A convention in Thanet celebrated gaming old and new with a weekend of talks, competitions and cosplay.

Play Expo Margate took place at the Margate Winter Gardens and offered three days of 8-bit nostalgia as well as showing off the cutting edge of the video game world.

Special guests included Nostalgia Nerd, a gaming YouTuber with more than 300,000 subscribers to his channel.

Also speaking at the event was retro-gaming enthusiast Octav1us Kitten, who has an online audience of more than 30,000 people.

The event gave the opportunity for seasoned gaming veterans to face off against each other in tournaments, on popular titles like Mario Kart, FIFA 20 and Street Fighter 2 Turbo.

Not to be forgotten was the growing popularity of indie games titles, with a host of developers showing off their hard work to the fans attending.

Head Tilt Games brought their dungeon crawler Millions of Minions to the show, where players have to command their undead minions across the creepy landscapes.

Game-of-the-moment Fortnite occupied a large space on the floor, with attendees facing off against one another in a bid to prove their skills.

Fortnight is one of the most popular online titles available, with an estimated 250 million players across the world.

As another hotly-tipped industry trend, virtual reality games were set up for players to put on VR headsets and enter another world.

Some of the visitors dressed up as their favourite characters, otherwise known as cosplaying.

For the collecting obsessives, traders set up stalls selling retro cartridges from the heyday years of digital technology.

Fans were able to pick up classic games like Sonic, Contra and Pac-Man.

The Play Expo first took place in Margate in 2015, and has since become one of the biggest gaming events in the county.

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