UK Games Expo 2018

Wargamers road trip.

Today I went to Birmingham for the UK Games Expo. Now this was my first time to this show, a show that is more to do with boardgames than wargaming, even if one of the sponsors of the show is Games Workshop. A four day show, for those so inclined you can spend the whole long weekend trying out roleplaying sessions, card games and all sorts of tiny independent games across two huge halls.

On the same day at the NEC in Birmingham a Collectomania convention was also going on, so the whole place had a huge geeky buzz about it. Only having one day we concentrated on shopping, the only game I did get to play was the new Munchkin Collectable Card game. It played like a Magic the Gathering Clone but with the expected Munchkin characters and jokes. We did unfortunately have a demonstrator that was not 100% confident of the rules, but managed to just about grasp the concept and finish a game.

The hall was a nice mix of traders, to be fair there was a high number of miniatures and gaming accessories, so plenty for the wargamer. There were lots of demonstrations and participation games and it had a real family friendly feeling.  I managed to pick myself up a nice reasonably priced gaming mat from a company that also sold cardboard terrain. http://shop.battlesystems.co.uk

Previous readers of this blog will know I have an addiction to Osprey rulebooks, so I had to make a visit to their stand. I meant to pick up another copy of Rogue Stars for a friend, but sadly it was sold out. (Could my positive review have been that influential?) I did however manage to find the author of another title I had yet to pick up, Gaslands. Mike Hutchinson was a very amiable chap and I picked up a signed copy of his rules as well as some specialist "skid" dice. I guess I shall be seeing if I can get away with stealing back some of my hot wheels from the youngest offspring and start supergluing guns to them.

Finally I found a blast from the past, back in my University days I used to travel over to Leeds to a a small store called Travelling Man for a bit of geeky shopping. They used to be based in the Leeds Corn Exchange and a couple of years ago on a visit back I found they were no longer there. It was nice to discover that in fact they had just moved and grown into a larger company that now has an extensive trade in board games.