A fledgling company had recently sent me a direct sales advertisement for their published boardgames. The company's name: Avalanche Press Ltd. (henceforth, APL). You may have noticed any of their marketing efforts in THE GENERAL, NAVAL HISTORY, or FIRE & MOVEMENT magazines. The apparent production domain for APL is both domestic and specialized, at a ratio of 1:5, respectively. The sample game pieces sent as part of the marketing promotion illustrates the quality control and aesthetic appeal demanded by this company's standards. AIRLINES and SURVIVAL OF THE WITLESS are two domestic variety games offered by APL. AIRLINES will allow you to turn your business into a profit! This game includes "220 full-color playing cards" for 38 dollars. The sample card sent to me is double-backed, coated, with full-color on one side, clearly showing the card's relationship and values. About the quality you might expect from a well-produced card game. SURVIVAL OF THE WITLESS is a game set in the environs of an American university, and it employs cards also. The game was specially rated by PYRAMID magazine and costs 28 dollars. For you specialty mongers, APL has produced and acquired a range of boardgames about warfare during the 19th and 20th Centuries. Their smallest has 140 pieces, and their largest has 960 game pieces. The game pieces sent by the firm included the Swedish vessel (bird's-eye view), TAPPERHETEN, and the U.S. DD20 class in full-color and double-backed, black-silhouetted and without values on one side. I had fiddled with the counter corners alittle and found that the paper laminate will separate at those weak areas, but the technological quality of the counter's base material is significantly better than the old paper and cardboard counter materials. This core material does not separate easily! The themes specialized by APL for their Wargame products are basically rare subjects, such as THE GREAT WAR AT SEA (North Sea and Mediterranean Sea WWI naval actions with scenarios), BLOOD ON THE SNOW (Soviet invades Finland), and one early Napoleonic warfare game, EAGLES OF THE EMPIRE: FRIEDLAND (acquired from GamesUSA). There are others available. For some of APL's games, their system designs overlap, offering their customers a truly comprehensive and intregrated method of friendly involvement and learning. Their products have achieved some recognition, such as "A MODEL RETAILER best seller" and "'Best Wargame Rules of All Time'." APL's product list price range is from 28 to 68 dollars, not including shipping and handling expenses. You can snail mail a request for their products list to: Avalanche Press Ltd., PO Box 4775, Virginia Beach, VA 23454. Send along a SASE on a #10 business envelope. If you have any questions, call them at: 1-757-481-3655. If you would like to place an order, use their Toll Free number: 1-800-564-9008. Have a VISA or MASTERCARD handy. APL also has an e-mail address available, but this address wasn't included in the marketing effort which I had received. Back to Dispatch Aug. 99 Table of Contents Back to Dispatch List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by HMGS Mid-South This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com