UK Games Expo 2012 Report

Had a great day on Saturday at the Expo in Birmingham.  Seemed busier than last year, but the numbers seemed to thin out by mid-afternoon, thanks to the mini heatwave the UK is currently enjoying.  The stands and format seemed to be pretty much the same as last year.  It's a great show to visit if you are a boardgame fan with money in your pocket.

I had it in mind to pick up a copy of Stars Without Number.  Unfortunately, they had sold out by the time I got to the Mongoose stand.  There was also no sign of Dungeon Crawl Classics, but it may be a little too hot off the press for the UK distribution copies to have hit.  However, I was happy to come away with a Slayer's guide for one pound, to add to my collection from the ever popular bring-and-buy stand, and a bargain figure storage case from Chessex (of which I really should have bought two or three).

The highlight of the show for me, was a game of Living Munchkin, which is a semi-LARP version of the card game and was great fun.  We also sat in on Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson's TopTen Games seminar where they each listed their top 10 games.  They both opted to put D&D in the number 1 slot, and had on display a very rare original boxed set signed by both Gygax and Arneson.

Here's a list of the other games from their lists.  They are not in order and I'm missing about five of them as my recorder ran out (if anyone was there and can add to the list please do so):

•Ticket to Ride
•Puerto Rico
•Acquire
•Can't Stop
•Small World
•The Great Dalmuti
•Lost Cities
•1829
•Balloon Cup
•Diplomacy
•The Warlord
•Caylus
•Civilization???

Ian Livingstone also announced a new Zombie-themed Fighting Fantasy book, which will be released in August this year to mark the 30th Anniversary of the series.

Overall, a great day was had by all.  It will be interesting to see how the show does next year in its new, bigger venue.