Last week on the Stonemaier Games monthly e-newsletter (subscribe here), I shared a demographic survey with our subscribers. I’ve done this a few years in a row now, with the intent being to learn more about our followers. I try to focus on questions with actionable results.
As usual, I’ll focus on data where a significant change happened compared to previous years, as well as new/revised questions. First, a few quick notes:
- You can see my analysis of previous years’ data here (2021), here (2020), here (2019), here (2018), and here (2017).
- The motivator for filling out the survey this year was a $100 gift card to our webstore, randomly given to 5 respondents. We received around 3900 responses.
- Keep in mind that this data is specifically from those who choose to follow Stonemaier Games, so it is not necessarily representative of the greater gaming community. I welcome the sharing of any other survey results in the comments.
This is a new question on the survey, and I’m absolutely fascinated by the answer. Over half of respondents indicated that they’re in the refining/enhancing stage of the gaming hobby.
At first this was concerning to me, as I thought this indicated a lack of interest in new games (and greater interest in expansions/accessories). Another question on the survey somewhat confirmed this, as 44% of people said that the type of Stonemaier announcement they’re the most excited about is that for a new expansion or accessory.
But I think “refining/enhancing” isn’t just about improving the games already on your shelf; it’s also about carefully cultivating your game collection to make sure you have exactly what you want for a variety of circumstances and gamers. I definitely think it means that respondents are becoming even more selective about any new games they consider buying, which to me means that we shouldn’t publish more than one game that scratches the same itch.
This is another new question. To be clear, Stonemaier products still have plenty of improvement in terms of eco-friendliness. But in the last year or so, we’ve significantly increased our efforts to make our games more sustainable for the environment (see articles here), and I was curious if customers actually cared.
According to these results, quite a few customers seem happy about these efforts, and a total of 93% are happy about it if you include those who want eco-friendliness but not at the sacrifice of the game experience (which is absolutely our goal). These results have reinforced our desire to continue to improve the environmental sustainability of our products.
I’ve asked this question for a while now, as campaign games continue to capture the attention of crowdfunding campaigns, but I continually wonder if they’re actually getting to the table (see 2021 article on this subject).
As it turns out, respondents indicated a continued but subdued interest in campaign games, especially in comparison to a survey question I sent to Stonemaier Ambassadors in 2021. In that survey, only 33% of people were on the low end of the campaign spectrum (0 or 1 campaign games played that year); in 2022, that number skyrocketed to 56%.
This isn’t to say that campaign games are dead or that they aren’t marketable–they certainly are. But I think this indicates an important shift that can open some room for creativity. I just unboxed Lands of Galzyr this weekend, and I was delighted to find that it’s a game with persistence and consequences, but it’s not a campaign game.
These two questions complement each other. Stonemaier is now quite immersed in the digitalization of tabletop games via full-AI games, Tabletopia, and Board Game Arena, but I was curious if this strategy is helping people figure out which games they want to add to their actual tabletop.
It seems to me that digital games continue to play a small role in tabletop purchase decisions (and to help people learn how to play games), but the bigger impact is that the widespread availability of digital ports is simply letting people play games the way they want to play them. For some, it’s tabletop or bust. For others, it’s digital only. And for many others, it’s a mix of the two. This is mostly conjecture–the data doesn’t clearly indicate any of this! I’m curious what you think.
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What do you think about these results (and how creators could act on them)?
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38 Comments on “5 Insights from Our 2022 Demographic Survey”
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[…] Publishers understand that when someone buys a game, the goal of that purchase isn’t to save the environment. The goal is to play a great game. We also know that a significant number of people appreciate publisher efforts to do less harm to the environment (over 90% of people, according to our 2022 survey). […]
[…] can see my analysis of previous years’ data here (2022), here (2021), here (2020), here (2019), here (2018), and here […]
Really interesting to see these insights!
You raised that 44% of respondents were most excited by expansions. Other than these surveys, how do you know the demand for expansions to a particular game series? Do you have any way of knowing how many people play your games?
