The GXL 512 LAN Event
Posted: Tue Oct 26, 2004 4:01 pm
The GXL 512 LAN event:
Murdock and I attended the GXL 512 LAN event this weekend and am writing a review of it
Things I liked:
The ability to have a pre-printed bar code ticket was good. It might have been better if they could have read the bar code rather then typing the number it, but it worked anyway.
The use of shopping carts to move PC's in and out was good. Even though I had brought a cart, being able to use shopping carts was good.
The check in went smooth. They did ask for a description of the PC and monitor to make sure that you didn't leave with someone else's PC. Also they made sure that you did not have speakers or switches. They didn't want to have switches leaving the building either.
The building setup, the LAN and the Power connections were very stable. I saw no power outages due to their setup or LAN problems. I did see someone turn off someone else's power when they left. The other guy had daisy chained to the power strip of the person leaving. I don't fault GXL for that.
Food and Drink prices were good. A price for Bawls, soda and drinks was reasonable and Ikes Crab Cake place was an excellent addition to the normal Pizza fest. Of course that still occurred.
The easy access to the Anonymous LAN Party Management software at http://www was good to have. I love a good caffeine log.
What I think they can Improve:
They asked if you wanted to reserve seating for your clan, and you could put down where it was in the forum. I entered W23-24 in the forum but when I got there I found we were assigned E12-13 or something like that (<i>see what I didn't like at all below</i>). Getting an earlier confirmation of where we were assigned would have let us tell some of our friends where we would be before the convention. Never did meet one of the guys I was looking for because of this. Btw, no one was assigned our original W23-W24. Having masking tape (or chalk) on the table showing the allowed area indicating the spot is reserved would be a good thing. I saw tables with 2-3 PCs and some with just one PC for the whole table. The person with the one PC had his stuff all over the entire table. This could have been a problem if space had gotten tight.
They asked for Public Servers way too late. I think one week before was too short a notice. They should have had asked starting a month earlier. Remote operation is fine, but they could still have had some with monitors and keyboards since they had such short notice. They weren't locked up as they announced.
The fact that they had so few servers meant others needed to start a game server on their gaming machines. They would then start playing other games and this would drag down those playing on the server on that machine too. There was no way of knowing which servers were what. And then you got hit with lag as the person started doing something on their PC.
Announcements were not loud enough if you were in the middle or far end of the building. They needed to have some speakers be placed in the middle of the building so that others could hear. I don't know if the Adrenaline Cafe got any notice of any announcements at all.
Rather than just clan seating, you may want to think about clan/game seating. This would be good for tournament management since you would have people wanting to play a certain game (CS, Unreal, CoD, etc...) to be in single areas. I understand that this may be logistically difficult however.
During the Bawls dunking and other game time, have a feed from the video cameras be displayed in the back announcer board. Only people in front could see anything happening. <b>BORING.</b>
There was no Unreal Tournament 2004 Deathmatch (team or otherwise).
What I Didn't Like at All:
The tournaments were not run on time. This is a major problem with setup and organization. If you have a tournament, and it doesn't start within a good starting point, cancel it. Have a tournament directory that assigns Tournament managers for each tournament (this may have been done but was not obvious). Captains should meet with the tournament director 15-30 minutes before the start. Signups of team Captains should close 30 minutes before the match. The manager may then create teams with people not already on teams but signed on as single players. Assign the team captain the ability to change their teams and the people until they have started their first match. (Then it's closed). The Tournament manager should have microphone access to announcement / speaker system. The Tournament Director (overseeing the manager) can cancel any match if it has not started within a specific time frame.
The finals match means you have the PC's in the area > 1 hour before the stated finals time. They should be set up and have all configurations done within ½ hour.
Walking into the seating area that you are assigned and finding a guy sleeping across the floor in your area. They should not let people sleep in the paths, computer seating area and walkways. They had an assigned area on the map. Take some gaffer or masking tape (or even chalk) and line up areas for people. Assign spots with chalk. Patrol the walkway and computer seating areas and move people who are sleeping to the assigned sleeping area. Tripping over someone in a dimly light room is never a good idea. Add chairs, tables and expensive systems around and someone can get seriously hurt or cause several thousand dollars of damage real quick. Also people were sleeping under tables and on or near power strips. Think of electrical wires against a sleeping bag. Think spilled bawls, think of liability.
In Conclusion
All in all, it was a good LAN party, but I recommend that they not add anyone else until they address the major problems listed above. Otherwise it will just get worse. I think they only brought in about 375-425 people with PC’s. Seating was closer to 2 per table, not the original 3 per table on the layout plan. So staying at 512 is probably valid. Have people that are comped or are volunteers that don’t have a PCs or use the Adrenaline Café might not be in the listing.
