Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;823169That probably has less to do with the games themselves and more to do with the age of the gamers. When I was younger, people would get into all sorts of "wars" over Nintendo VS Sony, Mac VS Apple, etc. Now nobody really cares.

Yeah I think age has a lot to do with it. Maybe around 35 (start of middle age) is a turning point on average for many people.

After around that age, as far as preferences go, they are what they are and naysayers can sod off. And also, you realise that as much as you love your hobby, and have invested so much in over the years, it's just a hobby, and the bills need paying, your health needs maintenance, etc, and other things just pale in significance.

And the average RPG hobbyist has now definitively aged past that point.

Its sort of dying in that compared to the 80s - early 90s, there are fewer people getting into it. I think the majority of regular players are older. If someone hasn't quit after playing for 20+ years, chances are they will be gaming deep into the golden years.

Local game stores in Portlandia seem to be packed with boardgame players mostly.

Quote from: The_Shadow;823156I've read a couple of RPG publishers stating that the industry has picked up modestly since a low point around 2011-2012.

According to ICv2 the low point was 2008, and the industry is "not dying anymore" for quite some time now:
   "The hobby games market grew around 15% in 2014, the sixth consecutive year of growth, according to a new report in ICv2's Internal Correspondence #87. The market is now roughly 2.25 times as large as it was in 2008, the last time the market declined."
http://icv2.com/articles/news/view/30959/six-straight-growth-years-hobby-games

QuoteI have noticed the change in the tenor of internet discussion, much less heated and more accepting of the enormous diversity of games and approaches to gaming. (...) But I miss some of the overblown absorption into both games themselves and the tribal conflicts around them.

But that seems to be subjective as Necrozius feels differently:

Quote from: Necrozius;823148But, as usual, the hobby is being ripped apart from the inside with factional infighting. Or maybe it's the same as it always was: social media just accelerates it or makes it more easy to "see". So it may seem like it's all gonna implode.

I wonder how much of the "missing folk" in Hobby Shops are truly not playing; given that Gamers are geeks and geeks tend to be early adopters of new technology, how many are playing MMO's (which does cater to a certain mindset) and playing in virtual rooms (like Google Meetups)?

Also, while it is true that I am aging, so to is it true my son is as well. And he started playing PF & 5th Ed this year.

Quote from: Novastar;823183I wonder how much of the "missing folk" in Hobby Shops are truly not playing; given that Gamers are geeks and geeks tend to be early adopters of new technology, how many are playing MMO's (which does cater to a certain mindset) and playing in virtual rooms (like Google Meetups)?

Also, while it is true that I am aging, so to is it true my son is as well. And he started playing PF & 5th Ed this year.

Bullshit.

I'm seeing MORE people in the store these days...

- Ed c.

NO

 NOPE - Hobby Not 'dying'.

 If anything it seems to be getting a tad stronger - maybe stronger than ever.

At the store I'm actually seeing MORE people getting into RPG and D&D type gaming than ever before compared to the past seven years.

Its BOTH new gamers and people who tried it once or twice and now getting back into it and trying it again. The NEW edition of Dungeons & Dragons seems to have done the trick of getting people back and getting new folks interested.

I'm also getting more questions about using our tables for RPG groups needing a place to play. They are pleasantly shocked when I say the table space and time is free. Some thought we would be charging 'rent'. (Nope , that's why the tables are there - so people can play games)

- Ed C.

Around here I have more players than I can get into my two games, and for most people is the same. The only people who don't game are those who have insane work schedules or familiar obligations that prevent them from doing so.

Maybe not, but I'd check to see if it's graying.

Quote from: RPGPundit;823140I just thought I'd check, since people have been claiming that the hobby was on the verge of death 10 years ago when I first started my blog, and back in 2006 when this site was in early days, and on a pretty regular basis in the various years hence... but I haven't heard someone claiming it was about to die lately.  Something change?  Or were people just sick of being wrong?

I don't think the hobby is dying, but I think it is being infiltrated by a lot more SJWs and their Quislings.

Quote from: TristramEvans;823166The hobby was never in danger of death.

The industry has been foretelling doom since the bubble burst in the early 80s.

One day the industry will probably die. The hobby will continue along just fine.

Mostly this, but the industry is pretty much into the long tail of its market cycle. It won't die, it'll just persist at a low level.

