants, and the very high quality of the talks and extra activities was all down to you. It’s almost unfair to single anyone out in particular, but special thanks go to Mary and Grant for bringing their arsenal of Nerf weaponry and running massive crowdsourced games over an entire floor of the building.
Siobhan Thomas and the staff of London South Bank University for the use of the venue and all their help.
London South Bank University and the National Film and Television School for sponsoring the event.
All the volunteers, particularly the games-library staff.
Strongman Games for help with logistics.
The staff of the Student Union bar for opening specially for GameCamp attendees.
Keith of Morgans Coffee Experience for bringing his coffee van.
Under The Greenwood Tree for the modelling clay, and
Princi for the food. (We pay for both of those, but both companies go above and beyond.)
Anyone or anything I’ve forgotten.

The GameCamp committee is, in alphabetical order: Rachel Clarke; Emmeline Pui Ling Dobson; Rob Harris; David Hayward; Siri Hommelsgård; Ian Millington; Jeffrey Sheen; Siobhan Thomas; Philip Trippenbach; and James Wallis. Siri and Ian were unable to attend the event due to ill-health: we wish them both a full and speedy recovery.

If you have any comments about how the day ran, anything that was particularly good or bad, and any things we should consider as we’re planning GameCamp 6, then please post a comment below.

GameCamp 5: last-minute updates

James Wallis — Fri, 11 May 2012 17:20:55 +0000

A quick note about tomorrow, mostly to do with catering. We’ve noticed that there’s a dearth of acceptable coffee places around Elephant and Castle, so our friends at Morgans Coffee will be sending one of their vans along on Saturday morning to serve fine cappuccinos, americanos, flat whites, and even teas and hot chocolates. This essential caffeine refuelling station will be parked outside the entrance to the Keyworth Centre: you can get your jet-fuel on the way in, or step out at any point to refuel.

Lunch will be supplied by the estimable Princi, who provided last year’s spread. Less foccacia this time, more salads, more selection for vegetarians. If you bring your own sandwiches you’re a mug.

Once again there will be a freebie on the door, with a game attached to it, and a prize at the end. Not Lego this time, sorry, but we think you’ll be entertained.

And when things wrap up at 4.30, we’ve arranged exclusive access to the LSBU Student Union Bar on Thomas Doyle Street. With tables large enough for gaming and beer at student prices, we think it’s the perfect way to finish off the day.

The hashtag for the event is #GC5.

See you tomorrow!

GameCamp5 fast approaches!

emeraldsong — Fri, 04 May 2012 07:39:38 +0000

GameCamp5 is drawing close and with a week and a day to go here are some details of the day ahead. Doors are open from 9:30am allowing you to grab a coffee, post-up details of any session you have planned on The Board and survey what’s been posted for 10:00am when the Unconference schedule goes live. At 4:30pm the sessions close and we head over to the student union for drinks!

Slots in The Board will be 45 minutes long with a break for a delicious lunch, so we recommend a 15/15/15 minute outline for kicking off a discussion, developing the conversation and finishing-off, dispersing and locating your choice of next session.

The popular Board Game Library is back and open all day. Please bring your own games to add to the collection – they will be weighed at the outset and when loaned and returned by other guests. Borrowing and playing games is a great way to enjoy a mix of discussion, meeting people and chilling out.

The Keyworth Centre Mezzanine floor will be a comfortable chill-out zone with beanbags for continuing choice conversations or just taking a break.

WiFi is available – please blog, Tweet, comment and communicate! Official hashtag: #gc5

What people have had to say about previous GameCamps:

I’ve run a few sessions where I’ve led the discussion rather than prepared a talk. Its very rare to get artists, programmers, gamers and critics in the same room with free reign to talk about what they want. You get interesting responses and views on things that you had never considered. Its an amazing opportunity. ~ Simon Roth
I ran a discussion group on Heavy Rain at GameCamp2 and a taster session for Arkham Horror at BoardGameCamp. It was great to be in a circle of people who were all interested in exploring the themes and how they felt about a game that tried to do something different with the genre. ~ Debbie Timmins
ZombieLARP. Running around the abandoned corridors of a university building with NERF guns was amazing. ~ Debbie Timmins
Best bits? The ability to just play. ~ Dr. Mike Reddy
Very friendly people, amazing food, great organisation. When “all talked out” it was good to get around a board game and make new friends. ~ Sarbjit Bakhshi
Whether you’re a seasoned professional or a wide-eyed wannabe, there’ll be something at GameCamp guaranteed to inspire, educate or simply put a grin on your face. ~ Rhianna Pratchett
The GameCamps, with their UNconference nature, are unique and there should be more of them. ~ Dr Mike Reddy
Free Lego? Dammit I knew I should have gone… ~ANJAL28

Example past session titles:

Games are ~~Art~~ Astrophysics / Gladiatorial session on narrative / Caldsys2 Games 4 dyslexia / 2D art: vector vs pixel vs painting / Nerds: does it matter if we’re all the same? / Bomb disposal

You can find a growing list of attendees and live information on Lanyrd.com

Information about the venue and travelling to GameCamp5 can be found here.

Final tickets for GameCamp 5 on 12 May are now for sale

James Wallis — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 00:03:59 +0000

The last batch of tickets for GameCamp 5 is now online at Eventbrite: miss out on these and you’re out of luck. The Late Bird tickets are the same price as the Middle Bird tickets—£15 for the day including lunch—but just that little bit later and slightly less middling.

In the run-up to the event we’ll be posting information about some of the many events and sessions that will be happening on the day, so keep watching this blog.

