[ul]
[li]The cards need to be made of durable cardstock that can stand up to repeated handling. This is more expensive than you’d think. Even a single deck of playing cards costs about $5, and those have the advantage of mass volume to keep the per-unit price low.[/li][li]It’s color printing, and there’s 168 cards to print not counting the game board. Even at a penny a card we’re over your estimate (yes I know you didn’t intend to be accurate :p).[/li][li]The manhours that go into development and playtesting of even a fairly simple game can add up pretty quickly.[/li][li]The typical retail markup.[/li][/ul]
Between printing costs, creator fees, and retail, $25 is fairly reasonable, though I’d prefer to pay $20 or even $15.
Then you get into cost comparisons:
[ul]
[li]It’s roughly the cost of a new hardcover book you might read through once or twice.[/li][li]A typical session runs about 90 minutes, which is about average for a full-length movie, and it’s played with 4 people on average. Four tickets to a movie will run you something like $40 these days.[/li][li]You own the game and can play it over and over again for as long as the materials hold up. If you do play a lot, the cost gets amortized out over the game’s lifespan and it winds up being real cheap for entertainment.[/li][/ul]
Really, Tabletop’s aim is to show you, a non-gamer, that these kinds of games really are worth the money. Gaming provides an opportunity for socialization that even watching a movie doesn’t really offer, and you get a different experience each time. That $25 goes a long, long way, which is admittedly hard to see if you’re thinking “Well, it MIGHT be nice to have IF I ever have a group of friends over who MIGHT like to play…”
That is similar to valuing the Mona Lisa for the cost of the paints.(by the way Munchkin is avilable for $16 online)
I’ve paid WAY more that 25 for games - I always compute it as / play, and I could redulce that to $ / hour. I know my copy of 7 Wonders has been played > 60 times.
For Munchkin, the devolpement costs have probably been amortized. (for me this was a “fun to play once” game)
I agree, but I am biased. The first arcade game I designed was roundly panned, and didn’t make any money. But when it came out on MAME, Wheaton wrote a review, and actually liked it. So I think he has impeccable taste.
I mean, the physical cost of a CD or book is under a dollar. The physical cost of an MP3 or ebook is literally zero. Do you have a problem paying $10-$25 for those?
I know some professional board game designers - the margin on board and card games is pretty small. That $25 board game probably costs about $22 a box to manufacture.
Also, playing Munching once a month with two friends for an hour is 10 hours of entertainment over a year for $25.
Assuming three people going to 5 two-hour movies at $10/ticket is 3x5x10 = $150.
So it’s much cheaper, more fun when you factor out the crappy movies, and more social since you can actually talk while you play. You could even buy 5 more boardgames to spice it up and still come out even versus movies.
That and I think there’s a long selling time on games. It’s not like a movie where you make a huge percentage of the sales in the first week or two and get the money you invested back quickly. You can release a game and even if it’s successful the sales will trickle in over a period of months or even years.
Heh. I just watched episode 4 (with Ticket to Ride).
I cracked up when Wil’s wife (Anne?) smacked the table during the end game scoring, causing the pieces to scatter. I thought “she doesn’t accept losing gracefully”.
I love the show. It’s a cross between Jon Favreau’s Dinner for Five and Celebrity Poker. It really gives me a good feel for how games are played without having a rule book read to me. We’ve got a board game group at work and prior to playing Settlers of Catan, I recommended folks watch that episode so they could get a feel for it.
So far they’ve played: Small World: Don’t have it, kinda want it Settlers of Catan: Have it, love it
**Tsuro: **Don’t have it, really want it.
**Zombie Dice: **Bought it because of the show (also, is available as a free iOs download for the 1 player version). Get Bit: Don’t have it, not too interested. Ticket To Ride: Have it and love it. Munchkin: Didn’t have it and didn’t want it based on the much maligned reviews of the game, now I do want it.
Based on the games listed at the bottom here, the next ones up should be:
Gloom: Already have it, fun game with a Richard Gorey-esque art Fluxx: Have it, used to love it now I dislike it (too random-little strategy) Dixit: This might be one that will push me into buying it Last Night On Earth I’ve heard great things about, but have Betrayal at House on the Hill so not sure if I need another Fiasco: Never heard of. Elder Sign Been curious about.
Someone on a boardgame forum mentioned that board game stores are selling out of the games after they’re on Table Top so that’s kind of awesome to hear.
Yep. I swung by the game store at the mall last week to pick up Munchkin and asked the employee how Tabletop’s been treating them. Instant enthusiasm; apparently business has picked up significantly. Ticket To Ride sold out pretty much the day they got a shipment in primarily because of the show. Heck, I was there for Munchkin myself. While I was there someone was trying to track down Zombie Dice, and I guess the store only had one left.
I’m really looking forward to the Fiasco episode. It’s actually an RPG, not a board game, but one with a huge emphasis on storytelling. There are only two dice rolls in the entire game, and they’re used to generate random story elements that the players can use to create a Coen-brothers-esque caper. I’ve played twice: one game was set in Dallas, September 1963. I was a used car salesman and heroin smuggler who got his hands on a suitcase full of an alleged “cancer vaccine.” I ended up being murdered by FBI agent Lee Harvey Oswald. (Wheels within wheels, man!) The second game was set in WWII, and involved stolen Nazi gold. I was a wide-eyed farm boy who successfully scammed the rest of the group into killing each other while I absconded with the treasure. Both games were hilariously fun - it should make for a killer episode of Wheaton’s show.
I’m pretty sure Smallworld doesn’t have cards. Are you sure you aren’t thinking of another game?
On the other hand, since Smallworld is a fantasy game with an arbitrary setup, wouldn’t playing it solitaire be like playing chess solitaire - what’s the real point?
I bought Munchkin because of the show. Never been a tabletop gamer but it looked really fun so I gave it a shot. My wife and my buddies wife were pretty reluctant to play at first, but once we got the basics down it was a very fun game. I became a thief and not long after stole my buddies armor, in retribution he buffed a monster and got me killed on the next turn. Later I yoinked some gear of my wifes only to have her play a card that stripped it away. The backstabbing and trading made for a very fun card game.