We have a few data points to use for this: We know how many of our games have sold to customers, whether those customers are consumers, retailers, distributors, or localization partners. We also know how the game is received by people thanks to BoardGameGeek ratings (and other stats, to a lesser extent). We pair that information with polls like this to determine if there is demand for an expansion.
I have bought tabletop versions of games having played them and enjoyed them on BGA and an Android app. Sea Salt & Paper was the most recent “conversion” – I had no preconceptions of the game going into a digital match and enjoyed it so much that I wanted to play it with my husband who cannot use computers for health reasons. I love the community spirit of online gaming, particularly on the BGA platform – being able to play with family and friends who live too far away to get around a table regularly is wonderful. Plus learning games online through the digital platform is a great tool I think – knowing the basics before you get a copy to the table enhances first play experiences!
[…] of digital versions of games has rarely–if ever–inspired a tabletop purchase. Our 2022 demographic survey indicates that I’m not alone in this–only around 5% of people said that they’ve […]
At the moment, I can’t play any physical game that requires more table space than an A3 piece of paper, unless I’m willing to play it sitting on the floor (or can take it somewhere like a friend’s house or the library). Not many board games fit into such a small space, so if I am playing it’s usually digitally. Hopefully in 2023 I’ll either get my spare room back or be able to rearrange furniture enough to squeeze in a proper table.
I also enjoy the chance to “try before I buy” with digital games, since my tastes don’t quite line up with some of my friends and family. (BGA in particular is nice for sampling like this.) Shipping costs mean that it’s difficult to sell board games second-hand so I can’t do trades or swaps like many people in the northern hemisphere can, and even a version of a game on Steam costs me less than posting a physical game to someone outside my city.
Hi there!
To add about online games:
1. We have now a big collection and we are selling some of them and now before we buy we want to try them first. This means physically or digital we have to try them first and usually for us the digital way its far easier (because our big gamer friends leave far away).
2. For some games hard to setup I start to prefer the digital version (Gloomheaven is faaaar better on digital).
3. We still like far more the physical experience but when you can’t have it (your local gaming group is not available), you can reach some far away friends to play a game.
Now about another topic:
1. You should not compare numbers of games with campaign without taking in consideration how many were released. There was a boom few years ago and as far as you get from those years the people have already play them. There are not that many being released now as before and most of them release throught KS which is sort of dead now because of taxes + crazy delivery prices. Many factors to analyze this.
2. I agree with you about refining. It’s just that we are now more picky about the games we add (space is a big concern, smaller boxes are SO MUCH WELCOME). We keep buying but less often.
I mostly buy physical board games that appeal to me after watching Before You Play’s playthroughs on YouTube (with the exception of Wingspan–my gateway game–which I purchased on the recommendation of a friend, who recommended it to me due to our shared love of birding). I have purchased the DLCs for Tabletop Simulator for both Wingspan and Scythe, however, based on my love of the physical games.
I don’t play any full AI digital games. (I tried the one for Scythe. Didn’t like the experience at all.) TTS, on the other hand, is very important to me. I live geographically isolated from all of my friends and do not own a car. TTS is the only way I can game with friends on a regular basis. I use it, along with a private Discord server, to game most weekends with a couple of friends who live quite far away from me (one on a different continent even!) Sadly, my regular gaming friends find Scythe “too thinky” for their tastes. I still get a lot of use out of the TTS DLC however because I use it for solo gameplay against the automa. (I prefer the tactile experience of playing the physical game. But Scythe is a beast to set up. There are many times I’m able to squeeze in a TTS solo game when hauling out the physical game just would not be possible.)
Laura: I appreciate your note, though it leaves me a little confused, as we formally removed all of our games from TTS a while ago due for moral reasons related to their poor treatment of trans and LGBTQ+ users. There should be no Stonemaier products on TTS, just Tabletopia. Are you still seeing our products on TTS?
