Last weekend I attended Wizard Con Richmond at the Greater Richmond Convention Center. I attended on both Friday and Saturday, so I have two wildly different stories to tell about my quest to see Bruce Campbell.
Friday. Opening day. Everyone just coming off of work comes down to the Con to get a glimpse of the scheduled celebrity appearances and festivities, right? That explains why I saw at most three dozen people at the entire convention. It was seriously a ghost town. None of the celebrities even showed up at the times listed on the program.
No big deal, I said. I’ll just do what I came to do: go to the tabletop gaming area (sponsored by Game Nite), and participate in the scheduled Magic draft. I showed at the right time and headed to the bedreadlocked girl at the front desk to sign up only to discover that I was the first person who even mentioned the event the entire day. So I packed up my stuff, headed home, and made sure to keep my three-day pass wristband.
Now it would have been easy to give up at this point, but I was really determined to see Bruce Campbell. So I headed out again on Saturday, this time bright and early, to see if I’d have better luck. Fortunately, the place was packed and all the events were in full swing. Unfortunately, this meant that the best glimpse of Bruce Campbell I could get was on the other side of the convention floor over the shoulders of the convention guards. When 4:00 rolled around, the nerd-herd shuffled over to the conference room where we got to see Bruce up close (~200 feet) and personal.
So I was now free to enjoy the actual meet of the convention. I got merchandise signed, and sold some of my own stuff to one of the many collectors. I was finally content and ready to head home. That’s when I was stopped by dreadlock girl. Apparently she remembered how the Magic event fell through the day before, so she introduced me to seven attendees who were looking to play.
I won’t bore you too much with the details of how horribly run this event was. In my 11 years of playing this children’s card game, I had never been to an event where the organizers hand out cards and just let the players figure it out for themselves. Three people dropped out of the event before the games even started, so I took my not-to-impressive victory and left a few bucks richer.
So if anyone else is interested in the fan-art, collecting, or cosplay aspects of Wizard Con, by all means, buy discount tickets as soon as you can for one near you. If you’re a fan of tabletop RPG’s, boardgames, or card games, save your $75 and use it to play at your local game store. Not only will the games be run more competently, but your opponents won’t forfeit so they can go catch a glimpse of Lou Ferrigno.
If you liked what Chris had to say and you agree with him then totally comment!
