Post Fan Festival 2016 Experience, Thoughts and Suggestions

[Taledar]

The festival was cool, but No shirt and not being able to buy any merchandise was extremely lame. They should definitely offer something for the people that went to fan festival to be able to buy the exclusive to fan fest items at the very least. I really hope they do something about this as that 7 hour+ fan fest merch line was the biggest waste of time.

[Avenger]

Giving a slightly more qualitative reply (besides my lengthy commentary & suggestions above) - I have to say the whole atmosphere and experience put me in a really good mood for days!! (Even waiting 4.5+ hours in the hellish merch line dps queue wasn't enough to dampen my enthusiasm!)

There really isn't anything quite like 5000 FFXIV fanatics filling up a fake Paris street, or cheering wildly as Soken's metal band tears through a set of songs from the game!! Experiencing this madness with folks from your FC makes it even better.

9/10 would lose gil betting on Yoshi-P's PvP skills again

[JaydeDancer]

((Just so you all know, you can edit your posts to get over the 1000 character limit))

I WAS WONDERING HOW PEOPLE DID THAT! Thank you!

I have to say the whole atmosphere and experience put me in a really good mood for days!! (Even waiting 4.5+ hours in the hellish merch line dps queue wasn't enough to dampen my enthusiasm!)

I wanted to add to your comment by saying that on Saturday at FanFest, during the PvP Exhibition, I made the decision to try to log in for at least an hour every Sunday from now on. It's been more than a year since I played the game regularly because I got caught up with life and school, and the last time I really logged in to play was back at the beginning of June. I made some amazing friends at FanFest who are a part of my husband's FC, and I want to be able to stay in touch with them. Thank you to the planners of this wonderful event for renewing my love of this game and making me want to play it more often.

[Rongway]

Repost from Facebook group for those who haven't joined it

Hi everyone. I'm that guy giving out the 3D printed job icon favors. I want to thank everyone who has allowed me to walk up to you and awkwardly hand you an expression of my appreciation for your cosplay, your company, or your conversation. As a person on the autism spectrum it is not so easy for me to approach strangers, and especially in cases where you might appear to be in the middle of conversation or moving with purpose to some other area, please forgive the awkward exchange as I try to figure out if it would be acceptable or not to interrupt you.

I'm so glad that people liked the job icons. I was a bit worried after the merch list was posted showing the official pins that people might not want them.

I regret that I didn't print jobs in better ratios -- I underestimated how many tanks would be there (despite what DF experiences might indicate, there are apparently more than 30 in the world) and the sheer number of WHMs (I ran out shortly after the keynote, despite them being the job I made the most icons for).

I'm also sorry I didn't get to meet everyone who wanted one. I tried to be more social/available than usual but I did have to disappear to my room or to the spa a few times to come down from the overstimulation. (PS -- in case you're wondering, the Bally's spa is much nicer than the Paris's)

Next time I'll give my printer more time to spit favors out and include more of the tanks and healers (and, Twelve willing, RDMs and DNCs).

[Avenger]

I'm that guy giving out the 3D printed job icon favors. I want to thank everyone who has allowed me to walk up to you and awkwardly hand you an expression of my appreciation for your cosplay, your company, or your conversation.

Nice idea! Fan-created goodies and mini-events are a great addition that I would really like to see more of!

[Heezeemeezee]

This was my first fan fest, however I have been to a number of gaming/anime/comic conventions and have also staffed and run similar events (on a shoestring budget though).

The biggest thing that struck me is how the event seemed to be "cheaping out" in certain areas. It's not like SQEX or the event is losing money (unless they are then...)

Anyway, my suggestions for improvements:

1. Place the merchandise area in a separate room. Have more stalls open. Have designated "cash only" & "debit/credit" only stalls. Perhaps open the merch area on day 0 for a limited period for people who arrive early (although most people arrived early), or allow online pre-orders and have people pick them on on day 0. Also merch should be slightly less expensive. Giving people tickets to come back at "xx:xx" time like on day 2 is a good idea as well to reduce congestion/rage.

2. Place the main stage in its own area. This allows people to actually concentrate on the stage events without being distracted by all the other noise of the other activities. Live stream the main stage events into all the other event rooms (like was done in the food room).

3. The food room: Not really advertised and was just "there". Should have more FF themed foods a la Eorzea Cafe (but might be hard to pull off if food is being provided by hotel catering.) At least have more food options to buy (less pricey would be good too.)

4. The activities should also be in their own room with better managed lines. Other people have suggested different/additional activities so I won't rehash that, but I will add that there should be a Cosplay area with themed sets/backdrops, and an scheduled autographs area for the dev team and other celebrities. Oh, and also a triple triad tournament? I mean if you're giving out the cards........

