Quote from: Zachary The First;271743Its usually not quite that pronounced.  There's usually 1, maybe 2 other companies at least in double figures, but yeah, I would imagine D&D is head and shoulders above.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen;271777Note: I don't know if we have a healthy market distribution.  I believe that it is healthier than you're suggesting.

I would be surprised if D&D didn’t make up at least 80% of the market. And I think I’m being conservative. They have way more than a mere 50-60% market share. I just look at the two local cons here in the bay area: when you count RPGA games, D&D makes up at least 80% of all RPG gaming.

D&D sells rpg books on a level that other game companies only dream about. When people on this site talk about D&D 4e weakened sales, they are talking about weakened sales for D&D. Other game companies would at least triple in size overnight if they had D&D’s “weak sales”.

My FLGS has a RPGA night once a week for living D&D campaigns. They do it because lots of people show up and it brings traffic into the store. No other game can reliably bring in the bodies like D&D. White Wolf is the #2 RPG company, and they’ve never been able to sustain anything close to what D&D has done.

We are talking about a game that had to physically go out of print to lose its #1 seller status. And its drop only lasted as long as it took for the game  to go back into print!

Quote from: jgants;272032I'm mostly just amazed that Munchkin actually still sells that much.  I can see people buying one RPG parody card game, but there are how many variants and supplements out there now?

  I’m not amazed. I stopped being amazed at such things after Pokemon. I thought Pokemon was the most idiotic, 4 year old level, makes-no-sense, juvenile anime wankfest I ever saw.

I was wrong, it was brilliant.

Between the cartoon, toys, CCG, and movies, it made hundreds of millions of dollars. I wish I thought of it.

.

Cool. It would be nice to know about their methodology though.

Also amounts. I sometimes wonder reading these things whether it's not, you know, 30 copies of D&D, followed by 8 of Warhammer, 5 of Shadowrun, and 3 of Pathfinder, or whatever. "Plus this one used copy down at the salvation army..."

Quote from: Jaeger;272057I would be surprised if D&D didn’t make up at least 80% of the market. And I think I’m being conservative. They have way more than a mere 50-60% market share. I just look at the two local cons here in the bay area: when you count RPGA games, D&D makes up at least 80% of all gaming.

D&D sells rpg books on a level that other game companies only dream about. When people on this site talk about D&D 4e weakened sales, they are talking about weakened sales for D&D. Other game companies would at least triple in size overnight if they had D&D’s “weak sales”.

Well, there are some numbers based on Comics & Games Retailers report and the ICv2 Retailers Guide to Games.  Ken Hite had yearly summaries in his Out of the Box column.  By those numbers, WotC was 43% in 2003 and 2004, and up to 53% in 2005.  

Now, those numbers need to be taken with a grain of salt, and WotC will have a larger market share than listed because they have greater dominance in non-hobby stores.  Still, from what I have heard from otherwise, they still make most of their sales from specialty stores (whether physical or online).  So I don't think that the total numbers from all markets could give them more than 60-70%, and possibly less.  

That is still very major dominance, though.

Quote from: Captain Rufus;271970And Ogre is just one of the best hobby boardgames ever made and its damned near criminal that it isn't in print.  I covet my mid 90s box and my Deluxe Ogre rulesbook.  Imagine it done up FFG boardgame style.  That would be sex in a box.

QFT

I would dearly love to see a deluxe Ogre game with modular terrain and big plastic ogre minis.  I think it would make an excellent clicky game too.

Quote from: mhensley;272087QFT

I would dearly love to see a deluxe Ogre game with modular terrain and big plastic ogre minis.  I think it would make an excellent clicky game too.

Here is an idea of what it could look like.  I've been using Heroscape terrain and my decent selection of metal Ogre minis for games.  This is a very simple terrain setup:



Its just lovely.  I need to run another game sometime soon.  I've got more models now and more Heroscape terrain.

And D&D's sales are wierd.  Its the number 1 game every edition yet its also the one game you can pretty much find anywhere that stocks RPGs even if they carry no other RPGs.

D&D's name and retail accessibility count for a LOT.  Plus people like to play games other people play and almost everyone plays whatever version of D&D is in print.  

Its the same reason Magic and Warhammer 40K are the kings of their hobby game subgenre.  They are popular so they get MORE popular because they are already popular.

GW had to be insanely inept just for Warmachine/Hordes to get where they got.  (And much of what made those games appealing has left with more units, expansion books, ever raising prices, and the hardcore PLAY 2 CRUSH fanbase of that game.  Maybe not hardcore to the level of Magic players, but it is definitely on the competitive play side of the game.)

GW has had superior games that failed or might as well be failing (LotR is an amazingly fun minis game.  Probably my second favorite GW system outside of classic Epic.) yet 40K chugs along regardless of what GW does to it.

Magic has had expansions that all but ruined play but it keeps on trucking.  (Mirrodin block pretty much ruined the game.  Its like the Glitter Boy of Magic blocks.)

D&D has had what, 2 totally incompatible rulesets come out in the last 9 years or so yet its got more players than it knows what to do with!

And as to Munchkin?  Yeah, every version I have played plays almost exactly like every other version.  Original plays like Star Munchkin which plays like Munchkin Bites.  (I own 3 versions, though I only paid for Star which was the catalyst for Munchkin with my crowd.  I let a friend borrow an X Box game and he let me hold on to the Kung Fu and original versions.  I haven't seen him in 3 or 4 years.  I am not sure who got the bad deal there.  Him with Halo, or me with Munchkin!)  

Its sort of like buying multiple versions of Monopoly, Risk, or Mafia/Werewolf.  Outside of new pictures and text, its really the same darn thing!  

Of course I have 3 versions of Risk so I may have formerly been part of the problem.  (But it was Transformers!  And LotR (except its the version before they did all the way to Mordor so I got hosed.)!  And the Deluxe one with lovely metal pieces!

I think it just takes a while for people to realize they are rebuying the same thing though.  Eventually the Munchkin market is gonna implode on itself.  And it may put the hurt on SJG unless they are ready for it.  Jackson has mentioned doing more with Ogre, but it keeps getting delayed Palladium style.

Quote from: Captain Rufus;272235GW had to be insanely inept just for Warmachine/Hordes to get where they got.

Its embarrassing how lame GW has become with their IP.

Warmachine / Hordes / Iron Kingdoms is an exciting IP, but lacks the humor of Warhammer.   Gotta love the Gobbo Squig Herders!

Quote from: jhkim;272085...WotC will have a larger market share than listed because they have greater dominance in non-hobby stores...

Greater dominance? My local Borders has an awesome selection for a non-FLGS: it has a few non-D&D core books. But it has a shelf and a half of D&D books.

Seanchai

Hmm, it's nice to have someone at least attempting to put together these kinds of charts, but they aren't as useful as the old ones - without the numbers it's difficult to really follow any trends, and the old C&GR charts were at least fairly transparent about their methodology.

Quote from: Captain Rufus;271970And Ogre is just one of the best hobby boardgames ever made and its damned near criminal that it isn't in print.  I covet my mid 90s box and my Deluxe Ogre rulesbook.  Imagine it done up FFG boardgame style.  That would be sex in a box.

I can see the appeal, but I like my VHS tape box that holds OGRE/GEV, Shockwave, and the Reinforcement Pack.  I actually find those old small games really appealing in their presentation.

Fully agree with you on Car Wars, though.