Music-lovers have Glastonbury and Reading festivals, football fans the World Cup – while computer gamers have Insomnia.
This multi-day event takes over the National Exhibition Centre three times a year – the venue invaded not by rock fans laden down with camping gear and cider, but gamers carrying their own computers. And, yes, camping gear too – the serious devotees pitching tents inside the venue and logging on in a huge LAN hall for, what at Easter, is a four-day long extravaganza.
There are reputations at stake in the tournaments, but for most gamers it’s all just a great chance to find out what’s new in the industry, play a few games, pick up some cool new stuff and – the big one – meet your heroes.
Turn up at a music festival and you won’t be allowed anywhere near the headliners, but at Insomnia the country’s biggest YouTubers are happy to sit for hours and meet a procession of fans – who happily wait up to three hours for a handshake, signed poster and, of course, a selfie.
This year’s big names included Tom Syndicate (aka Mancunian Tom Cassell), who has 10 million YouTube subscribers and many more on his Twitch.tv channel Syndicate.
Also meeting the fans were chirpy young upstart MarzBarVlogs.
But it’s more than just big names. Turning up on the Saturday, this Insomnia seemed particularly busy, with beefed-up VR area and retro gaming zone – bringing back memories of hours spent playing Mario Karts on Nintendo or Space Invaders on Atari before that. There was also more Cosplay – with a cool costume contest on the main stage.
If you’re a gamer, you’d have loved it, if not, you won’t have had a clue. There’s no doubt though, this is the new rock & roll.
TIM HUGHES
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