Image credit: ESL FACEIT Group
While we’re somehow approaching the halfway mark of the year already, there’s one recent gaming event that’s still at the top of my mind – DreamHack Birmingham 2026. Taking place in late March this year, it was a celebration of all things gaming and esports, and it was incredibly fun to attend.
At the event, I had the chance to chat with Shahin Zarrabi, Vice President of Festivals at ESL FACEIT Group, the team behind DreamHack. We dug into what makes celebrations like DreamHack thrive, and the craft behind the scenes of a gaming event.
The craft behind DreamHack
DreamHack Birmingham 2026 took place at the NEC, running from March 27 to 29, 2026, celebrating everything from competitive shooters and cosplay to indie games and fan-led communities.
While attending the event for Kyusai, I had the chance to chat with Shahin Zarrabi, Vice President of Festivals at ESL FACEIT Group, looking at the work that went into the event and what it takes to make a convention like DreamHack feel lively and fun.
We spoke on the Sunday of the event, first talking about whether Zarrabi had had the chance to explore the show floor and play any of the game demos on offer.
He shared that the event had been amazing so far, excitedly noting that it’d been a great first venture in Birmingham for DreamHack and that he hadn’t had much time on the show floor yet aside from showing people around.
“It’s a big success, both in terms of attendance, partners, the vibes in there,” Zarrabi noted, “So we can be happy, all the hard work paid off.”
Looking at the challenges with bringing DreamHack to life, he described there being both “operational and cultural” challenges to overcome with the team, due to this being the first full-scale DreamHack festival in the UK.
Operationally, the challenges range from finding the right suppliers and chatting with partners, to getting into key venues and even sorting out the right kind of plugs to ensure everything’s powered up.
“Culturally, it’s more like, okay, can we just replicate what we’ve done in Sweden? US, Europe, you know, those types of questions,” Zarrabi explained, continuing, “ And I think, you know, along the kind of 12 months that we’ve been planning this, we’ve been figuring that out, but wouldn’t say we’ve fully answered every question yet.
“I think we had to come here and do one event before, you know, for next year, hopefully, we’re much more comfortable with it.”
Taking events from dreams to reality
I wondered whether there were any key misconceptions that Zarrabi had noticed fans or observers holding about working on events like DreamHack, or if there were any behind-the-scenes elements that attendees may not consider.
“The boring answer is how much hard work goes into it,” He answered, “… and how much people disagree on what we should be doing, and that, since it’s an event rather than a, you know, online app or game or whatever, you can’t really do the iterative approach. You need to get everything right, or most of the things right.”
The DreamHack team spends a lot of time debating and chatting about key pieces of the event in the preparation stage, Zarrabi noted, saying that there was a blueprint for how they built things, but never an exact list of what should be on said blueprint.
Looking at what the biggest contributing factors for the event’s success were, the VP noted that DreamHack being a strong, known brand certainly helped, along with having brilliant headline content pieces.
“It seems like the UK is starved of an event like this,” Zarrabi mused, “And we wanted to fill a gap. So, you know, there were more of us identifying that, and then the people showed up.”
Looking ahead, we discussed what might bring someone who’s never attended a gaming convention to one of the upcoming DreamHack conventions.
“I think if you’ve ever even played more of Candy Crush on your phone, you should consider yourself a gamer. Almost half of the world’s population is a gamer,” Zarrabi encouraged, suggesting that people should take a chance and see if it’s for them.
“I think everyone deserves to see DreamHack at least once,” he continued, “Most people love it. And it’s not so much about, oh, I need, I need to be interested in something. There’s always something to find.”
I’m inclined to agree – the reason why DreamHack Birmingham 2026 is still standing out as a core 2026 experience for me is due to the immense variety of games, panels, shows, exhibitors, and cosplay artists on the show floor. It was a truly vibrant convention, and I’m excited to see where the team behind the magic takes it in the future.
FAQs
DreamHack Birmingham 2026 took place from March 27 to March 29, 2026.
DreamHack Birmingham 2026 took place at the NEC in Birmingham, UK.
While DreamHack events do largely focus on gaming, there are also plenty of interesting opportunities for tech geeks, esports lovers, and pop culture fanatics to explore.
Yes, there’s a thriving cosplay scene at most conventions like DreamHack! I saw a huge number of incredible cosplays at DreamHack Birmingham 2026, ranging from World of Warcraft characters to Hornet from Silksong.
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