Spring 2023 ICON helps grow the boardgaming community
Published at
IDAHO FALLS – The Snake River Convention Center at the Shilo Inn in Idaho Falls was the site of great battles, epic quests, murders and all kinds of crimes this past Friday and Saturday.
The convention center hosted the Idaho Convention for Boardgamers (ICON), an event focused on the growing board game community. Attendees of the convention could find out about new games coming out, play test games they wanted to try and form new friendships with like-minded individuals.
Vendors had games on hand, and the ICON library had games available for check out. People could even bring their favorite games from home.
ICON also provided vendors and game developers a venue to get their games in front of east Idaho gaming fans, selling their wares and creating brand loyalty. The con attracted both new and long-time fans, all hoping to find their next favorite board game.
“It’s been a really fun time,” said Tallis Barker, who drove in from Sugar City to attend ICON. “I’ve gotten to play a lot of games that I’ve heard about but haven’t had a chance to play before, meet some new people and play games I’ve never heard of before.”
One game Barker was excited to try out at ICON was the classic Canadian game, Crokinole.
“I haven’t had the chance to play Crokinole before because it’s a very expensive game to start,” he said. “It requires a very large, nice wooden board. But it’s been a really fun game.”
ICON is also a good place for vendors hoping to add to the ranks of their gaming communities. Scott Harper, owner of the Miniature Manager YouTube channel was demoing the war game Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings. It received an excellent reception.
“We have had a lot more engagement than I expected,” said Harper. “We’ve run lots of demos and we’ve had pretty much non-stop people wanting to play our game, wanting to try it out. A lot of people seem to have enjoyed it. I’m hoping we walk out of here with a few good new community members as part of our playgroup.”
For game designers, conventions like ICON offer first-hand insight into their games from potential customers.
“Environments like this are really, really great because you’re in your direct audience and you have time to sit down, get really good feedback from people, playtest your game and look for new feedback to make sure you’re developing something that the audience wants,” said Bryan Buttars of Utah-based Tuckered Rhino Games.
“On the flip side, if you have product that’s already available and you’re trying to sell it, this convention is fantastic for that kind of thing because it’s a boardgame audience,” Buttars added. People are looking for that.”
The ultimate goal of ICON for everyone involved was to have fun, create connections and grow the local boardgaming community. From that perspective, ICON was a complete success.
“(ICON) is a lot of people who are like-minded with you,” Barker said. “They’re interested in some of the same things, so you can talk about things that you have in common. People are social creatures. We like to do that. The last 20 years or so, board games have had such a renaissance that it’s cool to have a place where you can go and discuss and interact with others on a level that you just can’t normally do.”
