Over the past couple of weeks, there have been all kinds of discussions on forums as to the nature of what draws people to play the games we play. For many years, Games Workshop was the only major player in town. Things changed when Magic: The Gathering launched in 1993, and the gaming landscape had another behemoth which both attracted and appalled players. Over time, board games based on the Intellectual Property of Games Workshop and similar companies declined, and a rise in the more European style games came to the fore: Settlers of Catan, Ticket to Ride and others filled the vacuum.
All of the games have their champions, and most have their detractors. Some of these games are seen as an auto-pick for new players and groups to have in their collection because they are held to be so good, and some are steering newer players away from them because of the high cost to entry and investment required to compete.
All of these games target different demographics, target different markets, people and players. They all compete for the money in people’s wallets and thus compete for each other within a niche market.
That market has, however, grown rapidly over the last few years. Information is not easy to get hold of the state of the market, as the most information produced in recent months were all speculations on the slide of the value of GAW (Games Workshop) when 25% was knocked off its’ share price. The consensus was that sales revenue was static though sales volume was down, meaning that they were losing customers – just taking more money from them – when the niche market of the war-gaming hobby was in growth.
Some of this speculation is driven by the perceived size of Games Workshop, and the fact that to many, they are the Hobby (a view that management of GW also seems to hold, looking at transcripts from the ill-fated GW Vs. Chapterhouse court case).
( http://www.tabletopgamingnews.com/2013/06/18/74763/ ).
Some of this speculation is driven by the fact that that GW is the only publicly listed company, the others all being privately owned and not being beholden to stockholders.
ICv2, a marketing company that interviews retailers and compiles sales figures independently of companies reported a 20% increase in the games market in 2013. It is unknown if figures from Kickstarter are included in these figures, but seeing as they are a crowd-sourcing platform rather than a retailer, it is unlikely. ( http://www.kickstarter.com )
This compares with an average of 15% growth rate over the last 5 years, and this is the fifth year in a row of growth. The only problem with these figures is that it is a metric that covers the whole gamut of games: from Monopoly to Warhammer. (http://www.icv2.com/articles/markets/28119.html )
Warmachine, Warhammer 40k and other miniature games all fall into the category of ‘non-collectible miniatures’ in their analysis, and as such compete with the likes of Star Wars, Star Trek: Attack Wing and other pre-painted models. The sales figures seem to indicate that there is a mass appeal for these games which has overtaken the likes of Malifaux and Hordes since the release in 2012.
Voice Of The Forge 
I have to thank you for the efforts you have put
in writing this blog. I am hoping to view the same high-grade blog posts by you
in the future as well. In fact, your creative writing
abilities has inspired me to get my very own website now 😉
Thank you. The more informative of the posts are written over a couple of days, so will be a little fewer. There will be some ‘random’ posts as I am challenging myself to write more buy taking part in a blogging exercise. They provide the topic, and I am squeezing it to fit here, as I think that adds to the challenge.
Let me know when you post, I will be interested to read it!
It was ok until about the 3rd paragraph. After which it became a rather anti GW rant and a rather dull review of finances, which has little to do with what the title says.
I am sorry that feel that it is an anti-GW rant. Rather than focus purely on GW I merely reported on other gaming systems and the perception of their value to the whole of the market.
This market analysis was cited, and the problems with it as an industry sector report noted, so this is a fact independent of opinion.
It is a sad fact that GW is no longer the only game in town, merely the largest.
A rather dull review of the finances of the market, is still an intro to the finances of the market.
Thank you for your opinion.
I am afraid that you wont like the rest of the series as you will probably find them rather boring analyses of what games are, and why we play games.