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GW Grognard: This is How We Get Dead Game Systems

Hey everyone! Adam, from TFG Radio, back again this week to illuminate the darkness that are your minds.

There has been a lot of excitement in the gaming world this past week. A number things happened at the London Grand Tournament, and Games Workshop has made a few announcements. The one I will discuss this week is Games Workshop’s announcement of Warhammer Adventures, a new line of books aimed at young adults 8-12 years old. Mainly to discuss the communities reaction to the announcement.

This is how all young Mechanicus boys start out, right?

So apparently there are a number of people that are upset about GW making books that cater to young kids. Its actually funny because it almost sounds the same whenever a new edition would come out and people would complain that the game was being “dumbed down” so it would be easier for kids to play.  There have been concern about exposing the grim dark to people this young, or even the, GASP, sanitation of the grim dark for this new audience. People are crying to the winds in anguish over this new direction that GW has taken. To all this concern I will tell you that you guys need to “pump the brakes”.

I really do hope the books play out like this.

I don’t understand the vitriol that is being spewed about the new series. Sure, they will have to sanitize a few things in order to reach as many readers as possible within the age group. Just like most people, I will be curious to see when, or even if, they introduce Dark Eldar or Slaanesh to the series, how they will handle that subject matter. How does affect you if a young person reads the book? In fact, you don’t have to read the books at all. No one is forcing you to read them. GW isn’t pointing a bolter to your head, are they? No, and if you think they are, you have other issues. Truth be told, we actually need something like this. We need an easy way to capture young minds into the game or we will die as a game system.

Let’s be honest, We’d all end up like this

Now, I’ve played a lot of different game systems, both historical and fantasy/scifi. Some are still around, but a lot have fallen by the wayside. Now there are a myriad of reasons why this happened. One of the reasons, especially for games that had been around for a while, was that the player base got too old and there were no young people to replace, or increase, the player base. As a result, sales began to go down, and they never recovered. The need for new blood is a constant struggle for any game, or even organizations, that rely on a base number of people for it to function. Recruiting and retaining these new people is always an issue , with those in charge always looking for different ways to accomplish this. The new book series is a way for GW to get new, young, people attracted to the game and kind of ease them into the setting. If they are really interested then they will look for the models and other books about the background. This, in turn, will help the game in the long run by providing new players to the game, and hopefully keep the game around for a long time.

You know who you are

Now with all that being said, I look forward to reading the new books, and I am actually curious how GW will treat certain aspects of their universes. When my nephew was asked about the books, he’s 9 years old, he said he would give it a read, especially since his brother plays Necrons. If, after reading the book, he gets excited for the game setting and wants to learn more about it, then it really does show me that there will be a future for the game. Hopefully he can play 40K better than his father.

That’s all for this week, I hope you enjoyed the read. Let me know when you started with the 40K stories and what you think of the announcement in the comments section. Don’t forget to visit our Facebook, Twitch, and Patreon pages to stay up to date on what we’re up to and when episodes drop!

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