I’ve been meaning to go to Gen Con for a long time, and this year I tagged along with my old college friend Rob and his gang, who've been going for years. We had a lot of fun.
This year they released the fifth edition of Dungeons and Dragons. Forgotten Realms legend Ed Greenwood signed my copy.
I also got a copy of Call of Cthulhu, one of the other classic RPGs, autographed by Sandy Peterson. He wasn’t actually signing stuff, but by crassly pestering many total strangers, I was able to track him down.
Rob and his friends got me into a day-long game of D&D even though I’d missed the sign up. Here’s the D&D play area, which was just one of many at the conference. Here is a 360-degree pano showing the same area.
Everyone knows that folks dress up for Gen Con, but I was surprised by how many costumes there were. There were about 50,000 people at the conference, and maybe one-tenth were in costumes. Here's Rob with Darth Vader.
Here’s Rob and Karen with (I think) the Winter Warlock. 2014.08.31: Correction: it's the Ice King from Adventure Time.
Gen Con was in Indianapolis, just a couple blocks from the Indiana state capitol.
Here's a detail from the Sailors and Soldiers Monument nearby. I'm not sure what those bears are doing!
