- [Announcer] Funding for this program is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

(bright music) - "R-Town," the show about Rochester, learns about a tabletop gaming extravaganza coming to the Historic Chateau Theater later this month.

We also catch up with hometown favorite Canadian Honker as the restaurant celebrates its 40th anniversary, and we get the latest from the RCTC campus.

All that and so much more coming up next on "R-Town," the show about Rochester.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Coming to you from 125 Live in Rochester, Minnesota, "R-Town."

(upbeat music continues) - Castle Con, a tabletop gaming convention, is making its debut in downtown Rochester later this month and here to tell us all about it is visionary behind the event and the founder of Game Haven, Dave Razidlo.

Welcome to "R-Town," Dave.

- Hi.

Thanks for having me.

- So before we get started about Castle Con and Game Haven, can you just tell us a little bit about what tabletop gaming is?

- Tabletop gaming is changing.

So a lot of people when they hear board gaming and the new term people are trying to catch on is tabletop gaming, but it's not quite caught on yet, well, a traditional board game, you got Monopoly, Yahtzee, people sometimes call cribbage and poker and stuff like that.

That's more traditional.

So in the last maybe 20 years, maybe 10, it's really become something different.

So several thousand games are published every single year.

A lot of these are smaller batches.

So the production of these games, the cost is going way down.

Artists are getting more productive.

So there are many, many more being produced, meaning there's games for every sort of preference that people have for games and player counts.

So the new modern tabletop game is really for anyone.

And once you start playing them and you start enjoying them, you just want more and more and you want usually more complicated and more fancy and more expensive games.

But yeah, that's the general trend.

And I think the term people like to use is modern board gaming.

- Modern board gaming.

So that does- - Or modern tabletop gaming.

- Modern tabletop gaming.

- Even I can't get this right.

- So that still includes some of the old-school games like Monopoly and Yahtzee.

- Correct.

Correct.

And I personally have a problem where I just don't like those games anymore, but I'm getting better.

Like, I play Uno and Skip-Bo, and Skip-Bo is actually quite fun.

But I think a lot of people get nostalgia out of there and then they refuse to play these new modern games.

So I shouldn't do this, but I keep downplaying these older games.

There is a place for them.

But I really hope, like, through the outreach that we're doing through Game Haven and in these conventions, we get more exposure to these new modern games.

So if you're tired of playing Monopoly with a family, I've got family games that don't end in crying, you know, but maybe scratch that same itch.

Maybe people like the moving with the dice or shaking the dice.

So that's one of the things is if you know someone that knows a lot about games, they're gonna be able to find better games for you and your situation.

You're just gonna have more fun.

- For sure.

That's exciting.

So you mentioned it already, what is Castle Con and what can attendees expect from this event?

- Okay, so there's kind of two types of conventions.

One of them is a major convention.

So there's like, Gen Con is the perfect example, or Origins.

Those have thousands of people.

That'll have entertainment, speakers, workshops and stuff like that.

Then you've got your more smaller conventions.

So Coulee Con in Winona, I always confuse Winona and La Crosse, is an example of that where the primary focus is on getting games played.

At a tabletop convention, you're going to just not play games.

You're gonna have exposure to new things.

So first of all it's like a huge library.

So the bigger the library, the more options you have to play.

But then also people bring games to play.

So you'll see people playing really expensive or obscure or old games.

They'll just sit down and wait.

You'll have these little stands that say, "Looking to play," and all they want to do is share their love of that game or those sets of games.

So that's one thing you can be exposed to.

Another thing is just playing with your friends in a big event.

Like, we go to movie theaters for a reason.

You know, it's a community event.

The other thing is vendors.

So we've got probably five or six confirmed vendors.

So you have access to, we've got some local artists.

One does sketches, one does paintings, usually themed with, you know, fantasy and stuff like that.

And then we've also got a brand new board game called Scale.

A game developer printed maybe 5,000.

And then they go around and it's like selling, it's like selling a book, doing a book tour.

So you'll get to play with the people that made the game and you can talk to them and be taught the game by them and you give them feedback and then the next edition of the game is changed like that.

Other things like tournaments.

So for the more serious gamer, it may be hard to get 30 people that are into your game all in one place.

So we have a game called 40K Tournament.

40K is the game.

The tournament is on Saturday and Sunday.

So we're gonna have 32, I think, people coming from around the state that are gonna come in.

These games are serious.

So this is a game with little miniatures that cost a fair bit and then they paint them, they spend hours painting these.

So a convention is one opportunity to bring those people into like a critical, in critical mass, to play something really, really cool.

So they'll be playing for, I think each session is two and a half hours and there's five sessions.

So they'll be playing all weekend with 32 other people that love this game.

So that's another thing is, like, a convention can colocate, bring people together.

- Definitely.

