The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Unearned Swag
SecCom
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I almost felt bad for doing it, but at the same it was like why not. I told a guy passing out the Rock Band 3 shirts that I had played the previous day but didn't get a shirt, after a couple questions he gave me one, but the thing is I had never played. Honestly I wanted so bad to play that game, but it was just too low on my list of things I was willing to wait in a long line for and my group was just not interested in playing it.
Very sorry for tricking the nice Rock Band shirt guy, I just really wanted a shirt. Did anyone else pull any shenanigans like this just for swag?
Very sorry for tricking the nice Rock Band shirt guy, I just really wanted a shirt. Did anyone else pull any shenanigans like this just for swag?
Lead Editor of http://fullnovazero.com We like to write about video games.
SecCom on
0
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
This year I didn't
The reason "why not" is because you are cutting in front of all those people who are willing to wait in line. Virtually every exhibitor had limited amounts of items to give away, and you just selfishly decided you were more important than all of them. You can try to justify it or lamely apologize once you have what you want, but it doesn't change that what you did was lame and took advantage of the booth guy's trust.
What did irritate me at least a little bit was how much swag required you to do things to get this year. You would think the exhibitors would want you to wear advertisements for their products, rather than make you jump through hoops. I know at least a few places just started giving stuff out en masse right at the end of Sunday's exhibit hours because there simply wasn't enough time for enough people to jump through the hoops. It strikes me as more effective from a marketing point of view to simply give out shirts and stuff on day one to everybody on a first-come, first-serve basis. That way people will be wearing them on days two and three, providing conversation pieces in lines and such so that more people get interested in those games.
The fact of the matter is, people are going to queue up and play game demos no matter what if they're interested in a particular game. The swag isn't what motivates people to line up (unless the swag *is* the product), but the swag is a marketing tool. Give out the swag to everybody first thing for "free" and let the "market" determine what the coolest t-shirts, etc., are. Making some swag harder to get may increase the appeal, but doesn't increase the appeal for the game itself. Exhibitors should try to get more creative with their swag, not more creative with the hoops you have to jump through to get it. Look at the Fallout 3 hand puppets, which have become fixtures for PAX events every year since they were given out. A t-shirt you have to wait in line for two hours to get is not going to gain widespread use for the three days of PAX (thus less "free" marketing for your product), particularly when every other booth is requiring the same long wait. People will choose just one or two booths, and spend the rest of their time wandering around swagless and grumpy.
People will say "but there's limited quantities of swag!" but so what? Exhibitors can dole them out 1/3rd each day so it's more fair if that's actually a concern. The people most interested in the game will be headed to that booth first thing in the morning anyway, so the people most likely to wear the shirts will still be the ones getting them. The best thing exhibitors can do is simply make the best shirt designs possible, or make other really cool swag items that other exhibitors aren't competing with (hand puppets, etc.). Our RL characters have many item slots available, so get creative.
The best thing exhibitors can hope for at PAX is free word-of-mouth advertisement. Swag facilitates that. Get the swag out as quickly as possible, make it good swag, and it will drive more people to your booths. If people's only interaction with your booth is wandering by and seeing a huge line of people trying to get some so-so swag, that might get them interesting in gaming the system perhaps, but that's far inferior to people being unable to turn around without seeing another person wearing a t-shirt with your logo.
(You just say the letters)
Plus, I greatly enjoyed Nvidia's scavenger game. It was hard and took us forever, but the end prize was worth it. The reason they were able to give out such great prizes too was because less people completed the challenge.
(You just say the letters)
And I hate to disagree with the inimitable eye-shuh, but Nvidia is one of the ones that left a really bad taste in my mouth for their method of swag distribution. Particularly their visit to BYOC. Having people get their faces drawn all over with "Nvidia" in permanent marker seemed demeaning just to get a snuggie. Especially since everyone at PAX EAST BYOC got one for just being cool.
[edit]: Best distribution was Catan/Mayfair games who handed out the most adorable little stuffed sheep, wheat, logs, and coal to people who talked to one of their booth hosts about the game. That way they conserved limited stock, but also got them out to people who really were interested in the franchise.
