By Marc Farrimond.

It is often said that everything that the British do, the Americans do twice as big! Well this may be the case in a lot of things but when it comes to putting on a games convention I feel that both countries come up to par. At the beginning of August this year, the US saw the annual Gen Con games convention, an event that until this year has been organised by games moguls TSR (now with Wizards of the Coast calling the shots and TSR taking a back seat) and a couple of weeks later we see the European mirror of the show Euro Gen Con being held once again at Loughborough University in the heart of England.

Games are really big business and game conventions always pull in the crowds in droves. Euro Gen Con (hereafter EGC) is one of the largest games conventions held in Europe, attracting some 8,000 gamers from all over the world to take part in card games, board games, war games and of course roleplaying games. The turn out for this years events was astounding to say the least with scores of gamers cramming the tables playing the games on offer and traders in the shows huge hall seeing record sales in the first two days.

After arriving at the convention and registering, I made my way to the main trade hall to see what new items were on offer. Things always tend to be a little slow in coming out over here in Europe and we often get games months after they have been released in the US. A few new items were on offer and causing a bit of a stir among the gamers. The Great Rail Wars for Pinnacle Entertainment’s highly successful Deadlands the Weird West was selling out fast with copies of the game in hot demand from most of the traders. Hot on its heels was the latest release from Wizards of the Coast in the successful Magic the Gathering range Visionaries. A couple of other new card games were being promoted at EGC, these being the Shadowrun CCG and the yet to be released Dune CCG based on the successful books of Frank Herbert. Both games attracted a large amount of players and seemed to go down well.

Gen-Con is known for its guest appearances and this year was no exception. English actor, Michael Shard was one of the special guest of Wizards of the Coast on Friday, just why they choose this actor is unknown but he did play the part of Admiral Ozzle in Empire Strikes Back (all 10 mins of it) but he is better known over here as Mr Bronson, the school teacher from Grange Hill a very popular kids TV show that’s been running for the past twenty years. Other guests included artists Jeff Miracola, of Magic fame, Chris Foss one of the most successful sci-fi artist ever who’s work has graced dozens of books and album covers. An old favourite at EGC Jeff Easley was back again trying to out do himself this year and break his record of over seventy sketches set last year at EGC, with all the proceeds going to charity. Doubtless to say he is one of the best artist around in the fantasy scene at the moment and people were queuing to get a Easley original of their very own.

SLA Industries artist’s Stuart Beel and Clint Langley were also on hand answering questions and sketching for people. Marc Miller the designer of Traveller the New Era, was seen floating around the show and every time I saw him myself he was besieged by droves of fans asking questions and for him to sign books. Plus lots of other celebrities from the games world were present at the show just soaking in the atmosphere and mingling with the gamers.

Wednesday saw the opening of the show with all the tickets being available to RPGA members only. The annual meeting of the RPGA kicked off the whole show with members finding out just what directions Wizards of the Coast were going to take the European RPGA network in. Then the RPGA Tournament’s took place followed by a very lively and fun quiz which quizzed the knowledge of members on sci-fi, gaming, and even cult TV.

Thursday saw the show really kick off properly as the doors were opened to non RPGA members. The Magic: The Gathering Labyrinthe Challenge Cup was up for grabs and for the very first time in Europe we got a look at the latest offering from TSR, the sci-fi game Alternity, the companies first real outing into sci-fi since Star Frontiers in the early 80’s. After a fast paced show, with loads of games being played, the scene was wound down in the bars with the Live Action RPG Living City. Over 150 players took part and made this one of the most successful events of the whole convention.

Friday saw the AD&D opens with team Fun and team Serious in for some wicked adventures to claim the prize for overall open champions of 1997, with the winners getting a chance to play at US Gen Con next year in Milwaukee. Paranoia reared its ugly head as Steve Pennington a well know gamer over here ran his own warped and twisted version of Westend Games RPG, lots of clones must have hit the fan judging from the reactions of those watching.

Saturday saw lots of new arrivals and lots of frustrated traders who were running out of stock fast. More tournaments took place with the second part of the AD&D opens. More live action in the form of the LC Linear game and the AD&D Schools Competition with the winners again getting the chance to go to US Gen Con next summer all expenses paid (wish it was me!). And not one but two Vampire LARP taking place with the UK Masquerade and the Camerilla UK both running excellent adventures. Helping to round off the night was the fancy dress with a Rocky Horror Picture show theme to it, more bare flesh than you could shake a gamer at.

Sunday was marked by the sad news of the death of Princess Diana in a car crash in Paris earlier in the morning. The accident placed a cloud over the entire days proceedings and everywhere one looked people seemed to be shocked and a little downhearted. But the rest of the days events went on as scheduled with the Dragon Dice knockout competition and the Spellfire and Magic Winners Challenge cup taking place. The Camerilla UK ran another successful LARP Vampire game and after the Award Ceremony it was time to sit down and kick back until next year in the End of Con Chill in the Students Union Bar (location of many of the best events incidentally). A lot went on a EGC, far too much to write here and I have only covered what I myself could get too. Demonstration games were put on by two professional games demo companies, who were working for the two largest games distributors in Europe, Hobby Games LTD and Esvidium Games LTD. Plus a lot of small games clubs and shops played their own parts in entertaining the crowds. From wargames to roleplaying games, collectable card games to boardgames every aspect of the hobby was covered. Deadlands and Warzone caused a stir in the miniatures area, and White Wolf’s Storyteller system was packing them in the rpg’s. Magic seemed to be everywhere you looked along with some of the other CCG that are on the market these days.

And that was that. The gamers left. Traders packed up and counted their earnings and we all went home. This is by far the largest event in the European gaming calendar with more gamers attending this year (or so I'm informed) than ever before. Who knows what will happen next year. There was a lot of scepticism at just how Wizards of the Coast would take over the running of the event, but apart from the presence of a lot of CCG you would never have guessed that the events organisation had changed.