Boardgame News

Convention Report: Essen 2006: October 18, 2006 - Part 2 (Setup Day)

By Rick Thornquist
October 18, 2006

Here is part two of my report from the Essen game fair for Wednesday, October 18th. In this report I’m going to report on the rest of my day at the convention center. In the third part of this day’s report I’ll talk about the games I played.

After the press conference I headed back down to the convention hall where many booths were still under construction. Some of the larger booths are quite elaborate, with lights, lighting trusses, huge facades, etc, and people were working hard to get them all together. Huge piles of games on pallets dominated the aisleways. Because of these, walking down the aisles was actually a bit of an obstacle course, not to mention the trucks and forklifts that were tearing up and down with various construction materials and pallets of games.

One of the most popular activities on Wednesday is to check out the used games section of the fair. The used game dealers usually set up before everyone else - they know the exhibitors and press people here today are on the lookout for good deals. I checked them out for a while and though I saw some interesting games, there weren’t really any gems or steals to be had (at least, not that I saw). Any games that were of interest, like a copy of Chinatown, for example, were priced fairly highly. The dealers have become much more savvy than they used to be and I understand that many gems don’t even make it to the fair - those go on eBay. Your best bet with the used games dealers is to get some out of print games that perhaps are somewhat hard to find.

My next task was to pick up my pre-ordered games and games from smaller publishers. The press and exhibitors are usually too busy once the fair starts to go around getting games, so this is our opportunity to grab what we can and sock it away before the craziness starts. The big publishers have tons of stock of their games, and these can usually be picked up on the last day of the fair for reduced prices, so this activity mostly involves visiting the smaller publishers. I picked up pre-ordered versions of Fowl Play and the Reef Encounter expansion from R&D Games as well as Hameln from Fragor Games and the Kaivai expansion from Pfifficus Spiele.

It’s always tough to decide whether to pick up some of the smaller publisher’s games early or to wait. If you pick it up early it’s likely that no one has played it yet and you are taking a chance that you’ll end up with a dud. On the other hand, if you wait too long they could be all gone. I scoped out many booths and saw many games that I thought I may like, but with most of them I decided to wait until I either play them or get some feedback from others before I take the plunge.

While walking around the fair today I did see quite a familiar faces that are well known in the gaming community. I saw many publishers, designers, reviewers and others - many who have become friends. I took pictures of a few of them (see below) and I’m sure I’ll you’ll be seeing pictures of more familiar faces in the days to come.

Later in the afternoon, the boys and girls at Fragor Games hosted a little pre-convention party where they plied us with Scottish Mead and cookies (no Mead for me - just apple juice!). Lots of the usual suspects where there: Greg Schloesser, Stuart Dagger, James Miller, Ward Batty, Ted Alspach, Alan Moon, Richard Borg, Jason Matthews, Patrick Korner and many others. It was fun seeing everybody and catching up.

Before I left the fair for the day, I went around the halls one last time and took pictures of some of the big booths in their final stages of construction (see below). Don’t worry, in upcoming days I’ll make sure I get pictures of some of the smaller booths.

With that, it was time to head back to my hotel to post the first part of today’s report. After finishing up the report it was time for dinner and some games. Stay tuned for more about that in part three of today’s report!

Pictures - Click the picture for a larger version
	Some familiar faces from around the fair - Designers Fraser and Gordon Lamont of Fragor Games
	Designer Mac Gerdts with his game Imperial
	Designer Andrea Meyer shows off her games
	Game reviewer Richard van Vugt of www.gamepack.nl
	Game newsman Knut-Michael Wolf of www.spielbox.de takes a picture of me while I take a picture of him
	Designer Marcel-André Casasola Merkle
	Designer Friedemann Friese, of course
	Designer Michail Antonow
	Designer Alan Paull
	The Grand Poobah of Gaming - Greg Schloesser
	Scott Nicholson of www.boardgameswithscott.com with his video camera at ready
	BoardGameGeeker Derk Solko
	Game newsman Erwin Broens of www.bordspel.com
	Designer Richard Breese
	Designers Andreas and Karen Seyfarth
	Some booths in the final stages of construction - Abacusspiele
	da Vinci Games
	Haba
	Amigo
	Schmidt Spiele
	Goldsieber
	Winning Moves
	Kosmos
	Days of Wonder
	Hans im Glück - Booth One
	Hans im Glück Booth Two
	Queen Games
	Alea