[Communities] Card Games, Roleplaying, New Friends @ POPS Gaming

Welcome to Shanghai: the city where you can trip over three yoga studios, a crypto meet-up, and a Dungeons & Dragons guild on your way to buy imported cheese. This series, Communities, is our humble attempt to map the social undercurrent of this town – the clubs, cliques and curious collectives that make Shanghai less of a sprawl and more of a pulse. From vegan potlucks to runners' guilds, to board game nights, to small meetups up to large WeChat groups, we're seeing what's on offer. If you're looking for a place to start, this is it.

Yes, there is an expat-driven gaming community that arranges game nights for anything from board games to PlayStation competitions, even role-playing nights. Time to make some friends.

The person behind this... well, Julie Popelka did not mean to name a gaming empire after herself. (She sort of did, though.) People call her, though, Julie Pops, and so when she and a group of friends decided, in January 2021, with the world still doing its COVID thing and Shanghai settled into its particular version of normal, to host a sushi-themed board game night at a sushi restaurant as what everyone quietly agreed was kind of a joke – the name POPS was right there.

Five years later, POPS Gaming has two WeChat groups, a weekly Wednesday residency at Abbey Road, a 5th-birthday hoodie selling for 88 yuan, and a back catalogue of events that includes nerdy pub quizzes, video game tournaments across Mario Kart, Rocket League and Super Smash Bros., tabletop roleplaying one-shots in everything from Dungeons & Dragons to Thirsty Sword Lesbians (there is literally a system for everything), and – the crown jewel – a fully realized Game of Thrones mega-game with four separate rooms for four Great Houses, a map of Westeros covered in miniatures, and a designated person running between those rooms in a cape because nobody was allowed to have their phone. That one took a month of planning. People lost their minds in a good way.

We met Popelka on a Saturday afternoon at Abbey Road during the group's fifth birthday party. The vibe in general felt like... it would have been way more fun to join in on the games than working... but hey... letting everyone else know about it seems like a noble public service, so here we are.

CNS: Can you tell us how POPS got started?

Julie: A nickname of mine is Julie Pops – my last name is Popelka, so people call me Julie Pops. I kind of cheekily named the group after myself; it wasn't really my intention. My friends and I were playing D&D, playing board games. We used to play at a meetup here in Shanghai, and it was really fun, but the place was really not well kept up, and I wanted to see more diversity in the crowd and the types of events.

So we were just sitting around on a night, and we were like, we should do something crazy. We were playing Sushi Go! Party, and we were like – we should do sushi-themed board games at a sushi place, kind of almost as a joke. My friends Claire and Anthony were pushing me to be serious about it, because I had this far-off dream of wanting a board game cafe one day. So they said, just start with some events. We very quickly put together a logo, prizes, the concept and a poster.

CNS: When was this?

Julie: January 2021.

CNS: Right in the middle of challenging times!

Julie: Yeah, I know, a weird time to start a new thing, right? But we were all stuck in Shanghai and things were good here. The event was great. People had fun, it was a lot of different types of people. And we were like, this is fun – and people started asking for more. So the next event was Chinese New Year: We taught people how to play mahjong, xiangqi – which is Chinese chess – and weiqi, which is Go. And it got featured in an English publication in Shanghai and it just blew up. So many people were there, and we're like, we need bigger venues.

From there, I just started making whatever I thought would be fun, things I'd want to go to myself. A Mario Kart tournament – super fun. Then Mario Party, Super Smash. Then I was like, we need fun pub quizzes. So we started doing themed ones: Lord of the Rings, Squid Game, whatever's popular at the time. And now everybody in Shanghai does those, but at that time nobody was. It just kept getting bigger and bigger.

On inclusion and community

CNS: The community now has over 500 members across your WeChat groups. Who is it for?

Julie: Definitely not 500 active [laughs], because that would be crazy. There are a lot of people who come to one or two events a year, and that's kind of what I want. My goal is to put on lots of different types of events so that everybody can find something for themselves.