5. More Guests should be announced/available to create a better fan experience. We expect the devs to be there and the musical guests were a nice touch, but having more guests like voice actors and the art team or even celebrity cosplayers would add to the fan experience.

6. Someone mentioned earlier that having "player volunteers" rather than the temp staff "staff" the event would serve attendees better. However depending on how the event is incorporated there may be issues regarding paid workers vs volunteers etc...

7. More "I beat xxxxx" t-shirts, especially for the battle type events, and perhaps more prizes for winning other events as well. The Cactpot draw and Hildibrand activity was a nice touch though.

That's it for now, I did enjoy the event despite some of the hiccups but some improvements are needed so that fans in JP/EU can have a better experience in the next couple months and so that the NA folks can also have a better experience in 2 years time. :P

[Elkanah]

Oh, and also a triple triad tournament? I mean if you're giving out the cards........

What would've been even better is if they gave us the cards, but allowed us to make up a full TT deck just like we do ingame. Not just for 6 cards, but an ACTUAL DECK for 30 cards+. They'd be amazed at how much we collect these ingame! OR! Had they given us the amount we did, BUT! Decided to announce at FanFest that we would be getting the actual TCG later on in the coming year or so would've hyped up so many of us. How about ingame codes for each of the cards. You place the code on the mogstation and receive the codes ingame through mogmail like anything else. People think this to be gated, but that's what makes these event special. The content we walk away with. Also, Pokemon and Mew or Surfing Pikachu was gated. Don't even get me started on gated content for special events lol.

A room for TT separate from the con would've been nice. Kinda hard to play TT when everyone has the same deck as you though. Still don't have that darn Ser Aymeric card! *SALTY TRIGGER*

[RennyNanaya]

3. The food room: Not really advertised and was just "there". Should have more FF themed foods a la Eorzea Cafe (but might be hard to pull off if food is being provided by hotel catering.) At least have more food options to buy (less pricey would be good too.)

We Actually did a walk around and the food/drinks in the food room was more expensive than nearby restaraunts (comparing to the high-class ones like 'Steak' is unfair). They were selling half-bottles of Caeser's casino branded water for $3.00, wheres 15 feet around the corner was a corner store selling regular size Evian for $1.75

This is ignoring of course that the main showroom had free water fountains and dixie cups, but that personal preference.

[Ryuko]

I have a few thoughts about this fan fest, and how it compares to 2014, so I'd like to start from the beginning.

Thank you for clearing up the registration situation. It was very relieving to arrive at the hotel, check in, and grab my ticket within less than an hour. The registration line was nonexistent when I arrived at around 1pm, and only slightly long by the time my roommates arrived at 3pm. Like others, I was disappointed that we didn't have our character names or servers on the badge. Was this done to save time? If so, I can understand, but in the future would you please leave a spot to write our names/servers? It was really fun to bump into people just by glancing at their character name and saying, "Hey, I know you!" Sure, it would be just as easy for attendees to wear a "Hello, my name is..." tag, but this would just kind of encourage the mingling.

The overall tone I felt from this fan fest, compared to 2014, was that SE was putting a heavy emphasis on production value. As others may recall, the standard quality stream in 2014 was FREE. Anyone could watch it. (You received the Moogle outfit code and a HD stream for a price, but if you just wanted to watch the content at a lower resolution, it was available to you for no charge.) There were some marked budgeting differences between 2014 and 2016 that I believe were made to accommodate the fact that SE was charging $30 per person to stream. In other words, that stream had better be good, because that's where the majority of the money is going to be made... not the attendees' tickets. That said, the production changes also benefited attendees, but there were definitely residual effects that you could either love or hate. For example, not only did we get a Primals concert like in 2014, but we also had an amazing piano concert featuring Susan Calloway (who was NOT there in 2014). This was a nice touch, and very relaxing after the first day of the fan fest. So which concessions were made to make this additional concert happen? There were no cosplay judges for the cosplay competition, which was very frustrating to those who participated. Further, there were NO t-shirts available for either attending or beating the battle challenge (but you COULD buy fan fest exclusive t-shirts that were only available by waiting through a LONG LONG LONG line). By the end of the fan fest, the battle challenge had almost no one in line for it (while Odin was a staple feature at the 2014 fan fest). I had to wait just to get enough people to do it on Saturday afternoon. The Allagan Tomestone USB drive was a pretty sweet trade off, but the lack of t-shirts was disappointing. I know it may seem silly, but some of us are 'collecting' FFXIV "I Beat..." event t-shirts... and not just the ones available at fan fest. I love the Sephirot shirt I got at PAX East this past year.

