[BlizzCon 2023] Feedback Megathread

General Discussion
122

They did, mostly. Look in the Facebook groups about previous years, though. There were major complaints then, too.

Then COVID happened.

We are nearly certain that this happened. Honestly, Blizzard probably had no choice but to let them go. You can’t pay staff for 3 years and not have anything for them to work on. Blizzard knew, as any idiot would, that when they did it, they were letting go of 14 years of accumulated institutional knowledge of how to put on Blizzcon.

I know that they contracted an outside party to help with the logistics. I got help from one of them, and they were very helpful. You need people who know how to coordinate with the convention center, with partners, with security, with the police, all of that stuff, and Blizzard hired it. It was a reasonable decision.

My conclusion is that this other company didn’t know how to put on a Blizzcon. They didn’t know how high the demand would be for DMF. They did not know what Portal Pass expects. They did not know how geeks would react. That’s my best guess.

I will tell you from talking to Blizzard employees, including their manager of online CS who is hopefully reading this, that they’re gathering all the feedback, from everywhere they can, and working to improve. We saw improvements to ADA and entry lines and Portal Pass treatment on Saturday as a result of feedback. So they are listening and improving.

They plan to do it again; that’s why they asked for feedback and are acting on it. And it will be better, I am sure. We will not have the same problems next year. We’ll have different problems, because there are problems every year. (Look at the Facebook groups to see that!)

Hope to see you next year!

123

That line to get in for the opening ceremony was borderline abusive. There was no direction and clear understanding of where to go. There were people cutting lines, walking around aimlessly and just an overall sense of disorganized chaos.

There were fewer people working the event, those that did work it looked disinterested and did not want to be there. They were all looking at their phones. For the amount of money that you charge, this needs to be run much better.

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124

To start like many others I am a Blizzcon vet and have been apart of the World of Warcraft community for 19 years. Attending the first Blizzcon and following Blizzcons will always be dear to my heart and the memories gained can never be forgotten. That being said, I have some thoughts on this years Blizzcon that could have been done differently and improved upon.

Now in years past there has always been a First come first serve when it comes to Seating for the opening Ceremonies. Having a Lotto system regardless of family members or guildmates/friends or significant others, having a lotto quite literally prevented this from happening and like many others probably choose to try to watch the ceremonies else where.

Lack of sitting areas when the convention opened up was a huge red flag. I had many questions which couldnt be answered by staff being a Portal Pass holder. In 2019 we had multiple ways of entering the convention on top of which early access to the darkmoon faire on Thursday night.

Solutions to the over crowded 4hr long que for Darkmoon faire could have been prevented by keeping the layout how it used to be in the registration area which was decided to be at this year. By not having early access to the Darkmoon faire and having it in the main hall created a two fold problem. Not only were the lines disgustingly overcrowded for the Darkmoon faire but you could have potentially cut the lines by a 3rd by simply having the Portal pass out of the equation from earlier access purchase.

Lack of communication and potentially last minute ditch efforts to give portal pass people access seemed like a last ditch effort of a poorly planned con because giving us “free stuff toward the tail end of the 2nd day and early access to the con before doors opened” should have been communicated prior to the Con. Ontop of which seperate lines and seating. From what it sounds like portal pass people were also given access to seating in the Arena on the second day but that was never communicated to folks and number of available seats for other activities were left empty thus not even giving a chance to normal badge holders.

in 2019 at Blizzcon the portal pass lounge though it had grown to a significant in comparison had free snack and drinks this can easily be overlooked and I understand that it would be okay if they did continue down the path of charging folks for this. It just seems awful and lack of sitting through out the main hall felt really bad for people that enjoy other types of content like competition. Overwatch may have had its arena but the lack of sitting I would see hundreds and hundreds of folks in the WoW area having to stand watch the screen to enjoy any of the content during the Guild Clash. If I wanted to watch such content on a screen I could have done that at home I would have much prefered being in stage stand and being able to watch the best of the best in person rather than staring a over crowded small 40 seater lounge in the main hall.

