Last week I attended the UK Games Expo in Birmingham for the first time! As a seasoned SPIEL-attendee, I was especially curious to see how this compares. I’ve been to conventions other than SPIEL, of course, such as the Berlin Brettspiel Con, Spiel Doch! in Duisburg/Dortmund, some Dutch one I forgot the name of, and some smaller ones. But IMHO none of those are comparable.

Now that I’ve been to the UK Games Expo, I have to admit that I probably have a new favorite convention, because I enjoyed attending it even more than the now-way-too-big SPIEL. The UK Games Expo was really fun, is not too big and not too small, and the best thing: everything is in English! And everyone there was SO nice! I love it! I suppose I’m an anomaly because I’m a German living in Germany, but I’ve always despised playing games in German (same as watching movies in German). It just does not bring me joy and all I see is awkward and clumsy translations or terminology.

Having said that, I actually don’t feel like the UK Games Expo had a lot of interesting board games. I much more enjoyed checking out all the cool roleplaying games they had there, and there was quite a lot of really nice and unique stuff there. But interesting board games I didn’t see so much, which could also be a general trend in the industry. I feel that we’re past the peak of board games, and also at the last 2 SPIELs I didn’t really feel like there were any really cool new board games.

The UK Games Expo was great, and I would definitely like to go there again – next time, preferably for the whole 3 days instead of only two, and maybe I’ll also check out some of their events, because they have a lot of really cool events.

Aside from the UK Games Expo, we also explored the surrounding area a bit. I was traveling with my partner and two of our friends who are regulars in the region and know their way around. We visited the Hellfire Caves and Warwick Castle on the way to Coventry (where our hotel for the Expo was). We didn’t actually go into Birmingham, which is fine, I’ve been there and it wasn’t the most exciting city.

After our days at the Expo, we went to Nottingham, where we walked around the castle a bit, checked out The Olde Jerusalem Inn and later went to The Pit and the Pendulum, a goth-y bar that was very, very loud on a Saturday evening. The next day, we did an awesome escape room, which was actually the only officially licensed Warhammer escape room. Afterwards, we went to Warhammer World. I’m not really into Warhammer, but I do like mini painting and the exhibition was really cool.

After that we drove south, and the next morning we had a few hours to explore Canterbury before we had to catch the ferry. Canterbury was really beautiful, its center has that quaint British charm and is full of lovely old buildings. But the main attraction there is obviously the cathedral, and that was just stunning. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a cathedral as big and as awe-inspiring as Canterbury Cathedral. Sadly we only had an hour to explore there, and I feel like I have to come back and spend more time there. It was also interesting for me to visit because in university I learned a lot about the Canterbury Tales, Chaucer and Thomas Becket.

I really missed traveling in the UK, I hadn’t been there since before Brexit and it’s been way too long. I think I will definitely join the UK Games Expo again, and combine it with traveling around the British countryside like we did this time, hopefully with the same great company 😊