Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
Sea Monkeys sit at a table and try to take each other's money. But, like, in a civilized manner, with cards and clay chips and green felt and stuff.
Game lasts approximately an hour. Sign up at the Casino cashier window to reserve your seat.
4-player minimum, 10-player maximum. (If any empty seats at start of game, casino will open them up to non-Sea Monkey passengers.) Entry Fee $50 with a $30 re-buy option during the first 30 minutes, plus additional add-on for all players at the end of the first 30 minutes. Prize money: 70% for 1st, 20% for 2nd and 10% for 3rd, after House cut (20%). Players will receive 1,000 in tournament chips; blinds will start at 25/50 and increase every 10 minutes.
Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
Sea Monkeys sit at a table and try to take each other's money. But, like, in a civilized manner, with cards and clay chips and green felt and stuff.
Game lasts approximately an hour. Sign up at the Casino cashier window to reserve your seat.
4-player minimum, 10-player maximum. (If any empty seats at start of game, casino will open them up to non-Sea Monkey passengers.) Entry Fee $50 with a $30 re-buy option during the first 30 minutes, plus additional add-on for all players at the end of the first 30 minutes. Prize money: 70% for 1st, 20% for 2nd and 10% for 3rd, after House cut (20%). Players will receive 1,000 in tournament chips; blinds will start at 25/50 and increase every 10 minutes.
Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
The cruise is a spectacular time to try new things… so why not try a new game? The Tabletop Taste Test lets you take a twenty-minute taste of a game, then move on and try another. By the end of an hour, you’ll know how to play up to three new games—games you can find in the game room and play again at your leisure. It’s a great opportunity to try something new and get to meet some fellow Monkeys in the process. In addition, a few lucky players will win FABULOUS PRIZES from our sponsors, including the chance to play Munchkin with Steve Jackson! (Winners will be announced at the Tuesday afternoon concert.)
The Taste Test is broken into three one-hour sessions: 11 AM - Noon, Noon - 1:00 PM, and 1:00 - 2:00 PM. Stop by the Information Desk to sign up for a slot!
Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
Sea Monkeys sit at a table and try to take each other's money. But, like, in a civilized manner, with cards and clay chips and green felt and stuff.
Game lasts approximately an hour. Sign up at the Casino cashier window to reserve your seat.
4-player minimum, 10-player maximum. (If any empty seats at start of game, casino will open them up to non-Sea Monkey passengers.) Entry Fee $50 with a $30 re-buy option during the first 30 minutes, plus additional add-on for all players at the end of the first 30 minutes. Prize money: 70% for 1st, 20% for 2nd and 10% for 3rd, after House cut (20%). Players will receive 1,000 in tournament chips; blinds will start at 25/50 and increase every 10 minutes.
This is your chance to ask the Looneys anything. You can look through Andy’s notebook of unpublished Fluxx designs, ask Kristin about the business of selling games, learn more about the Pyramid Arcade Kickstarter and other upcoming Looney Labs projects, or even hear stories about their younger days at NASA.
Writing is not just a craft or an art: Those who make a living at it are running a small (and sometimes not-so-small) business as well. We dig into the practical side of the writing gig—what it takes, behind the scenes, to pay the bills and still make the work you love to read.
Songwriting is tricky enough as it is. Now you want us to be funny, too? And yet some people manage it—this very cruise is testament to the fact it can happen. We ask out songwriters to crack open the mysteries of comedy songwriting, and what it takes to make people laugh and sing along.
Aimee Mann likes nerds just fine. (She’s on her second straight JoCo Cruise, after all.) But she is not a nerd. She’s never read Harry Potter, she doesn’t own any 20-sided dice, and she is entirely unfamiliar with the work of Joss Whedon. But she wants to understand you all better. She genuinely wants to learn—what you do, what you like, how you think. And she wants your help.
Join moderator Ted Leo as he, with your help, develops a “Nerd Syllabus” to help guide Aimee on the Path to understanding the various enthusiasms that help define “nerddom." Or, at least, help her to know the difference between an orc and a kobold.
Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
Paul and Storm wrote a song called "Sausage Party"! Mike Selinker wrote a game about it! For the first time in public, we're gonna play it! (Spoiler Alert: it's completely madcap. Maybe even MADALLCAPS.) You should be there when it happens, because, mmm, sausages.
It's not a surprise that creative people marry other creative people. But once coupled up, how do these spouses face the challenges of two full-time creative careers running at the same time? We dig into the day-to-day of being spouses and being creative, and what it take to make both work
Would you like to try a game you won’t find anywhere else? Do you have a game you’ve been working on that you’d like to test? The Playtest Parlor is an informal event where any and all game designers—sponsors and passengers alike—can present games that are under development! Come play a game or just wander from table to table and see what people are working on!
Molly Lewis eats all the snacks & answers your questions about ukulele, songwriting, Stephen Fry, and Disneyland.
Begun on the ms Westerdam during JoCo Cruise 2012, the annual LGBTQSA happy hour celebrates its 5th year of having extra letters at the end of its acronym and being a low key get together for Sea Monkeys of all persuasions.
Sea Monkeys sit at a table and try to take each other's money. But, like, in a civilized manner, with cards and clay chips and green felt and stuff.