Pictures of having people with ADA section having folks stand in front of them blocking their view is infuriating because the lack of attention of care is just poor management. Im sure everyone elses experiences are different and may say quit complaining but im coming from a perspective of past experiences. I want Blizzcon to succeed and I want others to experience what I had in the past. I realize Covid changed alot things happen for a reason but the changes made in my opinion hurt the convention and experience most got out of this convention.

I go to the convention not to just enjoy the con but to experience these with the friends ive made along the way. Most if not all share the same sentiment as I in wanting Blizzard to acknowledge how poorly the Blizzcon was run.

Im simply adding my thoughts and experiences of this years Blizzcon and pray dearly that the community who attended also make their voices heard regardless of their negative or positive thoughts of Blizzcon 2023. I think with better planning and COMMUNICATION we can get back to the way things were and maybe up improve upon Blizzcon.

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125

Half of my time was cosplaying so please consider my opinion as lightly or solidly as you wish. I feel like had i just gone for the announcements and panels I would have been happy I went but if I went for the Warcraft experience in Hall D I would have been really let down.

  • In concept, I love the idea of an experiential experience. I actually liked that the Hall wasn’t just seats for panels but things to do and look at. It wasn’t that bad to be standing or sitting in the floor for the OC. If it meant memorable, interactive things to be done after. However, Im not satisfied at all with how little there was to do. Each thing to do, besides the demos, were 5 minute attractions. The Sword, the statues, the projectors, all cool but all could be seen and done with in 5 minutes each. You could maybe spend 30 minutes in the Hall and do everything there was to do (beside a demo that’ll be live in a few days at the time) and not feel like I’d be missing something if I left the Hall and didn’t come back.
  • I think part of the issue is not enough space. OW took up 2 Halls and Diablo another, which leaves one Hall to cram in Darkmoon Faire, Hearthstone, Rumble, and Warcraft. Even Rumble felt more memorable and interactive because it had a lounge area and a photo op.
  • Demos should just be done away with except for the for the next expansion. It was a huuuge waste of space and potential to use for a patch that everyone will be playing in 3 days anyways.
  • Lottos. Boy I know you have heard enough on this, and I’m not demanding anyone get fired, but man whoever thought of it and okay’d it really didnt think about how awful it could be. Not only was each ticket entered separately so even if you bought as a group you could still be split, but even guilds came together and bought their own singular tickets would have to choose to stick together or not go to the Arena. I wasn’t in the Arena, but I’ve heard it was at least half empy just minutes before the OC because everyone was chosen separately and decided to just watch it somewhere else. This issue was brought up repeadetly, time and time again since its announcement and was just seemingly wholely ignored because it wasn’t even addressed in a ‘we hear you, but we think itd be fun and exciting’. No communication on any level makes it appear feedback isn’t even being listen to, and perception is everything.
  • The staff really weren’t on the same page at all. One blue shirt would tell someone something and another blue shirt would tell them someone else something different 30 feet away. None of them knew where anything was and looked confused and lost when you asked directions. I feel awful for any 1st timers who decide not to come again because when you’re lost, as you will be, on your first time and you really want to go experience something and your one point of guidance shrugs their shoulders. Now you gotta waste time wondering around instead of enjoying yourself
  • The Cospitality Lounge was a great idea, but the two times I went in there it was mainly unused. So much empty space. I very deeply appreciate the volunteers, but when it was described as a place to repair your cosplay and saw there was 1 heat gun and 1 hot glue gun, it just seemed like such an enourous waste of space. While i don’t have any idea of fire marshall required space, if Hearthstone and Rumble were in Hall E they would have had more than enough space to make room for more Warcraft attractions and expand the lines for Darkmoon, or put Darkmoon where HS was and put more Warcraft stuff in.
  • The Arena was a great place for all panels as it can all be done in one place and it saves the Halls from being cramped with seats instead of things to do all day.

I tried to be objective as I could, but if I was going just for the experience and not the community/cosplay I’d peobably stop coming completely.

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126

The lines for the additional experiences in the Warcraft (Darkmoon faire) and Diablo (tarot card reading) were 3-4 hours long. There wasn’t anything to do in between panels because of this and my group did not have a great experience overall with Blizzcon 2023. Also, not to mention the amount of times we stood in line to find out that it was the wrong line because staff had no clue what they were doing… Or to be told a line is capped and turned away, then find another employee adding more people to the line a few moments later.

