All this talk about theory and what makes for a successful RPG is fine but rather meaningless if no one is stocking RPGs.  Something has happened.  I'm not sure what.  But I've noticed over the years that RPGs, specifically the pencil and paper variety, are getting increasingly harder to find in brick & mortar stores.

Why is this?

More importantly what can we do about it?


Example #1: The Mall Kiosk

There used to be a kiosk in the middle of a local mall that sold games, specifically board games.  About 60-75% of their stock was niche variants of MONOPOLY.  I actually stopped to talk to the guy running the kiosk and asked him about this.  In a round about way he admit that sales were infrequent but, over all, the monopoly game was a steady seller.

When querried about special orders his face lit up and asked me what I was looking for.

"What about role-playing games?" said I.

Dumbfounded stare as he goes to his lap top, "Not sure we have many of those."

Long story short he had no real clue what RPGs were.  Didn't know they came in book form.  Best I could do was send him to RPGnet at the time.  No idea what happened to the guy as his kiosk disappeared within a month.  But before his kiosk vanished I noticed that he'd at least begun to stock some Axis & Allies stuff and a few other items we'd discussed.  Still most of his stock was Monopoly games or "family friendly" board game fare.  Not exactly big sellers.

But the guy wasn't even aware of RPGs, not even the board game variants, they were totally off this seller's radar.  That's a bad sign.


Example #2: The Retail Bookstore

I've noticed most of the retail bookstores I go to have next to nothing in the way of RPGs or, worse, when they do have a RPG section it's small and contains a couple dozen D&D/D20 sourcebooks.  When I was a teen you could walk into a bookstore or *gasp* toy store and find not only product from TSR but also from Mayfair Games, Avalon Hill, and a handful of other companies.

What's changed?

Is it that role-playing designers have taken to writing MSS designed to be published as books?  It does seem like, back in the day, when there were box sets these got stocked regularly.  They were like the proverbial gateway drug.  A retailer would stock a box set and almost have to then stock the supplements.

Alas, now, it seems like retailers look at RPGs as just another type of book and treat them accordingly.  Which is to say like a pariah.  A RPG in a box could be stocked in either a bookstore, the games section of a department store, or even the toy section.  Which usually led to these stores stocking the "funny dice", which I haven't seen outside of hobby shops in ages.

I can't help but wonder if box sets are more likely to get stocked over books why aren't more boxed RPG game sets being produced?

It may be a chicken and egg thing, Kester, but RPG distributors sell to Game/hobby shops, not bookstores. Book distributors generally don't distribute games.

-clash

Many things damaged the "chain" and regular distro gaming side of the hobby


Distributors. There was a time when Random House distributed for TSR, most publishers accept returns. Gaming was a bit unique. TSR offered to do a one time return for some products--but they got bit by tons and tons of unsold crappy novels.

The distribution methods used by game companies were limited beyond TSR (and a few others), they also took a fair chunk of change just to put your books into a store. For something that sells madly, and is hugely popular you can piggy back a few more titles with it and make out decently. The problem was distributors work very specifically and those ways are unkind to the very barebones nature of game books.


Add to this that paper prices went up, and up, and up. Most game publishers do not print enough to get the discounts on paper and materials that large volumes tend to give.

Then on top of that, game consoles came out--and the games were highly visual, highly easy to drop in and play, and didn't take the effort of either board games or role-playing games, and we have a generation of parents who grew up with electronic media being a huge part of their lives.

Games went to better paper (since the price wasn't that much greater, except of course Palladium), and more visual styles to try and compete with the ease of newer mediums that entertained us (video games, better quality video tapes, then DVDs.) but the prices went up as well. Despite inflation mass market paperbacks and clothbound books managed to only inflate a tiny bit because of their mass volume. This is not true of comic books (who also had many of the issues of games)--their prices went up like games, paper got better, visuals are better simply because of better color processes--and the "price for inflation" plus "price for better materials" combined to make comics and games both less price accessible.

Of course the problem is that neither games nor comics understood that their appeal wasn't the paper, wasn't the color processes (or art for games) beyond a very few buyers.


Compare for example: Manga are most often black and white, come in big books that combine what would be the equivalents of several comic book issues, and many of them are read backwards (which is a barrier for many people who were trained to read right to left...) yet many manga "books" sell like hotcakes? Why? Because the writing speaks to the generation that is buying them, and the characters interest them--the characters aren't often 30+ years old with huge back stories you can't follow. (and I like comic books mind you) the characters are relatively fresh, and you can get a reasonably complete story, and sometimes several from (most) single manga volumes.

