Four helpful German mädchen tried to assist me buying a tourist U bahn ticket but the machine didn’t like my credit card. I didn’t have enough coinage to try bribing the machine either. A stressful journey from Breslauer to Kolnmesse, almost went badly wrong at Neumarkt, then followed the crowd to the North entrance. My press pass got me in quickly, I walked swiftly through the temporary temples for games waiting for worshippers to arrive.

(For some reason I found the underground easier to navigate in Japan than in Germany!)

A shared appointment to see the latest Frogwares Sherlock Holmes, they let me demonstrate my uselessness at controlling the game using a game pad! I found the interface too disorientating.

I frequented the sushi bar again to keep me going through lunchtime, this time having more pieces, and a cereal bar for dessert.

The lunchtime belonged to Daedalic Entertainment. A presentation of the Whispered World sequel Silence, then Fire starring a caveman with very limited vocabulary, then Blackguards 2 (a sequel to the RPG Blackguards which revises the ruleset and other features, then Kevin Mentz’s The Devil’s Men which like Dreamfall Chapters offers the player choices to be made. Daedalic were generous with PR material but it added to my rucksack’s weight and bulkiness! I was very lucky to be able to interview Kevin Mentz as he designed Memoria which I found a deliciously bittersweet game.

Andreas Heldt and Michelle Waschk of Z-Software told me about their upcoming game History in Letters - The Eternal Alchemist which is what I would call an Adventure lite game.

The last interview of Gamescom was with Jonas Kyratzes, who’s working with Croteam on The Talos Principle. The website says “Game is dealing with philosophical issues of transhumanity”. Jonas is a very thoughtful guy, a creator of idea rich indie games.

Got soaked walking back from Gamescom as the journey ended in a thunderstorm, and to my deep regret chickened out of the Adventure Treff party and instead found a nearby Trattorio - here the table had a bottle of balsamic vinegar and olive oil on it for the bread.