Interviews// Play Expo 2012: The New Kid on the Block

The UK could be getting its very own Penny Arcade Expo after all, thanks to the great North. The chaps behind Play Expo have a similar community-driven background, with a grassroots story in its past Replay events that has allowed it to grow to become one of the biggest expos in the country. And certainly in the North, where there is literally no representation.

For Business Development Director Gordon Sinclair, Play Expo - held in Manchester in October this year - represents an event that’s an order of magnitude greater than anything the team has ever done before. Rather than a sole focus on retro gaming, there will be four major zones - Now.Play for the latest games, Re.Play for retro games, Cos.Play for costume contests and Pro.Play for LAN gaming and tournaments.

I talk with Gordon about the rise of the expo and how getting people together and being social can be a great USP for events such as these. Read on...


SPOnG: Could you briefly run through the history of the Play Expo - how it came to be, and your beginnings in hosting events like this?

Gordon Sinclair: Taking it right back to the beginning, many many years ago, I went to a farmer’s market and saw someone selling a Dreamcast. I’d never had a Dreamcast before so I picked it up, paid a fiver, and realised how great it was. And it got me thinking about all the old machines that I used to have. I went to a few car boot sales, trawled through eBay, found all sorts of stuff and started to amass a collection of systems.

Then I started going on a few forums about retro gaming, and that was amazing - that there was a whole world of people who just wanted to discuss the old machines and games. It really excited me, because to be honest I don’t play that many games, but I love to talk about them. I’m far more interested in the community aspect and social side of gaming, rather than sitting down and playing for hours in your bedroom.

So that was great, and through that we heard of some small events that people were putting on. There was one in Glossop and one in Leamington Spa, and they had about 70-100 people coming to them. They were set in the back room of a pub with a few systems, just letting people drink and talking about games. They were great, and we really had some good fun at these events.

A good friend of ours decided to put on another event, which was bigger. He had 300 people turn up to his, in Stoke. We supported him and helped him out with some of the kit, because myself and Dave (Moore) had started to amass quite big collections of our own. We helped out with that... then as soon as that finished, we came away and I was wondering who’s turn it was next to stage an event.


SPOnG: That was when you decided to make your first event, right?

Gordon Sinclair: Yeah. I came to the conclusion that maybe I should give it a go. I held Retro Reunited in Huddersfield. What I wanted to do with that show was take it out of the pub back room and put it somewhere nice - actually make it a bit glitzier too. We hosted the event in a really nice hotel, and that was fantastic. 400 people turned up to that, which was great because that was just me deciding to do something because I wanted to.


SPOnG: For a small event such as that, you must have been surprised at the turnout - and the money you made back on staging it!

Gordon Sinclair: There were no thoughts of making any money from it. Actually, any surplus from that event that we had made from ticket prices went to charity.


SPOnG: So how did these two events evolve into Replay?

Gordon Sinclair: Dave got in touch with me while I was doing Retro Reunited, and decided to do a sister show in a different hall. So Dave did Acorn World at the same time. That teamwork really paid off. Dave and I then decided to really get involved and push the bar higher - we went to Blackpool and looked at a hotel. But we were wondering about how many people we could get to Blackpool. We had 400 before, so we went with 700.

Discussions were going great with the hotel, but then the venue had a change of manager and all of a sudden there was this pushback. The new manager said that they couldn’t risk us having the whole hotel just in case they didn’t make any money from the bar and all these other reasons. After they got cold feet, we went up the road and found Norbreck Castle, which has its own exhibition centre attached to it. We were just blown away by the size.


SPOnG: With a huge exposition hall, you must have been nervous about the price of hire.

Gordon Sinclair: Well, we thought 700 might be a stretch, but we actually needed 2000 people to turn up to this one, just to break even! So we were a bit concerned, but we did it anyway because... that’s what you do. 3500 people turned up, and it was just incredible. Above all else, we were surprised by how much of a professional job we could do. That’s when we thought, if we could do a professional job, why aren’t we professionals? That’s when Replay Events was born.


SPOnG: That’s a big step - to go from those events to launching a professional organisation.

Gordon Sinclair: Dave and I realised that we needed some help, sure. We couldn’t do it on our own. Andy (Brown), who runs a retro gaming retailer called Console Passion, had been our primary sponsor for the last couple of events. He was really keen on getting involved, so the three of us decided to form a partnership. Our next Replay event was... just unbelievable. To think that we could go from this one event, where we were panicking about getting done, to the next one which expanded everything... it just blew our minds.


SPOnG: That must have felt good.

Gordon Sinclair: We actually felt like we were doing a good job and not just bumbling along, you know? And that’s good, because once you formalise it into a company, you’ve got to be careful. You wonder about what happens if you just keep making the same mistakes. We’ve got responsibilities now, this is an actual business... but it’s just been going fantastically, and I’ve got to say, I’m now actually enjoying myself when organising these events, when I used to be panicking and stressing out all the time.


SPOnG: What made you choose Manchester for Play Expo?

Gordon Sinclair: We realised that we reached our peak in Blackpool. You can’t get more people to go there. We got 4500 people to come before, which was brilliant, but if we want 10,000 people we have to go somewhere else. You can’t get the publisher support otherwise, because they want somewhere major on the map, one of the big cities.

So we really had a choice - Birmingham, where GameFest was held last year while we were starting to plan this, so Birmingham was probably out. London was out - partly because of Eurogamer Expo and partly just because of cost.

So where in the North can you go? I’m from Manchester, so my vote was always going to be there! Andy’s from Blackpool, so he was disappointed to be moving away from there [laughs]! But we could have tried Leeds, Newcastle... and we even contemplated Edinburgh. Looking at the opportunities we had and the space that we needed though, Manchester was just ideal.

It’s not cheap, but that’s the kind of risk we’re willing to take because we have a loyal following and we know the scope and opportunities that are there. So we’re really excited.


SPOnG: You grew a bit of a loyal audience with the Replay brand - why change the name?

Gordon Sinclair: We decided to change the name because we don’t want to be seen as purely retro gaming this time around. Retro gaming is only going to be a quarter of this show, but it’s important to note that this retro gaming quarter is bigger than our last Replay event. So we’re actually expanding, but then we’re massively expanding around that as well.

There’ll be more retro systems than we’ve ever had before, but then we’ll have miles more space for modern games too... the cosplay is an element that’s quite interesting to get involved in. I went to a cosplay Japanese culture festival in Sunderland recently, which we provided some import games for to display.

It was eye-opening to see how passionate these people are. And they had 900 people turn up to this event, and it was the first time they had ever had an event like this too. It was largely about people coming in costume and listening to people talk about cosplay. The people lapped it up. So we’re really excited about bringing that element into Play Expo.

Our core is always going to be the retro side. That’s where we build around, but the modern gaming is where we can bring the massive numbers. That’s what we’re keen to do now.