I want to make it more accessible, more inclusive – to women, to queer people, to people who may not always think games are for them, or who don't think of themselves as nerds. I wanted more of my coworkers who had never played a board game in their lives to be comfortable and interested in coming to one of these events. That's why I try to make them cute and theme them around different things – so more people can enjoy.

I firmly believe I could take anyone and find a game they would enjoy. Some people just think, "I don't like board games – I played Monopoly, I didn't like it." And it's like, there's a whole world out there.

CNS: The social dimension seems really central to what you're building.

Julie: This is so important. As an expat, as a foreigner, you have to find your found family. You don't have your actual family, your high school friends and your college friends here. A lot of what I was experiencing before I created this group was: we're going out drinking again. Which is fun every once in a while, but I needed other things to do. (Copy Editor's Note: Some of you are shifting in your seats now, eh?).

I wanted to create a space where you don't need to drink, where you don't need to bring someone with you. We will welcome you, we will teach you, we will ask your name and become your friend. I wanted people to feel comfortable coming on their own. And especially the one-shots have been wonderful, because that's such a niche interest – so many people love it in Shanghai but can't find ways to connect, or it's like: Dungeons & Dragons players usually play campaigns that last for months, and you can't just meet strangers and commit to that.

CNS: For readers who aren't familiar – what's a one-shot?

Julie: You're sitting around with people, one person has a story or scenario, and you each have a character. It could be a medieval setting where you're a thief or a bard or a swordsman – or it could be Thirsty Sword Lesbians, where you're like, cyberpunk lesbians – there's literally a system for everything. Magical Kitties, where you're cats. Whatever.

You have some stats, some skills, and the GM – the game master – presents a problem or situation that you have to navigate together. You use dice to see if you're good at certain things. It's always hard to describe table-top role-playing games (TTRPGs). But a one-shot is where, instead of playing with the same people for months, you sit down and, within about five hours, you have a beginning, middle, and end to your adventure. All wrapped up. Nothing lingering. It's a great chance to experience role-playing games on an introductory level, and it's a super fun way to meet new people. You sort of do it through the lens of a character you play, so you can sort of choose to be whoever you want.

What POPS offers

CNS: Walk us through what POPS actually does – events, formats, all of it.

Julie: The weekly Wednesday meetup for board games is the best way to dip your toe in, I think. We teach everything – you don't have to know anything. We can pick something super easy on the brain after a long workday, or we have heavier strategy games too. It's whatever people are feeling. Lately, it's been here at Abbey Road; one of the things about finding a venue is that we need somewhere they'll also store our games.

Beyond that: the nerdy pub quizzes – Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Last of Us, whatever's popular. Video game tournaments: Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros., Mario Party, Overcooked, Rocket League. We've done all sorts. And then the one-shots, which are tabletop roleplaying sessions that are self-contained.

CNS: Why are the one-shots especially useful for this community?

Julie: D&D players usually play campaigns that last for months, and you can't just meet strangers and commit to that. The one-shots are great because you can just dip your toe in and meet some new people. Maybe you enjoyed playing with this GM, or this player was really fun – you get their WeChat and talk to them. It's a way to connect with very low long-term commitment. Just socialize and meet people who like the same things.

The games

CNS: For someone who's never been to a POPS event – which games should they know?

Julie: Some classics that a lot of people would know: Werewolf, Mafia, Codenames, Dixit, Settlers of Catan, Secret Hitler. But those older games – Monopoly, Risk – really have some issues as far as balance and time. Monopoly takes forever. There's no catch-up mechanic, so if you get behind, you can't catch up.

Modern board games – and when I say modern, I'm talking about 1995 forward, starting with Catan as a big creator of the euro game, games where it's not so much fighting but more managing your resources and playing your own strategy while seeing who does it best – have completely changed things. If you played Monopoly and didn't like it, there's probably a reason. Games are better now.

