Tabletopocalypse Now - GMS' thoughts about the decline in the hobby


log in or register to remove this ad

Sales only reflect the health of the gaming industry, not the hobby. There are still millions of tabletop RPG enthusiasts around the world. They may not be playing the same game as you or I, but they're still carrying the hobby' torch into the future.
 

Okay, a few notes as I read:

1) Specialty stores are not a good indicator - didn't most of us start playing at home, not in specialty stores? And certainly specialty stores are not a good measure of sales - Amazon could fill that gap rather nicely.

2) How many books sold by the Rank #5 game sold for the quarter doesn't not speak to how many #1 through 4 sold. There's an indication there that the hobby may be focused on a small number of games, but that's not an indication of its overall size.

So, questionable foundation leads to questionable conclusions.

Are we at the height of the 1980s? Probably not. But are we lower than we've ever been? I don't think we have evidence to say. Some folks seem to miss the fact that the hobby's always been a niche - that's the thing with hobbies. Being small didn't kill us off in the past, so it isn't necessarily a doom in the future either.
 
Last edited:

The Designer Monologues » Blog Archive » Tabletopocalypse Now

Gareth raises some good points but despite the decline in sales, I feel that gaming as a hobby remains fairly strong.

Comments?

(Let's avoid the snarkiness that EN folks tend to associate with GMS, please.)
I am in the middle ground. I do feel those that say the hobby is going strong do have their heads in the sand and are ignoring the obvious signs of a declining hobby. On the other hand, the "hard data" given tend not to be the strongest of signs. The key is these unreliable signs still almost all point in the same direction.

In this article the biggest flaw is pointing to the ICV2 survey. That survey is very flawed since it only goes by surveying hobby retailers. It doesn't measure non-hobby sales at all. It surveys a line of stores that clearly has a deserved reputation for often bit being the most professional and business-like (i.e. many make business decisions based on whether they like a game line rather than it's sales and marketing potential).

Looking at all that is out there and I see that the industry is shrinking and that definitely means the hobby is shrinking. That doesn't necessarily mean it is near a critical issue yet. It should be a wake up call for all who are concerned about it to look at ways of growing the hobby, though.
 

Unfortunate title for the post.

I first read it as "Tabletopocalypse", expecting a post on how the rise of tablet computing was dooming the RPG industry. I'm going along waiting for a mention of the iPad at the gaming table . . . :confused:

Reading it I understand it as TableTopocalypse. :blush:

Nevermind!
 

1) Specialty stores are not a good indicator - didn't most of us start playing at home, not in specialty stores? And certainly specialty stores are not a good measure of sales - Amazon could fill that gap rather nicely.
I played at home, but bought my product from what would have been a specialty store in those days (a hobby and craft store, the first hobby gaming store wouldn't hit Delaware for another couple of years).

I see a lot of polls here asking where people learnt the game. Most starting gaming because friends and/or family recruited them. However, where did they find gaming. I bet if you traced it back a connection, or maybe two, you would start seeing a majority of people who started gaming because of the hobby gaming stores. Those stores started it and the people they got into the game continued the growth.

Of course, even if you take that as a given, it does point out the most recruitment tool for RPGs, the players and gamemasters! That itself has challenges because I have noted that a very large segment of that group keeps itself insulated in their own longtime groups, in their longtime games, not adding to the hobby. Nothing is wrong with that, but when it is such a large segment, it does hurt the impression the hobby has on others and the ability to recruit them.
 

Re: Specialty stores

I'm a bit of an oddball. I'd heard of the game before ever seeing it, and was initiated by a fellow student doing an intro adventure in the school library after classes let out. I bought my AD&D PHB for that in a comic book shop.

A few months later, we moved to a small town in a different state. There, gaming supplies (and comics) such as could be found were only in a college bookstore and a small Mom & Pop bookstore. I exhausted most of their variety within a year, buying only things like character sheets and the occasional new mini that showed up. New modules disappeared as fast as they showed up because they typically only ordered one or two.

To find anything beyond the bare bones stuff I could get locally, I had to save up my $$$ and wait for one of our monthly family trips to Topeka or Kansas City- 1-2 hours away- to go to a specialty store.

(Yes, past Dino-riding Ninja Pirates in the snow...though not uphill since Kansas didn't order any of those when it was under construction.)

And while I'm convinced online retailers can fill a lot of the gap that existed back then, I think that the healthier specialty shops- esp. those with an online presence- are still the best places to find the full range of gaming supplies.
 

Okay, a few notes as I read:

1) Specialty stores are not a good indicator - didn't most of us start playing at home, not in specialty stores? And certainly specialty stores are not a good measure of sales - Amazon could fill that gap rather nicely.

True. It's a while I take my books from Amazon. No sales for my game shop, but I actually spent more on RPG books.

Anecdotal, of course, but it's an example of what you said..
 

I find the howwah at the potential loss of specialty stores interesting. For the first decade or so of the hobby, when it grew the fastest, there weren't any! So while I agree that their loss will hurt the hobby I rather doubt that it will simply keel over and drop dead without them.
 

I am in the middle ground. I do feel those that say the hobby is going strong do have their heads in the sand and are ignoring the obvious signs of a declining hobby. On the other hand, the "hard data" given tend not to be the strongest of signs. The key is these unreliable signs still almost all point in the same direction.

Agreed. According to the experts, the tabletop hobby has been dying for decades, and yet we're still here... but it would be a mistake to think that tabletop gaming is doing 'well'. At best, I would suggest it is doing okay.

But I wouldn't expect it ever to die off completely, and in fact think it may not shrink too much more. There are some things that tabletop gaming can offer that online gaming can't (at least for now; possibly, ever), the primary one being the feeling of sitting around a table with a bunch of friends - sure, online tools provide a facsimile of this, but it's just not the same.

1) Specialty stores are not a good indicator - didn't most of us start playing at home, not in specialty stores? And certainly specialty stores are not a good measure of sales - Amazon could fill that gap rather nicely.

Yep. RPGs could be selling more than they ever had, and the FLGS could still be dying due to internet sales.

(However, there are other problems associated with the death of the FLGS. Amazon and the like are great for buying all sorts of things, but only if you know what you want before you go there. D&D and the like need some sort of advertising presence to make people aware of the games in the first place, or their availability on Amazon is for naught. Of course, the FLGS is probably not the best possible venue for this, and probably hasn't been for some time, but it's still better than nothing.)

2) How many books sold by the Rank #5 game sold for the quarter doesn't not speak to how many #1 through 4 sold. There's an indication there that the hobby may be focused on a small number of games, but that's not an indication of its overall size.

It also says nothing of numbers #6 through #20 and beyond. In fact, I would expect there to be two or three games selling (relatively) huge numbers, and then "the rest". It happens that Dresden Files is #5 this time, but it could very well have been any one of many other games; it's just a question of how the numbers have come back this time.

Or maybe not. Who knows?
 

Trending content

Remove ads

Top