Essen Spiel takes place across about 9 large halls, most filled with retailers selling new board games and card games, but with a good representation for RPGs, miniatures and LARPS.

The event also hosts a comic convention at the same time.

As the event is mainly a retail event - compared to other CONs which are more aligned to game playing - many players end up sitting on any spare floor area and getting out their newly aquired games to play.  This slowly squeezes the walk ways tighter and tighter.

The following is the hall layout - the Yellow areas are the halls used.

The area between Halls 7/ 4 and 2 is set up for kids activites, with jumping castles, climbing mountains, sweets, and so on.  It is a good area to meet up with people or to take a break - it is also one of the areas to find toilets!