Running a Video Game Tournament at a Video Game Show

[Blur2040]

You can just read the stuff in bold if you don't care to read my long winded BS.

There's a local Retro Gaming show here in Columbus Ohio. See website here: http://corgs-con.webs.com/ Professional web site administrators, they may not be, but they put on a decent show last year, and they'll be expanding this year.

I've always been disappointed in the video game shows that I've been to here in Ohio, Cinciclassic, CCAG, and this CORGS show last year in that the only things on display for play are older things, such as Atari consoles and computers, Commodore stuff as well as other obscure older computing platforms. Though I love all that stuff (Atari 8 bit computers are one of my favorite platforms) I'm always disappointed that I don't see more interesting, obscure stuff, such as what is often talked about on this website.

So, this year, as they have moved to a bigger venue and I wouldn't feel like such an ass taking up limited/valuable selling space, I've decided to put up in lieu of shutting up and buying a table and bringing some of my own items of interest to let people play and fiddle around with.

To this video game show I will be bringing a Sega Saturn (for the purposes of Death Tank Zwei and Saturn Bomberman), my Supergun with a Neo Geo PCB and the following games:

Baseball Stars 2
Super Sidekicks 2 (Soccer)
Street Hoops
Top Player's Golf
Magical Drop 2 (Puzzle)
Bust a Move
3 Count Bout (Wrestling)
Sengoku
Aero Fighters 3 (Shooter)
Real Bout Fatal Fury 2
Samurai Shodown
Samurai Shodown 4
World Heroes 2
Real Bout Fatal Fury 2
King of Fighters 95
King of Fighters 99
Metal Slug X

As well as possibly the following Game PCBS --- Street Fighter Alpha 2, Mortal Kombat 3, and Tekken 2.

I'll probably also bring something else relatively obscure...perhaps Amiga CD32, or a PC Engine---as how often do you see either of those two running around in the wild (at least in the US). All of these are interesting things that I thought people might appreciate as your average person hasn't seen any of these things before, and I much prefer when people appreciate my video game collection.

All that garbage said, one of the runners of the show suggested that I might run a tournament of some sort. Problem is, I have no clue what game to play/anything about running a tournament. Single/Double elimination? Which game? I know fighting games are the obvious choice, but I was thinking it would be better if it was something EVERYONE could enjoy in lieu of some game such as a KOF where some fighter obsessed person could come along and dominate.

I suppose I'd need a prize too. (Do I?) I have Sega Genesis systems out the wazoo, so I could do one of those (in fact, I'd LOVE to get rid of some of those), or I could try and do something better, but I'm cheap and I don't have a lot of money to toss around. I have lots of Atari 2600 systems, a couple of extra Colecovisions, probably some NES and SNES systems I could part with too. I mean, I could AV mod a Colecovision and have a prize worth about 100 bucks right there...but I don't know if I'd feel comfortable managing a tournament with such a spendy prize.

Anyone have any thoughts for me? I don't have to do a tournament at all, my goal was to just bring some neato stuff for people to play with...but if I could come up with a decent, managable plan, I'd go for it.

[ASSEMbler]

Naruto 4 for gamecube is always a favorite

[mairsil]

The problem is that you need to know how many people you are going to have sign up. If you are going to have only a handful (~16), then single elimination would be your best bet. If you are going to have a lot (a couple dozen), then you might want to consider double elimination.

On the other hand, if the group gets completely out of control and you have a hundred or so, or if you want to go by pure scores over a set period of time, then you'll probably need to do a ranked "top 8" style single elimination (i.e. the top 8 records after X number of rounds play against each other in single elimination). This gives you a more manageable timeframe too, since players can come and go all day to enter a score, and then come back at a set time for the finals. If you have a lot of people, then you are really going to have to worry about time control.

[Blur2040]

Naruto 4 for gamecube is always a favorite

Problem is, I don't think the crowd here would go for that too much. The crowd you'll get seems not to be fighter nuts, but general classic gaming nuts...mostly skewed towards Atari...not really much Japanophile wise either.

I mean, I could go into my Dreamcast collection, pick out Garou, MvC 1&2, and Project justice and then say "OK, lets play" and I think most of them would stare back at me and say "Wuh."

So, now that mairsil has mentioned it, perhaps a score based tournament would be best. I think a high score competition would also make it more accessible, less intimidating...not having to sit

I dunno, looking at my list again, and what has been said so far, Magical Drop II high score contest doesn't seem like a bad idea. Single player games go fast (I'm pretty good and don't last much longer than 20 minutes) and I doubt that there would be any people out there who are so familiar that they can totally dominate it.

Score contest also seems a lot more manageable than a straight tournament, considering that I'd have to hunt people down and listen to people whine and complain about "cheaters" and whatnot. Though, for a brief time, I was enthused by the idea of a World Heroes 2 tournament, just because I love it, and it's so cheezy.

The only downside I see so far is that I pretty much have to allocate a bunch of time to Magical Drop II, when my whole point was to bring a lot of neato stuff to show. How much screen time do you think I have to allocate to such a contest? Just leave it going ALL day, or put out a sign+ score sheet and let people play what they want and switch games so people can put up a score if they wish? Maybe just set certain times during the day, hour blocks or so for it?

I dunno. Any flaws in my plan so far?

[oli_lar]

I went to one organised by a mate a few weeks back here in the UK. There was a fighting tournament that I didn't take much notice of tbh, but I did take part in the shooting competition. Three rounds, think there were about 12 people to begin with, played Super Star Soldier caravan mode on PCE and then took the top 6 scores, then Zap on the BBC, then down to top 3 scores on that and then played Mushihimesama Futari on Xbox 360. The top scorer on that got a gold spray painted joystick, just for a laugh.

The Soldier series of game's caravan modes are great candidates as they only last 2 (or 5) minutes, so if you get really good people they aren't on it all day. Problem is some people won't have played all the games, let alone the machines so people might be pretty crap at it. Thats how I explained my poor score for Zap on BBC at least as I'd never even seen the machine before let alone played one. Who on earth designs a computer with the cursor keys in two different sets at opposite ends of the keyboard!?!

[Blur2040]

I've realized that a day long score contest might suck in that I'd have to have it open all day....and it could just be a pain in the ass.

If I were to do a Neo Geo fighting game tournament from amongst these games:

Real Bout Fatal Fury 2
Samurai Shodown
Samurai Shodown 4
World Heroes 2
Real Bout Fatal Fury 2
King of Fighters 95
King of Fighters 99

What would you consider to be the most accessible/fun? I love World Heroes 2 and think it might be a good choice due to its simple controls and similarities to Street Fighter 2...but pretty much every other one is a better game.

[GaijinPunch]

Fighting games are always good. For non-versus games, where it's purely score, you want to completely rule out anything that has infinite scoring, or near-infinite scoring in the form of really boring milking. Pretty sure that takes out all Metal Slugs.

[karsten]

i would suggest super puzzle fighter :)

[ASSEMbler]

If you want to blow minds put up things like cowboy bebop or X