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@raxter It appears that the block booking won't be able to be organised by the A MAZE organizers. They simply don't have the time on top of the rest of the organisation, unfortunately.
I think if someone like yourself, @raxter, would take charge of such a venture, you would be a hero of much acclaim and earn yourself your weight in craft beers :) :P.
@bensonance will we allowed to do some focus feed back on our games in the meet. I imagine the list will be quite long so this is me booking early haha
So if you're exhibiting a game, doing a talk, or doing a Hypertalk, you get full access to A MAZE. This includes the talks and the parties.
The rest of you however, have to pay D: . I think the reasoning now is that there is enough benefit provided by A MAZE that it's fair enough to ask for entry. Having tickets also allows the festival to do more and cooler things in future.
The exhibition/arcade should still be free and open to all, unless that's changed without me knowing.
@Bensonance are we also going to have to pay for parking? Since R50 per day is quite a bit extra. And any reason the student tickets aren't there anymore?
'Cause 350 Entry + 50*3 Parking = 500 total. Is kinda fucking expensive for just going. Since we'll need to get food and drinks while we're there.
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And having gone to all the previous AMazes it's happened before that "oh this talk is really empty we'll just cancel it". So how is having a pay gate on the talks going to affect that? Cause the alternative is "oh this talk is kinda empty lets just let anyone in" both of which become rather terrible when you've paid to be there.
I don't so much mind the paying as it would have been nice to have that info ahead of time, and I'm not talking about me specifically, but other people. It's not very obvious. I think there's plenty of reason for the show to have commercial interest, it's just the how it works.
@Karuji's points (edit: about parking and workshops, which I can't speak for since I wasn't able to attend any day things last time) are quite valid there, too.
Maybe ticket pre-sales can help organisers gauge attendance numbers in advance and help make people that were on the fence stick around to attend stuff, seeing as they paid to be there?
R350 isn't a huge amount. Also, where the hell are you parking?
@Karuji, Unfortunately, A MAZE does not have any influence over entire city blocks of parking. If you have issue with the paying of parking you should speak to the city of Johannesburg :P. That being said, I don't believe the area where A MAZE is this year has any charging for parking :).
The student tickets are still available, I believe. However, due to the difficulty of automating the verification of student credentials online, student tickets will only be available at the door. Bring a student card or something else to verify that you're a student.
No Amaze game dev talks have never been canceled. At worst their format has been changed from a talk to a discussion.
Unfortunately, the ticketing is a decision that has been made from Berlin to bring A MAZE Johannesburg more in line with how the Berlin festival works. A MAZE Johannesburg is still staying much much less expensive than any other SA festivals, and the festivals in Berlin. The arcade is still open without a ticket, but the ticket gets you in to all the workshops, talks, and parties. If you are only able to come for one day, you can get a single day ticket at the door too.
@Bensonance it's just that I recall @hanli saying she would try and organize so that we didn't have to pay for parking. Hope people are ok with how flimsy UNISA student card is XD
@dislekcia I parked right in front of the Alexander theater.
And paying to be there doesn't really make that much of a difference. I had an all access pass to GDC, but I spent most of my time just hanging out with people and talking about games. The ability to go to talks is nice, and you can gain some interesting things from them. But in all honesty it is only a very rare and exceptional talk that will outshine actually just being with the people there.
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I know it sounds a bit like sour grapes, but AMaze kinda feels like it continually has issues that it shouldn't (like not being able to go into the opening party last year?). And yeah 350 isn't the most amount of money in the world, but we're all in different financial situations and 350 can be quite a bit for people who are struggling to make games! I can't help but look at it but being slightly weird considering how hard we've fought to keep MGSA voting membership free.
