Allow me to share with you the Nostalgia Nerd story of Play Expo Blackpool 2018.
A story of excitement, tiredness, shock, further tiredness, wind and glee.
It starts in Norwich at 4.30pm on Saturday 10th Feburary 2018, with myself and Stuart
Ashen as we prepare for the 6 hour journey to the other side of the UK.
As it happens, this journey was rather pleasant.
I'd hired a car for the occasion.
A Volkswagen Golf, and it was incredibly nice all round.
That is, apart from the Sat-nav, whose voice seemed to emit from a muffled potato bag.
She also insisted on using the term "Turn half left", which I was unsure how to perform,
given any turn left, is indeed, a turn left.
Another favourite was...
PREPARE TO DRIVE RIGHT.
Adding a sense of disturbing urgency to motorway lane changes.
ANYWAY...
Our destination was soon enough upon us, and by god, if someone had of warned me of unbelievable
Blackpool winds, I still wouldn't have been ready for the unbelievable Blackpool winds.
The Norbreck castle was our destination.
A vast, sprawling hotel which resembles a castle built by DIY Dave, from the local ad-trader
magazine.
We arrived for check in at approximately 10.30, with myself reaching reception first.
I was then handed a keycard for a shared twin room, for myself and Mr. Ashen.
Which was a LITTLE BIZARRE, and somewhat unexpected.
But what was more unexpected was the room itself.
I don't know if it's possible to have a room with greater wind volume than the building
exterior, but by god.
This one did.
It also had no heating, and was all round disturbing.
Myself and Mr. Ashen then proceeded to catch the end of the Saturday night party, where
we met various tremendous people, such as the Retro Hour podcast guys, Kim Justice,
DJ Slopppppeeeee, Ms Mad Lemon, Kieran Hawkin (aka Retro Laird), Mr. Biffo (just before
he headed to bed), and the almighty OCTAVIUS KITTEN...
Who was the only person I actually got a photo of before my phone battery died.
I can't stress how incredibly nice ALL of these people are... but then, the room situation
once again dawned, and it was decided to try and find alternative accommodation... because,
clearly we're fussy bastards.
This ultimately ended in a 2 hour tour around Blackpool finding hotels, which were all booked,
whereby Stuart gave up and stayed in Norbrek's windiest room, but I soldiered on, and thankfully
found somewhere else, with heating, and without the wind.
I should note that other people had no issues with their Norbrek rooms, so I presume we
just got the very, very, very short straw.
Which was nice.
SUNDAY.
After an hour of sleep, the panel day had arrived.
But it began with meeting some other tremendous folks, such as Andrew from the Back Office,
and even some of my patrons, which was extremely pleasing.
Some kind of 10am cabaret performance then kicked off, which disturbed me enough to head
to the main room.
The arcade area of the exhibition was vibrant and rammed even this early in the AM, and
was really something to behold.
So many cabinets, so little time.
In what seemed like minutes, it was time for our Youtube panel, of which I obtained zero
footage.
But thankfully, some other splendid folks did, and you can go and view it if you'd like
to.
I believe it'll also be on the Retro Hour podcast in the imminent future.
You can also catch the ZX Spectrum, DMA Design and Oliver Twins talks, all of which I regretfully
missed.
With the panel over, this left a few more hours to sign some of Ashen's Attack of the
Flickering Skeleton's books, check out the trading floor, meet further truly splendid
people, have a jolly around the home systems, including Kim testing her skill with Bomb
Jack, have a quick chat to the Oliver Twins, who are just incredibly fun to hang around
with, and then grab several bites to eat from the green room, before beginning the 6 hour
trip back to Norwich.
It should be noted I was almost asleep on this return journey, but the sheer mite of
the Golf led us on to victory, and home was achieved.
and that, my friends, is my experience of Blackpool's Play Expo 2018.
I
must say, the highlight for me, was just meeting so many people from the Retro community, who
really are the nicest people you could ever hope to meet.
I do apologise that I can't offer any more footage, mainly because I was absolutely and
completely slack on this occasion, but if you'd like to see more, check out the links
I've included below for a more detailed look at this weekend of frivolous entertainment.