Also, lawls, I had to look up what "inimitable" meant, and I like it. Hahahahaha
Approachable booths this year include the Star Wars one. There was an interesting VIP thing that happened that got people rather nice t-shirts, but the main appeal was that anybody could walk up and play the games. There wasn't one huge monolithic queue to get access to the demo machines, there was just many different shorter lines. Very easy to say to oneself "if I get in this line, I'm third up to play" even though realistically, there was probably just as many people overall in lines as there were at the Halo: Reach booth. If they were passing out TFU2 shirts to people first-come first-serve or some Sith/Jedi buttons, and then did the VIP thing separately for Rebel/Empire shirts for the main theater event, that'd be a pretty cool swag experience, and a pretty cool booth. As it was, the game was very approachable, and I'd seriously consider buying two additional products from the Star Wars booth whereas I was previously just planning on buying TFU2.
Unapproachable booths this year were the ones with single lines. Everybody knows exactly which ones those were. I'm not somebody who is planning on buying Portal 2. If I had heard they were giving out swag on a first-come basis without having to stand in line, I'd have definitely gone over there early on in the expo. If they had just a bunch of separate lines and a mess of machines lined up for people to just walk up and play after a short wait, the Portal 2 booth would have had a chance at convincing me that the game is fun enough to consider buying. If the Portal 2 shirt was "free" with a cool design, I would wear the thing whether I decided to buy the game or not from the demo, and that's "free" advertising for the rest of the expo and "free" advertising when I get home and wear the thing in NY.
In short:
With games that I'm already planning to buy, I'll only check out the booths if the demo machines are easy to get at, or if there's good swag. While I'm there, if there's other products to be seen, I'll definitely see them, and have an open mind (Star Wars).
With games I'm not already planning to buy, I'll come for free swag. While I'm there, I'll check out the product, and have an open mind (End of Nations, DDO).
If a booth doesn't have free swag, and I'm not already interested in it, swag isn't going to get me in line, no matter how cool it is (Portal 2).
If I'm already interested in a game, but the booth is completely unapproachable, swag isn't going to get me in line, no matter how cool it is (Assassins Creed: Brotherhood).
If a booth requires an appointment to see, or has little signs saying I might be asked to leave if media shows up, that's not going to give me a good impression at all (Civ V, and another one along the wall near Lucas Arts that I didn't even stay at long enough to see the name of once I saw the "fuck you consumers" sign).
Basically all I want is accessible booths and accessible developers. Swag will get me to your booth, but only if I don't have to sacrifice a huge amount of my time to get a five minute demo. There are companies that are doing it right, and there are companies that are doing it wrong. I don't think I'm the only one who feels this way. Yeah, there's people who are willing to stand in long lines for cool swag, but those are people who are already going to buy the game. If you just want to reward your customers, so be it. If you're interested in gaining new customers, you might want to try things a different way though.
My best PAX memories from the exhibition floor aren't the times I played a game for five minutes and got a t-shirt, my best memories are when I talked to a Microsoft developer about the Surface for fifteen minutes while other people stood in line to play D&D on it for two minutes at PAX East. I remember getting some one-on-one time with a WotC employee at one of many Magic the Gathering xbox stations last year and rewarded the company a week later by buying the game I had no previous interest in. This year it was all about going toe-to-toe with some LucasArts guy at the Wii consoles and then wandering through the rest of the Star Wars booth and seeing every single xbox and PC up close and personal, getting positive impressions without any long lines or time limits. It will very likely result in me sending more money LucasArts' way this year than I was planning. I have yet to be convinced to part with cash as a result of any long line for a t-shirt. I am a game advocate and the people who come in contact with me are influenced by what I say and buy. A good PAX booth experience, one influenced by swag as well as general approachability, does result in real money changing hands. Perhaps not a huge amount of cash from just myself, but when you've got tens of thousands of PAX-goers seeing your booth, it adds up to significant amounts if even a fraction are like me.
