Running with the Shadows of the Night

(GenCon Journal entry date: July 27, 2003)

An true-blue Midwestern thunderstorm is roiling outside: violent illumination followed by long rolling growling of the sky. It's blood-racing, exhilerating. The humidity in the air, heavy and warm, puts me in something of a trance - a light-as-air sensation, the edges of reality shimmering just a little bit. I've been up all night and I can still taste the cigar.

Friends of White Wolf are commited to adventure. They have something of a wild reputation - rumors of rowdy reveling gone awry, fist fights, outbursts, that sort of thing. It's true that they passionately embrace the good time. When it's time to party, they will party hard. I was swept along on this tidal wave of drink, bonhomie, and singing, and I'm still gasping for air. I think I can prove now what I've always suspected, that when bad boys are baaaad they are so good.

Under the Dome of the Sky

The evening started innocuously enough, at the official White Wolf party in the glass-domed Art Center. The venue was swank, with clean-cut white-attired waiters handing out free drinks for those of us who'd attended the press conference. A high class affair. You were supposed to wear the t-shirt they handed out to prove you'd been at the conference, but I didn't actually wear mine; it was too big (XL) and too hot and, well, it didn't go with my outfit.

I stood in the slow line for a jack on the rocks and then made the rounds. The music was geek-friendly 80s hits with some Gothica flavor thrown it - it suited the crowd, draped almost entirely in shades of black. I took some photos, tried to talk my way into the "VIP" area, and introduced myself to random people I found sitting at the tables. I admit that it was pretty easy for me to have a good time - the male:female ratio was working in my favor and free drinks were flowing.

Can it See Through Clothes?

I walked up to the bar for my second drink. My cup still had ice on it. "You can just use the same cup," I told the bartender. He smiled at me and filled it all the way up with liquor. Emboldened and, I'll admit, a little woozy, I switched the camera to nightvision. I took a photo - or I thought I did - of Glenn Ige, associate producer of Activision, who'd worked on the Vampire game, talking to Chris McDonough, a White Wolf. ("That guy is crazy," Glenn confided to me later. When you finish reading I think you might agree.) Unfortunately the picture didn't come out very well - my finger must have slipped - but the fact that the camera was in nightvision mode engendered speculation that one could see through clothing with it. After several experimental attempts purely for the sake of research, I have to conclude that the clothing must be nearly transparent in the first place in order for nightvision to be effective in that manner.

When the VIP lounge went away at some point in the evening, I spotted White Wolf President and CEO Mike Tinney. I rudely interrupted his conversation to take his nightvision photo (left).

A kindly soul handed me another drink and I decided to interview Tinney. I sat down at a conveniently empty chair at the table. I pointed the camera at him and inqured with all the professionalism I could muster at that point, "So how did you get into this whole gaming thing in the first place?"

The gentlemen he was with, two men from Germany and one from Hungary, laughed. "It's twenty questions with Mike Tinney! Go on, ask him; we already know everything." They'd worked with him, it turns out, for ten years.

But before I could ponder out my second question, Tinney appropriated my camera and pointed it at me. "What's your most embarrassing moment?" I hearkened back to grade school for that one but honestly, I must have had other worse moments. Maybe my most embarrassing moment is still to come. Oh, yes.

"You should come with us to the party after this one," said one of the Germans.

"Sure," I said, squinting into my drink.

Jolly all around the table. Mike rose to procure more drinks. The Germans laughed again. "He's crazy," they said, "He can drink us under the table, and we're German!"

So am I up to four drinks now? I was on my way to drinking the Germans under the table myself. The party started to break up. I'm not sure what time it was, but it was time to go.

Outside, the Germans chickened out - or maybe they were just responsible. "We have to work so early," they said. Some Germans! No wonder I could outdrink them! The rest of us - about a dozen or so I guess - somehow made it to the Hyatt, where Peter Adkison (left in photo below), the new owner of GenCon, had a suite. It was time for round two: fight!

There's a P-p-p-party Going On
Actually, there were no fights. I found out later that it wasn't uncommon among the White Wolves to experience some roughhousing. Everyone was rowdy but well-behaved. Peter himself seemed to be having a great time, attired in some sort of costume - with a mask (not pictured, unfortunately!).

Things are a little hazy until they broke out the karaoke machine. It seems that Chris McDonough is such a huge fan, he carries around his machine with him. And I'm not talking some little portable piece of plastic, this was the real deal, complete with speakers and songbooks. After a bit of wandering around the suite talking with a variety of friendly industry people, I ended up on the couch, thankfully bereft of a drink (by now I was feeling quite dehydrated) and with a songbook in my lap. Justin Achilli stole my thunder by singing Pat Benatar - my favorite. I sang along.

