Later that evening, James "2GD" Harding and Joe Miller stopped by to meet and greet. Adam "SyncError" Pyle, from id Software, joined us shortly after. I had the pleasure of working with Sync on QLTV's Young Gamers Cup coverage from the previous year. He approached us with a look of extreme disappointment on his face. We then got hit with a bombshell that made his expression clear: "There will be no matches on the main stage of the ballroom during the big finals party this year," he said. I looked at 2GD with astonishment. "You're joking, right?", replied James. A discussion ensued where 2GD and I made it clear how absurd this news was to us. Apparently, it was just as insane and newsworthy to SyncError.

Rumor has it that the finals were supposed to take place in the much larger ballroom next door to the location where they were held this year... the same room that was used in 2008, for those that attended that year. My guess is that QuakeCon got bumped at the last minute for the other larger convention that was going in the hotel at the same time... an unfortunately common practice.

The room that the hotel had allotted for the finals party was not very large. Even worse, the stage in the room was tiny. There was no good way to fit enough computers, a shoutcasting setup let alone the players and the broadcasters on it. Fortunately, there was at least the tournament viewing area in front of the Tournament Stage. This was available to attendees all event long, but it only sat around 200 people, and the finals party usually drew at least 15 times as many spectators. We immediately began brainstorming. We had to find a solution. There was no way we were about to step backwards to the days when the QuakeCon attendees missed out on the finals. As last year's finals reminded us, when you put 3,000 Quake-o-philes into a room and show them amazing matches, you bring down the house. Something had to be done.

At this point, re-planning QuakeCon 2010 coverage in 11 days seemed easy. Now we had 3 days that were supposed to be devoted to pure content creation sidetracked by the need to find a solution to allow QuakeCon attendees to see the tournament finals. Keep in mind that we're all at the event. All of our stuff is at the event. There is no easy way to add more equipment to the lot. Hell, most of my staff are poor college students who save up their money for half a year just to make it to the event in the first place. In the middle of our brainstorming, we got word from one of the A/V crews that they could pump a live feed from our setup at the tournament stage--which was located at the far end of the vendor area--across the hotel to the grand ballroom that housed the Finals party. "Whew," I thought. Sure, the broadcast won't be on the main stage, but at least QuakeCon would get its Grand Finals.

I had no idea then how misplaced my relief would be.

Part 3 - Fire In the Hole!