melancholia over phoenix fan fusion.
Jun. 8th, 2026 08:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
unbibiumback when it was Phoenix Comicon, one of my favorite things to do was go play Artemis, a cooperative 6-player startship bridge simulator game. At the time the game was much harder to set up, requiring actual PCs on an Ethernet network, but they still had 3 game rooms ("ships") set up with solid wall dividers, and a sign-up sheet for all the positions on each ship on each timeslot, and a little embarcation room that would play the tutorial video on a loop. It was in the furthest corner of the convention, in the Hyatt across the street, but it was still popular and had enthusiastic guests.
At this year's Phoenix Fan Fusion, since the TSA Lite traps us all in the convention center proper, the gaming floor is on the 3rd floor of the North building, in this corner that's barely indicated on the map, listed as "Holodeck 1". They have two "ships" set up, but this time they're all on 11-inch tablets on a table, with laminated instructions in front, all basically in the open air with the din of the convention echoing around us. and I couldn't find my magnifying glass. They did have projectors showing each crew the "main viewer" on a screen washed out by the window light peeking over the cloth dividers. There was no immersion, and just getting through security and the crowds all the way to the 3rd floor had sapped my patience. And what's worse, I didn't really have any friends at the con that I could try and entice into signing up for a timeslot.
I walked around aimlessly looking for something I liked. but I think the high point of the weekend was when I found a chair, where I could watch cosplayers walk by in relative comfort. Back when the Hyatt was accessible, it had a lobby full of chairs and seating and TVs playing ST:TNG. And I'd run into friends there just by chance.
Partially I'm getting old and partially the con is too big now... I don't know why I even bought tickets this year, as I'm pretty sure I reached the same conclusion two years ago.
actually I know why; it was at the encouragement of a friend who ended up not going.
and now, three months of oven weather to job hunt in.
At this year's Phoenix Fan Fusion, since the TSA Lite traps us all in the convention center proper, the gaming floor is on the 3rd floor of the North building, in this corner that's barely indicated on the map, listed as "Holodeck 1". They have two "ships" set up, but this time they're all on 11-inch tablets on a table, with laminated instructions in front, all basically in the open air with the din of the convention echoing around us. and I couldn't find my magnifying glass. They did have projectors showing each crew the "main viewer" on a screen washed out by the window light peeking over the cloth dividers. There was no immersion, and just getting through security and the crowds all the way to the 3rd floor had sapped my patience. And what's worse, I didn't really have any friends at the con that I could try and entice into signing up for a timeslot.
I walked around aimlessly looking for something I liked. but I think the high point of the weekend was when I found a chair, where I could watch cosplayers walk by in relative comfort. Back when the Hyatt was accessible, it had a lobby full of chairs and seating and TVs playing ST:TNG. And I'd run into friends there just by chance.
Partially I'm getting old and partially the con is too big now... I don't know why I even bought tickets this year, as I'm pretty sure I reached the same conclusion two years ago.
actually I know why; it was at the encouragement of a friend who ended up not going.
and now, three months of oven weather to job hunt in.