- Bring people together that love a certain hobby, and in that, a subset of that hobby, meaning a game that they just love, so.

- Yeah.

That's awesome.

It seems like there's a little bit of something for everybody.

How are you working to make sure that the event is welcoming to families and folks that may be new to some- - Yeah, so this is our first year and we felt that there was a need for an approachable convention.

So a lot of the people, we hosted a small convention at Fagan Studios and I think about 80% had never been to a convention and didn't really know what they were.

So as they came in, we just like, "Hey, have you ever been to a convention?

What would you like to do?

Do you need help recommending a game?"

And we gave them a quick rundown.

So in our major convention, we're going to have people, staff, ready to suggest games.

So near our library, they'll suggest games.

So if you come with your family or your friends and you don't know at all, come over and talk to.

We're going to have Grandpa's Games.

My dad is gonna host games for our more mature audience, helping them understand that you could play and learn new things at any age.

We have different, a section completely for family and then for smaller children.

So there's been like another big thing for games that are good for children.

So language independent or reading independent.

There's a lot of them, but they're not known, and they're great.

So these aren't just Candy Land, which I have a strong opinion of.

So we'll have a kids game area.

Then we have a social deduction.

So this is a new, very new kind of development in the industry and it's basically lying with your friends.

So playing a game where you're trying to deduce who are the bad guys, who are the good guys.

And we've got a couple people here in town that run a really great game called Blood on the Clocktower.

The problem with that is it's $170 for the game, and to play the game, you need eight to 15 people and you need an hour and you need it quiet and presenting the game, so being the master of the game, or it's called the storyteller, is very hard to do.

So only at a convention or in an organized situation are you gonna be able to play these more elaborate games.

So we hope that if you are the first time conventiongoer but you've played some games, that you just come through the door and we'll guide you on a great experience and hope you come back.

- You mentioned your software and you are the founder of Game Haven.

Can you tell us a little bit about Game Haven?

- Yeah, so Game Haven founded sort of on an accident.

A friend of mine, we're both programmers and I just started to say, "I'm tired of wasting time on board game night picking games."

And people just stand around like, "Do you wanna play this?

Well, I don't really like that.

I don't wanna play this."

So it started out like five years ago or four years ago where I just wanted to take what you like, what I like, and, you know, with three or four other people, rate your games and then combine them all with math.

And I just thought it would, you know, shoot out a list of, and then we'd say, "Hey, look, we all kind of like this game.

There's something called scope creep.

So it's like you had a good idea but it requires a little bit more and then it requires a little more.

Well, it took like four years to put down the foundation, but now Game Haven can offer that.

So you can say, "Here's my collection," your game collection, to three other people around.

Takes their collections.

Now that's our combined collection.

So we don't have to ask what games did you get?

We see them all.

And then we also know which games you like by if you rate them, we'll know that.

So my brother helps us, he's a machine learning and AI, to take those then recommend what you should be playing.

That's one side of it.

And then the other side is just getting the word out.

So if you're hosting a public event, it's very hard in the noisy world that we live in.

But if you have a specific hobby and you're using our software to help organize these smaller events, they'll get attended and then they can have more and more of these things.

So that's what we've been doing and we're just kind of launching now here in southern Minnesota.

We'll be doing some things in Iowa and we've done things in Omaha.

But we hope that over time, people will use our software to facilitate their own great gaming experience and we just expand the hobby as a whole and bring more happiness to the world.

- I love that, just sprinkling happiness all over the world.

- [Dave] Yeah, sprinkle happiness.

- You clearly have a passion for bringing people together over tabletop gaming.

- Correct.

- Can you tell us a little bit more about your own history?

How did you get into all of this?

- Yeah, so I was trying to think about this and it goes back a long way.

So I think it came with my grandparents playing cards.

So whenever we'd go to my grandparents', which was frequently, all the adults would gather around and play poker and cards and different kinds of games and dice games and stuff.

And only when you were old enough, you'd get to start to play with them.

And then when you were older, you got to gamble with them.

So I think that's the origin.

And I have a funny story.

My sister was learning, well, she was screening with her kindergarten screening, and they said count to 10.

She started to go, "Ace 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, jack, queen."

And then they cut her off.

She had learned, and the same thing goes for my son.

I had a game that was language dependent.

So there was just some reading.

I said, "You can't play until you can read."

And he got mad, and a few months later, he was starting to pick up little words and stuff.

So it goes back that far.

My addiction to modern tabletop gaming probably comes with, for a lot of people too, we played Settlers of Catan.

- Oh, sure.

- Which I just called Catan.

Then we just started playing a lot in college and then that's when they started to bloom.

So just so many games came out.

We had enough money where I could buy some and share them and stuff like that.

And ever since, any free time I have, it's way better to do that with friends than just stand around.

