Our friend James, who used to be such a nice, sensible lad, has been sucked into one of the strangest little subcultures that hide in the dusty corners of boardgame geekdom - the Advanced Squad Leader hobby. He actually travelled up to Blackpool recently to spend a weekend at an ASL conference called, appropriately, Berserk. Here's a brief post-con report from James:

I loved ASL at Blackpool. This link will take you to the site where I feature in two of the 2003 photos.

It took me six hours to drive up on Thursday afternoon and arrived at 19:00 paid the hotel bill of £20 per night (bargain), found my tutor from Bournemouth, had a drink, started my first game. I felt very welcome from the moment I got there they were a really friendly lot. Played 5 tournament games, won three lost two, so was really pleased. Lots drank eaten and played. Great.