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Millenials turning off video games for board games.
- SuperflyPete
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- Black Barney
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great book on this movement called Life is Br0ken.
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Escape, The Resistance, Rampage, Zombies!, Dominion, Zombie Dice, Skyline, Say Anything...And Age of Conan (which feels like the odd man out of that group). And Firefly was shown but not in the cafe which was the center of the report but in a house.
Another interesting aspect is that many clips shown showed people reading or referencing the rules.
My point? It seemed like the people playing weren't your die hard BGG gamers, and I just find it interesting what gets played by people not entrenched in the hobby.
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Thing is I really, really don't care. I like the level of popularity boardgames have, I like the games I own already, I like just enough new releases to keep me vaguely interested in the hobby. More players will probably mean more games, I guess... more games that I don't need. I feel that the hobby has been in a great place the last few years and if it grows (or doesn't) I don't really give a shit. It could get more pop focused, we could see more licensed games, we might even see a higher caliber of games criticism... which some people want. But none of this has any effect on me personally.
That's my entirely selfish take on it. Besides, the whole thing might just be a hipster fad.
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kingmakerscolumbus.com/
On the one hand, I think they should be smacked for 'Board Game Parlour' and 'Board Game Sommelier'. On the other hand, though, I keep meaning to go down there and throw them a $5 to help them fight the good fight. The owners thought that board games were now big enough to emulate the older chess/backgammon bar model, or Snakes and Lattes. The next Dominion expansion isn't going to bury Call of Duty anytime soon, but I think that's a sign that it's getting more popular.
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- Michael Barnes
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"Hey, wacky board games! Some people are having fun 'unplugged' ha ha! Oh, these modern times!"
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- san il defanso
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Is it just about finding more people to play with? Because otherwise it has a distinctly cult-like vibe, and mostly it just feels like a need for validation from more and more people.
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- Michael Barnes
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San Il Defanso wrote: One thing I've noticed from a lot of more prominent figures in the hobby is this relentless desire to "promote" board gaming. I'm not sure, but is this something that other hobbies do? Do stamp collectors and golfers feel the need to tell everyone they know about how great stamp collecting and golfing is?
Is it just about finding more people to play with? Because otherwise it has a distinctly cult-like vibe, and mostly it just feels like a need for validation from more and more people.
they are closely related but you do get this in RPGs, and War Games, and to a lesser extent minis games. Sports do it to an extent too. Professional Badmington has revised its rules a few times to make it more TV friendly. Cricket as seen increasingly shorter formats of the game with the aim of making it more accessible and trying to promote the sport. All these things are hobbies with a cash investment that need more customers and have hobbyists that want to see them succeed.
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- SuperflyPete
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@San: Promotion? Why? Because they get paid to promote. Free games, money, fame...etc.
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San Il Defanso wrote: One thing I've noticed from a lot of more prominent figures in the hobby is this relentless desire to "promote" board gaming. I'm not sure, but is this something that other hobbies do? Do stamp collectors and golfers feel the need to tell everyone they know about how great stamp collecting and golfing is?
I've complained about and hated board game proselytizing for years. It's fucking obnoxious at best. But yes, other hobbies do it, almost all of them in fact. There is no shortage of people telling me what shows I should watch, what kind of music I should listen to, how great football (or even worse, soccer) is, in the small towns I grew up in people were constantly being pushed into fishing or hunting (even fly fishing).
People love to sell their hobbies to others.
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@San: I'm not running around trying to get everyone I see to try out boardgaming, but I think I see where the folks that are selling it are coming from. I've had conversations, more than once, with my mom, in-laws, etc, where I've tried to explain the local board gaming club meeting or M:tG tournament. If it was a remote-controlled airplane club, or a chess club, or a quilting bee, I wouldn't have to explain it.*
*Yes, I know, I'm a big boy and don't have to explain jack shit about what I do in my spare time to anybody but my wife. But I like being on speaking terms with my relatives, however goofus they may be.
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- Erik Twice
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Now there are always shops selling Settlers, Dominion and every FFG title at cons and the local boardgame shop went from having three or four boxes to having a full wall of games. Most of the geeks my age may not have heard of Martin Wallace or Caylus but they play Smallworld, Chaos in the Old World or Citadels. Basically the demographic that could only play Warhammer 40K or Magic: The Gathering now plays more and more different games.
I think boardgames are mainly consumed by two demographics:
- Geeky young people (16-29)
- Couples, people on their 30s and geeks with a career and a stable job (The BGG crowd).
I don't think there's any basis on the idea that anyone is "turning off video games for board games" though. That's as true and as false as "people are turning off their Xboxes to play NES games".
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- ThirstyMan
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I think the main demographic is disposable income, like most hobbies.
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I find it really interesting that places around the world are figuring out a new way to make money in the board game industry. Places like Snakes and Lattes and The Windup Space in Baltimore have figured out that gamers want cool places to meet friends and play games so let's charge admission and sell so food and drinks to gamers. In the future the bar or cafe that runs game nights and sells a few games on the side will probably make more money than the game store owner who store is filled with Magic players who aren't buy much. The game store owner may start selling sodas and chips for $1.00 on the side to pay their rent while the gaming cafe is packing them in selling $4.00 fancy coffee drinks. Also, check out the male-female ratio at a Magic or RPG night at a game store vs. gaming cafe. The game store is missing out 50% of the population because the game store isn't hip and smells like teenage funk.
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