And @Bensonance you really can't compare a festival in JHB to one in Europe. I mean if we're lucky there will be what 200 people into AMaze for talks? It kinda feels counter to what we should be doing which is growing and trying to expand. And get the word out there. In Europe and the US there are way more devs and people that would come to this kind of thing. And yeah there was a panel last year that just didn't happen because there weren't enough people attending; guess you were one of those people who wasn't attending ;)
Which kinda leads me to that there has been a rather poor advertising / visibility for the festival. I mean I'm on the forums and twitter a ton and it's not like there has been any kind of official word about the tickets and such. Are there credit card machines or do I need to bring cash?
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And I know some people would probably try and give answer but in all honesty I think the only person who can give a suitable reply is @hanli since I'm likely to just go head desk and go err what. So I'm a chill out until the boss has time to answer ;)
Comments
I think if someone like yourself, @raxter, would take charge of such a venture, you would be a hero of much acclaim and earn yourself your weight in craft beers :) :P.
How does this work now?
So if you're exhibiting a game, doing a talk, or doing a Hypertalk, you get full access to A MAZE. This includes the talks and the parties.
The rest of you however, have to pay D: . I think the reasoning now is that there is enough benefit provided by A MAZE that it's fair enough to ask for entry. Having tickets also allows the festival to do more and cooler things in future.
The exhibition/arcade should still be free and open to all, unless that's changed without me knowing.
'Cause 350 Entry + 50*3 Parking = 500 total. Is kinda fucking expensive for just going. Since we'll need to get food and drinks while we're there.
---
And having gone to all the previous AMazes it's happened before that "oh this talk is really empty we'll just cancel it". So how is having a pay gate on the talks going to affect that? Cause the alternative is "oh this talk is kinda empty lets just let anyone in" both of which become rather terrible when you've paid to be there.
@Karuji's points (edit: about parking and workshops, which I can't speak for since I wasn't able to attend any day things last time) are quite valid there, too.
R350 isn't a huge amount. Also, where the hell are you parking?
The student tickets are still available, I believe. However, due to the difficulty of automating the verification of student credentials online, student tickets will only be available at the door. Bring a student card or something else to verify that you're a student.
No Amaze game dev talks have never been canceled. At worst their format has been changed from a talk to a discussion.
Unfortunately, the ticketing is a decision that has been made from Berlin to bring A MAZE Johannesburg more in line with how the Berlin festival works. A MAZE Johannesburg is still staying much much less expensive than any other SA festivals, and the festivals in Berlin. The arcade is still open without a ticket, but the ticket gets you in to all the workshops, talks, and parties. If you are only able to come for one day, you can get a single day ticket at the door too.
@dislekcia I parked right in front of the Alexander theater.
And paying to be there doesn't really make that much of a difference. I had an all access pass to GDC, but I spent most of my time just hanging out with people and talking about games. The ability to go to talks is nice, and you can gain some interesting things from them. But in all honesty it is only a very rare and exceptional talk that will outshine actually just being with the people there.
---
I know it sounds a bit like sour grapes, but AMaze kinda feels like it continually has issues that it shouldn't (like not being able to go into the opening party last year?). And yeah 350 isn't the most amount of money in the world, but we're all in different financial situations and 350 can be quite a bit for people who are struggling to make games! I can't help but look at it but being slightly weird considering how hard we've fought to keep MGSA voting membership free.
And @Bensonance you really can't compare a festival in JHB to one in Europe. I mean if we're lucky there will be what 200 people into AMaze for talks? It kinda feels counter to what we should be doing which is growing and trying to expand. And get the word out there. In Europe and the US there are way more devs and people that would come to this kind of thing. And yeah there was a panel last year that just didn't happen because there weren't enough people attending; guess you were one of those people who wasn't attending ;)
Which kinda leads me to that there has been a rather poor advertising / visibility for the festival. I mean I'm on the forums and twitter a ton and it's not like there has been any kind of official word about the tickets and such. Are there credit card machines or do I need to bring cash?
---
And I know some people would probably try and give answer but in all honesty I think the only person who can give a suitable reply is @hanli since I'm likely to just go head desk and go err what. So I'm a chill out until the boss has time to answer ;)
Unfortunately the curation of the games has already closed :).