We play Wingspan – super popular. Sheriff of Nottingham for social deduction. We love Skull, we love Trio. Lighter games: Spots, Chinatown, Heat. There are a million different types now, with a theme for anything under the sun. If you like plants, if you like science, if you like aliens, if you want to shoot things – there is a game for you.

CNS: What about classic card games?

Julie: We have a recent surge of people who are very passionate about euchre and cribbage and some of those more classic games – things you grew up playing with your parents and aunts and uncles. We're probably teaching some euchre at the birthday party today, actually.

As far as Magic: The Gathering, we don't organize any Magic meetups, but that's something I'd like to get into. The barrier is that it involves a lot of money – if you want to run a draft tournament, you have to provide packs. But we have a lot of community members who love Magic and play Magic; we just don't organize formal events for it yet. Warhammer 40K is the same. A lot of our members love it, love painting minis. There's so much I want to try to organize.

The mega game

CNS: Tell us about the mega game.

Julie: This is the event I'm most proud of. We did a Game of Thrones-themed mega game in 2023, right before we left Shanghai. A mega game takes tabletop roleplaying elements – roleplay, dice rolls – plus strategy board game elements, plus social deduction like Werewolf, and puts it all together where you're working with a team to win this entire macro-level game.

We had four-player teams, each a Great House – Baratheon, Tyrell, Lannister. Each team had four roles. The Lord of the House talked to other lords, wore a crown, social-deduced and gambled with resources. The Maester arranged marriages and tried to discover artifacts. The Heir was the only one who could move between all the rooms – because everyone else was separated – running messages back and forth, relaying what was happening. And the Knight was basically playing Risk on a map of Westeros with miniatures, sending troops and fighting battles.

Nobody was allowed to have their phone. That was very important.

It took a huge amount of work. Our friend Dan had run a version of this in Beijing and came to me and said he'd love to do it with POPS. We spent a month revising the rulebook – it had some serious balance and timing issues – and it still wasn't perfect when we ran it. But people had so much fun that it kind of didn't matter.

We want to do another one. Maybe the Dune universe, or general medieval, or Star Wars. If people are going to love it and show up, we'll do it.

CNS: POPS has also produced a real game designer from within the community?

Julie: Yes – Dylan Coyle. And now that's their job, which is amazing. They have several published games out now through the Charming Games Collective, and they're very successful. We had a party back in 2021 to celebrate the publication of Lucky Cat, one of their first games. It's really lovely to see them succeed.

Getting involved

CNS: For someone who wants to join POPS – where do they start?

Julie: Getting into our WeChat group. Everything is in WeChat groups in Shanghai. We have an official WeChat account – I don't post on there as often as I should, but I'm trying. The best way, honestly, is just to add me directly on WeChat: juliepops, and I'll get you in. We always have a QR code for the second group, but those expire every week. Just add me and I'll sort it.

CNS: Any events coming up to look out for?

Julie: Wednesdays are always here at Abbey Road, that's the constant. And now we are partnering with BnC for our video game tournaments. We just did a Mario Kart tourney in March, and it was a grrreeat time. They have big screens!

And if you've never played a game in your life and think they're weird: come on over. I will change your mind. If you need friends, come on over. We do games, but it's not about the games. It's about the people.

1) Board Game Weekly Meetup

Date: 6-10pm; Every Wednesday night

Venue: Abbey Road

Address: 3 Taojiang Rd 桃江路3号

Admission: Free & No signup

2) Overcooked 2 Partner Tournament

Date: 7pm, June 5

Venue: BnC

Address: 685 Xikang Rd 西康路685号

3) Summer One Shots!

Date: 5pm, June 13

Venue: Hita

Address: 909 Tianyaoqiao Rd 天钥桥路909号

Message Julie to sign up.

4) Dragonboat Board Game Event

Date:12pm, June 20

Venue: Abbey Road

Address: 3 Taojiang Rd 桃江路3号