MoreCooler.com: It's more cooler with the thing

First prize goes to the first person to find some way to get us into E3 this year. I'm thinking I might try a pay stub from when I used to work at ibuyline, but that might be too old.

I like sneaking into things.
Well, from their site, they need two forms of ID to register.. including:
- resale tax cert
- co. credit card
- insurance card
- bus. card
- bus. ad w/card (?!)
- bus license
- commercial license
- pay stub
- w2 form

huh. Looks like there's a few ways to go about this..
- actually get a small co. going (maybe even a dba?) so its recorded somewhere (altho i highly doubt the would check, which leads to next point.)
- print up fake business cards and some fake pay stubs. make sure any phone #s actually go somewhere so they can be answered correctly (or voicemail. "we're a small company.")

hmm, that might actually work just fine.. i doubt they would go around checking to see if the business name listed on a business card is actually regsitered with the state..

seems as long as you pre-register you need only your drivers license (or gov. equiv.) once there to prove who you are. you only need to bring extra stuff if you are not pre-registering.

Anyone want to put together an online Penny Arcade? I.e. costs a penny per play for simplistic Flash games, and your credit card is charged once a month (with a minimum charge; i.e. if you don't play 100 games you still get charged a buck if you play, say, more than 5).

The beauty of the plan is it doesn't have to make money, it just has to get us into E3. ^_^

you're thinking about getting in sorta-legitimally?! :)

Dunno, I'm game. :) Anyone else??

Can we still call the company I Wanna Get Into E3 For Free?

Gonna hafta agree about that being a BIT too obvious. ^_^

I'll work on some Flash MX 2004 stand-alone games once finals are done. Y'know, breakout, 3d tictactoe, an update to that car game y'all saw a year ago while I was playing with the engine, that sort of thing.

Anyway, back onto the penny-game system, I've already got a system to automagically accept paypal payments which could easily be changed around to work with whatever..

We could work it so that the site keeps a running total of the amount spent by all its users combined. At the end of the month, we have a random drawing, and one user gets half of the "pot." Those who have made the high score lists get a greater chance of winning.

I think users would like to see their penny get dropped into the pool immediately, knowing that if they're good enough they might get most of their money back. Good psychological incentive.

we can do cool things like charge a penny for everything. Wanna put a message on the front page? Its a penny (a day maybe.) Maybe other random silly stuff like that?

Penny arcade. I've been addicted to pogo.com lately. Those sites probably rake in the cash. Start it small, but if you make good games, you might end up making money anyway.

We'll have to do a cost analysis to see if we're paying more for bandwith than a penny per action. I like the idea of providing more options than just the games for a penny.

My only thought on the penny thing that is there are dozens of sites where you can play for free. Why would someone pay to play if he/she can play elsewhere for free? What makes our stuff better than a site like pogo.com? I'm still all for running with it, but I thought I'd throw that out there.

Another question that just came up is what exactly are the gambling laws that may apply to this? If people are playing for tokens with a potential cash prize, is that gambling?

...I mentioned the "pot" idea. Er, perhaps I'd better start calling it a "pool." Anyway, that little element of gambling is what we need to make it worthwhile. Especially since folks might just just download the SWF file and play it at home (although some sort of server handshaking could make it more difficult).

Alternately: Our mad game-making skillz are just that GOOD. ^_^

I guess theTombs could, eventually, act as a sort of flagship. But first I'll have to make it - er - not suck.

Having actually LOOKED at pogo.com, it appears they have a similarly gamblicious setup. So I guess all that would set it apart would be the pay-for-play model.

Eh, still would be fun to see how many users we can get.

If you're set on giving away money, you could always make it a free contest where you have to legally accept people via mail, but they get more chances for each penny they spend or whatnot. Co.s do that all the time..