Other Opening LAN gaming center, need input...

Hi all, like the title says. I'm opening a LAN gaming center with probably 40 pc's, 5-10 XBOX 360's, and maybe a couple PS3's and WII's. My question to you is this. What can you recommend for my gaming center. Have you visited a gaming center before? Was your experience good or bad? What did you like/dislike about the experience. Also, please feel free to offer suggestions if you have them. Thanks.

 

Bean bags and fizzy pop.

 

Stretch HumVee = Win

For example

 

Choose your equipment on a first come first served basis, i.e. the option of swapping the keyboard/mouse for one you are more comfortable with (some people like Logitech, some people like Razer, some people like Microsoft etc. etc.)

Good range of games.

Open all night?

 

A co-worker of mine used to have a LAN Gaming center. It seems to be hit or miss. He generated good business during the summer, and winter break periods (for schools), but usualy lost money outside of those dates. His place had a 360 Setup on a Large projection (Basically the entire wall) for Multiplayer local games with 1 system. It was cool, had a surround sound setup as well and really comfortable gaming chairs.

I think he said alot of the profits came from the sales of the snacks and drinks as opposed to the costs of accessing the systems at their center.

 

http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/2007/08/11/omega_sektor_lan_gaming_centre/1

Two things you need to do:

Save money by not turning all the PCs on if they aren't needed.
Have air conditioning or windows. AC is better. All centres I've been to are sweaty little holes with no ventilation. Windows are a cheap option, but they can mess up viewing angles and so on.

Send us pics and stuff.

 

What I always wanted to see was divided rooms (with some PCs and/or a console) for different moods with appropriate music (general): metal, hip-hop, trance, downtempo. This is something that the hugely successful Cyberworld Cafe does, but they are mostly downtempo and other lounge moods--very succelent and relaxing.

Sponsoring events will help with publicity.

 

Alternatively you could setup a Folding at Home team and the computers (and PS3s) could fold when not needed. Incentives could be given out for members to join your team, a discount for example if the member is an active folder.

Also don't focus solely on gaming. Other events that appeal to members could be offered.

 

Good idea!

 

My favorite gaming center here (before it was bought out by someone who ruined it ) had some simulators as well. FLying and racing, running like FS and GT sim games. The simulators were all home built so they weren't overly expensive, but it was pretty cool sitting in a mock 747 cockpit and flying around. Same with the driving ones. Big TVs, custom built car cockpits running top end gaming PCs strictly for racing games.

Nothing could beat the all-night parties and playing counter-strike 1.6 with 30 other people though . Plus, who doesn't like Pizza and Dew at 4am?

 

You could offer membership so it works out a little cheaper for the regulars but at the same time there's more chance they are going to come there often, as well as that your getting money upfront and making more overall compared to just hourly fees or whatever. It might be worth giving people with a certain level of membership access to certain things for free, like someone else said, most of the money made was from snacks etc so the longer you can get people to stay there the better, a free public area (with a large TV and sofas) would make sense for the same reasons. Selling hot food would be a good idea, you could team up with a local fast food shop to deliver stuff if you didnt want to have a kitchen. Special events/nights would be a good idea to keep people interested and maybe even a clan/team.

 

I would also put in something that you guys probably havent thought of, the worst thing in the world is to goto a gamecenter having a great time, then go into a crapshoot of a bathroom that you feel like you want your own hev suit to use, details like that make a huge difference believe it or not, also if you expand out and do cool things like, how to mod something into your pc etc etc, that is something I know i would goto if there was something local like that, ie you do psone monitor mods and for all the peeps who want to do it themselves you just happen to have the parts necessary , its a good business idea but you constantly have to reach out and do more, you cant just be the kewl lil shop on the corner forever, cuz they eventually end up going out of business no matter how good, was place right down the street from me that was only in business for a tad over a year, great place, had an awesome deal setup with the pizza joint right next door for cheap pizzas etc etc, but it still went under because they didnt really do anything to promote themselves.

 

A good cleaning crew or at least be very meticulous with your employees cleaning duties. Comfortable chairs and good monitors are a must. Air Conditioning, like Joe said, are very important. Keep those comps and those sweaty gamers cool. Have tournaments, host parties, and have special days like "battlefield day" and advertise those days in advance.

Lots of other things to buy. Magazines, snacks, drinks, posters, novelties, action figures, CDs, maybe some computer equipment like Razor Keyboards and Mice, T-Shirts, travel bags, manga, games if you can get licensing, just a few ideas for you. The more junk you can get people to buy, the better.

 

Good point!

You'll no doubt have decent equipment and powerful PC's so get some workshops going for things like photoshop, flash and after effects. I know that would be popular. I'm just thinking about things I might be interested in, but you could pretty much do anything like that. Also, gamers being naturally afraid of daylight means it would fit nicely as times you might want to do the workshops would be during the week daytimes.

 

don't go insane on the PC's most of the games people play multiplayer don't need insane hardware. For example CS, CS source, Natural selection, TF2, UT2k4, Quake 4 don't need ninja pc's. Obviously keep a few ninja pc's around for those into the latest and greatest but charge a premium to use them. A fair premium would be one that takes into account the extra cost of upgrading those computers compared to lower spec ones.

Also have a few pc's duel booting for linux gaming fun! warzone 2100, nexuiz, Freeciv, battel of wensoth, etc. that will set you apart from other lan centers and if they are not popular then you haven't spent any money

Host your own LAN game servers that are also connected to the web to generate some publicity for the lan center

Make sure the aircon has awsome air filtering as lans tend to stink after a day or so

Provide a shower cubical in the toilets, if your center is any good people will be spending the night and if awake for a 24hrs+ a good shower is awsome.

 

my god imagine the power bill

 

My only advice is don't open one not to be negative however with the further influx of cheap broadband of consumers! And computer price always coming down there is becoming less and less of a market for it.

Of course I have to give a disclaimer that I just got made redundant as the lan center I worked for went bankrupt.

 

Ok, On a more constructive note look into a piece of software called "SmartLaunch" has it's problems but is one of the best pieces of software around for doing lan center management. And I don't know what country your in but if your uk check out iguk.org You can join them as a member and as far as I know they have some decent information on setting up centre's.

If you go ahead feel free to contact me though I didn't set one up I did work in one and would be happy to give any advice I can.

 

Water dispenser, very important ;-)

I would say having a good set of rigs is important, definiately a 8800gt in there somewhere, and decent size screens. If you had the cash, definately some Apple displays. Also, a monthly tournament would go down well,especialy with some prizes to win. Where are you based btw?

Good luck with the project.

 

Given that this guys not posted back since the thread opened, I doubt very much that he is either reading these suggestions or going through with the plan of actually building the place.