I wanted to be smart, hack the system, and make an awesome Essen experience this year. It turned out, I am not that smart. It turned out, I ruined everything.

It was my 12th Essen. I figured out Portal Games is a pretty big publisher. I have an amazing team. They don’t need me anymore. They can run the show. They can build the booth, bring the product, sell the product, organize a demo team, do it all. Finally, I can step back.

So I did. I decided I will arrive on Thursday evening so I will be at the show on Friday and Saturday only. On Sunday morning, I planned to come back home. What a wonderful plan it was!

It started bad very quickly.

Detective got nominated for innoSpiel award and the ceremony took place on Thursday afternoon, at Spiel. Along with Deutcher Spiele Preis – Detective made it to the list and won 6th. place. Prestigious, class ceremony with all the press and media from Germany. But you know, Ignacy had this awesome plan for Essen, right? Small faux pas, huh? Luckily, my German publisher, Pegasus Spiele knew how to act. They accepted both awards on my behalf.

Things escalated quickly. On Friday morning I received a printed plan for my meetings. I looked at it and gasped. My first meeting was at 9:30 am, my last meeting was at 6:30 pm. Altogether 16 (sixteen!) meetings packed every half an hour. 'What is this?’ I asked Greg. 'I had to fit all the meetings in only two days. What did you expect?’

Awesome Essen experience, that’s what I expected. Not being stuck in the tiny office for nine hours straight.

’Here are cookies from a fan’
’Trzewik, everybody asks for you’
’Zee was here, was looking for you’
’Rodney was here, was looking for you’
’Here is a gift from a fan from France’
’Everybody asks for you’
’Trzewik, that was a bad idea. Everybody asks for you’

Yeah, tell me about bad ideas. I know it all.

In the meantime, it turns out we were publishing on social media the wrong date for my seminar. All our fans are confused. Some come to our booth asking about seminar. We explain it takes place on Saturday, not on Friday as we were informing on our social media. Awesome Essen experience.

I am entering the booth office again, but before that I grab Marek. 'Take Pret-a-Porter, go to the BGG booth and prepare the presentation, set up everything. I have a meeting now, and right after the meeting, I will run to the BGG booth. The live stream starts right after I finish this meeting. Prepare everything so I can start the demo the moment I am there. It’s gonna be tight.’ He grabs Pret-a-Porter and goes to BGG booth. I have a meeting. I finish the meeting. I run. The live stream starts in a few minutes. I take no prisoners – I trip over people, I act like an elephant, I have one goal – run, Ignacy, run!

When I reach, Marek smiles.

’You had it wrong in the calendar. Live starts in 50 minutes.’

Very freaking funny.

I guess, I just won a special price – I can visit the restroom for the first time today.

Back to the BGG booth. Live stream with Rodney. Great time, he knows Pret-a-Porter – it is so much easier to discuss the game and present to the audience when Rodney asks me good questions, knowing how to teach the game. In the meantime, I drop the bomb and make reference to the classic joke about Rodney and his tutorial video for Star Wars Rebellion. Rodney loses it for a few seconds. Well executed Ignacy.

Run. Back to the booth. Late for a meeting. One more meeting. End of the day. It’s Friday evening. The second day of the Essen. I saw no Essen. We are in the car. My team complains on me. 'People are asking about you all the time. You should be at the booth.’

I know. I know. Awesome Essen experience. What was I thinking?

***

Saturday starts. I try to be at the booth as much as possible. I sign games. I take selfies with fans. I take all the meetings fast and efficient. I have two double-booked meetings because of another calendar mistake. Hours pass. Finally, it is 3 pm. We run for a seminar. Spiel invited me to run seminar about 20 years of Portal Games. We are in Germany. We are at Essen. I am a guest speaker for Spiel. I prepared a nice and civil version of my Gen con seminar. And then the files on the computer are gone, somehow I have only half of the prepared slides. I need to improvise. I can improvise. I am best when I improvise. The only problem, no longer I am nice and civil. With every minute the seminar is more and more funny and less and less nice and civil.

I get my applause. After the seminar, fans from the audience are coming to me saying it was the funniest seminar they ever attended at any game convention. I am pretty happy with the outcome. Then, about an hour later I meet Max from Spiel. He says that the seminar was recorded and will be published by Spiel on their official channels. Well, that’s exactly why I should stick to the slides, be nice and civil. That’s exactly why…

Anyway, I run again. We have a live stream for Essen Spiel. I am supposed to play with Tom Vasel. We run to hall 6. In the hall there is no booth number as mentioned in the email. I double-check the email. Ah, that’s the booth number they used last year. No idea where they are this year. I sit at the booth and wait.

Few minutes later Max from Spiel rushes to Portal booth, looks at me and yells: „Ignacy, where are you, Vasel is waiting!” I answer in the most stupid way possible: „Where are YOU?! I was looking for you in a hall…” We run. We reach the booth. They are doing me makeup. 'Where is the game?’ Andreas asks. 'What game?’ I ask. 'The game you should play with Tom.’ Ah, that game…

They run. I sit with Tom and chit chat pretending everything is fine. In the meantime Max tries to convince Portal employees they need to get him copy of Empires of the North and they need to give it to him NOW!

We play the game. It’s fun, a ton of jokes, plays quick, I lose. Damn it.

Go back to the booth. Pizza party with our amazing Portal Gamers team. Jokes, selfies, beer. And the German security guard. 'You have no right to have a party here.’
’Yes, we do’
’No, you don’t’
’Yes, we do’
’No, you must stop now and leave the hall’
’Ignacy don’t argue. The party is over.’
We say sorry to our team. We clean the party. We go back to the apartment. We check in the emails. We did have the right to have a party, we did all the paperwork and payments. Something went wrong on the Essen side. Pity. Ruined our fun time with our friends volunteers.

On Sunday I come to the booth to say goodbye to our team. Shake hands with volunteers and that’s it. I am leaving Essen. I feel terrible. I bought 3 games. I missed all friends. I missed all the Essen. I failed my fans. I ruined Essen for myself.

No more. No more. Never again 2 day Essen.

How was YOUR Essen?