The Best Booth at PAX / Booth Tips

Attending PAX this year I kept my eye out on booth structure (the way props and demos were set up), population (the average number of people at the booth at any given time), and content (what the developer was showing off).

Why did I spend a good portion of my thought on this kind of thing? I probably carry a heavily burdening psychological disorder that will haunt me for years to come.

That aside, another good reason to have done that is for future experience when it comes time I need to set up a booth. I also looked around at various "10 ways to improve your booth" web pages, but I won't be directly stealing from any of them. (Turns out a lot of the tips were stuff I realized anyway!) I'm going to share what I learned with you, dearest reader. (Note the singular use of the word; I pretty much only have one reader.) I'll start by pointing out a few booths that stood out, why, and what they did right and what they could have done better, in my opinion.

[Note: I am yanking some PAX booth pictures from other locations on the web and giving credit, I hope the people don't mind!]

Bungie's Booth

You knew I was going to bring this one up first, being the ridiculous Bungie fan that I am. Bungie's booth had some nice blue lighting, a cool fuzzy rug, and what really stood out to me was the ease-of-access, along with the actual 'architecture' of it. The Bungie booth was first notable from a distance with a rotating cylinder spinning on the ceiling, printed with the words "Bungie". From that there was a curved overhang, supporting a piece of white fabric. Behind that going downwards was another, and then finally, a circular blue rug on the floor. This is the part where you go "Oh, I see what they did there." They essentially incorporated their logo into the entire architectural design of the booth.



(Images courtesty of Xbox Fanboy and Hawty McBloggy)

On top of that brilliant move and the great lighting, the actual layout of the booth was fantastic as well. It was easy to jump in and play, as there was a good amount of room to move about, as shown.


(Images courtesty of Hawty McBloggy)

On top of all this great looking booth, the staff was around and very available to talk to. If you had a question, they were there to answer it. If you just wanted to chat, they even were there to do that.

So what did they do wrong? Honest to say, I wish I had their booth. They had not only some of the most traffic, dwarfing all surrounding booths, but their booth also head a great setup and atmosphere to it. That aside, I still have one gripe. It wasn't very organized until the second and third day. The first day it was confusing where to stand in order to play. There wasn't a very organized line, and you kind of had to budge your way through a crowd in order to jump on and play. While they did really allow people to walk about inside their booth, which created a great lounge/community feeling to it all, it was pretty unorganized. Luckily, people are fairly polite about letting others get a turn...

Atmosphere: 10/10 [Very pleasant blue lighting, always something to watch, great developer-run community events]
Places to Sit: 9/10 [Comfy chairs when playing, coupled with Rooster Teeth's couch area (Bungie teamed up with Rooster Teeth, back to back booths)]
Dev Interaction: 10/10 [Always present, always eager to talk to people]
Lighting: 9/10 [Definitely well lit, but almost a bit too dark]
Eye-Catching: 9/10 [Huge spinning Bungie Logo, cool blue lights, lots of TVs]
Stuff To Do: 10/10 [Playable demo, Recon Challenge against the developers, Bungie quiz to win prizes]

Bungie Booth: 9/10
Best Booth of the Show, not just because of content, but because it was aesthetically pleasing and had a great staff, setup, and atmosphere to it. Off to the side they also featured some comfy couches that people lounged about at, one thing many booths were missing; places to sit! My feet sure weren't happy after all that walking, waiting, and standing.

The Behemoth's Booth

The Behemoth is another booth I checked out. I wanted to talk with the developers, but they were all hidden behind large walls that featured shirts they had for sale. There was a definite physical barrier blocking me from a lot of interaction with them. If the developers were more up front about talking to fans, they would've won some more points with me. That said, their booth was incredibly colorful and they had a large projector showing what was being played on the smaller screens so that spectators didn't have to crane around people to see the action. On top of that, they had some cool figures of their characters.

(Picture from The Behemoth website; as you can see, the developers stayed in the box area to the left, while everyone else played way off to the right. Were they trying to avoid their fans while playing?)


(Pictures courtesy of Xbox Fanboy; note the bright colors)

(Picture courtesy of Xbox Fanboy; see the lack of chairs? High stools would have been great for the people playing)

Atmosphere: 7/10 [Fun and colorful, but there seemed to never been a big crowd around it until the very end when they were giving away unsold merchandise]
Places to Sit: 0/10 [The people watching AND playing the game were forced to stand, nowhere to sit]
Dev Interaction: 5/10 [While the main person manning the booth and selling shirts to people seemed open to talk, the rest were in the back, seemingly ignoring the traffic at the booth. They did, however, pass my Xbox 360 faceplate around to sign.]
Lighting: 9/10 [The booth was plenty bright, and a large projector pointed above the booth at a white surface always gave the booth some life]
Eye-Catching: 7/10 [The bright colors definitely caught my eye, but not as much as they could have]
Stuff To Do: 6/10 [Playable demo, buying shirts, but other than that, there wasn't a lot of people available to talk to, fan and developer alike]

The Behemoth Booth: 7/10
One of the better booths, great colors and stood out really well. Spectators and players could see what was going on, but there was a lack of places to sit, the people watching were forced out into the main pathways between booths, not on the booth floor itself, and the developers weren't necessarily up front about mingling with fans.

One of EA's Booths

EA had about three booths at the expo. Silly them. One of their booths was a huge wall with the EA logo on it, one I avoided since it seemed like it was too hard to access... I was literally intimidated by that wall and did not dare try to venture around it. Looks like they lost one attendee with that move!

