Should we be surprised at the great expansion of the 'German Games' market, and the progressive disappearance in the market for American Board Wargames? In our opinion, the answer is in the negative. A quarter of a century ago, the board wargaming hobby went off in several wrong directions. It has continued to march off in those directions to the current day. Unsurprisingly, its market share has flagged as the years have gone by. An enterprising historian of the board wargaming hobby could readily point the finger and identify the parties responsible for our challenges. At this late, that fingerpointing is less interesting. After all, no one forced boardgamers to follow the unfortunate advice that they were given. However, let us consider some of that advice. Unreadable game counters. Once upon a time, board game counters were printed in highly distinct colors, such as pink and blue, using non-gloss inks whose reflections would cause no difficulties with the lighting. In the intervening period, readability has often fallen, with highly reflective backings, polychrome obscurely patterned counters, and the like becoming more often. Of particular misfortune was the belief of many graphic artists that uniform colours made a good choice of colors for unit counters. Excessively lengthy rules sets. The most-analyzed game produced by Avalon Hill had four pages of rules, and other games were not much different. Blitzkrieg with its strategic rules was far more complicated, by the standards of the time. Vast numbers of special case exceptions can make rules sets long indeed, so long that simply learning the rules to the game becomes a major challenge. When the return on investment is uncertain, fewer and fewer people bother. Designer time invested in historical research rather than on analysis of the game and consideration of the implication of rules sets. I am specifically reminded of a World-War 2 western Russian front game in which there was an enormous tonnage of rules and tables and charts, but if you analyzed carefully you immediately found that the German advance was totally controlled by its stock of railroad repair units. I propose that by correcting these issues, and in particular by discarding the notion that historical accuracy is a desirable feature in game design-consider, e.g., Puerto Rico and the debate on its historicity--it may be possible to revive the board wargaming hobby. So, until next month. Gamers! To Your Tables! Back to Table of Contents -- Game! # 7 To Game! List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2004 by George Phillies. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com