Another thing that really deserves its own mention was the ways in which the fan fest just seemed more 'serious' in general. I was sad Soken didn't get another panel. I recall in 2014, he joked about how strict Yoshi P was when he would make new music. This was great to see some of their personality. He also yelled at Koji a lot more during the 2014 concert, which was funny. The 2016 Primals concert seemed to be more 'put together' than it was in 2014, with a very specific set list and almost no audience participation. There were also points where it was very obvious that some sort of background tracks were used, and voice filters were added for certain songs. I understand WHY this was done... many people in 2014 were upset with the quality of the stream of the concert so they wanted to make sure it sounded great... but at the same time, I'm sad with the reduced authenticity of seeing a live show. Also, in 2014, the audience was encouraged to do a 'call and response' to Titan's theme, and someone was even called up on stage to scream "NOW FALL" during the beginning of Garuda's theme. A local female vocalist was hired to sing the female parts. That was excellent! I'm not saying they should have had a complete repeat of 2014, but more involvement would have been nice.

A few other marked changes that seemed to make the event more 'stream friendly' was changing the event giveaway into the jumbo cactpot, and omitting the raffle at the end of the event completely. The raffle prizes in 2014 seemed to be a lot nicer... but hey, what you can you do... sponsorship limitations. Again, the streamed events were kind of odd because this is supposed to be a fan event, but at times it really just felt like we were a studio audience, if that makes any sense. I *did* like the Q&A with live questions from the audience, though. On another note, I was also sad to hear that the winners of the art contest would not be announced at the fan fest. I understand it would require more staffers, but that was a really nice touch in 2014. (To people saying they should have gotten more volunteers: they tried getting volunteers in 2014, but they couldn't get enough. I remember receiving an email after the first day begging more people to staff, and offering us a refund on our ticket if we were willing to staff the next day.)

As far as the merch line was concerned... I was really surprised they didn't fix that after the issues we had in 2014. Those problems were infamous and they seemed to only get worse, especially because there were fan fest 'exclusive' shirts available, and you couldn't get them through trials. The 'come back at your time slot' thing was a good change on Saturday! Honestly, I'd prefer if time slots were simply handed out with tickets and goody bags to prevent overflow. This would allow friends to consolidate their orders (like many people did) if they didn't want any restricted items, and it would be easier for staffers to get through the line. The cosplay competition 'time slot' was handed out with registration and that system seemed to work out pretty well.

I didn't get to participate, but I enjoyed The Feast Exhibition. I really wish I had signed up! I would have loved to do that. Fingers crossed... I hope one day The Feast is so popular and competitive that it would be viable for SE to fly in the top teams from every NA datacenter for a live PvP finals event AT the fan fest. I know this is really hoping for a lot, but... hey, maybe one day! I'd love to be there for that.

The cafeteria next door to the convention hall was a very nice touch. I remember there being a concession line in 2014, but nothing like that. Sure, the food was pricey, but it's Vegas... and it wasn't bad food, just expensive!

...

So, I really wanted to mention the cosplay competition separately because I know cosplay is a really niche thing and definitely not something everyone is interested in. In other words, I don't expect SE to spend a lot of money hiring guest cosplayers to attend and judge the event. Also, I know there were some changes made that benefited cosplayers, and those were great improvements compared to 2016. For example, I really liked that the cosplay prejudging and event were held on the same day. This allowed people with really uncomfortable costumes to only wear them in one day, and they didn't have to throw everything on both days if they didn't want to. I appreciated this break! Also, I like that there was a requirement to bring progress pictures. Without getting too much into it, there was a very big reason WHY this rule was added (and it is a staple among many cosplay competitions to ensure honesty). Okay, but here's what really bugged me... FFXIV cosplayers, to me, are among the most impressive cosplayers I have ever seen. FF costumes in general have a LOT of detail, and so it takes a lot of time to replicate that. I can say from the bottom of my heart that I know each and every person who made their costume poured their heart and soul into it. I think that deserves recognition and appreciation. In an effort to keep prejudging short and concise, the judges (dev team?) needed to get through a LOT of entrants during prejudging -- 50 to be exact, between noon and the event later that day. However, due to the fact that they are devs (not cosplayers), there is simply a lot of terminology and crafty know-how that they won't understand. This is why many events will hire cosplay judges to be the 'resident experts' on craftsmanship, and this is why I assumed SE hired cosplay judges in 2014. Explaining how my costume was made to the dev team reminded me of what it might be like if they tried to explain how they created a particular model or questline to me. I'm not a dev, so I would understand it in simple terms, but I wouldn't really comprehend the amount of dedication and time that goes into every step of their work.

