Are game stores going away?

[thedungeondelver]

DD what store is that, not SciFi?

It is not Sci-Fi City.

Sci-Fi City is a tomb. It is utterly depressing to go in and see years-old Battletech minis gathering dust, single-layer depth Warhammer stuff spread thin...the Reaper minis wall is all I go in for any more when I do go there (and I won't be going back now that I found this place).

[Ecthelion]

This mini, this one right here? http://www.miniature-giant.com/colin-co ... 12794.html

cost me $2.99 the other night. Check the miniature-giant price. 5 bucks!

I have used www.miniature-giant.com and am surprised you found somewhere cheaper. Nice mini. It does look like a girl though.

[thedungeondelver]

This mini, this one right here? http://www.miniature-giant.com/colin-co ... 12794.html

cost me $2.99 the other night. Check the miniature-giant price. 5 bucks!

I have used http://www.miniature-giant.com and am surprised you found somewhere cheaper. Nice mini. It does look like a girl though.

okay

[Is_907]

I live within driving distance (20min to an hour) of three or four stores... most either went whole hog on MtG, Warhammer, Warmachine, or some combination thereof.
Those are games that really lend themselves to play-in-store and to higher volume of sales, so I can understand that a bit.

I have a local comics shop that does NOT do any gaming (they have a few boosters of MtG, WoW cards, etc but only one box of each, as they can be collectible.) The shop is amazing, and stays in business because they are the best at doing what they do: comics and collectibles related to comics.


I just don't think there's much need for a gaming shop any more. A place to play, as in a mini convention every day of the week or weekend? Sure that'd be great. Unfortunately I just don't need to buy much stuff for gaming that a brick-and-mortar would put on the shelf.
The broad diversity of products available on the internet has spoiled me, and no shop can feasibly stock that broad a range of products.

[Silk Spectre]

Let me try re-explaining my post, perhaps that will help with the hurt feelings.

A lot of posters here use female icons and their user names are non-specific. My own included. It wasn't intentional, for many years before the internet went mainstream (thanks to AOhelL) my online handle was Piper.

I had no reason to believe Silk Spectre was female (or male, for that matter). I'm certain she has made posts that might have made reference to her sex but, since I assume online forums make for poor dating services, I've never filed that tidbit away if I was made aware of it.

I should think this would be a good thing, since she was remarking how she had been hit on by undesirables at a game store. I would guess, if I took a poll of the few female gamers I know, I would get similar stories. In the old Usenet newsgroups, I used to get hit on by dudes thinking I was female (there was a Star Trek TOS era paperback heroine who went by the single name of Piper). So I know there is some substance to what she says.

So, I'm sorry if I hurt anyone's feelings by making that observation. I'm certain SS is a lovely woman and I can only hope she is understanding enough to overlook my clumsy and misguided attempt to reassure her this is a "safe place" to talk about games.

I understand your meaning Piper. No harm done. I am 44 years old. I'll be 45 next month. I am too old to have guys hitting on me. I have had to put up with this all my life. Now I have guys near the same age as my oldest son doing it.

[francisca]

Now I have guys near the same age as my oldest son doing it.

Apparently, "bagging a cougar" is all the rage in some circles. My wife gets a fair share of college age guys hitting on her as well, so I sorta know how you feel.

She'll get some leering grogtards ogling her at GaryCon in March, I'm sure. Thankfully, she's 6'2" and athletic, and could probably kick the living crap out of about 75% of the male attendees.

[thedungeondelver]

Now I have guys near the same age as my oldest son doing it.

Apparently, "bagging a cougar" is all the rage in some circles. My wife gets a fair share of college age guys hitting on her as well, so I sorta know how you feel.

She'll get some leering grogtards ogling her at GaryCon in March, I'm sure. Thankfully, she's 6'2" and athletic, and could probably kick the living crap out of about 75% of the male attendees.

...an event I would pay to see.

[Matthew]

I believe that I can count the number of times I've been into a brick and mortar game shop on my fingers. In the UK "game shop" mostly means "Games Workshop place where creepy fat blokes with breath that smells like it comes straight from Satan's arsehole try to sell you an individual lead miniature for somewhere upwards of six quid." I choose not to go in, and I believe I've only ever seen one woman in a game shop. (I'm married to her. She popped in to buy dice once.)

My son has been brought up to understand that gaming materials come in the post. We don't go to shops to buy them.

