I am a complete gamer, by that I mean, I own an Nintendo DSiXL, I have a PS3 (even if I only own one game for it), I play PC games, and I own role gaming books, as well as board games like the board game version of Civilization.
I also own numerous wargames, but I think everyone already is aware of this.
I have seen a lot of gaming since the 70s eh.
Sometimes gaming simply makes you scratch you head though and wonder, WTF? Really I mean seriously, WTF?
I am hardly a commonplace gamer all the same. I have never played Zelda on anything, and MMOs look boring to me. But then again, I don't actually expect to meet any ASLers here, I don't even expect you to recognize the term
Still there are always commonalities even with greatly differing interests. Some stuff is universal.
Advertising. It seems that so much of many of the games I like, exist off of almost NO advertising. It is no wonder my niche of a niche called wargaming suffers almost no new blood. None of you guys will have ever heard of the companies and the games that make them.
The recent release of Panzer Corps maybe, because it has ties to Panzer General, and that came out on console as well as PC back on the PS1 era.
But I don't really expect you guys to know the games I play mostly.
I am not a big fan of Steam, but I am also aware of how a lot of the negativity directed at Steam is often over hyped over stated and likely in some cases possibly even more biased BS than reality. It's not perfect, but it is also a lot of things you don't often hear about that are good (no one ever talks about the good stuff eh).
Steam has rescued some indie companies just by splashing their game front and center and pushed them with free advertising and essentially bailed out the company.
I have also heard a lot of justifications for avoiding Steam, that just sound like the person has not seriously done the math.
But everyone gets to determine how to sell their own property eh.
The thing is, a game sold via a non advertised web site, known only to a small as hell slice of humanity, simply can't expect to generate sales equal to a service that can generate massive sums of sales.
Yes I must confess, in the past, I likely was one of the detractors too.
But the mark of a smart person is they change when they get shown they might have been wrong on a viewpoint.
1 million sales at 5 bucks is simply going to massively out pace 10k sales at 40 bucks. It's simply math.
Saying it is your right to stick to your guns, and refuse to market through Steam is just silly.
If Steam took 4 of every 5 bucks (they wouldn't), that's still 1 million bucks from 1 million sales which is still a LOT more than 40k eh.
If you cut the numbers in half, 500k still represents a great deal more than 40k. And if you make the 40k into 400k it is still 100k short of a successful argument.
I am 50 shortly, and it irks me, that my wargaming hobby while not dying currently, also seems to have no realistic reason to presume it will outlive me.
I played early era board game wargames in the 70s and 80s. I was a late teen when I began and I have been with wargaming all along till now.
Today's greats of wargames on PC are made by people my age, played by people my age, and largely invisible to anyone NOT my age.
Sure I know where to find these games online, but do you?
Do you even know to look?
People rarely go investigating things they have no reason to believe exist.
When I turn 70, in 20 years, I will be completely fucking amazed to see the wargame hobby still breathing.
The companies that make the games, the publishers that publish the games, I don't see them still in business unless they turn to making something more mainstream instead.
We don't require fancy computers to run our dull looking only needs 90s era graphics looking wargames.
People often say when are you going to improve those archaic games? They fail to understand they look like they do, as that is how we want them to look. It's not accidental, it's deliberate.
They play fine the way they are.
They are just fine the way they are.
They could entertain anyone new to the hobby just fine, the way they are. Just the way they entertained me when I was 15.
When I was 15, I would likely have welcomed a PC option over a need to only be able to play it as a board game.
An alright option.
But there is NO effort to make any of YOU guys interested in any of it at all.
You COULD put any of my games on any of your machines easily.
It's already been done a few isolated times.
Remember I mentioned Panzer General. Panzer Corps would do just fine.
Just about all of my games could do just fine.
Commander Europe at War, on the Nintendo DS is really just a more complex game play version of Panzer Tactics.
But the hobby is just so utterly stuck in a rut sure that the old way is all that is required.
It drives me fucking craaaaaaaazy I tell you.
I also own numerous wargames, but I think everyone already is aware of this.
I have seen a lot of gaming since the 70s eh.
Sometimes gaming simply makes you scratch you head though and wonder, WTF? Really I mean seriously, WTF?
I am hardly a commonplace gamer all the same. I have never played Zelda on anything, and MMOs look boring to me. But then again, I don't actually expect to meet any ASLers here, I don't even expect you to recognize the term
Advertising. It seems that so much of many of the games I like, exist off of almost NO advertising. It is no wonder my niche of a niche called wargaming suffers almost no new blood. None of you guys will have ever heard of the companies and the games that make them.
The recent release of Panzer Corps maybe, because it has ties to Panzer General, and that came out on console as well as PC back on the PS1 era.
But I don't really expect you guys to know the games I play mostly.
I am not a big fan of Steam, but I am also aware of how a lot of the negativity directed at Steam is often over hyped over stated and likely in some cases possibly even more biased BS than reality. It's not perfect, but it is also a lot of things you don't often hear about that are good (no one ever talks about the good stuff eh).
Steam has rescued some indie companies just by splashing their game front and center and pushed them with free advertising and essentially bailed out the company.
I have also heard a lot of justifications for avoiding Steam, that just sound like the person has not seriously done the math.
But everyone gets to determine how to sell their own property eh.
The thing is, a game sold via a non advertised web site, known only to a small as hell slice of humanity, simply can't expect to generate sales equal to a service that can generate massive sums of sales.
Yes I must confess, in the past, I likely was one of the detractors too.
But the mark of a smart person is they change when they get shown they might have been wrong on a viewpoint.
1 million sales at 5 bucks is simply going to massively out pace 10k sales at 40 bucks. It's simply math.
Saying it is your right to stick to your guns, and refuse to market through Steam is just silly.
If Steam took 4 of every 5 bucks (they wouldn't), that's still 1 million bucks from 1 million sales which is still a LOT more than 40k eh.
If you cut the numbers in half, 500k still represents a great deal more than 40k. And if you make the 40k into 400k it is still 100k short of a successful argument.
I am 50 shortly, and it irks me, that my wargaming hobby while not dying currently, also seems to have no realistic reason to presume it will outlive me.
I played early era board game wargames in the 70s and 80s. I was a late teen when I began and I have been with wargaming all along till now.
Today's greats of wargames on PC are made by people my age, played by people my age, and largely invisible to anyone NOT my age.
Sure I know where to find these games online, but do you?
Do you even know to look?
People rarely go investigating things they have no reason to believe exist.
When I turn 70, in 20 years, I will be completely fucking amazed to see the wargame hobby still breathing.
The companies that make the games, the publishers that publish the games, I don't see them still in business unless they turn to making something more mainstream instead.
We don't require fancy computers to run our dull looking only needs 90s era graphics looking wargames.
People often say when are you going to improve those archaic games? They fail to understand they look like they do, as that is how we want them to look. It's not accidental, it's deliberate.
They play fine the way they are.
They are just fine the way they are.
They could entertain anyone new to the hobby just fine, the way they are. Just the way they entertained me when I was 15.
When I was 15, I would likely have welcomed a PC option over a need to only be able to play it as a board game.
An alright option.
But there is NO effort to make any of YOU guys interested in any of it at all.
You COULD put any of my games on any of your machines easily.
It's already been done a few isolated times.
Remember I mentioned Panzer General. Panzer Corps would do just fine.
Just about all of my games could do just fine.
Commander Europe at War, on the Nintendo DS is really just a more complex game play version of Panzer Tactics.
But the hobby is just so utterly stuck in a rut sure that the old way is all that is required.
It drives me fucking craaaaaaaazy I tell you.
