Sorry if some of you already recieved this, but...
Delecti
Subj: [WZL] Hasbro Speaks Date: 11/30/98 9:10:01 AM PST From: WinningerR_at_AOL.COM (Ray Winninger) Sender: WHEEZE-L_at_LISTSERV.RICE.EDU (WHEEZE-L) Reply-to: WHEEZE-L_at_LISTSERV.RICE.EDU (WHEEZE-L) To: WHEEZE-L_at_LISTSERV.RICE.EDU
As I suspected, Hasbro does have plans to "invade" the hobby gaming market. Hasbro Customer Service released this a couple days ago. Very interesting.
Game Giant Eyes Hobby Market
A competitor dwarfing the entire existing market is preparing to enter hobby gaming in 1999.
Hasbro Inc. -- which parlays mainstream brands such as Monopoly and G.I.
Joe into global revenues exceeding
$3 billion -- finalized its $6 million purchase of Avalon Hill's
intellectual properties, trademarks and
inventories on Oct. 27. The game goliath intends to support the former
Avalon Hill titles in both paper and
computer formats.
Hasbro will be specifically targeting the hobby-gaming market that it has
previously ignored. "It's more than
testing the waters," said Hasbro spokeswoman Gale Steiner, "but it's not
like they're going in gangbusters.
"I think it is an initiative that has potential. You have to look at the
hobby-games market. If you look at that
alone, it's about a $850 million industry . . . that represents a new
business opportunity for the Hasbro
boardgames group," Steiner said. "I think they're looking at a strategy in
1999 that would allow them to go into
this new segment."
While conceding that the market isn't big enough to be a top priority for
Hasbro, "I think the acquisition of
Avalon Hill should ring as a real positive for true gamers," Steiner said.
"We're going to pump new life into
properties that have been around for a long time, but really haven't seen a
lot of energy. We're going to put that
energy behind them. I think that's great news for Avalon Hill fans."
The purchase from Avalon Hill-parent Monarch Avalon included 100 to 200
titles, many of them unpublished,
Steiner said. Hasbro Games Group -- its boardgame unit -- and Hasbro
Interactive -- the electronic-game
unit -- are working in tandem to evaluate the acquisitions. Leading
properties include Advanced Squad Leader,
Runequest and Diplomacy.
"You go back through and you look at which ones have the greatest value,"
Steiner said. "You develop the ones
who have the greatest value first, but then you continue to look at the
other intellectual properties . . . There's all
kinds of things that can be considered an intellectual property. It takes
time to go through those and see what's
usable."
Diplomacy is one of the front-runners to be developed, she said. "It's a great multiplayer game; it's a classic; it has a terrific play pattern."
Hasbro intends to develop print and computer versions of a title in tandem.
The computer versions -- primarily
PC and potentially console in format -- would be distributed through
Hasbro's established channels. The board
and print products would take advantage of some existing crossover between
Avalon Hill's extinct distribution
and Hasbro's existing network, then likely improve upon that, Steiner said.
As for mainstream marketing of
titles such as Runequest, "I don't think we'd be going out to Wal-Mart."
Hasbro has hired two former Avalon Hill employees to aid its internal
development teams. Bill Levay will be a
producer and Don Greenwood is consulting with both Hasbro units, Steiner
said.
Hasbro executives have met with Philadelphia Phillies pitcher and ASL
creative force Curt Schilling "to really
understand what his role has been with the Advanced Squad Leader property,"
Steiner said. The discussions did
not include any potential sale of the ASL line nor are any of the lines for
sale, she said.
Hasbro entered the computer-game market three years ago, Steiner said. It
now ranks among the top five
publishers.
And later, this was released:
Hasbro Plans Diplomatic Debut
Games giant Hasbro will revive the Avalon Hill brand as it enters the
hobby-gaming market, a Hasbro
executive said Nov. 17.
"We believe we need to keep the Avalon Hill name. We definitely want to
keep that as part of the whole mix,"
said Hasbro Senior Brand Manager Phil Jamison.
On Oct. 27 the mainstream game manufacturer finalized its $6 million
purchase of Avalon Hill's intellectual
properties, trademarks and inventories. Hasbro exceeds $3 billion in annual
revenues from its host of toy and
game brands such as Risk and Tonka. It also has established itself as a top
publisher of computer games after
entering that market three years ago.
Jamison said early, tentative plans include a third-quarter 1999 reissue of
Diplomacy, continued support of
Advanced Squad Leader via new modules, reissue of out-of-print Avalon Hill
titles and the debut of several
titles under development when Monarch Avalon sold the assets.
The executive directly addressed Internet gossip that Hasbro simply intends
to strip-mine the Avalon Hill
properties for computer titles. "I know there's been some misinformation,"
Jamison said. "But that's not true.
"Hasbro is not out there to go and destroy what were some phenomenal
strategy games."
Hasbro's own strategy includes growing, not just reviving, the name that
ranks among the oldest in hobby
gaming. "At this time we want to develop Avalon Hill . . . to be the leader
of strategy games," Jamison said.
Titles such as Runequest offer the company a foothold beyond the
board-and-box product category. Of entering
the RPG field Jamison said, "We're definitely not ruling that out at all.
We're planning to go forward with the
Avalon Hill line . . . definitely the fantasy games. There's a great
opportunity for fantasy roleplaying games." As
for moving further afield into the collector's-card market dominated by
Magic: "We believe there are
opportunities throughout the hobby specialty market. At this time it's too
early to comment."
Hasbro is just beginning to sort out its purchase, with the boardgame and
computer divisions evaluating the
material in tandem. They plan to market the resulting products the same
way -- simultaneously releasing board
and computer versions of titles to maximize cross-marketing.
One factor the company has yet to iron out is distribution, considered by
some to be the weakest link in the
hobby-game market and likely to be eye-opening for a company used to
dealing with giant retailers such as Toys R' Us. "We actually have not sat
down and completed that process," Jamison
said.
End of The Glorantha Digest V6 #339
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