today at Caliburst some of the new folks from the UC Berkeley fgc group were asking how much money we made off our events. i explained that myung used to run Gamecenter as an actual arcade business, but kinda works out better as a community service, and the events we run aren't meant to make money, so we only charge the Gamecenter venue fee which goes towards rent, and when we buy pizza or make food for the attendees (joy was making smoothies and they were fuckin good as hell!) it's free because we just want people to hang out and have a good time instead of having to worry about leaving the venue and spending money on food, and if people like they can donate to help pay for it.
earlier i had joked that the funding for the $100 pot bonus i put towards UMVC3 was courtesy of tag-in battle, since i had won like $70 there the previous weekend. Tag-In Battle TO espada was there and eating some pizza, and he mentioned that the pot bonuses usually came from the money that i paid him to edit videos. most of that money comes from my patreon and twitch subs.
so the way it works is that i stream events and [http://pattheflip.medium.com](write essays/advice columns) for free, and a handful of nice people support me via twitch subs and patreon subscriptions.
the money i get from those endeavours goes towards funding the Play Guilty Gear Chop Shop, which is a small group of community members who make videos that celebrate our community events, like the RESSHOUMANIA 2 trailer or the REV2SDAY weekly highlights. espada is one of them, and puts the money he gets from his edits towards his own tournament's costco pizza and pot bonuses.
then when i win some of his brackets, the pot bonuses help with the gas costs to get out to elk grove from the bay, and the rest can go towards the food for Caliburst.
this is not a lot of money! the patreon and twitch pull in maybe $500-$600 a month total. but when we can put that money back into the community it ends up doing so much. in a given month, that money serves all these different roles:
- a token of support for funding instructional fg writing and rev2 local + netplay events
- a small stipend for community video editors to hone their craft and celebrate the scene
- a prize to encourage attendance and build hype for the sacramento area's anime fgc at tag-in battle
- gas money for a carpool from the bay area to go to tag-in battle to build and strengthen our regional network
- food for tournament attendees at caliburst
anyway, check out the UMVC3 and Rev2 VODs. if you wanna support what we're doing, feel free to sub to the patreon or twitch! but really, your efforts are better spent cultivating what you got near you ❤️