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Quakecon is a BYOC computer gaming event held every year in Dallas, Texas, USA. The event, which is named after id software's game Quake sees thousands of gamers from all over the world attend every year to to celebrate the company's gaming dynasty. It is North America's largest Lan Party and is held over a period of four days, with attendance completely free to all.
Quakecon originally grew out of a group of friends on EFnet (an IRC network) with the desire to get together and meet in real life. Jim "H2H" Elson, a Dallas area gamer, organized the bulk of the event for the first few years.
The first event, in August 1996, was held at the Best Western in Garland, Texas. It had around 40-60 attendees who brought their computers to play Quake I and DOOM, mostly. A small tournament was held, with winners taking home T-Shirts as prizes. id Software staffers were on-site as well, and stopped by to chat with the participants. John Carmack, lead programmer for DOOM/Quake, even participated in a 30-45 minute chat with attendees on the porch of the hotel.
Quakecon 1997 brought an estimated 650 attendees to the Holiday Inn in Plano, Texas. It was covered by numerous Internet and broadcast media outlets, and was aided by id Software and Activision.
Quakecon 1999 featured a BYOC of over 500 people, with an attendance that cracked 1000, at 1,100 general attendees. id Software sponsored the event once again, and this time even participated in tourneys against attendees. The Mesquite Convention Center in Mesquite, Texas (home of id) was the location for 1999's event. Many companies put their money on the line that year, including Activision, AMD, Apple Computer, ATI Technologies, Logitech, Linksys, and Lucent Technologies.
Quakecon 2000 brought the total attendance to over 3000, with a BYOC that nearly tripled in size to 1300 attendees. It was once again held at the convention center in Mesquite, this year occupying a larger space and adding vendor areas for E3-quality displays from sponsoring companies. Conferences and seminars were also added, creating places for gamers and developers to trade notes and discuss the industry and community in a friendly atmosphere.
Quakecon 2004 was the biggest event to date, with over 5000 total attendees, 2500 BYOC participants, over $150,000 in prize money distributed, and a concert on the last night by rock band Tweaker. The event was held for the first time at the brand-new Gaylord Texan Resort and Convention Center, a sprawling complex in Grapevine, Texas. For the first time in history, Quakecon was the largest LAN party in North America. The entire event occupied over 200,000 ft² (19,000 m²) of floor space, utilized over 1,200 power strips, a minimum of 80,000 feet (24 km) of Cat5 cable, 144 Linksys managed switches, and a Cisco 6509 with 7 48 port Gigabit ethernet blades, dual Supervisor 720's and dual 4000Watt power supplies at the core of the network. The entire infrastructure (including power distribution, cable crimping, and event setup) was completed over a 2-day period with an entirely nonpaid, volunteer staff.
Three separate tourneys were held: a Quake III 1v1 competition, Quake III Capture the Flag, and the world's first DOOM3 tourney. The winners of the DOOM3 and 1v1 tourneys each walked away with $25,000 in prize money, while the winning team for CTF netted $20,000 for their team.
The Quakecon community primarily organizes itself online, through IRC. The main channel for everything related to the event is #quakecon on EnterTheGame. Here you can find people discussing not only the event but also chatting almost every hour of every day with their friends.
Also, the Quakecon Forums are an incredibly active portion of the event. Posting on the forums is almost always the best way to get your questions answered in an incredibly timely manner, as many staff members read the forums regularily. Also, the community as a whole answers and helps out new members before they get together in August each year.
Quakecon.org - Official Website
Photos of the first Quakecon (1996)
Qconpics.org - A collection of photos from past Quakecons
idsoftware.com - Creators of Quake and DOOM; sponsors of Quakecon
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