After what can only be described as an absolutely dreadful lead up, IGS 2019 Day One is finally done. The good news; the event itself has began on a pretty great note. Our stall was larger than last time, and the response to our work was pretty good.
The bad news is that running damage control for all the things that threatened to turn everything south has cost a pretty penny indeed.
It’s safe to say that we’ve made up for an entire year of ignoring marketing investment with this one event. It really was about to turn into one of those shows where anything that could go wrong was most certainly doing so. Equipment malfunctioned, print orders got screwed up, and supplies ran short. Adding icing to this wonderful catastrophe cake was the somewhat baffling need for people to steal sketching pens, of all things. Note to self; leave nothing on your counter that isn’t chained to the stall or trapped.
The bright side of all of this is, gain, we seemed to get a pretty good response. Despite our inability to get the Elysium Alpha ready for the show, the game has earned a fair bit of attention. Acorns Above is also getting some generally positive responses, probably helped in part by its going free to play. I still must admit to having mixed feelings about our first game there. Every time I see the trailers, or watch someone at our stall playing it, I am constantly reminded of the sheer number of things I wish I could go back and redo. On the other hand, our demo machine did turn into a kids magnet, with a whole swarm of the younger generation flocking over to blow up some space squirrels. Although AWGN is hardly my ideal project, or even the kind of game that I want to keep making, there is something rewarding about seeing a bunch of kids being excited enough about it that they keep coming back for seconds. Or, in the case of one particularly awe struck little boy, coming back for thirds and even a photo-op with the developers! (I wonder if that pic will find its way online…).
Personally, I felt like the highlight of the day was catching up with Deepak. The very first to sign up on our team back in 2012, there was a real sense of old comrades catching up to trade war stories. 
Tomorrow is going to be an interesting day to be sure. Here’s hoping we don’t run into yet more printing issues, and actually get those card resupplies.
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