SPIEL

Typical setup of a games fair stand; times 100

Why would anyone go to a games fair, who is not professionally involved in the design, production, selling or buying of games? Pure and simple, because most of the activity at the fair is the playing of games - optionally, but in practice only occasionally, followed by the buying of the game just played.

This means that way over half the space in the three gigantic halls of the biggest games fair in the world are given over to small, 4-person tables in which a game is already laid out, and brightly dressed volunteers stand at the ready to explain for the umpteenth term the turns, interactions, cards plays, point counts and other intricacies of this and that game, in English, Dutch, French, Spanish or any other language that happens to be in the intersection of the strangers who meet at that table.

Live role playing attributes

So it was that we drove through a spell of very autumnly weather (gusty, rainy) for an hour and a half, and after finding a parking spot fairly soon by dint of moving into a residential area opposite the actual fair were at the gates practically the moment they were supposed to open. I say supposed to because the number of people inside strongly suggested that a lot of the attendants and stand owners had not taken the shift to winter time into account.

In contrast to last years, the fair was concentrated in the three biggest halls, rather than being spread out in about six or so smaller ones. I wonder what this says about the attendance, which was reported to be around 150000 the past two years (one hundred and fifty thousand; that is, not distinct visitors but "turnstile attendance" - a lot of visitors go for more than 1 day and then are counted for the number of days they attend).

Carcassonne championship, with the aid of a chess clock

Apart from playing and selling games, there are other events that keep things very lively. Like many of such events, this one is paired up with a comics fair, and there is quite a collection of role-playing attributes on sale - books for the miniature kind, swords, mantles, harnesses for the live kind. This in turn draws those who take part in such games, and they come dressed the part, so there are a lot of knights, monks, wizards, elves and the like among those present. There is also a section for children (not very large) and then various awards and championships. I more or less by accident bumped into the Carcassonne World Championship - not the game I would have imagined to be sufficiently balanced to be a consistently good player at. Well, maybe it isn't, but I'm sure it is good fun to take part, wouldn't mind to have a go myself.

Hollywood: I just produced two Oscar-worthy movies

Of course Willem-Jan and I played a number of games, I think five. Not all of them equally interesting: I don't know how a game as bad as The Witches came to be published and even promoted. But Flash Point (which reminded me a lot of Pandemic, not only because both are cooperative games with a comparable theme but also because I think the graphical design is somehow very similar) and Kingdom Builder are definitely worthwhile, and Concordia was not half bad.

While Willem-Jan stopped at a stand to buy some Magic cards, I looked around if I could find Marrakech, the game with the felt pieces for rugs that I had played and liked in York. Turns out there are at least four games with approximately that title, and took me too long to figure out the right spelling so I gave up on that.

We had planned to leave at 17:00 so as to be in good time for dinner, but we had too much fun so we stayed until closing time, 18:00. It being winter time now, that meant it was completely dark, and still wet, not the most pleasant circumstances to negotiate the traffic-jammed streets of ugly Essen. Fortunately it got dryer as we got further north, and Elise's kipkersentaart was delicious as ever, making everything all right again. The weather for tomorrow does not look so good though: a severe storm has been predicted, I'll have to wait and see what happens to my travel schedule. The plan is to visit +Joes Staal, son of an old friend of my father, who lives in Manchester with hise wife Nicole.