The hobby isn't dying. The industry might be depending on how you measure the industry, but the industry isn't the hobby. The industry depends on a healthy hobby full of people who buy their games/accessories. On the other hand, the hobby depends on people who are willing to play games, often with no purchase needed, so while a healthy industry is generally good for the hobby, it isn't necessary for the hobby.

Most of the claims I've seen over the years that the hobby is dying are really about the industry not being profitable/profitable enough. Sure, the hobby is smaller than it was in the 1980s, but many leisure time activities are smaller than they were in the 1980s as people today have less leisure time and many more choices of what to do in what leisure time they have.

Quote from: MonsterSlayer;823159Serious correlation question... are people getting tired of MMORPGs? And deciding that face to face interaction has more of a role to play in RPGs? I could be off track especially with the advent of virtual table tops, but I would look at that relationship for the answer.

I think there's a constant churn in MMOs these days, although WoW has abandoned pretty much any attempt to bring in new people and are instead focusing on getting back people who used to subscribe. To that end, the "remember the past!" Warlords of Draenor expac was initially a great success, although I have heard of players dropping off after the initial burst of enthusiasm. But WoW has a TON of ex-players, so they have a lot of people they could churn through before they have to worry about doing something drastic to keep subscriptions up.

As far as the rest of MMOs, there were two rather spectacular failures last year --The Elder Scrolls Online and Wildstar-- although both of those failures were more due to the belief that the hardcore "Vanilla WoW was the BEST way to do things!" was what players were looking for. In particular, Wildstar completely got that one wrong, to the tune of maybe a 100-200k subscribers are left.

The MMO players that convert to pencil and paper RPGers, well, I've not seen it very much. 4e was much more MMO player friendly in its design, and we know how well that one went over. I do wonder if some of the people playing Neverwinter are going to try out 5e given all of the cross environment coordination that Neverwinter and 5e have, but I've not heard of many doing so yet.

Green Ronin had a very good chance at capitalizing on the Dragon Age: Inquisition build up and release, but they really dropped the ball with Set 3. It's a shame, really, because they had a lot of good press with the Tabletop episode and everything else.

If someone had put out a good Marvel RPG right now, they'd be doing well too, given that the MCU and the MMO Marvel Heroes are doing well in their respective areas.

I can only speak for my local area, but the hobby isn't what it used to be in the St. Louis metro. Back in the days of second and third edition D&D I had a large pool of players to roll with. White Wolf games were especially popular here and I hosted a gathering that included up to a dozen regulars at one point. The number of brick and mortar stores selling RPG products has also sharply declined.

I had a friend who owned a chain of three gaming stores, but now it has been resold twice and is now down to one location under a different name. The other "major" hobby store now only really sells a couple Pathfinder and D&D books in low volume.

The gaming stores still in existence really only have the Pathfinder society going for them now, and I don't have much interest in that game or structured play. Rarely, a D&D "gameday" will be held with only a small turn out.

I am currently struggling to maintain a group of 3 to 4 revolving players of varying interests which makes longer campaigns nearly impossible. I personally know of two other gaming groups that don't routinely meet in stores, but they are composed of the GM's family and friends and they are not looking for new players or GM's.

Unfortunately, my gaming life is a bit unsatisfying at the moment. I've joined a board game group and I've had a good time, but it just doesn't have the magic of a good RPG. I wish that I like Magic:The Gathering. It sells crazy well around here. Just last week I saw a circle of 10-13 year old girls playing a multiplayer M:TG on a porch at my apartment complex. At least they can keep a little bit of the hobby alive. I would have asked them what other games they played out of curiosity, but I figured I would probably have looked like some sort of pervert.

To summarize, the RPG scene in St. Louis is nothing like it used to be. Aside from a few small groups that keep to themselves, the Pathfinder Society is really all there is. However, the board game and CCG scene is the strongest I've ever seen it. Thanks Obama.

At least based on my FLGS, the hobby is alive and well in my neck of the woods. There is at least 1 D&D game going whenever I go in to browse, and the median age seems to be early 20s.

My (totally anecdotal and unsupported) impression is that the Great Contraction happened in the 90s, and there hasn't been a comparable decline since.

The hobby has been dying since at least 1990. Given it's growth in that time, it must be undead. Its the zombie apocalypse of hobbies.