That’s me, standing in the IELLO booth, demoing Uchronia. Photo by IELLO’s Patrice.

So this was, perhaps, my 18th consecutive Gen Con; I believe my streak started in 1995. This year, as last year, I boothed for IELLO Games USA. I had many friends among the nearly 50,000 attendees, a few of which I actually managed to have conversations with, but others whose presence I was only aware of from their Facebook or Twitter updates.

Two things to notice in the picture of me in the booth: first, I’m wearing my Pivothead camera glasses; all of the photos and all but one of the videos I shot during the con were taken with those glasses. I’m still loving that purchase. And second, that’s Raz demoing at the right-hand table; Raz is the brains behind our Quizgle puzzle website project.

IELLO had the lovely and talented Dr. Horrible (Stephen) demoing Titanium Wars:

Dr. Horrible demoes Titanium Wars to the Rebel Alliance representatives. Photo by J. Hunter Johnson, released under CC-BY-3.0

Lexi Farron Strife as Super Nova. Photo by IELLO Games.

And IELLO also had Lexi Farron Strife cosplaying as Super Nova for the Guardians’ Chronicles demos. Prototypes of Heroes of Normandie and Zombie 15′ were shown, King of Tokyo flew off the shelves, and the new game, The Three Little Pigs, proved popular across a surprisingly wide demographic range.

King of Tokyo tournament. And a wolf. Photo by J. Hunter Johnson, released under CC-BY-3.0

Gen Con 2013 broke the attendance record, and it was marvelous. Mayfair Games capitalized on the opportunity and set a world record for most people playing a board game, with their mega Catan event. Paizo debuted Mike Selinker‘s Pathfinder Card Game, and I heard that they sold out of their con stock on Thursday. And IELLO ran King of Tokyo tournaments all weekend, with attendees standing in line for a shot at winning one of the coveted Space Penguins. Between the booth and the tournament area, I was well occupied during the exhibitor hall hours, which is my excuse if I missed seeing you!

For the last couple of years, Gen Con has been giving some gamers the opportunity to upgrade their pass to “Very Important Gamer”, gaining early access to the exhibitor hall on Thursday morning. This is my view of the registration line and the VIG line then:

IELLO also hosted an industry event to introduce their upcoming games, some debuting at Essen Spiel, others coming later:

[but you'll have to wait until early September for this one; sorry!]

That video was shot with my phone; the mic on my glasses did not capture the sound from the presenters well enough to be used. And on Saturday, I shot was is so far my most-viewed video on YouTube: the Gen Con Costume Parade:

Thanks to Stephan & the IELLO France crew, my roommate (and Gen Con rookie) Ivan, booth wrangler Russell, tournament wrangler Brian, and all the volunteers—it was a great show!

—jhunterj