How popular are RPGs today compared to the 80s?

[Storm Raven]

i wasn't a BMiG. and i had no problems finding gamers back then. i had 14 regulars in my group. but i also started clubs at my school. and easily gamed with many, many different people. ~ 125 or so.

Well, as long as you tie yourself to a game system that few people want to play anymore, you will have trouble finding players.

 

[Desdichado]

My suspicion is that we have more gamers now than we did in the early 80s, but that less people overall are involved. I think there were a lot of dabblers in the early 80s that didn't go into the cocoon so to speak and emerge as bona fide gamers.

 

[francisca]

I'm not so sure that book sales are such a great indicator of actual players. I bought my 3E core books 6 months before i started playing, and it was touch and go if I was ever going to get a 3E game going at all.

When you view this in the light that disposable cash is up and actual leisure time is down (based on the last "study" I read online), I'm willing to bet the percentage of people who own a PHB and play is lower than it was in the early 80's.

On the flip side, we own 2 PHBs in my group, one stays with me, the other floats amongst the players, so thats 2 books for 4 players.

However, I suspect there are lots of 30-40 year olds who went out and bought a PHB to revisit their youth, who have never played.

 

[Col_Pladoh]

Yeah, but let's face it. You are you. Big Man In Gaming. The rest of us... aren't

Back in 1973 I was by no means "stellar," just one of a goodly number of active game hobbyists in board wargames and military miniatures. D&D wasn't published yet, but the power of the game's play brought in newbies by the drove. This was true for all the new DMs back then if word got out that they ran a campaign and people could come by and play.

As you do that, though, compare the costs of travel, hotels, admission, food, etc, in each era to the disposable income of young folks in that era. If cons are relatively more expensive than they used to be, this won't be a good measure.

Some truth in that, but... Most cons draw half their attendees from a radius of around 100 miles of the event. The main expense for such persons is the entrance fee and food, for many go home to sleep. Small cons and large alike are not drawing young people as they did back in the 80s, pre-teens and young teens, as they did then. The young audience has plenty of spending money, but it is going to computer games, the greatest competitor of the paper games.

About the only recruiting centers around are game shops, and there are too few of them

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Col_Pladoh]

Hi, Gary! Glad to hear from you!

You are right, anecdotal evidence is worth very little -- your experiences in the "D&D heartlands" as it were, versus mine in the Bible Belt ran quite differently. What I would be interested in, were such a thing were ever available, is the size of "networked" gamers now versus the early 80's, whether the internet makes a big difference in the network size now versus then, because the number of dedicated gamers is roughly equivalent to the number of those who participating in networking - to me, this stands to reason, because the more serious you are about your hobby, the more time you invest.

I know for sure that in my area, I know far more gamers now than then - and the ones I know I keep in touch. My experience runs exactly opposite to Diaglo's: Back then, I knew all of one other solid gamer; now, I have had groups ranging upwards of 13 people at the same game! My personal record for a 3E group is around 9 at the table.

Maybe we'll never know for certain - but based on sales figures alone, we know that in three short years, WotC attained numbers not seen in 20 years. In that score, good for them. I am a firm believer in that if you grow the customer base, all the smaller companies benefit by default, because a Gaming Hobbyist is usually a gamer for life, and migrates around to other systems as he looks for new products.

Hi Henry

You are spot on about networking of hardcore gamers today. The computer and internet have made that de riguer. However, that also means that electronic games are even more competitive than ever.

The number of emails I get from former paper game players now active only online or in regards CRPGs is indicative of the fact that a "gamer for life" need not remain in the paper RPG fold, can find plenty of satisfaction playing on the computer. Married, with family and job demands, old gamer freinds scattered to the winds, such individuals can play when they have time, without disruption and the need to gather a new group, DM or find one to run games.

There is no question that attrition occurs continually, and gamers of the most loyal sort leave the ranks each year for one or another reason. To have a viable and growing hobby more new enthusiasts need to be recruited than veteran gamers are lost. My deep concern is that no real effort is being made by WotC to bring in new fans. They are the only company large enough to do that effectively, of course. Back when I was with TSR, I made sure that we were doing our best to recruit young people--the D&D Basic Set in mass-market outlets, ads in comic books,Boy's Life, etc. The news media did a lot of the groundwork, but we made sure not to let that ground go unseeded thereafter.

Cheers,
Gary

 

[Col_Pladoh]

go get the 20th anniversary DVD.

the child actors actually played D&D.

but in the movie it was Tunnels & Trolls. take a close look at the box on the table.

edit: i think it was at a suggestion from one of the kids.

I'll take your word for it. The box on the table might well be T&T, but the script called for D&D, and the dialog references were straight out of D&D

Cheers,
Gary

 

[diaglo]

I'll take your word for it. The box on the table might well be T&T, but the script called for D&D, and the dialog references were straight out of D&D

now, the movie Taps (with Tom Cruise, Sean Penn, George C. Scott, Timothy Hutton, et al) did use the D&D name.

the scene involves a staircase. Timothy Hutton's character is about to leave and someone yells at him if they are playing D&D that night.

 

[Storminator]

That being the case, it is selling as well as OAD&D, for 2E sold at c. 50% of what the original AD&D books did.

Cheers,
Gary

I would be careful about drawing inferences from those numbers. That's 23 page thread, and there were caveats thrown in here and there. Is the 2:1 number refering to total product life(~3 years for 3e vs ~10 years for 2e), or equivalent time in the product cycle (first 3 years for each) or consecutive years (last 3 of 2e vs first 3 of 3e)? It's not clear from that quote.

So it's hard to say.

PS

 

[Col_Pladoh]

I would be careful about drawing inferences from those numbers. That's 23 page thread, and there were caveats thrown in here and there. Is the 2:1 number refering to total product life(~3 years for 3e vs ~10 years for 2e), or equivalent time in the product cycle (first 3 years for each) or consecutive years (last 3 of 2e vs first 3 of 3e)? It's not clear from that quote.

So it's hard to say.

PS

Actually the 50% number for 2E referres to pre-orders and follow-on sales. The market for 2E was half the size of that for OAD&D, and thus the spate of products publoshed for the revised game as TSR sought to make up for a smaller market size by selling more titles into it. Economy of scale dropped, and resistance to new titles grew, of course.

FWIW, I have been informed that sales of 3.5E have followed the 1E/2E pattern, BTW.

In short, it's easy to say

Cheers,
Gary

 

[francisca]

My deep concern is that no real effort is being made by WotC to bring in new fans. They are the only company large enough to do that effectively, of course. Back when I was with TSR, I made sure that we were doing our best to recruit young people--the D&D Basic Set in mass-market outlets, ads in comic books,Boy's Life, etc. The news media did a lot of the groundwork, but we made sure not to let that ground go unseeded thereafter.

Cheers,
Gary

Yeah, well you know they sure don't want to cut into sales of games explicitly targeted for the pre/early teen audience.

Maybe with the "return to the red box" we've seen mentioned they are getting it. Dunno.