Player Meet and Greet: GenCon, Indianapolis

On August 18, 2007, NCsoft fans from around the country gathered at GenCon and the Alcatraz Brewing Company in Indianapolis, Indiana for this year's first NCsoft Player Meet and Greet! The Lineage II team's Head GM Charles "spam" Porter was there, along with several other members of NCsoft's community, production and QA teams, to chat with the enthusiastic players who attended.

In addition to Head GM spam, players also had the opportunity to meet with Tabula Rasa Community Manager and the people behind other NCsoft games like the upcoming Tabula Rasa and Dungeon Runners. Those who stopped by the Lineage II booth at one of this year's summer conventions was awarded a convention-exclusive circlet. Below is a screenshot of the circlet on Piewacket, clan leader of The Furions clan on Bartz.

Three of the attendees were kind enough to share their experiences at GenCon and the Indianapolis NCsoft Player Meet and Greet with the community. Here are some excerpts from their reviews:

"I wanted to take some time to write up what I learned at both GenCon and at the meet and greet Saturday night there. I am sorry if it is a bit long, but some of the people at NCsoft were kind enough to lend me an ear for quite a long time and I feel that as part of the user community, I would write my feelings and thoughts after this meeting.

First, to those of you all who couldn’t come, you missed quite a nice time. The GenCon show is awesome. People dressed up as their favorite fantasy characters, lots of people who share our love for both electronic games and board games. I did the show in one day, but since I am not a card / paper pencil game player, it was easy to do.

NCsoft had a very nice display, around 12 or so computers all running the different offerings that NcSoft has. Lineage II was lucky enough to have the game running on one of the big flat screens overhead in the booth and there were some real players there playing the game. NCsoft’s booth was well manned and there were people representing all of the games. Every one of the booth personnel was nice, and in great spirits. I also met the new Head of Marketing person there.

During Saturday, the booth had a lot of traffic. Quite a few of the chairs were taken with people checking out the different offerings and even more of the show goers watching the flat screens.

The meet and greet was excellent too. They had it in a brew pub right around the corner from the convention center. Easy walk, lots of people and Indy is very nice around that area. Lots of places to eat, have fun and very family friendly. The meet and greet was on the second floor. You needed to have a reservation, and upon getting there, I understand why. There was a limited area to hold the event. They supplied free pops and for the first 2 hours, nice food was brought out every so often by the staff of the brewpub. During this time, people from the different games would come in and shout out the names of their servers, trying to find others that play their games and hopefully people on their servers. I met some people from Bartz there along with 1 other server. It was a grand time. NCsoft people were also there, chatting and mingling. I met one of the nicest ladies from City Of Heroes there who works for NCsoft. If this is the type of people they have on the other games, they are in good hands." ~ Zhanig (Piewacket), Clan Leader of The Furions clan on Bartz

"Well i guess ill put my 2 cents in on the Gencon 07 at indy. First I would love to thank Our GM Spam for making a grand and glorious appearance (WAS A BLAST WOOT). Our new marketing director for new insight into the games and all the effort being placed to clean up Lineage 2 and restore the support process for concerns of the players. . . . I have great faith in the new support we are getting and Will as allways continue to Support the efforts of players trying to recover our Game.

Thanks for a great Time at GENCON 07 Indy NCSOFT!!!!!!!!!!!" ~Arissa on Bartz

"I had a nice conversation with Spam and also got to meet the new Marketing guy. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to speak with him at length.

I found out a few interesting things about our game. One, is that NC is extremely protective of the game as it really is their flagship product and they want things to be 'just so' Lineage and Lineage 2 are so Iconic that it isn't out of the question to see similar games advertised as a "Lineage type game".

They are very careful with how they disseminate information. So much so that our team doesn't get information any quicker than players. And in many cases they don't know what will be included in our version until it actually comes in.

I also got the feeling that they really did care about the game and they are just working with a different type of company in order to give us the best they can." ~Sovrath on Hindemith

You can read all three reviews, including details on their discussions with the NCsoft staff, here! The next NCsoft Player Meet and Greet just might be in your area next time, and we hope to see you there!

Thank you to the Indianapolis Meet and Greet attendees for chatting with us, and answering our questions!