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I really don't think it should be called the "ORC license"
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<blockquote data-quote="aramis erak" data-source="post: 8919662" data-attributes="member: 6779310"><p>I've seen multiple estimates putting the total population of gamers worldwide in the early 90's being around 100 to 200 thousand... but those are most likely quite wrong. They're based upon a mixture of magazine subs and sales, core sales, and GAMA reporting. I don't recall the exact ratio of PHBs to DMGs...</p><p>Classic Traveller, between 1977 and 1988, sold 175,000 core rules sets. Traveller wasn't the number one game;it was selling probably 20k units per year in the last two years.</p><p>MegaTraveller was more units in less time,</p><p>RuneQuest had similar numbers, and was in the same markets. Enough sales to make Avalon Hill snap it up in a sweetheart deal, resulting in RuneQuest 3rd Edition.</p><p>D&D was largely considered 90% of play and maybe as low as 80% of sales... (In Anchorage, the management of Boscos around 1990 was saying D&D content was almost 80% of sales of RPGs, even tho' it was 20% of shelf space. But Boscos was just really getting its business going strong then... in 1985, it was a comic shop that had a few games from parental liquidations of collections of mostly comics. I got one of my copies of ElfQuest there.)</p><p></p><p>In the early 90's, TSR had several deals that were balloning their market share, too... B. Dalton, Waldenbooks, one or two toy chains... and the novels outside those. Kaybee Toys carried only the boxed sets.</p><p>Metagaming was dead, but SJ learned from Howard Thompson that book stores are great for selling games with low prices. I bought most of my games at Bosco's, but Car Wars and GURPS were cheaper at Waldenbooks, especially with the discount card. But GURPS had to be special ordered. TSR stuff wt up new and didn't get restocked at my favorite Waldenbooks... but it always had the new stuff.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="aramis erak, post: 8919662, member: 6779310"] I've seen multiple estimates putting the total population of gamers worldwide in the early 90's being around 100 to 200 thousand... but those are most likely quite wrong. They're based upon a mixture of magazine subs and sales, core sales, and GAMA reporting. I don't recall the exact ratio of PHBs to DMGs... Classic Traveller, between 1977 and 1988, sold 175,000 core rules sets. Traveller wasn't the number one game;it was selling probably 20k units per year in the last two years. MegaTraveller was more units in less time, RuneQuest had similar numbers, and was in the same markets. Enough sales to make Avalon Hill snap it up in a sweetheart deal, resulting in RuneQuest 3rd Edition. D&D was largely considered 90% of play and maybe as low as 80% of sales... (In Anchorage, the management of Boscos around 1990 was saying D&D content was almost 80% of sales of RPGs, even tho' it was 20% of shelf space. But Boscos was just really getting its business going strong then... in 1985, it was a comic shop that had a few games from parental liquidations of collections of mostly comics. I got one of my copies of ElfQuest there.) In the early 90's, TSR had several deals that were balloning their market share, too... B. Dalton, Waldenbooks, one or two toy chains... and the novels outside those. Kaybee Toys carried only the boxed sets. Metagaming was dead, but SJ learned from Howard Thompson that book stores are great for selling games with low prices. I bought most of my games at Bosco's, but Car Wars and GURPS were cheaper at Waldenbooks, especially with the discount card. But GURPS had to be special ordered. TSR stuff wt up new and didn't get restocked at my favorite Waldenbooks... but it always had the new stuff. [/QUOTE]
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I really don't think it should be called the "ORC license"
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