Middle Bird

James Wallis — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:33:46 +0000

Predictably, Middle Bird tickets for Game Camp 5 are now on sale. £15 and a small booking fee we have no control over will buy you a full day of talks, activities, gameplay, socialising and lunch—and as always, any budget we have left at the end of the day gets put behind the bar of wherever we end up (probably the LSBU student bar) to pay for the evening’s drinks.

The best £15 you’ll spend this year? Could be!

Worm-catching for beginners

James Wallis — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 10:14:37 +0000

The first tranche of GameCamp 5 tickets (‘Early Bird’) is now sold out. Tranche 2 (‘Middle Bird’) goes on sale at 11am on Wednesday 18th March, at £15 each, and the final tranche (‘Late Bird’) exactly a week after that. If you miss those, the only tranche left is Frustrated Bird. Hey, that gives us an idea for a game…

The best way to get a reminder when tickets go on sale is to follow us on Twitter: @gamecamp.

Number five is alive

James Wallis — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 00:17:04 +0000

Attention! Your attention please! GameCamp 5 is GO GO GO for SATURDAY 12th MAY at London South Bank University. The fifth in the critically acclaimed series of games-based Unconferences will continue in the tradition of the first four events by being a games-based Unconference.

Last time we had free Lego, wild zombies, an amazing lunch, more than forty talks, a massive board-game library, and the student union bar all to ourselves. This time we aim to top all of that. High on the list: providing better coffee. The rest is down to you.

The first tranche of tickets will go on sale at 11AM on WEDNESDAY 11th APRIL (not 12th April, apologies for earlier typo), at a special Earlybird price of £12.50 which includes lunch. Two additional tranches will be along shortly.

We’re also on Lanyrd.

More information to follow!

This was a triumph

trippenbach — Sun, 15 May 2011 13:33:15 +0000

GameCamp 4 has come and gone. Thanks to everyone who made it a totally awesome day. This was our biggest GameCamp yet, with over 225 people attending. Good thing the venue at LSBU was big, because it was packed to the rafters.

GameCamp’s strength is that it can be a total grab-bag of discussions and activities you wouldn’t get anywhere else. The morning and afternoon boards show you the huge variety of sessions:

We had sessions on topics ranging from teaching game design, sex in video games, Little Big Planet and colonialism (!), lemon jousting, and even a zombie-themed live-action LARP with NERF guns that took over the 3rd floor:

The day also resulted in a GameCamp group on Steam, for those of you PC gamers out there.

And of course, our board game library kept people well busy on the ground floor.

There’s simply too much to cover in a single blog post. Jetsetnick and Nia Wearn have posted their overviews of the day. If you ran a session please do blog about it, and link to this post – then you’ll end up in the comments, and we can collate some sort of a record of the awesomeness.

Thanks to Princi for doing a stellar job with lunch, even though it was their first catering job ever. Thanks also to our sponsors Vertical Slice for helping fund this awesome day, and to LSBU for letting us take over their enormous Keyworth building.

Most of all, thanks to all of you who came and made the day excellent. GameCamp is a platform for you to share your interest and knowledge of games with others. It wouldn’t be anything without you.

We’re already working on ideas for GameCamp 5, so if you have any feedback we’d love to hear it! Let us know in the comments.

Boardgame Library at GameCamp 4

David — Wed, 11 May 2011 15:03:12 +0000

You’ll notice that this time round, it’s called GameCamp, rather than BoardGameCamp. The focus on Saturday will be on the talks, just like the first few GameCamps.

If you were at BoardGameCamp last year, you might also remember the absurd amount of boardgames we had there (63.6207 kilograms of them, to be precise). Myself, Ross, Jo and anyone else who volunteers will once more be running a boardgame library, but we expect it to be smaller and less busy than last time. We’re using the games kindly provided to us by Esdevium, as well as a few of our own, but if you *really* want to lug boardgames here and lend them for the day we’ll take them. We just want you to know that you really don’t need to and can travel light.

What we’ll have there will include *at least*:

Puerto Rico
Jungle Speed
Citadels
Lost Cities
Munchkin
Wings of War
Carcassonne
Bang!
Race for the Galaxy
Dixit
Settlers of Catan
Thurn and Taxis
The Village (Werewolves)
Puerto Rico
Articulate
Robo Rally
Last Night on Earth
Agricola
Saboteur
Back to the Future: The Card Game
Infinite City

There are multiple copies of some of those, and there will probably be a few more games too. We’ll be in the cafe with them throughout the day, so if you’re taking a break from the talks feel free to check out a boardgame and bring it back later.

In future, rest assured there will be more BoardGameCamps, but after the last one we felt that it’d be useful to have one event centred on making and playing stuff, and another centred on talking about stuff. This Saturday is the talky one.

‘I liked you better before you sold out’

James Wallis — Tue, 10 May 2011 14:07:28 +0000

Like it says right above this (assuming this is still the top post on the page, which it won’t be for long, so ah well) tickets for GameCamp 4 are now officially completely sold out.

However we’ve heard from a few people who won’t be able to make it now, so if you have tickets to buy or sell we suggest you get onto Twitter and use the hashtag #gc4 to hawk your extras or beg for spares.

Everything is looking EXTREMELY VERY GOOD for Saturday. Some people have been tweeting about the talks they want to give or hear, which sound great. And we’ve got a give-away that might be even cooler than the customised dice we were handing out at BoardGameCamp.

Doors open 9.30, and the board goes live at 10.00. One thing to note: though there’s a shop selling snacks and hot drinks on site, it won’t be open from the very start so you may want to get your teas and coffees on the way in.

See you on Saturday!