I think it was around then that the kids rolled in - young, although I can no longer distinguish between 17-18 and 22-23. But they were around that old - fresh-faced, sweet, and full of restless energy. I'm not sure exactly who they were and how they came to be here - I heard from someone that they were loyal fans who had been disappointed at the last GenCon for something and so were now invited to the party as recompense.

My most embarrassing moment? Maybe my rendition of "I Want You to Want Me."


(Photo by Mike Tinney - that's Chris McDonough in the background manning the machine.)

I think Mike tried to shoot a video of me performing this song - but for the good of all of you the tape was full and he only got the picture.

Reel Around the Fountain

The sky was lighter by the moment, a light pearly grey dawn. The kids enthusiastically propounded the idea that we all go jump in the fountain. A very vivid image flashed in my mind of frolicking in the cool morning air with them. I almost regret not doing it. The kids left, and we adults watched from the penthouse window as they, true to their word, jumped into the ornate fountain in front of the Hyatt, splashing shirtless between the arcing streams of water. I felt a pang of envy for that careless freedom. Later, when I finally slept a couple of hours, I dreamt that I had gone down to the water too, and that it was much deeper than it looked, and I had to stand on my toes to keep breathing.

"Let's go to breakfast," Mike said, and somehow it was decided that it would be so. We cleaned up just a little - Chris got his karaoke machine packed up - and nine or ten of us headed to one of the Hyatt restaurants. It was about 6:30 in the morning, but to my amazement there were a few other people there who didn't look as though they'd been partying all night. I couldn't think about eating yet but ordered coffee and a fruit plate and some yogurt.

There was some talk around the table, completely bizarre to my addled brain, of banking with the Amish and tearing out toilets in anger. I don't know what that was about. I was torn between wanting to sleep and wanting night to fall so I could do this all again. It reminded me with sweet sharpness of going out to an exhausted breakfast after a rave, when everyone is happily tired with flickers of endorphins still coursing through fingers and toes. I felt wiped clean, ready to start again. I really wanted sunglasses.

Now the party really broke up, the other breakfasters melted away, and I had a few blocks to walk to get to my hotel. But Mike had one more errand. "Let's go get coffee and doughnuts or bagels and bring them to the hardcore RPG players who are setting up to play right now." Right now? At eight a.m.? This guy's stamina is fucking amazing.

Sure enough, they were. We handed out bagels and cream cheese to non-plused gamers in various rooms of the convention hall. Some were surprised, then happy. Some seemed not to get over their surprise. I was still wearing my outfit, of course, from the night before - shiny pink which looked fine in evening interior lighting but which must have looked garish in the bright morning, and especially under flourescents. I shudder just to think of it.

It was perhaps nine now. I regret to have no photos to share of that remarkable morning, as we walked into the pre-storm Indianan humidity. I'm not sure that something like this could happen at E3 - it's too big, maybe, too crowded, with not enough room for improvisation. You don't have fans sitting around the convention hall before the doors open rolling dice on the floor or trading cards or moving pieces across a board. I felt at once an outsider and completely welcome. I wanted to jump down and sit cross-legged on the floor and get into a quick game of Citadel. There's so much about this culture I don't understand yet, but there's something very endearing about unpretentiousness of many of the fans and game developers. After all, the game developers are fans, too - gamers first and foremost.

We bid each other goodbye on the street corner and I headed up to my room, where my roommates were just getting up.

"What happened to you?" they said.

It was hard to explain. "I was at a party," I said. Without taking off my clothes I crawled into bed. It felt delicious. "I was at a party all night."

And I fell asleep with Cheap Trick ringing in my head.

Comments

[ClockworkGrue]

Three of my roommates hit that party, although they retired to the room much earlier, after learning that "open bar" meant that you could request an entire bottle of wine on the White Wolves' tab. They brought the bottle back to the room, and then ran up and down the streets looking for a bar to loan them a corkscrew, which they brought all the way back to the room, opened their bottle with, and then returned.

Pity the NASCRAG party has to be at the same time. If the White Wolf party is the rave of GenCon, then the NASCRAG party is the highschool Sweethearts Dance--fairly relaxed and tame, generally enjoyable, and easily over in time for bed.

One of these years, I'll get over to that party, clink some glasses, and cut loose. Still, at least this year I get to do so vicariously.

[jane]

Aw, I know! I really wanted to go to the NASCRAG party, too. Next year let's party hop from Sweetheart Dance to Rave and back again!

Actually, I was going to write up a little entry about the mini-party in your room - was it Weds. night? - seven guys, two sleepy-heads asleep on the bed, four playing Carcassone, and you and I sitting on the floor amidst the dirty socks talking. That, to me, is the essence of a Con.