Intercon  Mid-Atlantic is over, and what a convention.   The company was great, the games were very good, and the weather stayed fairly warm if rainy.   The Con numbers never reached the usual levels, but you couldn't much tell from the party in the function space after hours.  People had fun, talked shop, danced, and generally had a good time.  I got several "best Intercon evar!" comments from people, and if we lacked a little in numbers we made up for it in quality of company and good spirits. 

We had some new faces this year and that was very exciting.  I got a chance to talk to a lot of the good people involved in producing the New England Convention about cross promoting, and pushing the Intercon name.  If IMA is going to have a growth year and be a good neighbor, we'll need help and everyone I asked for help was really forthcoming and willing to go the extra mile. 

I love IMA and I want it to keep its special feeling and characteristics, but it's time for us to grow again as well, and this weekend we roughed out a lot of the things that need to happen for IMA to move forward.  Contest Submissions will be much earlier this coming year so that at least a few tracks of good games are up by the time the New England Convention runs.

This year’s contest proved pretty exciting.  There was some real competition.  I should explain briefly that all games compete in two categories.  Technical Submission (a copy of the game submitted beforehand and read by judges) and Runtime Scores.  A game that does not complete it’s Technical Submission may still run and Receive Runtime Scores, but is unlikely to win Best Overall since its highest possible score will be 50%.  We also had a “Wildcard” category this year which only reflected Runtime.

This years winners were:

Gold - Best Overall - Time Travel Review Board by John D'Agosta, Susan Weiner, Nat Budin, Josh Rachlin
“Wildcard” – Best Runtime - Holiday Season by Mike Young
Gold – Best in Category – 6-12 Players – The Road Not Taken by Mike Young
Gold – Best in Category – 12-24 Players - Time Travel Review Board by John D'Agosta, Susan Weiner, Nat Budin, Josh Rachlin
Silver – 12-24 Players - Shangri-La by Tom Vorhies, Carol Young, Andrew Zorowitz and the Foam Brain Staff
Bronze – 12-24 Players - Finals by Christopher Buck, Emily Buck, Jennifer Buck, Elizabeth Mullen

I’m going to throw in a note here.  People who were at the Convention are aware that Road Not Taken won best 6-12, but also had no competition.  I think it’s worth mentioning that it was only beaten for Wildcard by Holiday Season by the same author, so clearly competition aside, it was a very worthy entry. 

I think all these games were very solid and very credible, and the spread on scores was close enough to make us feel that all the games were good competitors and that everyone put in a good effort.

The real winner is the rest of the LARP playing world.  There are now six new games in the GameBank, posted and ready to go!

http://www.larpaweb.net/gamebank-mainmenu-31

On a final note, I want to thank everyone who attended Intercon, and the people who worked hard to produce it, particularly Stephanie Olmstead-Dean, who handled the hotel, and con-suite, Meredith Peck who handled a lot of the admin work of the convention, and Mike Young who handled database issues.

I also want to thank the many people who came forward and made displays of generosity by donating to the Con and the Bar.  Many people went above and beyond the call of duty to help out in this difficult year, and we deeply appreciate that. 

Next stop – Intercon I!