Game lasts approximately an hour. Sign up at the Casino cashier window to reserve your seat.
4-player minimum, 10-player maximum. (If any empty seats at start of game, casino will open them up to non-Sea Monkey passengers.) Entry Fee $50 with a $30 re-buy option during the first 30 minutes, plus additional add-on for all players at the end of the first 30 minutes. Prize money: 70% for 1st, 20% for 2nd and 10% for 3rd, after House cut (20%). Players will receive 1,000 in tournament chips; blinds will start at 25/50 and increase every 10 minutes.
Come to Cloud Nine and hang out with Mike, who very probably designed a bunch of games in your house. Maybe you've played the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game or Betrayal at House on the Hill or any of his other creations. He'll talk about boardgames, RPGs, puzzles, Japanese Kit-Kats, or whatever you like. He will probably drink whatever you hand him.
Molly Lewis eats all the snacks & answers your questions about ukulele, songwriting, Stephen Fry, and Disneyland.
Hang out with Christopher and talk about games, superheroes, and running a big damn Kickstarter.
Do you like live talk shows? Chats with your favorite celebrities? Commercials for products you wish existed? The NEWS? Well, fantastic. Everything on that list is here, and more. With guests Rhea Butcher and Cameron Esposito. Come to this, or you'll get scurvy.
Participants in this year's Ukulele Melee are invited to help Molly make another Video For The Internet. (Legal disclaimer: Molly might video-record you playing ukulele and put you in a Video For The Internet.)
All instruments welcome! but ukuleles preferred.
Come to Suite 1648 where you can:
John Scalzi is gonna read some new stuff! Some of it might even be funny!
Join Steve Jackson and Andrew Hackard to help create a new CHEZ GEEK supplement. This time, it's Chez Cruise—the geeks are on vacation, but they still need Slack!
Bestselling author Pat Rothfuss stands in front of a microphone and reads some new stuff he wrote. Perhaps some old stuff as well. He might answer questions too. Or maybe not. We'll see how he feels on that day.
How do you create a hero? How does the tale of a life—and death—create hooks for a story still to be told? In this hour you’ll be guided through the character creation system of Phoenix: Dawn Command to develop the life and death story of your hero. Whether you’re playing the game or writing a novel, join us and see how your story begins! All materials will be provided.
Sea Monkeys sit at a table and try to take each other's money. But, like, in a civilized manner, with cards and clay chips and green felt and stuff.
Game lasts approximately an hour. Sign up at the Casino cashier window to reserve your seat.
4-player minimum, 10-player maximum. (If any empty seats at start of game, casino will open them up to non-Sea Monkey passengers.) Entry Fee $50 with a $30 re-buy option during the first 30 minutes, plus additional add-on for all players at the end of the first 30 minutes. Prize money: 70% for 1st, 20% for 2nd and 10% for 3rd, after House cut (20%). Players will receive 1,000 in tournament chips; blinds will start at 25/50 and increase every 10 minutes.
Keith Baker is the designer of Gloom, Eberron, Phoenix: Dawn Command, and the worst Dolphins In Space videogame to never be made. Stop by and talk about games, game design, dolphins, and more!
She's outspoken, opinionated and hands down one of the best fantasy writers writing today, and we have her on the cruise! John Scalzi sits with Jemisin to talk about writing, life, and what it's like to be in the genre of science fiction and fantasy today.
A chance to talk with Gavin Verhey of Wizards of the Coast about Magic: The Gathering, Game Design, and surviving Cruise catastrophes!
These days, sharing details about your life on the internet is pretty normal, but some of share way more than your average person. Way, way more than your average person. What effect does this have on our lives, what lessons have we learned, and what are the lines that we ourselves won't cross? Come join us as we tell war stories and discuss the pros and cons of doing what we do.
Patrick Rothfuss and James Ernest talk about Tak. This new board game was first described in The Wise Man's Fear, and now Pat and James have made it a real thing. Tak is an abstract strategy game for two players, falling somewhere between classic games like chess, go, and mancala. Learn about the design processes behind creating a new classic game, and play Tak with the inventors!
If you're like Matt Gourley (Superego, Drunk History, Comedy Bang! Bang!), then you know all the classic movie and television scenes so well it's like you were in the room when they happened. Well, you weren't. And neither was he. But the people Matt interviews were! Listen in as they tell the inside stories of how cinema and television history was made from a fly-on-the-wall perspective you've never heard. Matt’s guest for I Was There Too: JoCo Cruise is Aimee Mann. The topic: her time on The Big Lebowski and at least one or two questions about what it’s like being in a Rush video. Also with special appearance by Paul F. Tompkins!
Come watch as four lucky Sea Monkeys match wits with the Master of Munchkin, Steve Jackson! (Participate in Tuesday's Table Top Taste Test for a chance to be one of the players!)
We don't know...what do you think?
We've all seen Women In Gaming panels at conventions. They're almost mandatory for female designers and company executives these days. But are we helping or hurting ourselves with these gender-specific panels? Does our anatomy make a difference in our gaming experience? Come join in on a round-table discussion led by Lone Shark’s CEO, Marie Poole, featuring game industry guests Kristin Looney of Looney Labs, Elisa Teague of Lone Shark Games, and Christopher Badell of Greater Than Games.
