So I’m back home. Bags in the house but not unpacked. Reunited with the two attack chihuahuas Nico and Loki. So it’s time to reflect on this years expo.

One thing I hate about the UKGE isn’t the show itself, and this stands even for cons I don’t attend also. Is the flood of haul photos that hit social media once attendees start arriving home.

I get it. They are excited about their purchases, and want to share with the world what they got. I’m happy for them. No I really am.

The issue I have is it can come across as a bit insensitive to those unable to attend or afford such a haul. This has been the first and last UKGE where I haven’t been on a very limited budget. And it can make you feel a bit bad seeing all the hauls. Yes it’s a me thing. But I’d be surprised if others don’t feel that way.

Those board game content creators that go often put out a video of their hauls. Which is basically them saying “look at how much free stuff I got”. They buy the odd game. But the majority of the stuff is free from the publishers. I really do hate those videos. It’s boasting. I don’t like it.

This is why I’m not going to share photos of everything I bought or list everything. I’ll mention one or two games if I think they have an interesting story from the expo to justify mentioning them.

I don’t like talking about my acts of random kindness. However I will this one because it explains poorly how I ended up with three copies of Moving Wild!

I ended up with two copies of Moving Wild by Oink games on day 1 of the expo. Ben had picked me one up (at my request) but before I had seen his text saying he’d got it I had picked a copy up with Scout.

When I mentioned it on Twitter/X my friend Gavin claimed it. But I felt bad I hadn’t given it to someone on the Facebook group Board Game Trading & Chat UK.

So day 2 I bought a third copy! Along with a copy of Rafter Five as I picked up a copy of Maskmen for Ben. I then posted on Board Game Trading & Chat UK saying that I’d chose one lucky person not able to attend the expo to win both games and the promo meeple. All they had to do was leave a comment on the post.

Later in the day I was walking pass the Oink stand and noticed the designer of Moving Wild Chris Priscott was coming to the end of his signing spell on the stand. There was no queue and I thought that having the copy I was giving away signed by the designer would be a rather cool surprise for whoever got it. So I got Chris to sign the copy. Sadly my own copy was sitting in a box in the shop & drop. Yes I could have kept the signed copy. But that wouldn’t have been the right thing to do.

It will be interesting to see how long it is before the person that won the game notices the surprise.

Even after selecting a winner I felt bad. I would have loved to have been able to send all entrants a copy. Sadly I’m not a super rich person.

Before the expo had started I had arranged to buy a well played copy of the 2011 out of print Gears of War board game by FFG. It was much cheaper and affordable than a good quality one, which often goes for nearly £400. The exchange of plastic and cardboard for paper went smoothly. I had also agreed to do a similar thing for Marcin because a couple of people he was buying from were at the expo on the days he wasn’t. The shop & drop is important for these sort of deals so you aren’t carrying them around all day.

When I was gaming with Charlene and Diego on the bank holiday Monday, Charlene mentioned that there was a card game of the game I was talking about. A day later could I remember what game it was? Nope. Nor could Charlene. But dang when I was browsing the stalls at the expo and saw the Gears of War card game it instantly clicked thus was the game Charlene had mentioned.

My highlight of the show has to be the people/friends I met and gaming with them.

On the first day of the expo I got to play some games with Harrison and Ben. Which was great fun. Life has meant Ben and I haven’t been able to play anything for a while. So to be able to sit down and play some new to me games such as Robotrick and Charms was great fun. We had a blast lots of Banter, and a very funny fact about Ben came to light.

Day two say me playing an Inventors of the South Tigris with Sarah and Luke. Sorry can’t remember their friends name who was also playing. I think I held my own in the game seeing as I was the only one who hadn’t played any of the previous games in the series. Then got to do the Yonder demo with them later in the day. I really liked Yonder and will be backing it when it hits Kickstarter. It was a half hour demo that flew by. I was wanting to play more of the game.

In the evening Charlene invited me to join her family for the evening meal, and then playing some games back at the hotel with them. That was a great evening. Although I will say I hadn’t been to Nando’s for a couple of decades, and their extra hot sauce is not hot. I felt it was more salty than anything. They definitely hadn’t used reapers or scorpions for the extra hot sauce.

The last day of the show I managed to rope Colin into doing the Star Wars Unlimited demo with me so I could get a play set of the Grogu promo card. There was a pleasant surprise because not only did we get the promo I wanted. But the demo person also gave us each a promo card of the leader we were playing.

For two days I bumped into my friend Jamie. I hadn’t seen him for a few months. So it was good to catch up briefly. He did tell me about the games shop in March running a weekly Star Wars Unlimited event on a Sunday. Which works great for me because that is normally my day off.

This year I returned to the Fort Dunlop Travelodge for my accommodation. I went with the standard plus room, that includes the Wi-Fi and a coffee machine, and paid for the all you could eat buffet breakfast. My room was on the tenth floor and had a great view.

Obviously I took some bacon and sausages with me to the expo, along with a couple of sachets of ketchup and mayo from the buffet. This was my filling for the wraps I had with me. That was lunch taken care of for the day.

Ok I ate at the hotel Thursday evening, and with Charlene and family Saturday. Which meant Friday night saw me sitting on a bench outside the hotel with my peak ignition stove(the pizo ignition no longer working), titanium pot, and 6 bean chilli. Apparently the hotel staff had found it humorous that I had done this. Hey I had an awesome chilli.

I thought this worked well, and sets up camping for the expo another year really well.

I hadn’t really gone to the expo with any particular aims or games to get. The plan was to take things as they came. The only organised thing, a first for me was the game and demo with Sarah. However I enjoy the freedom of having no real plans.

I had a great expo, missed Jonathan not being there. But understand why. Looking forward to next year. Time to start planning.

And now lots of photos to end the post with.

UPDATE: forgot to add the organisers released the attendance figures for this year. Can’t remember last years figures. But I’m guessing by the organisers statement this is the highest attended yet.