But comic books and games insist that breaking things across several books "makes sense" contrary to how badly other examples did. (Example: Stephen King's Green Mile, was considered at one point a disaster when they sold it chapter by chapter--it only didn't fail completely because King was a big enough name to barely hold it together.)

All these things combine to make games less interesting: The boxed model was good, but boxes got expensive, the fact that many boxed sets contained less than 200 pages of material was often good for beginners, but the game publishers (and many die hard fans) wanted "more, better" and because the industry catered to that, it lost its hold too some degree in chains and peoples interests/ease of accessibility,


Now these are just observations based on working in bookstores and being a gamer, and reading publisher reports and other bits....so it may be flawed, but that's how it looks to me.

Quote from: flyingmiceIt may be a chicken and egg thing, Kester, but RPG distributors sell to Game/hobby shops, not bookstores. Book distributors generally don't distribute games.

-clash

Sorta. Ingrams (common distributor for special orders for Waldenbooks and Borders, and Barnes&Nobles/Bdaltons) carried a few games, not just Random House Derived TSR either.

Great post Silverlion!

flyingmice, you're right, up to a point.  While RPGs are technically classified as "games" I have been in several stores that sell games, usually in the posh malls whose primary target consumer are tourtists, that have said, bluntly, that they do NOT stock books when asked about RPGs.

IOW: Treating RPGs like games, yet publishing them as books, is a major hindrance to their getting stocked.

Best I can figure, based on past discussions, is the proprietors dislike the RPG model of selling the game in pieces, or rather book by book.  In addition to which they have to worry about stocking speciality dice and etcetera.

I know many will want to use CCGs as an example of how selling a game piecemeal works, but it's a totally different type of game.  Not to mention there's a vast difference between stocking a box containing, say, 100 units, and stocking one book that may cost that exact same per unit (book)!

Quote from: SilverlionSorta. Ingrams (common distributor for special orders for Waldenbooks and Borders, and Barnes&Nobles/Bdaltons) carried a few games, not just Random House Derived TSR either.

I know, Tim. Ingrams distributes StarCluster 2. They don't get it into B&N or Waldenbooks, but you can order it online. That's where I learned about the distro system.

-clash

Quote from: Kester PelagiusGreat post Silverlion!

flyingmice, you're right, up to a point.  While RPGs are technically classified as "games" I have been in several stores that sell games, usually in the posh malls whose primary target consumer are tourtists, that have said, bluntly, that they do NOT stock books when asked about RPGs.

IOW: Treating RPGs like games, yet publishing them as books, is a major hindrance to their getting stocked.

Best I can figure, based on past discussions, is the proprietors dislike the RPG model of selling the game in pieces, or rather book by book.  In addition to which they have to worry about stocking speciality dice and etcetera.

I know many will want to use CCGs as an example of how selling a game piecemeal works, but it's a totally different type of game.  Not to mention there's a vast difference between stocking a box containing, say, 100 units, and stocking one book that may cost that exact same per unit (book)!

I agree there, Kester, but the initial expense of creating boxed sets is too big a hinderance to anyone but WotC and a couple other games publishers making them. Chicken and egg again.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceI agree there, Kester, but the initial expense of creating boxed sets is too big a hinderance to anyone but WotC and a couple other games publishers making them. Chicken and egg again.

I hear you.  It takes money to make money, but there has to be some alternative.  Perhaps using stock boxes without having them custom made, gluing a printed custom cover on them, or something?

Quote from: Kester PelagiusWhy is this?

First, the nature of the hobby business and traditional distribution channel makes it a low profit business that puts all of the risk on retailers (they have to essentially buy their stock and hopes it sells -- they can't return unsold merchandise the way book stores do).  Oh, and they have to compete with bookstores that can return stock for the most popular lines like D&D and WW.

Second, role-players seem reluctant to spend a lot of money on their hobby.  They buy online at a discount instead of at a brick and mortar shop.  They download bootlegs.  They let the GM buy all the books and don't buy books as players.  And then there is all the moaning when a core rulebook costs $30 or $40 because they used to cost $12 back in the day (I'm reminded of my grandmother talking about loaves of bread for a nickel).

Third, the customer base is relatively small and doesn't need to buy regularly.

If you want to encourage brick-and-mortar game stores, you need to encourage role-players to part with enough money to make it profitable or you need to convince game publishers to take on more of the risk by allowing returns on unsold product.

So, praytell, aren´t pre-painted miniatures one nifty idea to fight all those structural problems?

I work at Borders, D&D Books and other RPGs are classified as Sci-Fi/Fantasy Fiction. Our file system for them has them all over the place (for example, the author of the book is sometimes D&D and sometimes the first author alphabetically or sometimes Monte Cooke-even if he had nothing to do with the book).