That's what I say is, like, why just stand around if we can play a game and still talk and interact.

And one of the fun things is you can still talk and interact, but now you have a common goal.

It's like you're working towards a fun common goal.

And ever since, that's now my profession.

So it's pretty enjoyable.

- That's excellent.

- Yeah.

Well, we have a few minutes left.

You brought some games with you.

Can you tell us a little bit about what we have here and what your favorite, do you have favorites?

- Yeah, you can see by this one, I don't know if it shows up.

This one is a silly little game with cats and dogs and they got little faces on them.

Basically it is just lying.

So it's lying and bluffing deconstructed to a silly card game.

So this is like 7 or $8 and we've played it hundreds of times.

So me and my niece in one convention, we just got this, we came back to the hotel room and we just sat down and played a two-player version.

So you lie about how many shapes you have and how many colors.

So you say, "I have five green," and you have to say a higher number or call me on my bluff.

So it's just a bluffing game.

We played it for hours, just one after another.

So that's a really simple one.

I'd say that's my most played game.

This one here is called That's Pretty Clever!

It's like Yahtzee but with strategy.

So you're rolling dice and, you know, you roll the same, I think the same number as Yahtzee, but they're all colored and you make decisions about how you use the dice, but then you also make decisions because you pass some of the extra dice onto you.

So this is a good two-player game.

If you've played Yahtzee and you had a little bit of, little bit of instruction.

YouTube is great for learning these sorts of games.

You'll never play Yahtzee again and you'll have a great time.

This- - You'll move on from Yahtzee.

- This is interesting.

This is called The Crew.

If anyone's played a trick-taking game, so there's lots of trick-taking games.

So anyone that's familiar with trick-taking games, I just say, "Have you played this?"

This is cooperative.

So you're working together to make- - [Nicole] I love a cooperative game.

- Yeah, and that's good, especially if you have siblings.

So some people like cooperative and some siblings for sure they like them for other reasons.

This is cooperative.

So you take tricks in a way not to steal from your neighbor, to work with your neighbor to solve these riddles and puzzles.

And the final one is Spirits of the Wild.

So this one's out of print unfortunately.

I'm hoping they, I talked to the producer and I said, "Can you get it back in print?"

He said, "I would."

But it's still great if you can find Spirits of the Wild at a good price.

It's a little gem-taking game.

So you take gems out of a bag.

So a lot of people like this 'cause it's very cute and tactile.

And there's a little fox and there's constellations.

So what you're doing is placing the gems in a certain way.

- Well, thanks so much for sharing these with us, Dave.

We don't have time to go through all of them right now.

- Oh.

- But just real quick, how can people learn more about Castle Con?

- They can go to mygamehaven.com and you'll have a link there to Castle Con.

We're just putting out more and more information, and if you go there, we can give you recommendations on games if you rate them.

- Awesome.

Well, thanks so much.

- Thank you for having me.

This has been great.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) - Be sure to stick around.

We have much more coming your way on "R-Town."

We catch up with the founder and CEO of Powers Enterprises, Joe Powers, as he reflects on 40 years of history and the legacy of Canadian Honker restaurant.

We also get some heating and cooling tips from the Facilities and System Technology Club at RCTC and catch a holiday concert on campus in our future segment.

(bright music) - I've had some people tell me, like, "Can you believe it's 40 years?"

And A, I cannot believe it's 40 years, and the second thing I want to say is it's been that great.

I mean, how lucky am I and how blessed am I to be in an occupation where I literally love what I do each and every day.

- I mean, the history piece behind the Canadian Honker, obviously Powers Ventures was started with it and it really has just grown from this.

So this really is the center stone of Powers Ventures and the history piece is fantastic.

I mean, at least for me, you know, as a kid watching it continue to grow has really been amazing, you know, and it started before I was even alive, so it literally has been a part of my entire life and it's beautiful to watch it grow.

(bright music continues) - It's really critical that we still make everything, that it's homemade.

And, you know, a lot's evolved in the food business in regards to that.

That's probably the biggest change.

But we've stayed old school.

We still prep everything.

We still make everything.

(bright music continues) - So we finally got to the point where we said, "You know what?

This famous goose needs a name."

So we had over 300 kids, adults, submit different names.

Many of them were actually very funny.

So it was fun to sit down and to kind of go through and decide, you know, what name we were gonna choose and ultimately we came down to Gus.

The history behind Gus is really somebody that was a mentor to my father and really helping starting the Canadian Honker, Gus Chafolias.

So ultimately that's what kind of pushed it over the finish line.

- We've been in business for 40 years and besides the COVID year and the year after COVID, every single year has grown in sales, which tells me that we're doing a really, really good job.

(bright music continues) The difference of when I first started, I didn't have such an established base of employees as I do right now.

