Size of Gaming Industry???

Wombat said:
I have not heard anything much about the RPG industry actually growing of late. Like movies, pen & paper gaming is (supposedly) losing out to computer games.

Again, this I only know as rumor, not as fact. I'd love to see solid information on the topic.

A rumor probably from some anonymous dude on RPG.net, and everybody knows how reliable the info on that site is.....

And please, use the more specific term ***console games/gaming***, not "computer games" which refer more specifically to PC games. Console gaming is definitely growing; however, PC gaming has shrunk ALOT in the last couple of years

Here are some threads showing these trends:

http://forums.interplay.com/viewtopic.php?t=38644

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6087227/p-6.html
 

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Dristram said:
Something interesting I've noticed in my small gamingverse is that it seems more and more people are beginning to move away from PC games to pen and paper games. This is what I've seen...a kid comes in my store looking for a video game, and doesn't find one. But he is intrigued by what he does see, like D&D. He asks about it and I tell him. A few days later, he buys the intro D&D box for 10 bucks. Then a few days later he comes in with friends and they all start buying up the core D&D books and begin making characters right in my store! And what else is they say it's so much more fun than video games!

Another thing I've witnessed is that parents come in with their kids to check out the store. They notice D&D. They begin pushing their kid(s) to try it out and tell me it's because they want to get them away from the computer and into a more in-person social game. And D&D seems to be one that is close enough to the video games they've been playing. Gee...parents WANTING their kids to play D&D. I never thought I'd see the day!!

Since I opened my store a few months ago, I'd say a good 20 kids have begun playing D&D for the first time. And by kids, I mean between ages 10 & 17.

But, this may be, like I said, just in my small gamingverse. But I hope it's a beginning trend!

As a long-time PC gamer, it wouldn't surprise me any. The problems inherent with PC gaming are just legion (escalating system requirements, buggy software, incompatible hardware, etc.)
 

As a reference to parents urging gaming, I think we can all remember (well, those who are around 26+) at least one of the fellow gamers we knew had parents who bought in to the old "gaming-is-bad" thing.

But now, with the furious growth of sedentary and solitary entertainment, I guess some parents are realizing that a small group of kids sitting around a table and really interacting is very, very healthy indeed. At least more so than staring at a PC or console game for hours. I think, and this is a stretch, that gaming (and especially DMing) increased my group discussion skills and my ability to facilitate debates. I wonder if this could be an interesting marketing idea for Wizards some day . . . .

Still researching the industry size thing. I hope to have reached PR dept at Wizards by Friday afternoon, but until then I will be too busy.
 

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