127

Here is some feedback regarding Blizzcon’s programming and organization:

(1) Organization

  • Four? different contractor groups staffed the event, and they often had misinformation or no information
  • Line management was extremely poor/absent
  • Wristband technology was provided, but not used for anything meaningful

(2) Security

  • Bag checks were inadequate; felt very unsafe to get waved through wearing the swag backpack stuffed with merch.

(3) Programming

(A) No digital scheduling/queuing

Most conventions nowadays provide attendees the ability to schedule their program digitally by claiming free ‘tickets’ to the events they want to do. Then, they only need to scan their badge to get in at the appropriate time.

This way, event organizers can manage attendance to events more directly, for example by only allowing attendees to schedule either the opening or closing ceremony on their badge. This ensures attendees have a fair chance to attend events they want.

Usually, there is a paired waitlist line with each event, which backfills the event.

This should have been easy to do with the wristbands. Why have this technology if you don’t even use it?

This also ensures there aren’t ~50% of attendees just waiting in line somewhere at any given time. It’s more opportunity to schedule lunch, meet friends, or check out community events.

(B) Too much focus on visual appeal over content

There was no community exhibitor hall. The con was so cramped around the art installations. The two neighboring hotels have large business conference spaces that could be used for community exhibitors, or side-stage events like panels, discussions, community reading groups, and other content.

We have the wristbands, which make it easy to establish multiple security perimeters. Why not use them?

(4) Content

This has been discussed elsewhere, but, this felt more like an Apple/Amazon/Microsoft conference with industry partners rather than a true community conference the likes of PAX/otakon.

There were no community Overwatch tournaments, like little single elimination 4 team tourneys with a $10 buy-in per player. There weren’t even really cosplay categories or brackets for the competition, like most eco-friendly, best in show, or brackets by cost.

No voice actors, engineers, designers. So few writers, who only did signing? Why aren’t they talking about their books and the worlds they’ve built with Blizzard? Aren’t you proud of them??

Put the community back in the conference, please.

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128

I’m surprised they waved me through. My backpack was empty but still, I expected them to check. They didn’t.

I did feel really safe though because I saw on multiple occasions patrols of police officers. Both plain uniforms and swat/tactical who had big guns.

But yeah security into the event was…odd. Especially for an event this size.

129

Where did all the epic Blizzcon music go? Previous blizzcons it’d play a lot - during breaks, announcements, pretty much all the time except for when someone was talking on stage. Now we just got only applauses and some generic music.

This year, only the Community Night had that. Breaks had only ads and the same trailers aggressively playing for 50th time, and the thing that played during the brief “up next” and “we’re taking a short break” screens. It’s as if Blizzard listened to the feedback after first day and decided to put the blizzcon playlist on for the community night.

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130

I try and go every year but don’t always get tickets, this was my 4th Blizzcon. There was so little to do and so many people. Thursday during registration people were worried because “they didn’t sell out” on tickets… ya I think in reality they just didn’t have a cap. I’ve never seen every bathroom have a line! Blizzard, did you think you needed less at the con sense everyone would be waiting hours to do anything anyways? The fire department got involved! They were kicking people out of the warcraft hall because almost everything to do was there! The Darkmoon Faire hall line went backwards through the first overwatch hall and half way into the 2nd overwatch hall. Why have x2 Overwatch halls?? Because of the tournament I’m guessing? You didn’t even promote it, I didn’t know when the finals even happened. What was the point on the extra 500 dollar portal pass? Those people were waiting in line with me all day, I’m glad I didn’t pay for whatever that was. Once I got into the Arena I basically had to camp there because of how hard it was to get back into it. I love the Blizzard community because overall the vibe was great but individually if you actually wanted to do things you had to implement some dog eat dog behavior and a lot of people who didn’t will be complaining on these forums. Accessibility-wise I was very impressed. A lot of extra effort was put into the con for people with disabilities and I noticed this year, you deserve credit for that imo.

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131

There was a LOT to be desired with accessibility. A LOT of changes happened fast because quite frankly it needed to in order for any of that convention to be ADA compliant. And even then, it is a stretch that it was.

