Kickstarter general question about profitability

[beetle496]

Originally Posted by philreed

The overall market has changed dramatically. Even at $75 -- which would have been, at best, a two-player set -- the game was unlikely to ever make it into any of the mass or specialty stores.

I have to presume SJG knows the market better than I, but I still feel like I fallen into alternative universe! Never would I have expected to see GW branded stores in my lifetime! I guess those are all gone, but now B&N carries a wide range of 40K stuff, and that still leaves me scratching my head!

Originally Posted by philreed

We're being careful. It's no fun for any of us if we produce the game and then have to stop making more games.

LOL. Yes please. I still remember the 1st Ogre KS fondly. I think that must have just about killed SJG! I got the box (from my FLGS), and assembled all the pieces, but I hardly play it because it is just too big. I think with CW 6e, it will be easier for me to find pick-up games.

Originally Posted by totalfailure

I think a couple of your premises are incorrect - I think it far more likely the plans for the car expansions were changed precisely because they weren't selling, and SJG could see the writing on the wall.

That makes perfect sense actually, but I have a hard time squaring that with the apparent enthusiasm of the KS comments.

Two, I think there was about 0 percent chance Car Wars 6E was ever going to be a viable 'mass-market' success.

You and SJG think the same way. Munchkin is already in the mainstream channels, so SJG has the contacts. The mainstream market already has $70 games, which CW 6e could have hit easily, had they not bothered with the miniatures. CW 6e is a much funner (and deeper) game than anything B&N is selling for $70.

That's just not the state of the hobby market of 2019.

The hobby market does seem weak to me. I cannot get the SJG games I want at HobbyTown or the comic book stores. But the larger gaming market seems to be doing very well. Catan is available just about every place that sell Monopoly; that boggles my mind! Mine is a sample of one, but Halloween I was inspired to introduce Mysterium to my family. I tried HobbyTown and my regular comic book stores; no luck. B&N had it though!

Someday, I hope someone writes a war game version of “Accidental Empires”. I understand that better products don’t always win in the commercial market place (BetaMax v VHS) but really I would love to understand the last 30 years in gaming better!

There are mountains of product being slammed into the market every week, and the likelihood of one generating enough interest for one of the big retailers to pick it up is remote.

Mostly that seems like KS vanity projects to me, so zero chance for big retailer to pick up. But SJG already has retail channels because of Muchkin. I truly do not understand the difficulty they are having with expanding with another franchise!

I think SJG made the correct decision to focus it on the 'hobby' market. And to be honest, it may not even succeed there.

Well, hopefully CW6e will get to my local FLGSs. It comes in an expensive box, not unlike several other available choices, so that fits. I was sorry for the news that that are not planning to sell the miniature and card sets at the FLGS, since that seemed like a great synergy opportunity to me.

With that state of the KS already, I don’t see how 6e could be regarded as anything other than a success. Even if it is only ever available Warehouse 23.