This year, the swag was few and far between. Perhaps the economy has something to do with it, I don't know. I know that I spent a lot more time off the exhibition floor as a result, as opposed to previous years and PAX East where swag was more easy to get and I was on the exhibition floor most of the time. Easier swag overall means more people are spending time on the floor trying to hunt for it, and that means far more impressions at each booth. Where was I instead of the exhibition floor? I was shopping at the vendors, and playing tabletop all weekend. That's an opportunity cost to the exhibitors, one I expect is greater than the profits gained from not giving out more swag. Is the must-have-the-most-swag mini-game kind of silly? Yeah, but... we're the product at these things. PAX is selling us, the audience, to the exhibitors. It does go both ways, to an extent, but if the exhibitors don't bring their A-game, we don't show up, and that's not good for the game companies who want to move their products. Yes, PAX-goers will come to PAX for everything else, the concerts, the freeplay areas, the dozens of other official and unofficial events that we all love so much. But ultimately, the exhibition floor is what allows everything else to happen.
(You just say the letters)
On Friday it was worse - the dude said we needed tokens to play, so we went to ask for them, the girl said she wasn't giving any more out because people had disappeared with the tokens. So we go back to play and the guy says "you need tokens" then proceeded to hand-pick people out of those waiting that he thought were cool enough to jam with him (and he got to pick the song and his instrument for every song). Nobody had tokens. We waited for 45 minutes for the chance to play with him but apparently we were too ugly or some shit and we had to leave because he kept ignoring us on purpose and when we tried to talk to him pretended we didn't exist. He was a freakin jackass.
Also - I think that some of the hoops were reasonable but most were not. Particularly when you do their hoops and then they pretend they don't know what you are talking about and refuse to help you with the badge that you need or whatever. Pissed me off.
The Dolby Axiom button hunt that was advertised with the badge mailer was especially great for me because I'm in the market for a headset. I was able to determine right off the bat that Turtle Beach and Triton's headsets are way too huge on my head and fall off. In fact I plan on heading over to Best Buy in a few hours to go buy some Plantronics that I tried at their booth because they fit me so well. (I hate finding things to fit a small head!)
I just went through my swag and yeah I only had 2 shirts that I was able to get in a size small that I'll probably wear. Last year I came home with 5 shirts, 3 of which are under my bathroom sink for cleaning rags because they were L and XL men's sizes. So I'm actually more happy that I'm not spending half a day trying to figure out where to put crap with logos on it that I can't use.
It's been mentioned, but consider that these companies are also trying to get by in the economy and probably don't have a lot of extra money to beef up your wardrobe for free. While some of the shirts to generate advertising not all of them are effective. I've been wearing my Brink and Wet shirts from last year all the time going to the gym and lounging around the house and I had no idea what either game was because I just walked up to the Bethesda booth last year and took them and walked away. I did finally see some footage of Brink while waiting in line for Portal 2 this year. So I think the companies really had to leverage how to get the information out there about their products and partners to make it worth their while to spend the money.
If you really want some cheap t-shirts for little work at all, Old Navy is at 5th and Pine. :P
Oh man when did they give out snuggies for the punch cards?? I got the "CRANK THAT S#IT UP!" shirt on Friday and luckily in my size but a snuggie would have been fun too!
"Pictochat? No. Dicktochat!"
I stole it from her phone when she wasn't looking.
Hear hear.
I sincerely hope guys like the OP are in the minority.
YES! =D
I wasn't even expecting swag, and was genuinely interested in their display of the new game
To me, that's the best use of sweet swag for existing games: reward for loyal fans
T-Shirts are more generic swag, and it's probably not worth it to line up for, even if I'm a fan.
Small complaint about the Dragon Quest booth though:
I saw a lot of people with those cute, blue Slime bags, and asked if they had any more. I actually saw that on Sunday afternoon they have a whole box tucked inside the booth, but the staff lied and said no they're all gone, people had to line up for them etc. Dude, just say no, we're saving those for [insert purpose], don't lie.