I’m not sure what your experience was for accessibility, but for my family it was dismal. Fortunately the staff of Blizzard was extremely receptive to feedback and a lot of those changes happened at the excruciating expense of others who had less-than-acceptable accessibility experiences.

Thank you to Blizzard for helping alleviate the ADA issues, but it was not above-and-beyond the minimum expectations for ADA.

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132

Please see this reddit post a user posted. I was in it too and it was absolutely a scary situation at the Diablo hall during raffle, and I was anxiously looking for an exit. No security guards in sight for crowd control. It absolutely reminded me of the Itaewon Korean Halloween event I saw on the news. This was indoors too. Please SAFETY first, blizzard!

Reddit Post

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133

Hey all this is the 3rd blizzcon I’ve gone to, here is my comprehensive thoughts on the matter, especially when compared to 2019 and 2018 blizzcon;

Worse;
Opening ceremony (only 1 cinematic and bad seating)
Line to get in was horribly managed.
No alcohol.
Blink shop has gone down in quality.
Darkmoon Faire shoved into a corner.
Goodie bag-I feel like in years past I got actual memorabilia, this time I get a cheap backpack that is just going to collect dust
Lines were AWFUL-this is probably my biggest complaint. This was mainly a mismanagement part on blizzard. Reasons including bottlenecking, not limiting gacha purchases, allowing portal pass line skippers, having nothing to do but line up activities, and limiting floor space thereby giving attendees no other choice but to line up.
Overwatch had way too much space. 50% of the convention space went to a game with only two new updates; a new hero, and a re-released map. Meanwhile a franchise like warcraft had only 25% despite having demos for a new game, new patch, new classic expac, new hs expac, new hs game mode.
Not nearly enough seating-in the past there must have been 2 seats/person.
No sc2/hots/wc3. Atleast give me an area to vibe out.
2019 ceremony was much better, you were pretty much guaranteed to enjoy a live performance of some sort of artist. Also, it was longer than 30 minutes.

Better;
More unique content (mountain dew quest, tattoos, limited edition artwork, artists “alley”)
Better set designs everywhere.
Crew seem more abundant and trying to help more.
Security seems more “uptight” which makes me feel safer.

The only other thing i wanted to bring up was that portal pass owners crying despite getting things that weren’t even advertised is a bit silly. Portal pass has never been worth it, if you didnt realize that before clicking “purchase”, you are silly. Your crying caused blizzard to afford you benefits that weren’t advertised, and i think that is a very bad precedent to set. At that point what the hell am I even doing when I decide to buy product X instead of product Y? It made me feel like portal pass was an IRL lootbox, where I get to discover what goodies I get as the con goes on. Will I get legendary skip a line, or will I get stay in line with GA? Stupid

Thats all the judgement i have. I will give 2024 another shot. If things do not noticeably improve, i dont plan to come back.

134

  1. Lines:
    -need a clear indication of where they are, I would suggest a bigger sign on a pole and lift it above people’s heads so everyone can see where it is at without the Blizzcon Staff having to repeat themselves over and over with the same questions.
    -Also add “Open” or “Closed” to the line so people can glance at it and move on instead of huffing hopium that the DMF line will open again.

  2. Darkmoon Fair:
    -You need to break this up into specific times people can line up and do their thing like airlines do with boarding. Makes expected amount of people for the line manageable at specific times.
    -Maybe have people be able to pre-purchase DMF tokens online, have an order# or something and just come by to pick it up (you can put a limit per ticket or something to have enough stuff for everyone). Also, give the major attractions of darkmoon fair opposite ends of the area, so theres more space and organization for clear lines, instead of mashing everything up.

  3. Portal Pass:
    -Have it auto bump people to the front of whatever they wanna do, its like 1st class on an airplane…spoil these people.

