The (Yearly?) TGXPO/SGD and whatever else I attend Thread

[Kyrael Seraphine]

I don't really think it's management's fault people were douchebags. That sort of behaviour is beyond the pall, even if you're sick of waiting. Yeah, it's unorganised, and mismanaged, but that's no excuse to break things, steal things and start what basically amounts to a riot.

[Scylla]

Wait, so women and men aren't even allowed to attend together on the same days?

[ghanmi]

/me can't understand why does Sony and everyone else takes Saudi Arabia as the lowest common denominator for the Arabic world in general, and not just in gaming.
It's obviously not a good choice to base their operations there, since there are other Arab countries more "open" about media and less prone to engage on banning campaigns spree after a single baseless rumor. Just put a local distributor there and you're fine.

Is it just me or Sony is pushing their operations abroad more frequently? I heard they were translating Persona 4 Golden for the Vita in Chinese (snickers), and some Final Fantasy ports too (am I mistaken?).

I was surprised to hear that recently, there have been some Arabic versions released exclusively for PS3 for Red Faction, Need For Speed Most Wanted, and FIFA 2012/2013. There were also Arabic versions released for Toy Story 3 and Wall-E for PS3 and xbox 360, though not the Wii for some reason. And I don't think if the Arabic voice-overs (covering all the game) over English text for Epic Mickey 2 counts.

But when I heard about Square Enix confirming an Arabic version for Tomb Raider new reboot, then pulling the arabic tag from the Steam version info, I just wonder how do they hope to market that thing in Saudi Arabia. And I'm just surprised how they are marketing Ninokuni there, with the main character trying to bring back his mother from the dead (this is a sure-fire religious-bait, and I'm sure they won't even make an actual research about the game before that / spoiler: he doesn't)

They have 21 other Arabic country, I mean the Saudi "religious" over there are the kind of people that:
- said Pokémon must be banned because some people could use the trading card to ... gamble. Another one said the whole elemental weakness principle and the evolution business COULD be related to some satanic pervert organizations... They even went on record to spread rumors about its name being Hebrew in origin just to "convince" people, unabashedly lying and bragging about it
- said manga should be banned, publishing hentai on newspapers headlines to prove their point. It has to be seen to be believed. (I was exposed to this as a kid, and was thraumatized back then)
- said chess, card game, watching tv, reading, activism to overthrow dictators or protest about bad life conditions;;; ARE forbidden because they are a potential waste of time
- they claim to see and talk with angels, and do miracles... clearly contradicting their religion (protip: according to Islam nobody, even prophets, can see or fathom angels existence)

I think the unfortunate events that happened today should be a lesson for Sony. And really, no identity/invitation check system? Anyone can enter as if it was a brothel, including troublemakers. They should fire their guards (and some of their Vita-related decision makers in the process)

[Allie]

Dec 8, 2012 19:53:41 GMT -5 Scylla said:

Wait, so women and men aren't even allowed to attend together on the same days?

At the risk of sounding bigoted, that isn't altogether surprising for an Arab country.

[Ace Whatever]

That's a generalization though, because its mostly just Saudi Arabia that strongly enforces a non-mingling rule.

Also, the reason this and other conventions are happening around the gulf is because there are local organizations pushing for them, not because of some silly notion of Saudi Arabia being the lowest common denominator.

[Scylla]

Besides just being backwards, that seem incredibly stupid from a business point of view for an event like this. I would guess that female gamers are probably even less common in the Middle East than they are in the US, so the place must look like a ghost town on the women-only day. And does that mean they also have to hire two versions of the staff, one all male and one all female? If I was a businessperson organizing an event like this, I think it would make more sense to not allow women at all, as unfair as that would be, than to waste money on such a small group of people. Of course, the truly smart thing would be to join the 21st century and allow men and women to attend together, which would probably also relieve the crowding some if the men attending could be spread out across all the days of the event. Personally, I don't think I would even attend a gaming convention or whatever if I couldn't be with my fiance and our male friends. It's nowhere near as much fun if you can't enjoy this stuff with the people you care about.

[Ace Whatever]

No need to sell the gender short. Female-only conventions of any kind are not uncommon here, so the idea that they should either allow mingling or not do it at all benefits no one. The reports I've read mentioned that there was a respectable amount of women who showed up for the two days, but you don't need to take my word for it. I'd be more than happy to get in touch with GCON and ask about statistics if you're interested.

