"GDW 20+ years latter" Topic

I wonder, looking through this old catalog, if the GDW products of old would still sell well today. Many of their games were well thought out.

For my The Third World War series, Space 1889, Europa, and Traveler were personal classics. What are your thoughts?

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Jon
lebanon1982.blogspot.com

Space 1889, Traveller (2300 and original), and Twilight 2000 are still be produced and sold through other companies so I'm certain it would sell. Those titles and GURPS were/are my favorite RPGs.

Board game wise they had interesting ideas but bad playtesting – many scenarios in the First Battles game series were impossible for one side to win, or the only valid strategy boiled down to get adjacent and fire away.

GDW made a lot of interesting board games back in the day. I was sad to see them go. All of the name board game companies from my youth are gone or have folded into new companies that just don't seem to have the same panache, GDW, Avalon Hill, SPI, and even TSR.

I think they could sell well to the simulationist but not to those that are more in line with the "modern" game company such as FF. These folks expect a lot with their graphics and game components.

Imperium would still sell today and to this day it remains one of the better space war-games out there. Phase Line Smash, while it doesn't get a lot of love, is still a very good game that deserved more recognition than it received when it came out, which was probably due to the complexity of the game.

During the 80s they certainly did have a good run with the NATO vs. the Warsaw Pact genre, with the Third World War series (playing the combined game is still one of my hobby life's great memories), the Assault series, Harpoon 2 and all the supplements, Tacforce, and the Air Superiority series.

The sci-fi games were kind of hit and miss. Snapshot, Imperium, and Fifth Frontier War were very good, but Double Star, Invasion: Earth, Bloodtree Rebellion, etc., were OK, but nothing to get excited about.

As above, Imperium was one of my favourite boardgames of all time. Assault was also very good.

I love the Europa series but time, space & a new wife put paid to playing them for the last 25+ year. They are all sitting on top of my wardrobe just begging to be played.

Yeah, I have Fire in the East, Scorched Earth and a couple of others taking up space on the bookshelf--I haven't even opened them since the mid '80s.

I do peek at La Bataille de la Moscowa from time to time.

I have the Europa rules in a big three-ring binder. I can't imagine kids my youngest daughter's age willing to go much beyond the first page. "Memorize all this? You're crazy--can't I just Google it?" :-)

Belter was an excellent multiplayer game if you wanted something to play on and off over the course of a few months. Remember leaving the map set up for most of a semester on a spare bed in one of our dorm rooms back in college.

These days playing on a PC would be a lot more sensible, of course, especially with an online setup so your player base could be scattered all over the place.

Bloodtree Rebellion lacked an evocative background.

Of course, Imperium also did, at first …

I know a lot of folk still love Space 1889, though I tend now to play G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T. and In Her Majesty's Name for rule sets.

Still, I've the old books, and get ideas from them.

Traveller still is influential. I've not put one together, yet, but love playing with the boardgames as miniature campaign sources.

Doug

Command Decision? Combined Arms? Over the Top? Volley and Bayonet? Harpoon? (Please don't hit me on that one….) Fire and Steel? System 7? (Yes, cardboard counters got the Origins Award one year for Best Historical Miniature Line of the Year!!!!!) Innovative-YES; Historical miniatures?--NOT!

But they had some real successes! Hope Frank Chadwick, Greg Novak and crew are not yet totally done yet…..

Tom

Mr Chadwick is alive and pitchin', thank you very much, though mostly for the S1889 rebirth.

I've a copy of Port Arthur somewhere; 'arcane' never frightened the man. ;->=

Doug

Loved and still have Imperium.

Apparently, Frank is working on a series of operational level WWII boardgames.

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Of course he also recently published Men Under Fire miniatures rules and is working on Mars Needs Steam. Miniatures rules.

Www.testofbattle.com

Thanks for the update, Rich.

Unfortunately we lost Mr. Novak a couple of years ago. Still have my collection (Traveller, Assault, TWW, etc)

I played one year Fire in the East & Scorched Earth at a club in Allentown. We meet once a month and tried to get in 4 turns each gaming session. So yes we were playing WWII in real time. Was a blast.

We played the Third World War game Persian Gulf earlier this year. The political game is a little dated based on the last 20 years, but still entertaining.