But I don't want to talk about that booth. I want to talk about their booth that featured Dead Space. Aside from this one sitting right next to Bungie, and therefore dwarfed by it, this one carried quite a few flaws. The first one was the fact that I didn't realize there was a playable demo until the second day. Their booth consisted of a Dead Space painted wall, a desk in front of it, about two developers sitting at the desk, and then one guy cosplaying as the Dead Space main character. The second flaw was the one doorway every one had to cram through in order to play, or even SEE what people were playing. I want to at least watch a game before waiting an hour in line to play it.

(Image courtesy of Xbox Fanboy)

Atmosphere: 3/10 [The wall was covered in Dead Space stuff, but other than 2 trailers playing on the outside and the cosplayer, nothing was very interesting. A quick glance inside showed the interior was mostly white, not at all lit to match the style of the game]
Places to Sit: 5/10 [The people playing got chairs to sit in, but their booth pretty much pushed people into lines, or straight into the path of others passing between booths]
Dev Interaction: 8/10 [Developers were right there out front, ready to answer any questions... If only I had questions.]
Lighting: 1/10 [The outside and inside of the booth was not very brightly lit, and didn't really match any sort of theme]
Eye-Catching: 7/10 [The Dead Space sign, wallpaper, and cosplayer did catch my attention, but not much more than many of the other booths]
Stuff To Do: 3/10 [Playable demo after waiting in a massive line, or you could have talked to the developers sitting outside, but other than that, it was a pretty boring booth I skipped over fairly quickly]

This particular EA Booth: 5/10
While the cosplayer was cool, and I would have loved to play the game, this booth didn't offer a lot. I must admit though, I didn't expect a lot of developer-fan interaction from EA at this point anyway. That's not really something they're very big on.

I could go on about more and more booths, but this is getting pretty long. My tips on how to make your booth great?

Top 10 Ways to Make Your Booth Attractive

1) Shut up! [Sound]
A major turn off from a booth was how much noise it was producing. You might think loud booths attract more attention, but if you're not the type that listens to fully blasted death metal, you probably wouldn't like a lot of the booths I saw. Keep your noise to a tolerable level. If you're showing a trailer, yes, have it turned up loud enough to hear, but I don't want to hear it 10 booths away. By all means though, feel free to let me see it.

2) Be Bright! [Lighting]
Dark booths blend in with all the other dark booths. Shine some bright lights on your back-wall surfaces, shine a projector on your booth, make stuff bright! As long as you're not blinding your audience, light is not a bad thing. On top of that, try some colored light. Bungie had a very calm blue light, which made it seem all the cooler. Many of the booths with very plain, white lighting were boring. The only time a booth should have just white lights is if they're demonstrating something on stage, or they're trying to illuminate some brightly colored wallpaper. (Castle Crashers, for example, could have used some very bright white lights shining on the walls.)

3) Make a Presence! [Stand out]
Not just lighting, but also wallpaper. Put something above your booth to show there is something there. If someone looks over the crowd of booths and people, they should be able to see your company or game logo hanging from the ceiling. Let people know you exist!

4) Have something for us to do! [Demo, Merchandise, etc.]
All the booths with a simple trailer playing were more or less boring. If you're going to show up at an event like this, have some T-shirts, have some merchandise, have something to sell, have something for them to play, whatever it may be, have something to make your booth worth standing in, not just passing by with a quick glance.

5) Heal our feet! [Make your booth comfy!]
Give attendees somewhere to sit, or a soft rug to stand on. Not only does this make them feel more welcome, this also allows them to just hang out at your booth. This is also a great time to start some conversation with them. If your booth will have a line for a playable demo, give the people in line somewhere to sit, and when playing, a chair or stool to sit on. Don't force people to stand. Simple chairs are not that expensive and your booth attendees and staff will not stop thanking you.

6) Eliminate Barriers [Be there, be accessible]
Physical and psychological barriers come in all shapes and sizes, be they a giant wall, or oddly colored carpet. Try to make them feel welcome to your booth, and ensure that your staff are there to talk to the fans, not just sit by and make sure no one steals anything.

7) Re-arrange the Furniture! [Let people feel welcome!]
Another type of physical barrier is narrowing people into a single hole, or putting stuff in their way. Keep all furniture to the back and sides, or if you do have abundant room in the middle (Bungie's booth is a good example of this), ensure there is plenty of room to pass through or stand behind the people playing for spectators. Don't let your attendees trip over cords, bean bag chairs, or consoles.

8) Wear a uniform! [Dress Code]
A small badge is very hard to see, especially from any sort of distance. If you're an exhibitor, make sure people know you are, and who you represent. Make sure all the staff manning the booth are wearing identical attire, or at least one piece of identical attire. (Staff-only T-shirts with your company logo, for example)

9) Be happy! [Developer-interaction]
Put your best, happiest people in the booth. If it turns out a lowly concept artist is one of your most outgoing staff members, put him in charge of the booth! Ensure the staff at the booth at all times are the happiest, most outgoing staff, with the ability to answer questions and strike up conversations with any one.

10) Stay in touch! [Bloggers, fans, media, etc.]
Get in touch and stay in touch with bloggers, fans, and media. If you meet a really great fan at the show, remember who he is, maybe even mail him a cool prize just for simply being an outstanding fan. If you meet a blogger, stay in touch. They'll be the ones spreading the word about your new title. Do everything you can do get noticed by the gaming media (Aside from the obvious and creepy things that may or may not involve clothing)...

There are my tips. Will any one use them? I don't know. I'm sure this has been said many times before, yet I saw many terrible booths at PAX '08.

All I ask if that you let me have the best booth.