I don't ask that you understand how the government chooses to uphold Islamic law, but don't tell us to throw the game just because were played a bad hand or five. ;P

Dec 8, 2012 19:26:28 GMT -5 Kyrael Seraphine said:

I don't really think it's management's fault people were douchebags. That sort of behaviour is beyond the pall, even if you're sick of waiting. Yeah, it's unorganised, and mismanaged, but that's no excuse to break things, steal things and start what basically amounts to a riot.

It's the management's fault in the sense that the registration was supposed to ensure rabble can't just walk in off the street and the failure to ensure a working ticket system on the first day is a clear sign of carelessness and half-assed planning.

[Super Orbus]

Dec 9, 2012 10:35:50 GMT -5 Scylla said:

Besides just being backwards, that seem incredibly stupid from a business point of view for an event like this. I would guess that female gamers are probably even less common in the Middle East than they are in the US, so the place must look like a ghost town on the women-only day. And does that mean they also have to hire two versions of the staff, one all male and one all female? If I was a businessperson organizing an event like this, I think it would make more sense to not allow women at all, as unfair as that would be, than to waste money on such a small group of people. Of course, the truly smart thing would be to join the 21st century and allow men and women to attend together, which would probably also relieve the crowding some if the men attending could be spread out across all the days of the event. Personally, I don't think I would even attend a gaming convention or whatever if I couldn't be with my fiance and our male friends. It's nowhere near as much fun if you can't enjoy this stuff with the people you care about.

It's not just up to the convention organizers. Unless everyone wants to go to jail.

Moreover, cultural norms are much different in Saudi Arabia than what you or I are used to. I think you need to view the situation through that lens, even if you ultimately still don't like it.

[derboo]

Dec 9, 2012 12:41:36 GMT -5 Ace Whatever said:

I'd be more than happy to get in touch with GCON and ask about statistics if you're interested.

That'd be great, actually. Also, I'd like to put this on Games of the World, if possible.

[Ace Whatever]

Sure thing. I already put in the request on their Facebook page.

[Ace Whatever]

So hey! TGXPO 2012 just got confirmed for next Wednesday! Admittedly the game list isn't terribly interesting much like last year and the only guest they got is EVO player Razer Latif. But who knows maybe some surprises will pop up.

I hope to cover it like I did last year and hopefully you guys aren't sick of me yet. ;D

[Feynman]

Yeah, I'd love to hear about it. These posts are always fascinating, as we in the west never really hear about conventions or gaming culture outside of Europe, North America, and Japan.

[Allie]

Kind of curious as to hear about the philosophy and practice of game censorship in the Arab world.

Do the censors take it seriously? Are they closely tied to the government?

I don't mean to dredge up a can of worms, I just wonder how much attention they're really paying.

For example, could something like Dead or Alive slip through without issue?

[Ace Whatever]

I explained the general gist of that last year:

Nov 29, 2011 6:42:03 GMT -5 Ace Whatever said:

-Much like movies and other entertainment mediums, Islam in general doesn't have a specific stance against games, except of course when they indulge in concepts that very much against its teachings.
As far as the religious police are concerned, they don't heavily engage in gaming censorship but rather deal with it on a voluntary case basis. That, they'd never know a game is questionable content without like-minded citizens bringing up the issue to them.

A few years ago some random news channel made a report on GTA with the usual "HURRDURR in this game you kill people and sleep with prostitutes our children are getting corrupted". And this was like years after San Andreas had come and gone. So currently, aside from backdoor under the counter deals stores here don't sell GTA, God of War or Dante's Inferno. I also discovered recently that Saint's Row 3 also got banned despite the first two games being sold here without a hitch.

In Catherine's case, shops opted to chicken out of getting the game altogether because they knew nothing but negative word of mouth would spread about it. The situation's more or less the same in the United Arab Emirates. But in Bahrain nobody gives a crap as I found plenty of copies of Catherine for both systems.

As an addendum, no store here is willing to put my used copy of Catherine on display.

As far as Saudi Arabia is concerned, the censors are more or less part of the government. There aren't specific cases of games being censored here to remove content since most of that happens before the games are imported here thanks to Islamic groups in the west [1][2]

For game specific cases, Dead or Alive games sell here fine without any problems (dunno about the Extreme Beach spin-offs though).

