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Starting a LAN Gaming Centre?
A not-s- Anonymous Coward asks: "I've been given the opportunity to pitch a group of investors to open a LAN gaming centre (or centres, depending on how things go). These centres will be opening in an area that has little to no high-speed net access (and will be unlikely to in the future), very cheap equipment and labour, and a good core of 300-400K potential customers (right age groups, well-developed gaming culture, and plenty of disposable income). Anyone have any experience running a gaming centre, or any ideas of potential gotchas? We have written up the proposals and plans including the standard things (PCs, networking equipment, servers, furniture, fixtures, techs, games, etc), but were wondering if the community has anything to contribute? Oh, and there are none of these centres where we are planning on opening them..."
Consider selling the games being played.
You could probably get away with charging higher prices than retail stores.
(Kind of like buying a golf shirt from the pro shop)
Do some research on what it takes to be a distributor.
Make sure you have accounted for the physical security of the building, it's contents, and it's visitors. I would highly recommend a hired deputy or two at the door; it does wonders for the level of confidence that your patrons have in your establishment. You'll also want to consider security cameras or some form of access controls with all of that nice equipment getting lugged around, if you haven't done so already. What do your business plans say about casual theft of patron property?
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If you can't hear the voices in my head, then you're just not listening hard enough.
You've got 300,000 to 400,000 potential customers, but no chance of high speed networking in the near future? What bizarro world is this?
Consider that computer gamers are a small subset of the computer using public. No idea of the percentages, so I'll say %50. So double that number you quoted, fudge it a little bit...
You have a million potential customers for high speed networking? Drop the gaming crap, and run, run as fast as you can to set up an independent DSL provider. Get in there fast, before the ILEC beats you to it.
Or how about just opening a plain-jane cybercafe? If there are this many people wanting net access (again, I doubt it. Go back and double-check your analysis thus far) you can setup a cybercafe with your choice of T-1 or private satellite connection.
Ignore the comments about free drinks. That's completely idiotic. Bowling alleys give away the games (almost) in an attempt to sell sodas and nachos. I would also be careful of food in/around the games. Personally, I would outfit the place with USB equipment. With the 6-10 foot range, you can keep the computers locked up, or at least away from cokes and chips (and cigarettes. When you aren't looking, someone will light up). And when someone dumps a coke on the keyboard, with USB, you can replace it without a hitch. Or even a reboot.
What about software? Are you going to make sure someone shows up with legit copies? Or are you going to rent copies? Call out the attorneys in either case.
Someone talked about quality of gaming rigs. There's a few ways to handle this. First, I would check with Alienware and similar companies, and see if you can get reasonable lease terms. Try to get into a situation where you are replacing the top of the line machines every six months (shortly after the latest and greatest video cards come out?) Older machines can then be either sold for reduced rates, or donated for a tax write off. Sooner or later, you will have new machines and old ones. Charge more for the more expensive machines.
They do at Kinko's. Speaking of Kinko's, a self service payment system would be something I would like.
Reservations? I'd charge a fee. Require a deposit of 30 minutes time. If they show, it is applied to the cost of the session. If not, you keep the money. This also gets you credit cards, which you'll surely want for someone who might hose the machine.
Again, I'd like to say that if there are that many potential customers, there are more lucrative things to do. But if it works, let us know.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Actually, if they just skip the plywood and let the cube walls do their job, it will cut down on sound a lot. Problem is you want sight lines to make it look "cool," while at the same time hiding how crowded/not it is.
All the places I have seen in SE Asia have been loud and obnoxious for "adults," but I guess the "kids" like it.
Main trick would be high ceilings with acoustic tile ceilings, block line-of sight to the speakers with interior partitions, with some kind of background music and white noise. There isn't much low frequency rumble to make it too rough on whomever would use the place.
I hope you include how you are going to make money, and how long it will take to become profitable. This may sound obvious, but many geeks spend lots of time planning hardware and software, but forget the business plan. If you are new to this, I recommend that you spend the money to hire someone to review it, and/or get some good books on the subject. The more you know ahead of time (plans, failsafes, even what criteria you will use to decide when to give up) will improve your chances in may ways.
The trick is to bind you're customers to you. A bar is a stupid place to go to to get drunk. You can get you're alcohol much cheaper at home, you can get it at home 24/7 and there is no problem with getting home afterwards. So why do bars still exist?
Well they are more fun, they will have a lot more different drinks then you have at home, potential to meet new people and so on.
A good lan center would allow you to play new games without first having to buy them. (Lawyer check!) It should make it a lot easier to simply go gaming and find other people ready, biggest headache of home lan parties is getting all the people on the same date.
One little tip that I have seen many cyber-cafe type setups make here. Keep the entry level low. Sure having regular game freak players may seem nice but if they create an atmosphere where newbies are turned off you will eventually run out of players as the freaks grow up.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Thus far I've seen some good argumenst and they come in a these 3 main topics:
:)
Legal
Food
Asthetic
Now my points
Legal - All the games you want to have can be played with out much hassle and legaly too. Most FPS games have a contacn number where you can purcahs a site copy for much less than the sum of all the computers you will have. And all the Blizzard games(Starcraft Warcraft III Diablo II) have an even better deal because they want to start a cafe movement. I word of warning you want to be open late but but many of your customers are under 18 so look at curfew laws around you and post a sign about your policy you don't want to get shut down for contributing to the deliquency of a minor (you know that's half the point of having this lan cafe but you don't want any proof to haunt you
Food - ONLY ALLOW WHAT YOU SELL, and then only sell bottles of pop so people can keep lids on and make sure you post a policy about $25 for replacing a spilled on keyboard or such, no big deal. Oh and those cold frapachino thingies can keep customers awake and paying for a few hours. For snacks avoid chips because of the grease and other residues. But you do need something. I haven't figured out what yet but it is a must. This place in Niles, Illinois Called G-Zone is run by a Korean family and they have bags of non-greasy ethnic snacks I love em... but I think individual chex mix bag arerelativly grease free, but work with what you have.
Asthetic - Get comfortable chairs this is greatly important. Also I reccomed an area with a couch and some chairs for little kids mothers to sit and for burnt out gamers to rest for a few mins after a huge frag fest. Free coffie here would be a good idea(like a quick lube's waiting room)
I love cyber cafes because the give me a chance to get out of the house and beat some people's faces I can see. So have late night parties on the weekends, people will stay.
A word on staff now do not hire regulars they will be more interrsted in playing than doing work I know I was one for a while.
-Ben
---PRESS ANY KEY TO CONTINUE---
"Now, where's the damn 'any' key?"
We went to a gaming centre and paid $12 per person per hour. We play pool as a group paying just $7 an hour for the table. Needless to say, we only went to the gaming centre once, and it closed down within months.