I thought folks might find this interesting.  It was posted over at the Story Games Forum by one of the owners of the Endgame store in Oakland California.  Chris lays out his stores sales of the indie games he carries.

I found the numbers pretty interesting, particularly that RPG sales were up for his store roughly 24%.  Chris also has some interesting things to say about the numbers drawn from Comics and Game retailers further in the thread.

Hmm, interesting figures, but in the bigger picture I don't think they mean much. Remember, it is california we're talking about there, the "land of fruits and nuts" so its no surprise that their tastes be out of the mainstream.

In any case, the confessions of the couple of guys later who list the massive shopping list of storygames they bought from the store make it very clear that what happened is that there is a small community of very hardcore Forgites in that region, and that the handful of them are responsible for all those "storygame" sales.  Which is a pretty awesome business strategy for the owner of said store, a half-dozen utterly obsessive fanatics who buy absolutely everything Ron Edwards tells them to can quickly pay your kids' way through college.

It just doesn't really tell us anything about the bigger picture of what's going on with the gaming industry as a whole.

RPGPundit

"But will it play in Peoria?"

-clash

Quote from: flyingmice"But will it play in Peoria?"

As far as I can tell, D&D is the big game in Peoria.  No surprise there, really.

Quote from: RPGPunditHmm, interesting figures, but in the bigger picture I don't think they mean much. Remember, it is california we're talking about there, the "land of fruits and nuts" so its no surprise that their tastes be out of the mainstream.

In any case, the confessions of the couple of guys later who list the massive shopping list of storygames they bought from the store make it very clear that what happened is that there is a small community of very hardcore Forgites in that region, and that the handful of them are responsible for all those "storygame" sales.  Which is a pretty awesome business strategy for the owner of said store, a half-dozen utterly obsessive fanatics who buy absolutely everything Ron Edwards tells them to can quickly pay your kids' way through college.

It just doesn't really tell us anything about the bigger picture of what's going on with the gaming industry as a whole.

RPGPundit

At any rate, this will make it easier to round the forgites up for medical experiments.

Minnesota has quite a large following of forge games. The FLGS here don't seem to realize it though, because they carry little or no forge games. Whether people like it or not I think any gaming store that does not have a small indie/forge section of rpgs is missing out on some sales.

Why'd he list the PHB2 but not the PHB for comparison purposes? Huh.

Ok, well anyhow. I think in some ways this illustrates the folly of the short-subject game in action: scroll down just a bit and you can see individual  guys talking about what they bought from him: in two individual cases 15-25 different games. On the one hand I'm amazed, but on the other hand, of course it's the same guy buying multiple games. Because most of these games are primarily for one-shots and fairly short run sessions.

I'm starting to hypo-theorize that the real goal may not even be the games themselves, but in being able to participate in the discussions. You'd have to be familiar with the gamut of the games (and own one of each) in order to really participate, wouldn't you?

Is the primary audience meant to be collectors? I'm not sure.

If they are meant to be played.. how do you even get a game group together and switch the game up on them that often? That seems like it would get old real quick. And if you hate gamers and want to play with senior citizens and the like.. wouldn't that get old.. quicker?

I have often heard the claim that "it costs $100 to play D&D." But this is an inflated claim. All you really need to play is a PHB, which isn't that expensive (more like 13-20$). And you can just use http://d20srd.org and do it for free, if you really want to. The SRD lacks character creation guidelines, but you can generate characters for free too: http://www.pathguy.com/cg35.htm
 Only the DM really needs to have the full set, and that actually costs about $45-60 on Amazon, depending on if there's a sale. (And once again, the SRD's are all online free.) So whats the average price here? At a conservatve 10$ each, we're talking individual collections in a single year of purcheses being $150-250. I definitely have about that many D&D books, but I bought them over a period of 6 years. On sale. At Amazon.

Some of these indie darlings are available online for free, but in general, if you really want to be part of the club, you need to own a fairly good library, don't you?

Kudos to people for successfully selling stuff. But I have to kinda laugh at the people who bought most of it.

Quote from: keith senkowskiI thought folks might find this interesting.  It was posted over at the Story Games Forum by one of the owners of the Endgame store in Oakland California.  Chris lays out his stores sales of the indie games he carries.

These numbers are encouraging and it's good to see some of these games getting sales.

