Games Day 2012

Yesterday I spent the day at the NEC outside Birmingham at UK Games Day 2012 - which I realised was actually my 18th Games Day in a row!

I had a great day, which began with me chatting to John Blanche - Warhammer (40K) visionary and Sorcery! artist.

 John Blanche - the master.

And it didn't end there... I also got to meet Jes Bickham - new editor of the brand new White Dwarf - and whilst chatting to him, the original editor of White Dwarf, Ian Livingstone, turned up with a folder full of archive material (including old Games Day programmes and a copy of Owl and Weasel).

Jes Bickham - new editor of White Dwarf, and the man who commissioned this...

The old and the new - no offence, Ian.

I spent quite some time in the Design Studio area chatting to the likes of Dave Andrews (former Fighting Fantasy cartographer), Jervis Johnson (living legend of games design), Robin Cruddace (author of the awesome Tomb Kings army book).

Dave Andrews - drew the maps in Out of the Pit, donchaknow?

Then it was on to the retail zone where I caught up with George Mann (BL head honcho) and Eddie Eccles (who used the word 'dozens' when describing how many copies of Herald of Oblivion he had sold), before heading over to the Black Library area for a good chat with the likes of editors Christian Dunn, Laurie Goulding, Lindsey Priestley, and fellow authors Graham McNeill and Jim Swallow.

Path to Victory gamebooks - sold quite well, or so I hear.

With time flying by, like a journey through the Warp, I headed to the Forge World area to say hello to Alan Bligh and Talima Fox, before ending the day (briefly) catching up with Dan Abnett and Nik Vincent, and saying an all too brief hello to rising star Josh Reynolds.

I came away feeling thoroughly inspired and can't wait to get started on some of the projects that were discussed today.

So here's to UK Games Day 2013!