UK GamesExpo 2024

This weekend saw my 6th year of attending GamesExpo at the NEC and it was as much fun as it always is. Expensive yes, very crowded, but still fun.

For those who are not aware this is a huge 3 day gaming extravaganza featuring all aspects of gaming over 3 halls at the NEC, Birmingham plus competitions and additional events in the on site hotel. By gaming I mean every aspect of the wider gaming world, so board games, collectable card games, hybrid games – part board game part figure game, kids games, family games, traditional D&D, other adventure games, sci fi figure skirmish games, fantasy skirmish games. Then there are all the supporting traders selling all the previously mentioned themes plus others selling items to support those themes – clutter, dice (lots of dice!), dice bags, dice trays, game mats, terrain pieces, terrain ground cover, outfits, swords. You name it and it’s available. This isn’t the 10,000 that Salute might achieve, this is 50,000 plus.

Just to be clear this isn’t a pure figure wargaming event so if your hobby interests stop at the little men in uniforms then read no further 😁 if however your interests are broader then maybe this might be the event for you.

I guess the main difference between our traditional wargames shows and this is the dozens of games on offer that you can just step into and play. These are not like our traditional convention participation games where the game is controlled by an umpire/club, these are fully developed games that the publishers are inviting you to play alongside, or overseen by, staff familiar with the game with the obvious hope of you being so impressed you’ll buy the game – there is nearly always a new Star Wars game (figures or cards), but also (and this is the really fun bit) are games which are first run prototypes of somebody’s brilliant idea that is nearing it’s publication date (or might just have been released) and they want to drive up as much interest as possible by inviting you to play. This was the bit that kind of blew me away the first time I attended (and I still don’t know why I went 😕) but it’s really good fun, the people fronting the game are super enthusiastic, there is no financial pressure because the game isn’t out yet (even if it is there’s no hard sell) and you get to have a go at something that you’d probably never normally play and you’ll probably never play again.

This time around I played six different games; a traditional fantasy card game out of the Magic the Gathering genre, a co-operative fantasy board game, a really clever board game/console game hybrid using smart dice of the old PC game ‘Vampires the Masquerade’, a sci fi skirmish game called Zeo Genesis which had some serious potential and some nice minis which I’ll keep an eye out for, a Crusades board game of factions, a sci fi trading game. Actually I think there were a couple more but my brain shut down 🤣.

No show of course is complete without a purchase or two and so I did 😂 Nothing extravagant this year (I was very restrained) and stuff that I could have ordered on line or in some cases got at a traditional wargames show but the advantage here is that at such a large show traders bring all their stock and you get to see what it really looks like. Also, a company like Gamers Grass, for example, is usually sold by a third party at a wargames show and it is never all the range, so here I got to see the lot and found there was stuff that I didn’t even know they did.

The other very noticeable thing about the show is the inclusivity. Let’s face it, your average wargames show is mainly men of a certain age, generally white and middle class; not so at GamesExpo, the age range is particularly noticeable, young, teens, families, matures, the ethnic mix is a fair representation of the nation at large and who held hands with whom was equally mixed 😊

Now although I have painted this as not a wargames show there are none the less a number of familiar faces from the wargames scene. The redoubtable Annie of Bad Squiddo Games has been in attendance for several years, Black Scorpion and Rubicon are usually there, plus, ABC Brushes, Great Escape, Warlord, Irongate, Gale Force Nine, Warpaint, Deep-Cut, Osprey and Sarissa.

The other plus of the show is the ancillary stuff you can pick up that you wouldn’t see at a traditional wargames show just because the core market isn’t military. Just by browsing the stalls you can come across clutter for skirmish games that is a bit different, the various figures in the sci fi & fantasy ranges on offer can yield eye catching additions to your Viking warband or future wars game, buildings not seen before etc and this has multiplied exponentially with the arrival of 3D resin printing.

Final points. This isn’t cheap (18 quid for a day ticket) so going along isn’t a decision to be taken lightly and it’s the NEC so food and drink isn’t cheap. There is always a queue first thing (I queued for 40 minutes this year, my longest yet) but if you want to get your moneys worth then you kind of have to be there early. It does get busy so if crowds aren’t your thing then that might be a consideration although that said I never got barged into or experienced inconsiderate behaviour. All that said, if your hobby is a broad church then this is well worth the trip, even if only for a one off, I’ll certainly be going back, so maybe see you next year 😀