But could anyone tell me why the fuck is Artesia not considered an indie game by that asshat owner and instead thrown alongside WotC and White Wolf products? It's just profundly dumb.

Aside from the fact Luke Crayne blows a couple of Forge folks, is there any reason Burning Wheel is an indie game, a "story game" or whatever lame and useless labels you want to use, while Artesia is not?  

Artesia is a one-man endeavor. Even the art was done by the guy himself, which is more than can be said of most games on the indie list.

Shame on this blind and irrational elitism.

Quote from: Consonant DudeBut could anyone tell me why the fuck is Artesia not considered an indie game by that asshat owner and instead thrown alongside WotC and White Wolf products? It's just profundly dumb.

Aside from the fact Luke Crayne blows a couple of Forge folks, is there any reason Burning Wheel is an indie game, a "story game" or whatever lame and useless labels you want to use, while Artesia is not?  

Excellent point consonant dude! I hadn't noticed that. If Artesia is a "mainstream game" so is Burning Wheel. If Burning Wheel is a "story game" so is Artesia.  They're both "indie," just like Paladium...

"Story Games" seems to be equivalent to "Games the Forge Likes" as usual. Nothing new here! Move along, move along!

-clash

Quote from: Consonant DudeAside from the fact Luke Crayne blows a couple of Forge folks, is there any reason Burning Wheel is an indie game, a "story game" or whatever lame and useless labels you want to use, while Artesia is not?  

Artesia is a one-man endeavor. Even the art was done by the guy himself, which is more than can be said of most games on the indie list.

Dude.  Artesia won "Best Production" last year for the Indie RPG Awards.  I was there at Gen Con when these were announced and a bunch of people from the Forge booth went over to Mark Smylie at his booth to congratulate him.  

Best Production in an Indie RPG

Chris' listing was a mistake.  I would guess he didn't know much about Artesia, and it simply looks so slick that he thought it was put out by a big company.

Quote from: Abyssal MawI'm starting to hypo-theorize that the real goal may not even be the games themselves, but in being able to participate in the discussions. You'd have to be familiar with the gamut of the games (and own one of each) in order to really participate, wouldn't you?

Is the primary audience meant to be collectors? I'm not sure.

If they are meant to be played.. how do you even get a game group together and switch the game up on them that often? That seems like it would get old real quick. And if you hate gamers and want to play with senior citizens and the like.. wouldn't that get old.. quicker?

I have often heard the claim that "it costs $100 to play D&D." But this is an inflated claim. All you really need to play is a PHB, which isn't that expensive (more like 13-20$). And you can just use http://d20srd.org and do it for free, if you really want to. The SRD lacks character creation guidelines, but you can generate characters for free too: http://www.pathguy.com/cg35.htm

Only the DM really needs to have the full set, and that actually costs about $45-60 on Amazon, depending on if there's a sale. (And once again, the SRD's are all online free.) So whats the average price here? At a conservatve 10$ each, we're talking individual collections in a single year of purcheses being $150-250. I definitely have about that many D&D books, but I bought them over a period of 6 years. On sale. At Amazon.

Meh... I think you are reaching. You're ascribing motives that may or may not be there on an individual basis. Yeah, some of these people may be buying the games to be part of a club, some may collect, some may play them often or not.

It's really not different from mainstream RPGs. I know a guy who just bought the totality of Warhammer's 2nd edition line. It's a huge fucking line. Incidentally, all these books are fairly recent. The core book was released early 2005 so the line is 2 years old. And we're talking about a guy with hundreds of dollars invested in GURPS, D&D and other lines.

There are a lot of roleplayers out there spending money on things they like. You can easily spend $100 a month if you so choose. Not that you need to, of course.

So to me, it makes sense that indie games would also experience that kind of customer base. Anyway, nowadays the industry (dumbly) targets almost exclusively young professionals instead of kids. Instead of a massive fanbase, they're targeting repeat purchases from a select few. It's nothing new and not at all "indie".

Quote from: Abyssal MawWhy'd he list the PHB2 but not the PHB for comparison purposes? Huh.

Why not ask him?

QuoteI'm starting to hypo-theorize that the real goal may not even be the games themselves, but in being able to participate in the discussions. You'd have to be familiar with the gamut of the games (and own one of each) in order to really participate, wouldn't you?

Where? On the internet? :emot-sissies: :roofle:

QuoteIs the primary audience meant to be collectors? I'm not sure.