I think if retailers were educated on them, they would sell more. But it's a niche/hobby product. So really it's up to the fanbases to introduce people to the hobby themsleves and try to create a demand.

I think the first decade the became popular because it was new, it was fresh (good word SilverLion) and it was exciting. Now, we have things like GNS and other codeified terms (System, fluff, exploding dice etc.) to make it innaccessible and boring.

It's also got a horrible (HORRIBLE!) Social-Stigma. Roleplaying is for LOSERS. Whether they're nerdy-geeks (a la your D&D stereotype), frail waif like pansies (Your WW player stereotype), or unsocial, unwashed pixel bitches (GURPS anyone?); Roleplaying just has a negative stereotype (I think Pundy has taked about this at length, lawncrappers and catpissmen and whatever).

I think all we can do about it is invite people to play.

Over and over again I read online "Waaaagh, there's no gamers where I live and I want to play Exalted...Waaaaaagh!".

Well, you don't need gamers, all you need is friends ( or really, interested aquaintences).

This is getting really rambly/ranty

To fix the problem of low sales all we have to do is get new/more people interested.

Ideas:

* Invite local WoW Guildmates over to play a roleplaying game.
* Buy a friend a roleplaying book as a present,
* Invite co-workers over to play a Role-Playing game
* Run an RPG in your local chain-bookstore, when people ask about it, invite them to play.
* Leave your current, long-time role-playing group and start a new one.

See the trend, if we want to expand the hobby, we have to expand the hobby. Don't let RPG's end up like Lionel Trains:)

Full supportive fire from my position!

Quote from: SettembriniSo, praytell, aren´t pre-painted miniatures one nifty idea to fight all those structural problems?

For RPG's? No.

Wargames--yes.

The difference is subtle and yet also discreet.

Mini have issues with being fixed figures for games where the imagination is often the only limit (ok..and genre) who wants a yet another elf with bow when they can be an elf with a giant two handed sword? (and yet Elves are always given BOWS for many mini lines)

It hits the "I can do anything" on the head, and that's a problem because that's a tabletop RPG's strength.

Quote from: SilverlionFor RPG's? No.

Wargames--yes.

The difference is subtle and yet also discreet.

Mini have issues with being fixed figures for games where the imagination is often the only limit (ok..and genre) who wants a yet another elf with bow when they can be an elf with a giant two handed sword? (and yet Elves are always given BOWS for many mini lines)

It hits the "I can do anything" on the head, and that's a problem because that's a tabletop RPG's strength.

One day we'll probably have holographic gaming tables with holographic animated mini's to replace our lead ones.  But, until someone invents that table we can sit atperhaps the initial step will be RPG corebooks that come with a PC/Video game?

Somewhere in my library I have a couple Krondor novels that came with the PC game.  Never used it.  But it made me wonder why no one had thought to bundle a introductory level game with a core rule book.

What would the future of RPGs be like if you could buy a rulebook that came with a game you could put into your game console to begin playing with?  You'd literally be able to learn the game as you played AND have the rules so you could run your own games with your friends.

I know this could work as I knew a few gamers, way back when, that actually got their start in gaming playing AD&D gold box games on the C=64!

Quote from: Kester PelagiusAll this talk about theory and what makes for a successful RPG is fine but rather meaningless if no one is stocking RPGs.  Something has happened.  I'm not sure what.  But I've noticed over the years that RPGs, specifically the pencil and paper variety, are getting increasingly harder to find in brick & mortar stores.

Mate, take your "roleplaying is dying" doom-saying shit away from here, it doesn't belong here. Where does it belong? Forge or rpg.net, maybe.

Quote from: KrakaJakIt's also got a horrible (HORRIBLE!) Social-Stigma. Roleplaying is for LOSERS.

So is pr0n, but that sells extremely well. The difference is that a majority of people are interested in sex; but only a minority of people are interested in pretending to be elves. Same as with golf or model trainsets - people just plain ain't interested. They like other stuff instead.

The future of pen and paper rpgs is as rosey or dim as it ever was. I was first told roleplaying was dying about 1983, when I'd bought a copy of Advanced D&D to complement my Basic D&D; when I read it I realised it was actually a new game. The guy who'd introduced me to Basic assured me that the release of Advanced D&D meant that roleplaying would die, because they were just ripping everyone off, and everyone would realise this and stop gaming.

Then there were the collapse of TSR, magic cards, computer games, White Wolf, pdfs and piracy, et cetera et cetera ad nauseum. And yet here we are. It's bullshit.

Take that shit back to rpg.net or the Forge where it belongs.