PC gaming - and the game niches specifically tailored for the PC's strengths - have shrunk significantly, though. Most high budget games can't afford it anymore to ignore the console market and the console focus groups.

What is a high budget game though? A large, weighty hardback? Or a 'pocket' sized player guide like savage world explorer edition?

I'd rather the latter over the former for many reasons, nost least of all practicality.

FFG's 40k games are surely high budget. They are lush in production, look stunning and tick all the right boxes for high quality big budget (proofreading nothwithstanding). But they are also big and heavy and expensive. Even the supplements are between £30-40!

We all love the big books. I remember buying VtM 2E and relishing it. But i didn't relish lugging it and all the various supplements around on a bus!

Quote from: Melan;412093PC gaming - and the game niches specifically tailored for the PC's strengths - have shrunk significantly, though. Most high budget games can't afford it anymore to ignore the console market and the console focus groups.

It has mostly shifted to on-line purchasing. Steam and similar sites has just as much variety as PC game stores had back in the day.

Quote from: estar;412103It has mostly shifted to on-line purchasing. Steam and similar sites has just as much variety as PC game stores had back in the day.

Very true. Steam is where I get almost all of my computer games these days. Haven't owned a console since the Xbox.

completely off-topic, but the next consoles won't have CD/DVD drives anyway.  It'll probably be solid-state storage and a Steam-like interface, thus rendering the used game market null and void.

progress...it's a M.F.

also, I don't buy that the iPad is outside the price range of the disposable cash demographic that plays role-playing games. Those same people shell out cash for the latest version of Sony/MS's console systems, and are used to $60 games.  Granted there are your luddite grognards who will shake their heads at "these kids with their fancy sticks and hoops", but still...they are the exception.

Going back to the beginning of the computer game market and you're still looking at $60 dollar games - Only, with inflation, that's a significantly more expensive $60.

Quote from: kregmosier;412114completely off-topic, but the next consoles won't have CD/DVD drives anyway.  It'll probably be solid-state storage and a Steam-like interface, thus rendering the used game market null and void.

My situation is that my kids scratch the damn CDs all the time. Having gamed from the floppy only era of 1990 to now. I like the on-line services. I switched computers once since I started buying from Steam and it a lot less hassled getting things up and running with the current situation.

Of course if Steam ever went away it would suck, a lot. But now entering my third decade of computer gaming so far it is an acceptable trade off. However I rarely will pay release day prices unless the game is really really good. It was several years before I picked up Civilization IV + expansions for a song on Steam.

The exception are with companies that are not a dick about DRM like Paradox and their Hearts of Iron/Europa/Victoria series of games. With Paradox I buy their thing, download it, enter the key (if it even needed) and start playing. Those guys and similar companies I like will get my money on the day of release.

The Steam DRM in my opinion is worth the risk once you get down to the sub $30 range.

Also there are a bunch of retro-games sites, I don't have any links at the moment, that putting the time in packaging emulators with old old games, and getting legal permission to sell. I think that is way cool, hopefully we will see the old SSI gold box games pop up someday.

Quote from: estar;412284Also there are a bunch of retro-games sites, I don't have any links at the moment, that putting the time in packaging emulators with old old games, and getting legal permission to sell. I think that is way cool, hopefully we will see the old SSI gold box games pop up someday.

Good old Games is the one I know about. I'd appreciate links for any others.

I like a number of Gareth's games, he's a good game maker. He's also very outspoken . And I also agree that the industry is shrinking. Most of the game stores that I knew of 5 years ago are either out of business or well on their way. And Hasbro could easily just shut WotC down if it's profits aren't what Hasbro wants (and from some of the stories coming out early in 3e, even those sales weren't good enough).

Quote from: danbuter;412300I like a number of Gareth's games, he's a good game maker. He's also very outspoken . And I also agree that the industry is shrinking. Most of the game stores that I knew of 5 years ago are either out of business or well on their way. And Hasbro could easily just shut WotC down if it's profits aren't what Hasbro wants (and from some of the stories coming out early in 3e, even those sales weren't good enough).

*Psst* We've had a world-wide recession for the last few years.

Quote from: Narf the Mouse;412304*Psst* We've had a world-wide recession for the last few years.

Psst, D&D 3E was launched at the beginning of the one-two Dot-com bubble burst / 9/11 recession.

As it happens, D&D 3E was a good prduct, readable both by newbies and grown ups (I'm re-reading the Manual of the Planes and I'm amazed at the quality of writing and at the sheer amount of content) and sailing on the wings of "The Lord of the Rings" movies (when you see scores of halfling clerics named "Aragorn" you understand the impact).

D&D 4E is a terminally lame attempt to cash into a score of markets that have near-nothing to nothing to do with GdRs (Eurogames, MMORPG, miniature skirmish games, card games...) And the contents are written with retarded children in mind (or, even worse, by people thinking that if you write for a kid you must write in a retarded way).

[As a side note, I'm finally playing "World of Warcraft" steadily due to a job-related need - and I even more amazed by how much 4E attempts to plagiarize this MMORPG mechanics. So much for those who scream "lie!" when you point out the similitudes].

Anyway, regarding tabletop RPGs and MMORPGs, the original link gives us this gem:

"Now, imagine you're Hasbro. You have total control of the rights to one of the most recognizable fantasy brands in the world. Will you a) leverage that brand online, where games like World of Warcraft and even fucking Farmville are making hundreds of millions per year, or b) stick with the traditional model, aimed at a shrinking market where 3000 copies per quarter means you're a top-seller?"

Uh? Why not *BOTH*?

And a last note regarding "4E Essentianls" - the game that allows you to play with... er... ELVES AND DWARVES!!! A friend of mine has a 12 years old son and a 11 years old daughter. They are both reading "The Lord of the Rings" and enjoying it to the point that my friend had to buy a second copy so that each kid has his own.

"You know?" he noted "for us (he is a gamer) many things are a given: elves, dwarves, the enchanted wood, the dungeon with the end boss... but, of course, when you are 12 you are discovering them FOR THE FIRST TIME". True: after all, I myself discovered this "new, amazing, never heard before" book in 1980 - 25 years after it was published. And I followed up with D&D *Basic Set* in 1984 - I wasn't interested, at that age, in "different thinghies" like Glorantha or Elric.

We are now planning a session with his kids, using Basic D&D (the revered Rules Cyclopedia) and they are jumping with excitement at playing "Legolas".

Which is the whole fucking point WotC missed with its "Jasonbourne" and "Shadowcuckold" races and classes: if you write for a kid, write around basic archetypes. They are not called so without reason.

He's now posted a follow-up saying we're all big dummy doo-doo heads for being provoked by his provocative blog post. Also, we don't understand anything he said, or meant. And other passive-aggressive classics, followed by a lament that people still incorrectly think he engages in the kind of obnoxious behavior he just finished engaging in.

Good times. Oh well. I wish him luck with his transition into digital media, or video games, or whatever he's going to do when all his infallible predictions inevitably come true. And I still like Hong Kong Action Theater.