There is more than a bit of that aspect to all RPG books. Especially the ones where the products are these huge lines.  Me, I don't buy anything that I don't have 100% intention to use in play in short order.  But at times I really feel like an anomoly.

Of course the IPR games that I have personally bought are of the extended use type. Minimum a year of weekly sessions potential play in them. *shrug*

QuoteIf they are meant to be played.. how do you even get a game group together and switch the game up on them that often?

I think TonyLB should pipe up here, since he seems to have a lot of experience with this. I don't have much (see above), although I have on rare  occation been involved with quick one-off game situations within a group, specifically Parinoia and Macho Women With Guns. Some games that play longer really only fit a relatively limited slice of setting AND genre (e.g. SR without rewriting it).

Whoa. I guess there have been games like that for a really long time, huh? :eek:  Hey I'm not sure I could think of Squirrel Attack as something for longterm play, but that isn't any sort of disrepecting of the game.

Plus how many adventures modules, campaign modules, and assorted setting books and such have you bought over the years? Many that even have their own little bit of rules in them? Was that foolish to buy them? Was it foolish to sell them? Well in some situations "yes" I suppose, but that's usually just a matter of in that particular case of buying the wrong setting for youself.

Well somewhere between GURPS and The Village of Hommlet is where those types of limited scope games sit. You get the rules, and replay is somewhat limited for many people, but typically has more replayability for the same group of people than the adventure modules.

Quote from: blakkiePlus how many adventures modules, campaign modules, and assorted setting books and such have you bought over the years? Many that even have their own little bit of rules in them? Was that foolish to buy them? Was it foolish to sell them? Well in some situations "yes" I suppose, but that's usually just a matter of in that particular case of buying the wrong setting for youself.

Well somewhere between GURPS and The Village of Hommlet is where those types of limited scope games sit. You get the rules, and replay is somewhat limited for many people, but typically has more replayability for the same group of people than the adventure modules.

My grand total of adventure modules and settings over the years: I was going to say none (I don't buy adventures, since I run a weekly campaign); I write my own setting.

Quote from: Abyssal MawMy grand total of adventure modules and settings over the years: I was going to say none (I don't buy adventures, since I run a weekly campaign); I write my own setting.

Here I felt like I was an anomoly.  So is your opinion that publishers are fucking idiots to publish them? To publish settings? To publish anything other than some bare rules (and expect the customer to rework those rules anyway)?  Obviously you aren't going to buy them, but for others?

EDIT: Incidentally I haven't bought many modules myself. An actual adventure module proper I haven't bought since...hrmm, last one I bought was the sequel to The Village of Homlett and that's going back a LOT of years. I've used setting books though, and obviously with SR the setting is worked right in (plus I have a couple "fluff" books there) and been a player with them though.  Why not Adventure modules? Because there isn't much replayability in a lot of what you get, although that varies widely from module to module. Some have a large portion as a really nice background that has zippo to do with the game if you just play through the module proper. Those have some replay, just not with anything prepared for you. So IMO you might as well just buy a proper setting book. *shrug*  You just happen to be at the extreme end of that. Therefore would be suited to a relatively limited number of IPR games....and I should say a very limited number of RPG products in general.

Quote from: Abyssal MawIf they are meant to be played.. how do you even get a game group together and switch the game up on them that often? That seems like it would get old real quick. And if you hate gamers and want to play with senior citizens and the like.. wouldn't that get old.. quicker?

Um, hello?  Obviously, if you hate playing those games (as you apparently do), then yes, it would get old very quick.  Duh.  However, to those who like those games, no, it doesn't get old.  

You organize it by getting people to get together to game, and you just switch games more frequently.  Heck, I'm currently in a mainstream gaming group who switches games every 4-8 sessions.  That's the typical length of many Forge games like Polaris and My Life With Master.  Sorcerer and Primetime Adventures are a bit longer, while others like The Mountain Witch and The Shab-al-hiri Roach are shorter (a long one-shot up to 2 or 3 sessions).  

We've played Gamma World using the Hero System, GURPS Supers and GURPS Fantasy, a WWII game using the horror system Nemesis, and a number of one-shots (horror, supers, etc.).  We have played a few sessions of Dogs in the Vineyard somewhere in there as well, so I guess we're off from mainstream somewhat, but it's not that strange.