Record of Agarest Wars games sell normally here too, although, back when the first game came out I couldn't find copies of it because the first run was the LE version only and nobody wanted to touch that. Eventually some stores quietly snuck it onto shelves presumably by throwing away all the lewd LE swag.

[Ace Whatever]

True Gaming surprised a lot of people still somewhat sour from the events of Sony Gamer’s Day 2012 by announcing TGXPO 2012 just a scant two months after it.

The three day event took place at the MENA Grand Khaldia hotel, a somewhat odd choice given its location in one of Riyadh’s older shopping districts. Entry required purchasing a physical ticket for every day of entry at a nominal fee. The game line-up consisted mostly of already released games, but there were promised demos of DmC, Metal Gear Rising, Gears of War Judgment, Lost Planet 3 and Fable: The Journey. Nintendo was sadly absent this year. The tournaments this time around were for Halo 4 and FIFA 13, and there was an additional challenge event where people could register to fight EVO player Abdullatif Al-Hamli aka Razer Latif in Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition for a chance to win an Xbox 360.






The first thing I noticed upon entry on the first day is that I wasn’t wading through a sea of people like the last two times. The floor was spacious and there weren’t enormous crowds of people. Everything was going smoothly apart from the fact that Gears of War Judgment and Lost Planet 3 were conspicuously absent. Some legitimate talent from the east and west coast of the kingdom tried their hand against Latif, but the man who once beat Daigo walked away with the win every time.






I spent the second day mostly sitting down with Latif and making pleasant small talk. The third day was mostly chilling with the floor staff over matches of Street Fighter X Tekken which was on display for some reason. Once again I couldn’t attend the cosplay contest due to circumstances but it still showcased the same level of talent as last year, including a very nice Auron costume and the return of Frank West.






Overall, I had fun at this expo. Personally I found that it lacked a bit of oomph with regards to guests and events but it’s still an improvement over last year and a step in the right direction for conventions in the Kingdom.





But wait, there’s more! I caught up with True Gaming founder Mohammed Albsimi and asked a few questions. Here’s a paraphrasing of the interview:

How long was TGXPO 2012 in planning?

We’ve been planning it since the end of the first one last year. We had initially promised to hold the event on October in the Riyadh Exhibition Center (RICEC) or at the Faisaliyah hotel failing that. However, scheduling conflicts with Sony Gamer’s Day and a few other circumstances forced us to delay by a few months.





What do you think went wrong with Sony Gamer’s Day and how did that affect planning for TGXPO?

Sony advertised the event a little too publically, and that attracted the attention of the wrong crowds. We took careful note of the mistakes made there and did everything we could to circumvent them





Was the location (an out of the way district) and date (which coincided with many students having final exams) a deliberate decision?

It was completely a matter of circumstance.





Were there plans to get more guests who worked in the games industry?

SGD set a bad precedent for bringing foreign guests to gaming conventions here, but next year we should be able to bring back high profile industry veterans as well as have more interactive panels.





Similar to last year, TGXPO seems to suffer from having game lineups that are mostly already released on the market as opposed to upcoming. Are publishers being difficult with regards to providing playable demos? Additionally, what happened to games that were promised but didn’t show up like Gears of War Judgment and Lost Planet 3?

The publishers aren’t actually a problem. I believe we had a respectable selection of upcoming games for TGXPO 2011. As for this year, most of the games on display actually were unreleased back in October, but obviously the two month delay wasn’t something we could easily adapt to in terms of the lineup. As for the missing games, the matter was out of our hands. The Lost Planet 3 demo unit that we were sent experienced technical issues and wouldn’t work, while the Gears of War Judgment demo was being held by customs.



Where was Computer House?

Computer House’s participation this year was limited to only being our ticket vendor.

Where was Nintendo?

Nintendo was actually planning to display the Wii U at TGXPO but ran into trouble with their corporate headquarters due to not having settled on a release date for the console.

Special thanks to Mohammed Albsimi, Adel Bajunaid and the rest of the TG staff for making this happen and I wish them the best of luck on future conventions.



Tried to take a photo with Mohammed but my light sensitive eyes derped out. Still worth it to show off my custom t-shirt.

I think this and the SGD piece are ready to go on the blog now. I hope you guys liked it.