I like the box sets.

Does anyone remember Metascape? It was a big, fat box. Expensive. $40 or so--in 1993 dollars. Very ambitious. It had a cassette tape and cards and minis and super-odd dice. Eclectically-numbered sixteen-siders. The authors wanted to parley the system into a highish power generic system, I think. The campaign world was called Guild Space, and it was kind of a cross between Star Wars and Battlelords of the 23rd Century.

It was produced by an outfit called The Game Lords, who attempted to have excellent support, and a club, and all kinds of cool stuff. These guys had a pretty good game, although it perhaps was not as revolutionarily innovative as they may have wanted it to be. Finally, I think it just collapsed under the weight of that box and all that stuff.

In that time, before the ubiquity of the net, they could be admired for their attempt to release a complete, innovative, supported product. It didn't work, but sometimes, when the brisk autumn wind snaps down from the foothills, I dust off that old box, and think about what might have been . . .

Boxed sets have the potential to be very cool, but very, very few ever realize that potential. Plus they don't survive very well, often ending up getting crushed at some point.

My biggest beef is with the basic boxed set configuration so many companies, especially TSR, settled into - a couple of perfect bound books and a couple of maps. La-dee-fucking-da. How boring. TSR and WotC managed to do a couple of nice boxed sets which were a cut above, contents-wise. Return to the Tomb of Horrors was one, with books, maps, illustrations, and a facsimile of the original Tomb of Horrors module. Dragon Mountain also had some cool components, including cardboard minis and stands. I figure a boxed set should contain stuff that couldn't be contained in a book - such as props.

Loved em but the expense, and design (and shelf space)  are problematic.

Really loved things like the original Gamma World sets. Or the later "deep box" D&D ones like Mystara, Planescape, Darksun and Birthright, with a LOT of stuff packed in them.

I wonder if one of the small press publishers could weigh in and give their opinion on boxed sets from the other side of the counter, as it were. Are they prohibitively expensive to produce? Unpopular with the broad mass of your customer base? Or just something that games companies don't really do any more? I'd be interested to hear your perspective.

I live boxed sets, but only if they really are boxed sets.

IMO, a boxed set has to be more than just a couple of books in a box. There shoudl be a large map and other goodies included.

Quote from: stu2000I like the box sets.

Does anyone remember Metascape? It was a big, fat box. Expensive. $40 or so--in 1993 dollars. Very ambitious. It had a cassette tape and cards and minis and super-odd dice. Eclectically-numbered sixteen-siders. The authors wanted to parley the system into a highish power generic system, I think. The campaign world was called Guild Space, and it was kind of a cross between Star Wars and Battlelords of the 23rd Century.

It was produced by an outfit called The Game Lords, who attempted to have excellent support, and a club, and all kinds of cool stuff. These guys had a pretty good game, although it perhaps was not as revolutionarily innovative as they may have wanted it to be. Finally, I think it just collapsed under the weight of that box and all that stuff.

In that time, before the ubiquity of the net, they could be admired for their attempt to release a complete, innovative, supported product. It didn't work, but sometimes, when the brisk autumn wind snaps down from the foothills, I dust off that old box, and think about what might have been . . .

Believe it or not I remember seeing that they are printing a revised edition of that.  You could probably find it on the net.  I really have no idea what ever happened to my box set.  Just the mention of that game brings me back to the days of ordering from Dragon magazines and the occasional Palladium catalog that we got.