Is the third time the charm?
Having been to Anzio a couple of times before and although having had OK days, in hindsight I felt the action was never there for me and with a renewed play style (last time I went with a VSR and gas capa), I wasn’t expecting a lot but was expecting to at least have some uplift on previous visits.
Where: First and Only Airsoft Camp Anzio Leek ST13 8TL https://firstandonlyevents.co.uk/locations/anzio-camp/
Date played: November 15th 2025
Weather: Dry Winter
Type: Ex-Mod base, building to building with woodland outskirts.
Cost: £40 paid up front via the website.
Arrival & Safe Zone
We knew the drill, in through the gates that open promptly at 8:30 and left to the smaller outbuildings where if you’re in teams which I was with the Killzone Airsoft guys, you can grab a small room to yourselves. Ideal. We managed to get parked up nearby so only a short walk with kit to our room. The main safe zone is a short track to the main hangar warehouse, well laid out, shop on one side and sign in on the other, I of course hadn’t filled in a waiver so did this easily on the tables provided with attached pens and fresh copies.
Sign In
The beauty of online booking now is there’s no wait for payment, register, that’s me, hand in the waiver and I’m away. That easy. No big queue as most were starting to get their gear out and sorted, for once I was semi prepped so no rush on my part.
Safety Brief & Chrono
We were informed safety brief would be at 9:30, we made sure we were chrono’d in advance of this but it was eyepro on, out for brief and then back in to get kitted up for game on.
The brief was significantly better than I remembered with only one real pause due to other players not listening, it carried with the usual airsoft humour and a nice bonus was a huge map that was used to explain. My memories of the brief were it being a long and cumbersome affair and whilst it wasn’t the shortest briefs ever, it in my mind wasn’t terrible.
Chrono was open almost straight away, just inside the game zone so eyepro on and head out. I cannot, cannot praise this enough. Anzio which used to have a real anti HPA vibe with lower limits for HPA has evolved! They chrono in joules (converted for fps of BB weight) and HPA limits are the same as their AEG counterparts.
Personally I aim to be 5-10 below the limit at every site I play at, this was more so important at Anzio as if you are hot on one shot on a random in game chrono. That is your day over and I don’t want to be that guy.
Limits were 350/400/500 equivalents. At a field like Anzio I don’t feel the DMR role is of any benefit at this level though, it could be better if raised to 450 and allow the designated guys to have a touch more range where they can find it but 350>400 I would happily lose those extra 5-10M of flight to be able to use fun mode and shoot within a 20M MED.
Site & Playing Areas
Anzio is an ex army base, it has multiple buildings which are in play and outside there are some great areas like the shooting range and some nice pathways which weirdly put you at eye level with the first floor of some of the buildings. It’s not the place you can sit in an upstairs room and overwatch either, the greenery between the buildings is thick and in some places you can’t see the building less than 50M away from you. Great for some sneaky and tactical play.
That said though, our DMR found a lovely corner where he lay and really took some enemy down who weren’t expecting him to be there. The overall feeling I got though again was this is a site which is in it’s element when you’re going from indoor area to indoor area. A way of playing I hadn’t done here before.
Games
After a typical warm up game (Zombie style) we did some kind of conquest game before moving on to an objective in W to go to building X before the enemy get objective Y to building….Z Free roam around the site again so the ghillie guys disappeared and the rest of us got stuck in to some proper urban warfare. It felt great pushing into buildings, through and really letting the Article1 loose with some tracers. Games felt long enough and it was easy to find some action as well although sometimes the action was a random person wandering aimlessly but a kills a kill!
Lunch
Lunch was a pause in gameplay, it was about an hour max but it’s no longer provided for you, I headed over to the main hangar and the only hot food was a pot noodle with some hot(ish) water in it. That’s the real criticism I have here, for a site as established as Anzio, not to have any form of junk food at lunch is a real shame. I managed to get by on Pringles and Bebeto sweets though.
Games contd…
The afternoon consisted of another objective based game of grabbing objectives and defending them before moving onto the end game where you had to hold the medical building, that really came alive towards the end where ammo was going everywhere! All of our team were stuck in, comms were good and it felt fantastic. CQB in a well spaced out environment, holding the corners which there are so many of and definitely not going for a wander through the middle as you’d get lit up. Well timed games, clear objectives and a day long contest. Nothing revolutionary, just som ebasics done well.
Marshalling & General Attitude of Players
Overall I’d say the hit taking wasn’t terrible from what I saw. Maybe one incident where it was questionable from my perspective but that wasn’t reflective of the day overall.
One comment from a player on our team about people needing a BB not a mag though was met with a harsh reprise which by the time was finished, if it was me – I’d have melted into the ground. Anzio is hard on people who don’t conform, it’s done in the name of safety and I understand this fully. I just do everything to ensure it’s not me who the marshalls eyes turn towards.
Overall
The Anzio buzz carried through the full day. It was a great day in terms of gameplay, teamplay and nice to get out with the KZ guys, completely different in that we turned up in non-camo to mix it up and it’s left me with a changed perspective. I really think Anzio is a viable alternative to my beloved Kirkby no longer being around. My CQB gameplay hasn’t died yet and I found myself already trying to find room in the calendar to get out again.