Three game shops in Newcastle, each part of a franchise:

Forbidden Planet
Travelling Man
Games Workshop

The Travelling Man is currently the best and the only one to carry War Hammer: Historical, ironically. Usually I purchase from there, as long as they are stocking stuff I want. In London I have only really been to Forbidden Planet, Orc's Nest, and Playin' Games, but have heard good things about Leisure Games.

[Silk Spectre]

Now I have guys near the same age as my oldest son doing it.

Apparently, "bagging a cougar" is all the rage in some circles. My wife gets a fair share of college age guys hitting on her as well, so I sorta know how you feel.

She'll get some leering grogtards ogling her at GaryCon in March, I'm sure. Thankfully, she's 6'2" and athletic, and could probably kick the living crap out of about 75% of the male attendees.

I'm only 5'8" or I would kick some ass. I wish I could go to GaryCon with Clang, but I can't take that long off from my business.

[Geleg]

On the one hand, I think that game stores may be in sharp decline but won't disappear.

On the other hand, I think I am increasingly likely to disappear from (or not frequent) game stores.

Why? All but a very few (none of which are near me) just don't carry the stuff I'm interested in these days. Most of them, for reasons already stated upthread, have to focus on mass-market products, which means MtG and rpgs that I don't play and have no interest in playing. When the only items of interest are in the lottery pile (i.e., the out-of-print pile), you know that the store isn't really going to serve your interests very well. I'll be the first to confess that this is mostly a sign of the narrowing of my gaming interests (OSR Fantasy) (gone are the days of picking up new systems on a whim 'just to check them out').

We had a pretty good game store fold up in my city about 5 years ago. Last april a new store opened. I finally got around to visiting it last month. Why so long? Because I was pretty sure there wouldn't be much in it for me. And I was right. The owner was friendly enough, but had zero OSR stuff and had never even heard of things like C&C, let alone OSRIC. He assured me he could order whatever I wanted, and that is probably true. But if I have to come to a gamestore to have them order stuff, I might as well order it myself from the internet. I asked him about used material and he eagerly pointed me to a shelf - it was all 3e and 4e rule books. So I bought some dice and minis and wished him well. I really do wish him well, and there seems to be a clientele for what he's offering. That clientele just won't include me, I fear.

[francisca]

I'm only 5'8" or I would kick some ass. I wish I could go to GaryCon with Clang, but I can't take that long off from my business.

I will say GaryCon does seem to have a fair amount of women around (like Gary Gygax's daughters), especially for a small convention, and I think you'd be just fine, if you could ever find the time to make it out. There is one woman in particular that Jeffrey Sinclair and I have a long-standing, good-natured grudge against, as we've been running against her in Circus Maximus races nearly every year since, gosh, 2006, I think (dating back to the now defunct Lake Geneva Gaming Convention).

I also don't want to give the impression that GaryCon is full of bad examples of gamers. I mean, I am taking my wife and kids.

[Clangador]

This GaryCon will be my first out-of-state convention in 16-17 years. I haven't done much traveling since I got married and had kids. (Technically my wife had them.) With that said, I was tempted to take my eldest son (13 [almost 14]), but my wife wouldn't let me since he is in school at that time.

[Juju EyeBall]

All the game stores around here are COMICSand games.

At least there is a presence but it gets old hearing "yeah, we can order that for you!"

[Is_907]

All the game stores around here are COMICSand games.

At least there is a presence but it gets old hearing "yeah, we can order that for you!"

Interestingly, as I mentioned above, my comics shop does NOT do gaming stuff.
However, I went to a newer gaming shop back in about October, and they had a few comics. Seemed to be the opposite--gaming primarily, comics as afterthought.
They were going the right way, too, for business success: board games primarily, and RPGs based on their customer base's desires.
The owner had ordered a stash of Savage Worlds books based on a recommendation, and sold out of them immediately.

I don't think this shop would be likely to carry OSR type gaming books for the same reasons we keep mentioning, though. Most of his customers are going to be playing Pathfinder and board games.

[TRP]

This GaryCon will be my first out-of-state convention in 16-17 years. I haven't done much traveling since I got married and had kids. (Technically my wife had them.) With that said, I was tempted to take my eldest son (13 [almost 14]), but my wife wouldn't let me since he is in school at that time.

It's an educational field trip. Subjects to be included will be vocabulary, reading comprehension, history, martial arts, military history and tactics, economics, ecology, resource sustainability, politics, comparative religious studies, anthropology, geography, philosophy, psychology, math, multi-cultural interactivity, etiquette and sportsmanship.