HOW DID I MISS THIS?!? I'm a complete Settlers nut, those would have been awesome...
I usually stay on the straight and narrow when it comes to acquiring swag, unless it's out of my hands - last two years I've taken surprise hits to the head multiple times by t-shirts both flung by hand and shot out of a cannon, when I wasn't even paying attention to the booth in question. Great way to get stuff
Only iffy moment this year was running the Alienware Survey gauntlet some 6-7 times to try and get something, ANYthing other than the cup-holder "Partner Prize" :? (Seriously, one time the three people ahead AND behind me got water bottles, and I still ended up cup-holder. Thing had a grudge.)
Personal opinion? Swag last year was a LOT easier to get, they literally just flung (or shot) it at you. Now that companies are actually making you DO STUFF for the swag, people are slightly miffed because, well, you gotta DO STUFF, and as a result you end up with less acquired. In some minds it's a downfall from last year's free-stuff-a-palooza, but methinks it makes what you DO get more meaningful, and less likely to be used as a set of rags (earlier post's example, not mine).
PSN: Quintonious
They were against the wall nearest the queue room.
My personal opinion is the opposite. Last year, in the pax offical booklet, BUNGIE said their panel would "rain swag". They didn't in fact give out anything. so they suck, and I swore never again to do something I personally find unfun for swag again.
So this year I still "worked" for swag, like PAX-XP, the quests for Magic Party, and line up for Epic Mickey sketch by the official Disney Consumer Goods department artists. Got a D&D redbox for entering a D&D spelling-bee. However, these were totally fun and with the exception of the sketch, I would've done them without a reward anyway.
But I also received generous and awesome swag for not "doing" anything: a Precipice of Darkness collector's edition box, 3 of the 5 catan resource plushies, a super cute Dragon Quest blue slime bag, and a whole bunch of awesome Magic card stuff. Some friends and I also played a fun game at Soda Pop Minatures together; to our total surprise, we were each given a little miniature treasure chest at the conclusion of our awesome and hilarious game.
My weekend was totally more awesome because I did random, off-the-beaten-track stuff that I probably wouldn't have thought of doing otherwise, rather than wait 5 hours in line for previews of games I already know I'm going to buy. To me, PAX this year isn't preview of next year's titles, or get-boring-crap-for-doing-boring-crap, but a trip to an exotic new candy store with free samples of strange flavors
For swag that you don't have to jump through hoops for, though, I think a lot of it boil down to sheer luck.
For example, our party was doing one of those Magic the Gathering challenge things(white, I think?) when a guy wandered in and ask our party for help on his quest. We'd just completed ours, and gladly offered our assistance to a fellow PAXer. Turns out, he works for WotC, and gave us super sweet stuff as a reward even though we couldn't help in the end. I got the 2011 core set fat pack. [ footnote: And then we ran into him again at the Magic party =D awesome dude.]
That was awesome!
I remember a group of 2 entering the Portal 2 line (while it was still kinda short on Friday, "kinda" taken in the light terms), and they got their shirts and left the line without seeing the mystery behind the doors (IT WAS FREAKIN' AWESOME)! I also saw one guy snag an Intel bag without actually winning it, and took off like a ninja (it was the dice number guessy game, the real winner got another one, but it's still a dick move).
I was also one of the people who actually wanted to contribute to the Video Game Voters booth, the T-shirt was just an added bonus and a way to show off my support.
(Which is currently crashing my system and making me break out the VOM... think it's the power supply.)
The queues for the hot games like Killzone 3 and Portal 2 weren't nearly as bad on Friday. I went through Killzone twice, once for campaign and once for multi. Line for the same booths on Saturday and Sunday were much longer--to the point where I would have avoided them. The Bethesda/Zenimax booth was handing out shirts two at a time early in the show, with no line, and ran out Sunday. As a result, I was able to snag several shirts and doo-dads Friday, but came away mostly empty-handed on Sunday.
My overall swag haul this year was much, much better than in years past.
