“This place is too important to too many people”

Playopolis quickly became a favourite café in Medway, somewhere for friends and strangers to play games, drink good tea and eat good food. This year marks its tenth anniversary, so Steven went along to talk to owner Rebekah Jordan about how she came to open a board game café, surviving covid, and whether Jumanji would actually work as a game.

What is your official occupation?
That's a really difficult one. I never actually know what to call myself. I think just... owner at Playopolis. I never quite know what to write in those boxes.

What is Playopolis?
Playopolis is a board game café in Rochester, and arguably if you don't know Playopolis, you might not know what a board game café is.
Essentially, we have a library of over a thousand games, and people pay a small fee of £4.50 each. Then they access those games for an amount of time, and we operate as a normal café. We've got a bar as well.

Do you have any other roles, paid or unpaid?
I work at the food bank, unpaid.  

It felt like we weren't quite cool enough for it.

It's Playopolis's tenth anniversary. What was the initial impetus?
We started it back in 2016 with my brother. It was a family affair. My husband was involved, my sister-in-law.
We'd gone to Draughts in London for my brother's birthday and thought, 'This is really cool, but wouldn't it be nice to have something closer to us, that you could come to and be with your kids, and on a date, or all these things?'
Not that Draughts isn't super inclusive, but it felt like we weren't quite cool enough for it. That was March 2016, and we were open by August.
We were really lucky because at the time my brother ran a different business that gave us the initial cash injection. Without that, this would not be.

You've been in the same venue that whole time. Do you own it?
No, we rent it, but the landlord's been pretty alright, considering.
I think we only looked at this property because we were coming from not knowing anything about running a bricks-and-mortar business. We were like, “This is nice”, without really thinking any of it. It didn't have a kitchen downstairs, just a storeroom.

That initial outlay for board games, was there a process in mind?
Basically, we bought what we wanted to play, because at the time we were trying to make sure, with a much smaller library, that we all knew every game without even having to look at it.
We also used BoardGameGeek, which tells you the hot games, and Kickstarter. It's the same now. We go between what looks good to us and what people are going to play, which isn't necessarily what you want to play all the time.

For an adult, what is a great entry-level board game?
The whole middle shelf of our library is dedicated to what we call popular entry-level modern board gaming.
I think people should probably start with things like Catan, Carcassonne and Ticket to Ride. Once they've got the basics of those... obviously we're not talking about Twilight Imperium, which would take days, but I would say those are a good start.
There are different games, party games even. If you don't think you like board games, you probably will like party games.

What is the longest you've had people play in a single game?
All day, from open till close, from 12 till 10, for sure. We have D&D sessions that last as long as that as well. People book multiple sessions, so they know that they're there for that whole time.

What's your preferred board game choice?
I don't know. I don't like to play the same one too often. I like 7 Wonders and Inis. I like an area control game.
At the moment, when I come in to play, I've got my set of board game friends, and we play the new stuff. We've got the Deep Rock Galactic board game, which is based on the video game, and that's really good.
But I don't have a favourite at the moment.

They'll come with their family, or their partner, and then discover how good they are at lying

At family events or Christmases, it can all get a bit heated around a board game. Have you ever had anything kick off here?
I don't think so. We often have a conversation at the end when people come to pay, and I ask, “Did you have a nice time?” They say, “No!” and I'll ask why, and they say, “Because he won!”
Luckily, most things seem to be okay. I think the one that gives the most aggro is a game called Blood on the Clocktower. It's a massive social deduction game that we run on a Monday when we're closed for anything other than that.
Some people get quite upset with that game because it's a lot about lying. They'll come with their family or their partner and then discover how good they are at lying.

What was the biggest learning curve in terms of developing the café?
We didn't make the kitchen big enough. Our kitchen is the same size as our bar, and it's where our till is and where we all are. We have to try and make the best of what we have.
We can do loads. I'm quite impressed with our menu at the moment. Our pizzas are really good.
The challenges are with the space in the kitchen. Because of the way our building is, we can't have a deep-fat fryer, and a lot of people want chips. We tried everything, but we haven't found a way of doing them.

Do you have games if someone comes in on their own?
Yeah, I've got quite a few games for people who come in on their own.
On Tuesdays we have the social, which is for people who don't have board gamey friends. It's a really good night because they meet people who also like games.
A bunch of groups have started from our socials and now come in independently. They're full friends and have been friends for years.