A Farewell to Hexes: The Wargame Requiescat in Pacem Born 1958 Died 1996 My take on all this is slightly different. First, tastes change. In the 1950s, miniatures were the primary activity for gamers. In the 1960s, these people turned to board games and miniatures declined. In the 1970s, people with an adventure games bent turned to RPGs, and away from wargames. In the 1980s, it was computer games, the 1990s Magic type games, and now it is the German ones. In short, each generation found its own favorite game form instead of adopting the previous types. Hence, the previous game forms did not continue to grow in popularity. Secondly, I believe the market was and is potentially huge. There are games that have sold hundreds of thousands of copies. They cannot all be impulse buys. If the wargame market in the 1970s was under 50,000, as Dunnigan often stated, then another 150,000 copies of Squad Leader were bought on impulse. That just does not ring true. And keep in mind, a majority of wargamers never bought SL. The sales figures for Axis & Allies alone would indicate that there is an interest far beyond the wargaming hardcore. Third, what is limited is the number of people who buy lots of wargames. Here I agree with Stephen. The hardcore is small. There are not a lot of people who would buy more than say 6 games a year. But there were and are a lot of people who will buy 1 or 2. This group kept Avalon Hill afloat and today keeps Hasbro's offerings in business. SPI failed because they aimed at the hardcore market, and could never penetrate the larger one. As the hardcore market shrunk, so did SPI's business. Most of the other wargame companies competed with SPI for the hardcore market and went down with it. Avalon Hill always went for a more general market, thus they sold more wargames and survived longer. AH also had family and sports games line that gave it some market flexibility. Their biggest sellers were not Squad Leader or PanzerBlitz, but rather Facts in Five and Outdoor Survival. Fourth, I wonder if there is a saturation point as Avalon Hill always claimed. Most wargamers don't need or want 300 games. 30 might be enough for them. Thus, at a certain point they stop buying new games and just play what they have. To an extent, buying games is a habit, and feeling overwhelmed by your collection is an easy way to break the habit. In addition, there is a point where a gamer will start to weed out his collection, and these used games can compete for scarce gaming dollars. Fifth, wargames tend to played solitaire. That means that players are less likely to bring others into the hobby. One reason why D+D, Magic, and German games are all popular is that they are social in nature. People expose their friends to them, and then their friends buy them. Wargaming doesn't seem to have that culture, which means no word of mouth advertising. In short, lots of adventure type games (Axis & Allies, Magic, D+D, computer and video games) have sold in the hundreds of thousands, even millions. So, are these people potential wargame consumers, and can they be reached? If so, then wargaming can grow again. If not, it's cooked. Back to Table of Contents -- Game! # 15 To Game! List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2005 by George Phillies. This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com