Utah Retro GameXpo

The Utah Retro GameXpo 2026! Coming August 7-8 2026. Get your passes now! utahretrogamexpo.com/event-passes

We would like to welcome back, a fan favorite, @johnblueriggs as a special guest of Utah Retro GameXpo 2026. John is a content creator and Game Developer and much more! Avoid the lines and get your tickets now. utahretrogamexpo.com/event-passes

We would like to welcome @BrettWeissCHVG a special guest of Utah Retro GameXpo 2026. Brett is a content creator, professional gaming writer and more. Avoid the lines and get your tickets now. utahretrogamexpo.com/event-passes

For our first announcement we would like to welcome Brian Colin as a special guest of Utah Retro GameXpo 2026. Brian is a game designer and the creator of Rampage and much more. Avoid the lines and get your tickets now. utahretrogamexpo.com/event-passes

Are you looking to sell your collection? Promote your business? Sell your artwork? Get in on a vendor table at the Utah Retro GameXpo 2026! We are starting to run low. Tables start at $275. Sign up here: utahretrogamexpo.com/vendors

@SandyofCthulhu We would love to have you tell your story at our event! I sent you a DM.

When we presented Rise of Rome to MicroSoft as a fait accompli, they were not that happy. They were used to people obeying their every whim. But they hadn’t actually forbidden us to do it. They’d just said they thought it wouldn’t sell. Did it? Well yes. It did FANTASTICALLY well. First off, it of course sold plenty of copies in its own right. I think it sold for about $25. Since it cost maybe 3% as much as Age of Empires (which went for about $50) that meant it only had to sell 6% as many copies to earn the same amount of money proportionally. But as I’d predicted, it sold more like 25-30% as many as the core game making it dollar for dollar a more successful produce. Of course we needed Age of Empires to exist for us to do this. But MicroSoft also noticed that when we started selling Rise of Rome, the sales of the core game suddenly boomed again. By this time, Age was past its first release, so was selling more slowly, but Rise of Rome perked it up almost like a new release. Then about a year later, MicroSoft bundled Rise of Rome with the core game in the “Gold Pack” and they had ANOTHER big boost in sales. It was a super-success so impressive that even MicroSoft was forced to pay attention. Then later when we were finishing up Age of Empires 2, MicroSoft came to us all pompously and said, “Experience tells us that game expansions sell really well. We demand that you do one.” We rolled our eyes, because that “experience” came from us defying them. But hey it was all good. 4/4

How Rise of Rome: The Conquerors came to pass. I had been hired to head up the new magic-based real time strategy game Sorceress, but when Age of Empires 2 got underway, management kept coming to me and asking, "Can we borrow [X] artist?" and "Hey we need [Y] programmer." and they kept stealing my personnel. After a few weeks of this, I realized I was down to just me, one programmer (Tim Deen), and one artist (Scott Winsett). While we were all talented guy, three people wasn't going to be enough for an entire RTS game, even back in 1997. So I thought about my prospects, and after discussing it with my stub of a team, I went to management and said, "We can't do a full RTS game with three people." They got nervous, because they assumed I was going to demand a bunch of folks back. But that's not how I work. I said, "What I CAN do is make an expansion pack for Age of Empires." I knew that an expansion would take a lot less effort. Plus the programming was mostly already done. Yeah I'd need some coding, but we felt one programmer (maybe with occasional help) could do it. We might need another artist at some point. 1/4

Hi Everyone, Happy New Year! I haven't been posting much. I’m trying to get better at it. As we start 2026 I wanted to post this message and say thank you for your support! If you don’t know, I am not part of a big corporation that runs events. I own, operate and do most of the planning for the Utah Retro GameXpo myself until my family, friends and volunteers can step in and help when the event starts. (If you would like to volunteer at this year’s event make sure to sign up on our website.) I am currently working on getting together the special guest lineup. I hope to bring in some guests that are a great fit and add to the value of the event. I will start announcing guests in the coming weeks. Thanks again to everyone who has supported this event in the past and I hope we can continue to make it bigger and better each year. I couldn't do any of this without you! Please tell all of your friends, family and maybe people you don’t know. Hopefully we can increase our attendance from last year and keep it going strong year after year. If you haven’t already, get your tickets now! If you have any questions or comments feel free to send them my way. - Tracy

@MetalJesusRocks 👋

I need to start thinking about what expos and conventions to hit up this year. Which ones do you recommend? I love to travel, so let’s make it happen!

What special guest would you like to see at the Utah Retro GameXpo 2026? Give us your Christmas wish. Let us know and tag them as well.

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The Utah Retro GameXpo is back again! Coming August 7-8 2026. Get your passes now! utahretrogamexpo.com/event-passes

If you applied to be a vendor and haven't heard anything you may need to apply again. There were some hiccups the past couple weeks with the form. utahretrogamexpo.com/vendors

About half our vendor tables are sold out for next year's event! If you are interested in being a vendor next year fill out the form on the website to get started. utahretrogamexpo.com/vendors

The Utah Retro GameXpo is back on Aug 7-8 2026 at the Davis Conference Center in Layton. Vendor applications are available now at utahretrogamexpo.com/vendors Ticket sales are coming soon!

Here are the cosplay photos and winners from this year. Info on next year's event coming soon.

My family and I want to thank everyone who supported us this year at our event! All the attendees, vendors and guests were wonderful! Stay tuned for announcements about next year in the near future! (I need a little rest first :D) - Tracy A few things to mention: - We will have the lost and found items at Minus World Video Games in Layton. - If you lost something please contact us there and we will check to see if we have it. - We have all the drawing items from the food drive that were not picked up. - If you won something we sent out a text and they will be at Minus World in Layton to be picked up. - Cosplay pictures and other videos of the events will be posted soon. - Again stay tuned in the near future for updates on the next event!