UK Games Expo Retrospective – The Musings of a Major Gaming Convention newbie

Friday at UKGE

Friday morning, and despite awaking early, like my young self on Christmas Days gone by, we didn’t arrive at the NEC until near 10am. This was due to taking a rather unfortunate detour onto the M6 – good going me!! The anticipation was palpable as we arrived at the East Car Park, finding a space near the back, and walking the 10 or so minutes to the Convention Centre, numerous bags in tow.

We were met with a rather large queue forming to collect tickets. For such an established convention, I can’t for the life of me understand why the option to have passes mailed-out prior to the event weren’t offered.  I for one would have happily paid a little extra to not have to stand in line for 45 minutes.

Despite the various delays and setbacks, we finally made it into the expo proper. One thing you don’t quite appreciate having never experienced the Expo is just how loud and busy it can get, and this was just the first day! It was pointed out to me by a fellow gaming friend that up until this year, the Expo had been confined to the one hall. It certainly needed to expand, given some 20,000 were expected to walk through the doors across the three days.

There were banners and stalls in all directions, enticing you to visit the ‘bigger’ named stands. I/we were not about to be waylaid, and we set about walking briskly up the stairs to Hall Two. I wanted to get around to a few stalls here first, as I had felt that if anything was going to run out of stock early, it may be those there, as the stands and stock was decidedly limited compared to those in Hall One

We headed straight for the likes of Oink Games and Fanboy 3 to pick up some smaller games, including, Troika, Startups, and the flavour of the month online Four Against Darkness.

One good thing about UKGE is the number of lesser known publishers showcasing their wares, with some titles that are either in early design, or not currently available to the mass market. We noticed a colourful display for the game Towers of the Sun from Quality Beast. The production values on this little-known title were quite impressive, and we settled in for our first play-test. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, staying to the very end. I’m hoping to keep tabs on this, as it is not due to be on Kickstarter until sometime in 2019.

Our next stop was to get our first few purchases over to the Shop and Drop: A handy facility where expo-goers could hire storage space to leave their bags securely as they went about their business. To my utter surprise, this was already fully booked out by 10:30am… I can’t help but think that demand was greatly underestimated. We therefore had to carry a number of bags around for the entire day – the blisters on my fingers are testament to the struggle we endured.

I was never overly interested in the Bring and Buy, not just as a seller, but as a buyer. The thought of queuing again to seemingly grapple for the biggest bargain didn’t appeal to me (still doesn’t in all honesty). Strangely, I received a message from a good friend who asked if I wanted him to pick up one of my grail games, Bruges, which was available there. I knew I’d be paying a slight premium, and there was a distinct possibility that components would be missing. However, I was willing to play the lottery on this occasion. I suppose this is one of the major attractions for a lot of gamers over the weekend, each to their own.

Following a brief rest at the benches close to Z-Man Games, we split up into smaller groups to explore the main hall (Hall One). I had planned to work through my list of games I was hoping to buy on the first day, as I’d already heard rumour that Century: Eastern Wonders had already sold out across the convention. We snaked up and down the named streets dissecting the stands, stopping off every now and then to marvel at games being demoed to the masses.

One thing that I loved about the weekend was that for every large online store/games publisher stand, there would be a smaller-lesser known company in-between that was getting a fair amount of welcome attention.

The first day seemed to rush by, and I was soon due over at the ITB Games stand for my 3D Body Scan appointment. I had pre-booked a session, with the promise that a character model would be manufactured and sent out in the next couple of months. Although this was just 10 minutes out of my day, its little things like this that are out of the norm that truly make these events memorable.  I highly recommend anybody taking advantage of this facility should it make a return in the years that follow.

We hadn’t explored everything Hall One had to offer on the Friday. As the trade hall was due to close shortly, we arranged for a group of us to meet over in the Open Gaming area in Hall Two. This was surprisingly empty. I expected that on this occasion, a fair amount of attendees had retired to the Hilton Suites to game. There were ample tables running parallel to one another, all well lit, and close to a bar for refreshments. We stayed until around 10pm before heading back to Coventry, as we knew tomorrow would be another long day.