FFXIV Fanfest 2023 North America safety/security/disability support issues discussion

[Dagny]

I do hope the English side of the company has a lot more involvement with future English fanfests. Its quite clear there is a barrier preventing as much oversight to the fanfests. I wouldn't be surprised if Japans fanfest is much smoother, and doesn't have as many problems.

I'm sorry to break it to you, but I have received confirmation that the English side of the company is pretty much the one that organizes the entirety of fanfest. One of the people that was 'managing' crowd control during the Primals concert is in management and refused to do anything about it when concerns were brought up about safety, he only stated that he would 'bring it up at a meeting tomorrow'. This was when a crowd crush scenario was potentially forming. Everyone that was sitting with me in the ADA section assumed that he was a temp employee, and not someone that has worked at SE for over a decade and has had a personal hand at organizing every fanfest.

(We have ID, name confirmation, photos/video, along with SE directory/linked in information to confirm this. I have passed this information along to SE and have requested a timely, public response in regards to their lack of safety concerns at fanfest. If not, I will be passing this information onto as many press outlets as I can--I have already given this information to two reporters that are working on chronicling the difficulties fanfest had.)

[Ath192]

One of the people that was 'managing' crowd control during the Primals concert is in management and refused to do anything about it when concerns were brought up about safety, he only stated that he would 'bring it up at a meeting tomorrow'. This was when a crowd crush scenario was potentially forming.

The Japanese side reading about crowded conditions at Fanfest on their way to work as professional pushers compress them to fit into their trains (Source)




Litigiousness aside, probably the manageable thing to do for SE is simply make Fanfest smaller again next time. The lottery will just be tighter. I think they wanted to include as many people as possible but the logistics were clearly difficult for them.

They could also move to a model like Apple and other companies with huge audiences do and invite the press to the live event and stream it for the rest of people.

If they change venues and keep the same size it hardly seems worth it as the venue salesmen will always tell them it will be fine and they won't know for sure how the event is going to play out. Hardly worth doing if all this experience yields is upset people, lawsuits and bad press.

[Naraku_Diabolos]

Lmao people keep blaming the staff but from what I've heard a lot of fans were rude to ADA fans.

Lmao you are rude to everyone else on this forum with your petty and offensive statements. Either contribute to the thread meaningfully or just disappear. I’m sure you can grow up and be more mature Mr RMT.

To be on topic with this thread, that’s awful. Square-Enix should have had a bigger venue since they knew FFXIV was increasing I popularity. I would have liked to go to Fan Fest but my wife and I are tight on money.

[Teeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeej]

Folks let's keep things civil here. I don't think any of us want this thread locked on a technicality because too many of us are using foul or harassing language in our replies. Try to stay cool, even if you're getting baited to do otherwise. There are folks on this thread who are saying "I" a lot here... that speaks for itself, and shows that they are all about themselves. No need to dogpile them.

An update on Vegas-local advocacy efforts here: I got on the phone and managed to send an email reaching out to LVCVA's VP of Customer Safety, and am working on getting a face-to-face meeting to fact find/discuss what the convention center and monorail provides and assumes responsibility for with regards to ADA accommodation. I am also awaiting confirmation on a 30-minute appointment on Monday morning with my elected representative on the board of directors.

I would suggest being kind. Things happened last weekend that did not meet the needs of those who required special accommodation. For folks reaching out to SQEX, try not to put them on the defensive because we are admittedly requesting a heavy lift from the individual or team of folks who can actually do something about it. For folks like myself who are reaching out to the Las Vegas government side of things, let's keep things chill and try to find opportunities to work together, and limit our impulse to take an adversarial position/approach vector.

-Nacl

[Naraku_Diabolos]

Folks let's keep things civil here. I don't think any of us want this thread locked on a technicality because too many of us are using foul or harassing language in our replies. Try to stay cool, even if you're getting baited to do otherwise. There are folks on this thread who are saying "I" a lot here... that speaks for itself, and shows that they are all about themselves. No need to dogpile them.

An update on Vegas-local advocacy efforts here: I got on the phone and managed to send an email reaching out to LVCVA's VP of Customer Safety, and am working on getting a face-to-face meeting to fact find/discuss what the convention center and monorail provides and assumes responsibility for with regards to ADA accommodation. I am also awaiting confirmation on a 30-minute appointment on Monday morning with my elected representative on the board of directors.

I would suggest being kind. Things happened last weekend that did not meet the needs of those who required special accommodation. For folks reaching out to SQEX, try not to put them on the defensive because we are admittedly requesting a heavy lift from the individual or team of folks who can actually do something about it. For folks like myself who are reaching out to the Las Vegas government side of things, let's keep things chill and try to find opportunities to work together, and limit our impulse to take an adversarial position/approach vector.

-Nacl

He’s a known troll and doesn’t contribute to the forums with his posts or threads. He posts outlandish things to get people angry. He didn’t even make a post that contributed to this thread.

[Xaruko_Nexume]

Im sorry this happened but I am not surprised. Stuff hundreds (thousands?) of people into a venue in the middle of the desert 110+ degrees oof. Glad I went to the beach instead Lol.

[Yolo_Chan]

With how disastrous this fanfest was, with how much of a failure and breakdown in logistics as well a monetary damages caused by making people throw out their water bottles, SQEX should refund everyone their $200 to help compensate from this terrible experience.

[Jeeqbit]

the English side of the company is pretty much the one that organizes the entirety of fanfest.

This is actually clear from Square Enix job recruitment. Whenever they are hiring Community team members, they include organizing fanfests and events such as live letters, twitch streams and so on as responsibilities. The purpose of their regional offices is, in part, so they can take into account local laws and culture from around the world, so they have regional offices with community and marketing teams, translators and lawyers.

They do happen to develop games at these regional offices too, but even if they didn't, we shouldn't ignore that their regional offices have a clear purpose for the MMORPG.

[Avenger]

Yet you ignored what I specifically said I blame the attendees for - like not realizing 10k other people might have the same idea for transportation or choosing to not pre-order merch when they were warned that supplies were limited. That is what I blame attendees for and I'm pretty sure I made that apparent if you read my post and didn't nitpick just to be contrarian.

Sorry if it came across that way - I did read your whole post, and was trying to add that there seemed to be several serious issues, safety and otherwise, that the attendees weren't exactly to blame for, and that better event management could have helped with. I don't really think we're in disagreement, and you also noted transportation issues that could have been handled better. I agree that having contingency plans is a very good idea, recalling one time when SDMTS canceled the last couple of trolleys/light rail trains and stranded a large contingent of attendees at SDCC even though many of them had prepurchased special 4-day convention transit passes as recommended by the convention and city, etc.

[Nyxs]

Some of these people sounds like karens on ngl.