The biggest games convention in the world is over for another year, and thousands of happy, tired gamers – including over 100 Blizzard staff – are heading home.

It’s been another vintage year for Blizzard at gamescom. On Wednesday we announced the upcoming Diablo III expansion, Reaper of Souls, at a press conference, and those lucky enough to be there that day were able to play it in the afternoon.

The doors opened to the general public on Thursday morning and very quickly the queues started to build at the Blizzard booth. Diablo III: Reaper of Souls was playable by the public for the first time anywhere; Diablo III on PlayStation 3 and Hearthstone were playable for the first time in Europe; and with World of Warcraft Patch 5.4 playable too, there was something for everyone.

Meanwhile, the stage entertainment and activities just kept coming. Quizzes, WoW leveling contests, StarCraft II Arcade Map Challenges, and Mega Bloks building contests gave players the chance to get involved and win great loot, and there were spectacular live music concerts by special guests Omnia and Asturia.

We had World of Warcraft guilds Method and Genuine showing us how the experts take down Mists of Pandaria’s toughest raid bosses; and pro StarCraft II players including WhiteRa, LiquidRet, JaeDong, HasuObs and Socke tackling each other in show matches. Speaking of experts, Lead Artist Ben Thompson from the Hearthstone development team demonstrated his skills live on stage, creating fantastic artwork while the crowd watched.

And finally, gamescom would not be complete without the Blizzard costume contest and the World of Warcraft dance contest. We saw some incredible efforts in both competitions and we’re really pleased so many people signed up to take part. Great prizes were won, including two AlienWare 14 laptops and a trip for two to this year’s BlizzCon. Congratulations go to our dance contest winner Thomas Y. and our costume contest winner Ralf Z.!

We’d like to thank everyone who visited our booth. It was great to see and meet so many of you there – and we hope we’ll see you again at the next gamescom!

Check out our Media section for all the photos and videos from the event.