40K Deep Thought: Did the Summer of Sigmar Hurt 40K?
Longtime gamers have noted some odd GW trends since this summer. Do you think the 40K community took a hit this summer?
So we all know the basics outlines of this past year:
Q1-Q2, Red hot weekly releases for 40K including knockout awesomeness such as Harlequins and Adeptus Mechanicus
Q3, Summer of Sigmar (all 13 weeks of it)
Q4, Tau, Betrayal at Calth & a month of Sigmar
Some BoLS Lounge alumni have seen some interesting trends this year in the online community.
Defenstratus starts it off:
“Did the Summer of Sigmar kill interest in 40K?
Thinking back, I get the gut feeling that this slump started during the Summer of Sigmar. Indeed traffic stats seemed to indicate that the sigmar focus of GW killed hobby website traffic but has it recovered?
Is it due to something other than Sigmar? I know that on the IRC channel that I’ve been on for more than 20 years now on efnet called #Warhammer, its been 24/7 Infinity talk. In fact, the old timers of the channel have started an *Infinity* podcast and pretty much abandoned their 40k-centric blog.
AdvertisementAm I just imagining things?”
Coffeegrunt chimes in:
“Locally at our store it went very quiet. I think the disappointment around AoS there was so intense and sucked so much that it formed a vacuum that everything else struggled to fill. That, and an absolute horde of new games are pouring out these days, with Halo Fleet Battles, Guild Ball, Malifaux, Frostgrave, Attack Wing, X Wing, Armada, WarmaHordes, Flames of War, Dropzone Commander, Batman there’s just so much leaving communities feeling a bit fragmented unless you buy into several, different games.”
Daboarder followed up with:
“I think when GW was releasing a constant rush of products people were caught up in the release pace then AOS dropped, the focus swung off 40k and people started playing other games while they waited.
Its also interesting to note that the fanfare about the return of 40k products hasn’t been all that massive, you didn’t hear much in the community about Betrayal at Calth at all really.
Wonder if this means people have gotten tired of the release pace and product quality now that they have had a chance to breathe and look at other companies.”
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Some followup questions to get you thinking?
- How strong do you think 40K is at the end of 2015 compared to the start?
- Do you think 30K will be a shot in the arm for the Grimdark, or potentially split the community?
- Do you think Age of Sigmar should have multiple short releases windows, or fewer longer release windows?
- What will it take for 40K to come ROARING BACK?
~How does this match what you are seeing locally and what do you think is going on?
