Sticking With Board Games in the Digital Age
Nov. 4, 2004 — -- It was like an adrenaline-packed dash to the finish line, but the prize was not a gold medal. Instead, it was a neatly packaged box of Pictionary, the trusted board game that often has players squinting at their teammates' indecipherable squiggles before gustily yelling their answers.
Jed Miller still remembers the time he drove down to New York City from Amherst College in Massachusetts with three classmates to buy a copy of the beloved game.
It was the winter of 1987, at the height of what he calls his "collegiate obsession with Pictionary," and the game was sold out at every store in Massachusetts. In desperation, the four friends packed into a car and drove down to Manhattan, where they rushed into Altman's on Fifth Avenue just 10 minutes before the old-world department store closed, and emerged with their much sought-after Pictionary set.
"We were completely sober at the time," recalled the Amherst grad, who is now 38, in an e-mail to ABC News. "But the entire episode had the glee and desperation of a stoner's late-night run for the munchies."
These days, "games" usually means video games. There are PlayStations and Xboxes and downloadable software with stunningly believable 3-D images. There are superheroes, gun-toting, muscle-rippling hunks, cute and cuddly characters, Harry Potter licensed games and sports videogames.
So in this high-tech age, is it harsh to ask what possible chance do the old board games have, with their dice, pencils, sand-clocks and plastic pieces? Should the companies who make the board games of yore just pack up and lament the death of their industry?
If market figures and analysis by toy experts and board-game manufacturers are anything to go by, the answer is a surprising, resounding "No."
Fans like Miller suggest there's still life in the genre. A New York-based online communities expert, Miller is a tech-savvy young man, familiar with the latest video and computer games. But while he's had some enjoyable video gaming experiences, Miller says nothing comes close to the sheer fun and challenge of a trusted board game.
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