Colours 2023 Report

[Colonel Kilgore]

I thought Colours was a pretty good show today. There were some complaints from some traders about lower footfall / takings, but it felt pretty busy and one of the organisers told me that entries were better smoothed out during the day than usual, with the entrance desk only shutting at 15:30.

There were a number of good-looking demonstration and participation games in various scales and genres. The traders were mostly the usual bunch. I was sad not to see The Last Square or the Plastic Soldier Company, though.

The availability and choice of food (sandwiches, pies, other hot options) was much better than a few years ago when there were long queues and the food ran out. The free jugs of iced water at the bar were also much appreciated.

Simon

[Colonel Kilgore]

Martin and Stewart attracted a good deal of interest and participation with PP's new Conquerors & Kings "nearly there" game.

Martin's new Macedonians featured strongly, and very nice they are too. Several people told me how they prefer the "open hand" option that these figures feature.

The new PP ancient scenery ("Greek" temple and a multipurpose L-shaped building) looked good and suitably "Ancient".

I'd attach a few photos of the game in action, but seem.to have lost the option to do so on this app from my phone...

Simon

[Colonel Kilgore]

Miles's German Tank Factory game looked very nice, after all the work that he had put into it recently.

Many people commented favourably on the  buildings, gantry crane, trains and "fantasy tanks"  on display. Less so on my German infantry force... 

We managed to play three whole turns in between lots of talking to friends and passers-by.

There is more tweaking to do from the gaming aspect, but already it's achieved its aims as a show game, by providing a visually attractive and eye-catching board that solicited lots of conversation.

Simon

[John Watson]

A good day. PP games looked good. Miles has certainly put a lot of work into the Factory Game to good effect. Well done Miles. I'm sure the footfall was down. Possibly partly because of the weather and partly because of the cost of living effect. Thanks to the Newbury club members who help us load up the book stall I was working on, at the end. This is one side of the show that most people don't see or appreciate.
John

[Sean Clark]

Here are two action shots. Stewart and Nigel in deep conversation and Martin also deep in conversation.

Seems like Simon is deep in thought and Miles is coming up with a desperate plan.

Talking is good!

[Smiley Miley 66]

Thanks to All that was there on the day.
From where I was Sat it looked quite busy. As Simon says we did get a lot of interest with people looking and Taking Pictures of our game.
Still quite a bit to be done, but I did manage to make the board "presentable" for the show. (So many bits to set up!)
I do agree with John the cost of living has had an effect. The only reason I was their was to put on the game, I personally couldn't afford to actually dare to look too far as my money is very short at the moment!
But lots of people came up and thru, lots of people took interest in the game, some we had chats too.
I think overall "our" little bit of PP and RFCM territory generated a fair bit of interest from people.
Of course it was very hot( hottest day of the year!)
But unfortunately unlike John I didn't find the men in yellow T shirts quite as helpful, one even damaged one of my boards ! But ha ho. It's repairable, so life goes on.
Miles

[Colonel Kilgore]

Here are a few photos of the official PP participation game - Conquerors & Kings, with the Macedonians playing some hairy barbaric army:

[Colonel Kilgore]

I didn't get photos of most of the many other nice games on show.

Here are a couple:

1) some kind of Samurai-with-magic skirmish game by the Too Fat Lardies, on a lovely table:



2) a 2mm Ancients game that attracted a lot of vocal participation!

[Colonel Kilgore]

And finally a few from the Factory Game, hopefully showing some of the fine detail that Miles has added to the board and buildings:



















Simon

[Traffic]

I thought it was a good show.  The amount of games both demo and participation was up on what I have seen previously. They all wanted 15-30 mins of your time and there was just not enough time to get and look at everthing.  Good chat with Miles at the Factory game.  The car park was rammed full but the event didn't seem busy.  The worst queue was the bring and buy as you would expect.  Overall an excellent event.

[Sean Clark]

Lovely pictures and well done to Martin for getting all of that scenery finished in time for the show.

[Sean Clark]

A video report of Colours. Peter Pig appear around the 10:30 mark. Unfortunately, the videographer says that Miles' game is 28mm   

I've left a message on the channel to correct him.

[Colonel Kilgore]

Nice smile for the camera, Stewart 

Sean, maybe the videographer meant that 28mm would have been the right scale to play CK in? 

Simon

[martin goddard]

A very good show report.
Most stuff covered.
This is the sort of review that shows the whole of the show.  Well done Graham



martin