  Back! Whew, that was quite the whirlwind tour. I'm SO glad to be back home. urlLink JD asked in the comments recently about the travel and networking required for running our business. I have to say that I usually enjoy the travel and attending the conventions. Having been in the same line of work since I left high school has meant that I've met many dozens of other game industry regulars who have, over the years, become some of my best friends. The internet allows us to keep in touch, even though we usually don't get to see each other in person for more than a few hours at a time, two or three times a year.
On the other hand, the turn-over in the game industry is tremendous. People leave the business on a regular basis, going off to more stable or lucrative jobs as game systems and companies rise and fall in and out of popularity. Sometimes the companies come in with a spectacular splash: sponsoring banquets, offering golden contracts, throwing parties with ice sculptures and live bands, renting riverboats or hotel ballrooms. Sometimes they go out in a similarly spectacular manner: they blow the money for their new fax machine on a dinner for their staff and volunteers at a highbrow German eatery, they spent the money for the print run of the new book on ice sculptures and hired models to hang out in their booth, they have stiffed so many printers/artists/writers they can't hire anyone to print/draw/write their products anymore. Countless people have come on the scene with their "better" versions of D&D or their take on Magic: the Gathering, dozens of perfectly nice men and women have mortgaged their houses thinking that the world really needed another game magazine. I miss many of those people and wonder what they're up to these days. If one is not actively "in" the game business, one is very much out. Having now been to E3 in person, I have to say I hope never to have a job that would require me to attend on anything like a regular basis.
Just being there for one day was far more than I could stand! The lights in all the halls are dimmed so that no glare on the computer screens will distract people from whatever cool, new graphic effect your company is introducing to the world. Giant, flashing, booming displays thirty feet tall loom in each of the three gigantic exhibit halls, where people line up to have a chance to play a few minutes of your as-yet-unreleased game (or crowd around to watch some other lucky fellow have his turn).
The noise is tremendous and assaults convention attendees from all sides. Each exhibitor wants to attract your attention and draw you to his booth, but not only that! They do not want you to be distracted by other exhibitors' game noises or promotional hooha, so when you enter the circle of their exhibit space you're assaulted by a wall of sound that miraculously blocks out all others around you until you somehow wander out of the range of the noise and into the range of the next booth's soundblast.
Having a conversation with someone on the floor of E3 is like trying to shout out anything meaningful to someone standing right in front of the amps at a rock concert. I have no doubt that serious hearing damage took place at that show, and I feel no compulsion to put myself through that even once more. I'm pretty wiped out, so I guess I'll wrap this up and get some shut eye for now. 