  • Make the Portal Pass itself a collectable, like the ticket can be metal/foil or something cool.
  • Maybe a limited meet and greet with the key figures of Blizzcon, can be before or after Blizzcon if you need more time.
  1. Duration…instead of 2 days, make it 3.
    -I know that is asking a lot from everyone at Blizzard but would allow people a chance to see EVERYTHING you guys worked so hard to put together and present to us…the fans <3.
  • More time = more stuff. You could have tourneys and panels spread out over 3 days for B reel on the display projections while people are waiting in line for demos and stuff.
  • Possibly make each day last longer like till 9pm or 10pm. You could close down the major things at a certain time like the panels and tournaments earlier and leave cool things up like Darkmoon Fair and demos open that would need extra time to get in and do their thing.
  1. Starcraft? HotS? Blizzard Arcade? Blizzcon App?
  • where are these cool things? are you able to use more space within the convention center like past Blizzcons to accommodate these IPs?
  • Blizzcon app from the past was much easier to deal with than using a paper map or trying to navigate through the website to schedule or map. If you have to, just build your own again because I loved how easy it made for laying out a gameplan and hitting all the things you want to do at the convention.
    -For the blizzcon app, I would also add timers/prompts for when the next thing is coming up that you plan, so you can make the most use of your time.

Thanks for reading.

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135

Look I have been playing Blizzard games since Orcs vs Humans and have been to quite a number of blizzcons (including 2019 with a portal pass). When I heard they were doing it again I was 100% stoked especially for the portal pass. I came to Blizzcon with expectations of what I had previously experienced.

Here is what I got with my 750$ portal pass.

A lounge with some food that you pay additionally for. A dry bar that sold mock tails and no actual adult beverages. Early access to a store that you had to make online purchases to and set pick up times for meaning I sat around for 2 hours as a reward for getting here early. We barely managed to actually make it to the quick entry on day 1 where half my party was stuck in the line for general admission (they had portal passes). Zero chance to see the main stage during the opening ceremony as they used a lottery to randomly give people access. No early access to the dark moon faire which turned into a sad cluster where my father was moved around 3 lines before being banished a hall away to the “back of the line”. Even all of this I was willing to give them one more shot as I heard that portal pass had alternate entry to the arena for the second day of panels. We waited a hour and a half in the sun after being told it would only be 15-20 minutes and then as we stepped in we were herded to the upper level of seats as far away from the main stage in the arena as possible. When I inquired if there was anyway to get back in later if we left the arena to go get food and drinks (as none of the concessions were open in the arena) a very tired but nice blizzard employee informed me that sadly they had hoped to keep a lane open for the portal pass through out the day but they simply were not given enough staff.

I love blizzard and blizzard games but I spent extra money to come to this event because in the past it has been such a wonderful and joyous vacation. I feel as if I was scammed. I’m sorry but I don’t think I will be returning to this event in the future.

6 Likes
136

Lots of folks mirror your sentiment.

They didn’t offer portal pass early access to Opening Ceremony because why? Too many people bought it?

I went to charity auction before. We got opening ceremony access. Though there were only two hundred tickets sold.

But I think they need to do something. I’d buy the portal pass again if I get added benefits.

I’ll be honest. I don’t want to be at the lounge. If I’m at the lounge I’m not enjoying the convention. Portal Pass needs to be way more inclusive with activities.

The dev signing was nice. I had a chance o talk with some great devs and it felt very personal. I really, really enjoyed that aspect.

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137

Yeah as of this posting the blizzard staff did end up bringing some free swag up for folks to the lounge and they did open up the dark moon faire so that portal pass people could get into it so at least they are trying to do something to make it a better experience. I do appreciate that.

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138

DMF is open to portal pass now?

*edit DMF coins are all sold out. :sob:

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139

Thats cool, but they had lost me by then

140

The portal pass was 100% a scam. Waste of money. Even if they started to add value it was too little, too late. Since it was not communicated out in any consistent way it actually makes it worse. Some folks were scammed a little less I guess since they got some extra value. You can’t start fixing this mid way through the second day and not tell everyone who paid the extra money.

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141

As an attendee I wasnt able to get into the arena to view WoW content.

As “fun” as it is to see the speaker from many angles the quality to view the game content slides is poor.

I imagine the content is really cool, but I’m guessing I’ll be waiting to see after the convention on wowhead to see the slides.

Feedback next blizzcon try to have a hall setup like the 2019 halls with the many tv screens and more focus on the slides. Vs the speakers themself.

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