Having had time to recover and reflect on the retroball i'll tell you how I see it:

An absolute great weekend, as I'm sure you can all imagine I have had many, MANY great/lost weekends - but this one really does go straight to the top of the pile!

All you guys who attended need to give yo'selves a pat on the back - 'cos although Chris, Pete, and I organised it, a big chunk of you actually turned up and made it what it was. Everyone I met both forum mates and total strangers were all warm and chilled out making for the coolest atmosphere at any event I've attended (admittedly only 3 :roll: )

Guys of note:

Mike the shmuppet - great guy, had met him once before but got to spend a bit more time drinking and gaming with him this time! what can we say I think everyone saw his shmup skillz and he even found it in his heart to perfect me on street fighter II even tho' I was so drunk I think I was playing it on kongo Bongo drums :oops: A big thanks to Mike for running the zone (pretty much single handed after bar opening times :wink: ) but also for driving me to and from the venue!

RS200 'the yeti' - This guy is like 8 foot tall! and his enthusiasm was just as big, he was well and truly stuck into the wire gubbins before I even arrived on the Friday! was great to meet him, pretty damn funny for a tall guy

Rossi & Turrican ‘the jocks’ – well I was on the door when 2 people that could only be these guys walked in! and were the consummate Scottish retro gamers, big on the drink and big on the laughs! Yet another massive boost to the event thanks guys it was great meeting you.

Donkeyspank ‘mr swarve’ – this guy smooched in looking like some sort of ‘midlands james bond’ he truly could have been the milk tray bloke! A very funny chap indeed made me laugh plenty (although what concerns me was a PM from one of his mates that I didn’t get to read in time before the ball – asking me to speak to DS about an incident at work)

Barry, Tom, Rich and Pete ‘retropassion’ – Wouldn’t be an event without these guys ‘cos it’s the ‘pikey chariot’ that makes it a true retro event – thanks guys (especially tom beating me on outrun2 about to days ahead of me)

Andy ‘consolepassion’ – A great guy many thanks to him for his support and sponsorship of the event, I mean the guy made it to the event days after having some crazy altitude sickness that made his lungs come out of his nose! Now that’s class and on top of that he drank as much as me.

Muguk ‘the genius’ – this guy is and techno gubbins KING, I’m sure at one point he had built a new front end for my xbox with a beer mat and 2 elastic bands! I keep saying it but another true pleasure to meet the man!

XP ‘alzo’ – Didn’t see enough of the graphics guy himself, but when I did he was great! Another scot, which added to the whole feel of the event

Darren from gamesT……..er…..I mean retrogamer – Got to have a drink with the guy who actually got corpsie in the new retrogamer! What a guy! And true to form I will be subscribing, as was the deal, cheers Darren!

Finally Pete & Chris ‘the guys’ – A huge thanks to these 2 for organising such a great event with me. Thanks to chris for how many lifts to and from places he gave me as well as letting me be involved in the event and retrofusion magazine. As for Pete? the man did pretty much every job at one point or another, truly keeping the event running as smoothly as possible (and still found time to beat me at outrun2) cheers Pete.

Everyone else involved or attended – THANK YOU! Celebs, a chunk of my family/friends, Ms Koops all helped the event be a success, I’f I’ve missed you out and think I should mention ya’ PM me and I’ll be happy to edit this post (as although fully recovered the weekend is still a bit of a blur)

My last word – Would love to do it all again (just not for a while) I didn’t really get that much gaming in TBH however the social side of it really gave me a buzz which truly made it worth while

Cheers suckas!

Actually I had fully recovered from my altitude sickness, I had suspected Malaria :wacko:

Can you mail me so I can send you that E-Mail about Africa - I promised you a copy but I can't find your addy anywhere...

Had a *monster* hangover yesterday - started again when I got back to Blackpool and managed to polish off a bottle of Moet & Chandon at 2AM. Thank God I had yesterday off work, I was dying!

AndyB