And so that's made a significant difference.

We had quite the party.

It was actually on a Friday.

We had it at the Hilton.

We had two floors.

We had about 650, 700 people that showed up for it and we put out a lot of food.

Everything was free.

We had some jazz bands playing.

And then the following night on that Saturday, we had an event at the event center.

That was more geared towards our employees.

I would say Friday was more geared towards really our customers and the people we do business with.

But generally speaking, it was really employee oriented, close friends.

(bright music continues) - We actually had a manager come to us, it was probably six, seven years ago, and brought up an idea about putting a sign on our roof.

Just being across the street from St. Mary's, you know, a lot of people are, you know, have a lot of time to kill looking out the window, looking at the buildings.

And we thought it'd be cool to put a sign up there, and it says, Get well soon, God bless."

And, you know, it's kind of one of those things since we don't see it consistently, sometimes we forget it's up there.

And then so it's really nice to have, you know, patrons come in and mention the sign and, you know, just basically say how much it means to them, so.

(bright music continues) - You know, the saying location, location, location is so true in this location.

I mean, to be across from St. Mary's Hospital.

But also the part of that is, like, probably one of the most exceptional things that we have at the Honker is the fact that how many people from out of town we do help in any kind of capacity, whether it be time and conversation or otherwise literally help them in whatever need they have.

And there's some people here with some real, real challenges.

So it's really, it's just an incredible location.

(bright music continues) It's kind of a funny story, but my mom asked me, like, "Did you ever really get scared or worried or anything like that?"

And honestly, I never really did 'cause I never thought about it.

All I wanted to do is pay my bills.

That was it.

If I could make it and make very little amount of money, I was thrilled just to be in the industry and on my own, making my own decisions along with my team members.

And so, you know, it's been really, I've never really got scared or anything like that to the point where I wasn't sleeping or anything.

Honestly, if you work hard enough and you work long enough, you're gonna sleep.

(chuckles) You don't get no worries.

(bright music continues) - [Announcer] For more information about this story and other "R-Town" features, connect with us on Facebook, Twitter at @KSMQ, #RTown, or ksmq.org/rtown.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (bright music) - Today we are in the RCTC eSports gaming room.

The club that started with just a dozen members in 2022 has now grown to a membership of over 40 people.

The team won the championship in the "Overwatch" game in 2023.

We talked to a few of the members to see what makes this club so special.

- eSports has been here since 2022.

It's been a club that's been growing recently.

- We have about 20 active members, I'd say, and then around 73 in our Discord.

- You see a lot of people coming in.

It's basically just playing competitive video games and just having a good experience socializing and everything and building a lot of relationships and just building a community around you for competitive gamers alike.

- So what we do is we are a college team that compete against other colleges within the Playfly organization currently.

(bright music) (gamer speaks indistinctly) - [Gamer] Oh my gosh.

(bright music continues) - I play "Overwatch," "Rocket League."

Hopefully next semester, we get a "League of Legends" team.

I play "League of Legends" and "Rainbow Six Siege."

If you don't know what "Rocket League" is, "Rocket League" is a game.

It's either one V one, two V two, or three V three.

There's multiple game modes, but it's basically soccer with rocket-propelled cars.

- I have two memorable experiences and that one being the first one, which is the first VR party that we had.

It was really nice just having people to talk to and having the VR stuff available, which was really cool to experience 'cause that was my first time experiencing it.

My second most memorable memory is winning the fall championship with "Overwatch" since it was the first time since fall of 2022 since we've competed in it.

And so having that experience with the people that were here in the eSports team at the time was really memorable.

It was something that we were all proud of, something that was like, I guess, a milestone for everyone here and me alike.

- And it was just so fun and we worked really hard to get there.

- We're ending this week with a performance from the recent RCTC holiday concert.

This is the RCTC concert choir performing "Et in Terra Pax," composed by John Purifoy.

♪ Gloria ♪ ♪ In excelsis deo ♪ (gentle piano music) ♪ And suddenly with the angel ♪ ♪ There was a multitude ♪ ♪ Of the heavenly host praising God ♪ ♪ And saying glory to God in the highest ♪ ♪ And on earth ♪ ♪ Peace ♪ ♪ Et in terra pax ♪ ♪ And on earth ♪ ♪ Peace ♪ ♪ Et in terra pax ♪ ♪ And on earth ♪ ♪ Peace ♪ (gentle piano music continues) ♪ Peace ♪ - Thank you for joining us today.

I hope you learned as much as I did about all that's going on in our city and the wonderful people making it happen.

For more content produced right here in Rochester, please be sure to check us out on Facebook and Twitter at #rtown.

I'm Nicole Nfonoyim-Hara, host of "R-Town," the show about Rochester.

We'll see you next time.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (bright music) - [Announcer] Funding for this program is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.