I have confirmed with Richard that he will be signing at the Grand Prix on SUNDAY only. He plans on arriving at 12:00 – 12:30 and will be at the event for several hours.
I can’t tell you how great it is to have him at the GP. This event is going to be amazing.
Tim
I have just faxed the paperwork to the next closest hotel – as the marriott is sold out. The new hotel should have a room block set up with discounts for GP players.
“Reservations can be made through our dedicated property reservations team at (253) 238-8000 or toll free at (888) 862-3255. Please advise your guests to ask for the “Magic – Grand Prix Tournament” group to ensure they receive the special room rate. Guaranteed reservations must be cancelled by 24 hours prior to arrival to avoid No Show/Same Day Cancel charges of one night’s room and tax.”
http://www.hotelmuranotacoma.com/
Looks pretty nice.
Tim
Confirmed vendors – There are likely 1-2 more but this is the ones confirmed.
Tim
| Cardhaus |
| over the edge |
| Pastimes |
| Troll and Toad |
| Gaming Etc |
| Strike Zone |
| Morgans Cards |
| Hot sauce games |
| Game Empire |
| Type 2 Magic |
| A place to game |
| Star city |
Again – I don’t know if the hotel is going to sell out or now – I haven’t ever rented a block of rooms before – so I am just providing the numbers and letting you draw your own conclusions on how many rooms have been rented for GP – Seattle.
Currently for the 100 room block (numbers are rooms rented each night) so we will have at least 50 players at the GP 
At long last I have finalized the negociations for the Seattle Prerelease location. I will spare you the details but it was a real pain. Seattle Center and all my usual locations were booked. However I did manage to get the Ellis Pavilion at Seattle Mariners/Safeco Field 1250 First Avenue South Seattle, WA 98134
If your going to GP Seattle we have arranged for a discount at the hotel next to the venue. They are currently holding 100 rooms for the GP. These could sell out in which case they will not be able to add more.Hotel Reservations – Courtyard Tacoma Downtown
To book reservations for the event call: Marriott reservations at (800) 321-2211 or Courtyard Marriott hotel directly at (253) 591-9100
Please request the special rate for “Grand Prix Seattle”. Reservations by attendees must be received before 5:00pm, Friday, May 1, 2009
from ICV2.com – I really liked this game at first. Over time the development of the game went in a direction I really didn’t care for but I really loved this game.
Tim
After producing 25 releases and more than 4,000 cards over the past five years Upper Deck Entertainment has announced the end of its Vs. System CCG for Marvel and DC Comics properties. In a post on the Upper Deck Entertainment Website lead Vs. System designer Ben Seck bid farewell to the game and to the thousands of fans who Seck counts as “among the most staunch and dedicated that I have known in my twenty years of gaming.” For the past year Upper Deck has been producing hobby league kits for the Vs. System. The January kit, which has already been shipped, will be the last one as UDE ends its OP support for theVs. System.
With the demise of the Vs. System, the fact that WizKids’HeroClix CMG has not yet found a new home, and the discontinuation of the Marvel board game from FFG, it appears that there are currently no Marvel or DC licensed non-electronic games in the game space.
Although Upper Deck Entertainment’s Director of Marketing Scott Gaeta mentioned several new Vs. System releases when interviewed by ICv2 last April (see “Interview With Upper Deck’s Scott Gaeta”), the handwriting may well have been on the wall with the first series of UDE layoffs announced in May, which included R. Hyrum Savage, the Brand Manager for the Vs. System (see “Layoffs at Upper Deck”). Although the products that Gaeta mentioned, which were in the pipeline, were released, they turned out to be the last Vs. System releases from UDE.
The cancellation of the Vs. System is the latest in a series of retrenchments in the gaming industry in the face of economic conditions that steadily worsened in 2008. Upper Deck’s May layoffs were followed in June by cuts at Score and Donruss (see “More Game Company Layoffs”). In November Topps shuttered its WizKids division (see “Topps Shuts Down WizKids”) and Upper Deck announced a second wave of cuts across both its sports and entertainment divisions (see “Upper Deck Lays Off 40”).”
Clearly this is one more example of Upper Deck reevaluating its trading card game business. In addition to losing YGO (at least for now) they have now canceled Vs. This might be a logical move from a purely finicalperspective – however it is certainly going to raise questions in the minds of new players before they start playing a new Upper Deck game.
I have scheduled 2 artists in Seattle and 1 in San Diego for the saturday prerelease event.
Guest Artists:
- In San Diego we will have Mike Dringenberg.
- In Seattle we will have Don Hazeltine.
- In Seattle we will have Darrell Riche.
This afternoon an Upper Deck OP manager has again told me to run all the premier events I have scheduled as normal. This includes SJC SF.
Thats correct – SJC SF is good to go. I’m delighted. I really like running the larger events. I also have prepaid over $10,000 in room fee, tables, chairs, stage etc so I would be really hurting if it was canceled.
Please tell everyone you know that the SJC and all the other events scheduled are good to go.
Tim
PS – on a personal level I know this has been really difficult for lots of people and I would like to thank everyone for not freaking out. I will do everything I can do to make this transition from UD OP to Konami OP as smooth as possible.
We just wrapped up the WoW Realm Champs in Seattle and Phoenix. Now the not fun part – paperwork. Attendance was not great even though we had ridiculously good prizes. Not sure exactly why as it was pretty easy to qualify for and the prizes were great. The WoW TCG sells fine but the players just don’t seem to be into competition.
I just read my email and one of my all time favorite Magic artists – Rob Alexander has confirmed for GP Seattle. Rob is a great guy and I’m really happy he is going to be able to make it. I have been a fan of Rob’s for years and particularly like his landscapes. I was just on his site http://www.robalexander.com/
and he has new images up in his gallery and several pieces of original Magic art for sale.
I wish I could collect original art in a serious way. I have a couple pieces but would like more. (christmas)
On Robs site there is a list of cards he has done but it doesn’t look like he has updated it for awhile. I will get a current list up on my site soon.
Tim