Murdock and I attended the GXL 512 LAN event this weekend and am writing a review of it
Things I liked:
The ability to have a pre-printed bar code ticket was good. It might have been better if they could have read the bar code rather then typing the number it, but it worked anyway. The use of shopping carts to move PC's in and out was good. Even though I had brought a cart, being able to use shopping carts was good. The check in went smooth. They did ask for a description of the PC and monitor to make sure that you didn't leave with someone else's PC. Also they made sure that you did not have speakers or switches. They didn't want to have switches leaving the building either. The building setup, the LAN and the Power connections were very stable. I saw no power outages due to their setup or LAN problems. I did see someone turn off someone else's power when they left. The other guy had daisy chained to the power strip of the person leaving. I don't fault GXL for that. Food and Drink prices were good. A price for Bawls, soda and drinks was reasonable and Ikes Crab Cake place was an excellent addition to the normal Pizza fest. Of course that still occurred. The easy access to the Anonymous LAN Party Management software at http://www was good to have. I love a good caffeine log. What I think they can Improve:
They asked if you wanted to reserve seating for your clan, and you could put down where it was in the forum. I entered W23-24 in the forum but when I got there I found we were assigned E12-13 or something like that (<i>see what I didn't like at all below</i>). Getting an earlier confirmation of where we were assigned would have let us tell some of our friends where we would be before the convention. Never did meet one of the guys I was looking for because of this. Btw, no one was assigned our original W23-W24. Having masking tape (or chalk) on the table showing the allowed area indicating the spot is reserved would be a good thing. I saw tables with 2-3 PCs and some with just one PC for the whole table. The person with the one PC had his stuff all over the entire table. This could have been a problem if space had gotten tight. They asked for Public Servers way too late. I think one week before was too short a notice. They should have had asked starting a month earlier. Remote operation is fine, but they could still have had some with monitors and keyboards since they had such short notice. They weren't locked up as they announced. The fact that they had so few servers meant others needed to start a game server on their gaming machines. They would then start playing other games and this would drag down those playing on the server on that machine too. There was no way of knowing which servers were what. And then you got hit with lag as the person started doing something on their PC. Announcements were not loud enough if you were in the middle or far end of the building. They needed to have some speakers be placed in the middle of the building so that others could hear. I don't know if the Adrenaline Cafe got any notice of any announcements at all. Rather than just clan seating, you may want to think about clan/game seating. This would be good for tournament management since you would have people wanting to play a certain game (CS, Unreal, CoD, etc...) to be in single areas. I understand that this may be logistically difficult however. During the Bawls dunking and other game time, have a feed from the video cameras be displayed in the back announcer board. Only people in front could see anything happening. <b>BORING.</b> There was no Unreal Tournament 2004 Deathmatch (team or otherwise). What I Didn't Like at All:
The tournaments were not run on time. This is a major problem with setup and organization. If you have a tournament, and it doesn't start within a good starting point, cancel it. Have a tournament directory that assigns Tournament managers for each tournament (this may have been done but was not obvious). Captains should meet with the tournament director 15-30 minutes before the start. Signups of team Captains should close 30 minutes before the match. The manager may then create teams with people not already on teams but signed on as single players. Assign the team captain the ability to change their teams and the people until they have started their first match. (Then it's closed). The Tournament manager should have microphone access to announcement / speaker system. The Tournament Director (overseeing the manager) can cancel any match if it has not started within a specific time frame.The finals match means you have the PC's in the area > 1 hour before the stated finals time. They should be set up and have all configurations done within ½ hour.
Walking into the seating area that you are assigned and finding a guy sleeping across the floor in your area. They should not let people sleep in the paths, computer seating area and walkways. They had an assigned area on the map. Take some gaffer or masking tape (or even chalk) and line up areas for people. Assign spots with chalk. Patrol the walkway and computer seating areas and move people who are sleeping to the assigned sleeping area. Tripping over someone in a dimly light room is never a good idea. Add chairs, tables and expensive systems around and someone can get seriously hurt or cause several thousand dollars of damage real quick. Also people were sleeping under tables and on or near power strips. Think of electrical wires against a sleeping bag. Think spilled bawls, think of liability.In Conclusion
All in all, it was a good LAN party, but I recommend that they not add anyone else until they address the major problems listed above. Otherwise it will just get worse. I think they only brought in about 375-425 people with PC’s. Seating was closer to 2 per table, not the original 3 per table on the layout plan. So staying at 512 is probably valid. Have people that are comped or are volunteers that don’t have a PCs or use the Adrenaline Café might not be in the listing.