Now stuff like the nvidia prizes, or my Brand new favorite prize of a One of a kind DSi with Scribblenauts art on it. That is the stuff that needs to be earned.
I have no use for an extra large t-shirt, thank you very much.
Why should you be given a free T-Shirt just for being alive and in the same place as others who are actually interested in the product?
The point of 'earning' these things it that you try the game. Why would you want to wear a shirt or hang a poster for a game that you never played, may not like or have absolutely zero interest in in the first place?
At events like PAX or the Arnold Fitness Expo, or Sakura-Con, THERE WILL ALWAYS BE SWAG. It's a fact of life. However, placing so much value on "OMGMUSTHAEV!" versus "This looks cool, I want more info, oh look a free t-shirt, thanks" is more of the problem that I see. If you go at it in the sense of a WoW goldfarmer, you're going to be disappointed because that last thing that you wanted wasn't "worth" the tasks they wanted you to do. Therefore, the experience will be much richer if you go at it with an attitude of being a nerd. As one John Green has said before, "being called a nerd is like someone saying to you 'Hey, you like stuff'." Let yourself look like a fool for a little while, because you will have a story to tell to your friends that will give you a warm reminder of a few days where you just got to have fun.
Though a free Snuggie doesn't hurt either...
I mean with Rock Band, its coming out relatively soon, I know I'm gonna buy it, I've invested literally hundreds of dollars in it already. Plus the whole con I had been watching others play it and enjoyed their songs, so its not like I never even knew what Rock Band 3 was all about.
This isn't some black and white thing where some people are only trying to get swag, for me it was play as many games I've never played as possible while grabbing some free stuff in the meantime. I really love getting swag since I think its cool and its a neat memento to show off to friends. If you don't think its that important I totally understand, but I personally love getting it.
I got the impression that nVidia was only giving away those shirts and it was a shirt I couldn't see myself wearing like ever, so I decided to pass on the scavenger hunt. If I knew there were video cards being given away I probably would've put more effort into it.
Actually really liked the idea of a PAX-XP game, but found myself never playing it. I think this was just because of the friends I went with, if it were just me I would have probably done everything on that card twice, but anytime I was interested in doing something like a panel, one of my friends insisted that our time was better spent in the expo hall. I would say 90% of my time was well spent anyway, so its not a huge deal to me, but next year I'll probably do it differently and do more of the panels and generally fun stuff.
On a last note though, put your pitch-forks down, I enjoyed PAX just as much as anybody did and earned most of my swag legitly, I was just curious if anyone else pulled a stunt like mine. If it was something nicer than a t-shirt then I would have been legit about getting it, but it was a t-shirt so really I didn't see why they were being so stingy about them.
Feh. I guess... it's just swag. Although if I were less anti-line I would've gone through great lengths to get that Portal shirt.
PAX Prime '10-'13 Triwizard Drinking Tournament || Hufflepuff Head of House!
Twitter: @jujukoo
[E]
How did I miss both these things!? Who was giving out the RPoD boxes?
What's worse is how it seems to change the exhibitors expectations. Case in point: Hothead Games. I tried asking a question after a panel about the Swarm because I was genuinely interested in the game only to be given a blunt answer and then snapped at that he'd already given out the t-shirts. No leading answer, no tempting sales pitch, no invitation to try the game. WTF? I'd rather they did away with swag altogether or move to something cheaper that they're actually willing to just hand out to everyone.
Did they even have F3AR shirts? I thought they only had the Mortal Kombat and LoTR shirts, and the F3AR prize was a red-on-black waterbottle...
PSN: Quintonious
I know they had a F3ar poster, a couple of my friends got them. So for this all my friends and myself simply played a single game then pooled the buttons together to get shirts. The ironic thing is that F3AR's demo was so long that none of us played it, but it was probably the one demo I personally wanted to try. I'm not sure if this was an illegitimate way of getting that shirt, but really when you think about it, they were only giving out 2 shirts for 8 games, which is pretty lame. They're entitled to give out whatever they want I suppose.