Insomnia 64 - am I a gamer girl now?

The answer to that is quite frankly, no. No, I am not a gamer girl. At least not a good one. But, disregarding my status as a total *noob for a day, my eyes were opened to the world of gaming at Insomnia 64.

*a noob is someone who is inexperienced in activity involving computers, games and technology, so, basically me.

Insomnia 64 is a gaming festival taking place at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham. It started on Good Friday and finishes on April 22nd, allowing games fans a full week to come and compete in all sorts of tournaments.

I went to the convention on Easter Sunday. Forget the eggs, we wanted games.

When we arrived, there was a Tetris tournament playing live on a big screen, with some gaming YouTuber calling up members of the audience to compete. It was insanely bright. It took my eyes a little while to adjust to all the flashing lights and garish colours of all the Nintendo stalls and screens.

Boys and girls alike participated equally in the tournaments and games, dressed in Mario leggings, Walking Dead t-shirts and flat-caps. Unfortunately, I'd left my baseball cap in the car, so felt as though I stood out as a lost little non-gamer.

My lack of interest in the gaming sphere may have you questioning why I was at such an event instead of sitting out in the glorious sunshine. Turns out there needed to be a second responsible adult for my younger cousins. I thought I would give some of the games a go, but my general interest in this area is fairly minimal.

Don't get me wrong, I was a fan of Animal Crossing and I love a good game of Solitaire nowadays, but any games with guns and bad guys are completely beyond me. I just don't understand them.

I decided to jump in with some un-intimidating, familiar games by Nintendo. I chose to be Link (from Zelda) in Smash Bros, and lost significantly. Then I won four mini-games in a row on Super Mario Party and was incredibly proud of myself. My cousins were impressed, but annoyed that I had swooped in and won having not played the game before.

Once I had super-sucked playing Splatoon, a game where you have to shoot paint and move through it to avoid the opposing team, we headed over to the Retro Games section.

I really liked it. There were old school TVs hooked up to all sorts of original Mario games and classic Space Invaders games on table top screens. Plus, I had a hell of a time revisiting Tekken, a fighting game that I used to play on Playstation.

It was really cool to see all of these people playing together, supporting each other in tournaments and getting really involved. I'm not sure I'll ever understand the world of gaming in the way that these committed gamers do, but #i64 did open my eyes to the community behind the gaming scene.

There were people giving out 'pay what you think it's worth' massages, for those true gamers who have been sat there for hours getting a crick in their neck and tension in their shoulders. Amazing.

Other stalls there were filled with all sorts of merchandise, ranging from X-Men keyrings, Mario hats, Assassin's Creed T-shirts and Dragonball mystery boxes for £30.

At around 3pm there was a Cosplay show on stage, where people came out dressed as game characters and performed a 30 second stint in front of a live audience.

And that's where you lost me.

I understand Cosplay being a big deal. People take a lot of time and effort to make their costumes as accurate as possible, and the people on stage took it very seriously. There were songs, dances, and even scripts from games for the contestants to truly commit to the character.

I just didn't get it. It felt awkward - a little bit like those weird auditions you see on Britain's Got Talent. I had no idea what I was watching.

The audience however, cheered them on regardless.

Insomnia was a surprisingly good experience for me. As I said, gaming is really not a scene that I am into, so I expected to feel overwhelmed by the event and stick out like a sore thumb in amongst all of these talented gamers.

But, I was entertained by the games that I played and fascinated by the crowd that surrounded me. It wasn't nearly as intense as I'd expected.

I am not good enough at games to be a gamer, but I am taking my status as champion of four Mario Party mini-games, and because I attended a convention I'm obviously a true gamer girl now...

I lie. I can just about manage Mario games but anything else just does not do it for me. I could practice at home, but any XBox games that have first person shooter or when you dive into the map on Fortnite, it makes me dizzy. Literally motion sick.

Screens really aren't my thing.

For me, it's Game Over, but for all those other gamers out there, I say fair play. It seems a tiresome commitment and not one I would bend my neck over, but that's just me.

For you lot, it's Game On.

May the best player win.