All of that said... I should also mention that I participated in the 2014 and 2016 cosplay contests, and was a finalist both times. This meant I made it to the stage part of the competition. Prejudging in 2014 made my costume feel appreciated. I had ample time to talk about what I had done to the judges -- a combination of devs and cosplayers. Detailed questions were asked about how I made each piece. I believe the judges (cosplayers themselves) really listened and interpreted each costume, even if they weren't super familiar with the costumes they were looking at. They had reference images. In 2016, perhaps to accommodate for time, the devs simply asked, "Did you make this? Which pieces did you make?" They flipped through my progress pictures and asked zero questions about my materials. This was frustrating because I wanted to tell them how I got heavy pieces to FLOAT on my body! Lol. As I was explaining how I made my thermoplastic pieces, I was essentially cut off and told they had heard enough. Sure, it was done in a polite way, but I didn't even get to start on my cloth pieces, my fabric painted pieces, etc. I am not a rambler but I definitely felt rushed through this process. I did NOT win a prize or place in the contest, but I did hear from other finalists and people who placed that they also felt like they were hurried along. I can't speak for others, but for me it is really less about possibly winning a prize and more about just getting to show you how hard I worked on making this outfit from a game I love. So really, my two requests would be this: please get at least one cosplay judge to be on your panel, at least for prejudging. It doesn't have to be someone famous... even a local cosplayer... maybe a past winner of the FFXIV fan fest (the Garuda in 2014 or the Dragoon in 2016 -- these would be my top choices). That would be a really fun 'call back' for them, and for us! But, the cosplay judges are important. Please. And please, set aside time to review all costumes. I'm not even going to mention how uncomfortable the entry process was (first come, first served) because that is a separate thing... but in general, there were a lot of things that could be tweaked to make this event more enjoyable overall.

Now, as far as the cosplay event is concerned... I appreciate that you let every single entrant walk across stage! I do not envy the judges' jobs when it comes to having to choose just 20 finalists and five prize winners, so it was nice that everyone was featured before the end. It was also really nice to see mini 'groups' walk across stage with each other. This was an improvement from 2014! But, the lack of organization leading up to the event (literally: stand here until it's time, everyone walks and poses quickly, then you walk off stage and wait to see if your name is called, get back up on stage, stand in a row) meant that we didn't have our names featured on the big screen behind us. I know Bayohne did announce our names (and possibly servers?) when finalists were called back on stage, but this is very quick and easy to miss. I miss being able to glance at the screen and see someone's name. And, people who watch the stream could recognize their ingame friends with ease. So, if possible, would you please bring back this feature in 2018? Also, I thought I'd take a moment here to apologize for my blunder on the stage. I walked in, did my little pose, and then went to walk off. The lights were blinding and I guess I had forgotten the orientation of the stairs I had walked up (it was all very quick with lining up) so I went to find the side of the stage, looked down, didn't see stairs... got confused, walked behind the curtain... people started following me (LOL I'M SORRY) and then a staffer had to run on stage and lead us all down the FRONT of the stage. From that point forward, there was a staffer standing on stage making sure people went where they needed to go. And I'm sorry because I felt responsible for that whole thing and leading everyone into the dark. But hopefully that didn't show up on the stream... Anyway, I know I made a serious blunder, but if it wasn't me it would have probably been someone else... there needs to be a little more organization next time. I understand that there was very little 'wiggle room' as far as event blocks are concerned... With the concert being at 6:30 or 7 (I forget the exact time), the cosplay competition needed to start by at least 5:30 or the event would have had to go longer to accommodate everything. That said... why did the hall close at 8pm? That seems a little early. :P Was it a venue agreement? I would have loved to have more time just to do more events.

Something I *loved* this time around was how nice Yoshi P was about taking pictures with the cosplayers after the competition was over. He came over to take a group photo with us after the contest, and then allowed us to get in line for individual photos and signatures. He signed my book... and I'll cherish it forever!

...

Like in 2014, I loved the 2016 fan fest, and I'll hopefully be back in 2018! Everything has its ups and downs and I really hope SE takes our comments/suggestions seriously as they continue to tweak future events. Here's a few takeaways:

1) Please include at least one t-shirt at a fan fest -- whether it is included in the goody bag or as a trial reward. As silly as it sounds, people really like these. It's a big deal.
2) PLEASE find a fix to the merch line. Releasing fan fest 'exclusive' items and then forcing people to stand in line almost all day to get these items isn't just an inconvenience... it's almost cruel.
3) Please send all fan fest attendees a login or token or something to view the stream for free. Please don't make us pay $30 to watch a stream we saw in person. Many of us missed some events and would love to see them!

[Avenger]

As others may recall, the standard quality stream in 2014 was FREE. Anyone could watch it. (You received the Moogle outfit code and a HD stream for a price, but if you just wanted to watch the content at a lower resolution, it was available to you for no charge.)

@Ryuko: Great comments in general. I'd forgotten that you only needed to pay in 2014 for the HD stream and moogle attire (SD stream was free on Twitch though it didn't include the opening and closing ceremonies?) and that it was $20 rather than $30.