Hi Jamey, I’m similarly confused by your reply. Stonemaier’s decision to stop selling on TTS doesn’t obligate me to throw out products I’ve already purchased.
Definitely, no one is suggesting you do that. Rather, I was surprised by the *availability* of our products on TTS, but it sounds like this is a case where you had already downloaded our games and own them on TTS (which is perfectly fine), not a case of our games still being available there. Thanks for clarifying!
Correct.
What’s always been interesting to me about campaign games is that there’s always a good initial interest for the game. But as my group (and other groups I talk to) come together to play games, they either want to play other favorites, new purchases, or just something they haven’t played in a while. And campaign games are always the first to get cut from a game night unless it was a date set specifically to play it. Often, they are good, but not good enough to replace a groups’ affinity to something else that also might take a while, and so when you have to pick between 2 large games, you pick your favorite, rather than the one that has to get you back in the mindset of the day you last played it. I’d be curious to see how often the games that were played actually had repeat plays, and how many repeat plays they got. Also, I just finished writing up a term paper using SPSS to parse through and compare data and run different tests, and it makes me want to play with the data you’ve gathered to find trends xD but that’s neither here nor there.
Physical board games feel more communal. Many of us haven’t been up to much due to work and exhaustion, so don’t have much to talk about, and the physical games are a good excuse to bring everyone together face-to-face without forced and awkward conversation. It can come naturally while we play. Our refining of the collection ensures we have a bit of everything. Long and complex games largely for my husband and I (I refuse to explain Scythe to anyone who won’t play it with us a few times a year), medium weight for some friends and family who can’t stay long enough for a complex or campaign games, intro games for those who don’t like too many rules, quick party games for the very tired or those who struggle with engine strategy. It’s important for us to have something for every interest and ability. New games go down better than expansions with our social circle so as not confuse game rules between irregular meetups. My husband tends to win more with base game rules, and I fare better with expansions. Drawing Vesna seems to be the only way I win at Scythe! Refining for different mechanics is good, too. We like that Scythe has very Quidditch World Cup wins sometimes. You may catch the Snitch (6 stars first), but lose the game (coins). Can result in interesting risk-taking when we know the game will end in 1 or 2 turns.
Becoming a new parent this year has made me more thankful for digital board games than ever. I’d almost always prefer to get together with people in person, but this has helped me to continue to access the hobby during a hectic part of my life. And they’ve definitely convinced me to buy a few games, or to not buy some (sometimes even because I know I’ll only play it digitally, so I can save the money).
Digital games for me can both persuade. me or disuade me from buying a physical game. Usually, it depends on how good the digital implementation of the game is and how much more fun I think a physical version would be. In my case, most of the times I play games on BGA that I own or am planning to get to either learn it, or to “get it to the table” if i’m struggling to do so during my weekly game days. Ultimately, my heart has space for both of them <3
Delightful to see your mention of Lands of Galzyr. I hope you like it, or at least find it an interesting and fresh.
As for my collection, I try to convince myself that I’m in the refining stages, attempting to keep the total number of games stable. However, I sometimes seem to slip a little, haha. 😅
Thanks for innovating, Sami! I’m really excited to play it soon.
Hey! So, as someone who is in the growing and collecting phase (not sure I will ever get out of that phase 😂)…. As well as, someone who has recently started playing on board game arena in the last few months…. Here is my thoughts:
I have tried a few games, on Bga, that I had been curious about playing…. But just hadn’t had the opportunity to play as of yet. It absolutely helped me decide whether or not I would buy the physical copy of them, or not.
Also, I really enjoy the tutorials on bga…it’s helped me learn games easier. Everyone’s style of learning is different…. Some people can read, or have someone explain the rules, and it just “click” for them. I’m very much someone who needs to be able to play as I’m teaching myself… and I do feel like bga does a great job of that with their tutorials.
That said, the physical games I already have played prior to their digital release- I bought the digital release because I love the physical game so much.
Wingspan was a game I wanted for well over a year and my husband bought it for me for my birthday earlier this year…. Once we played the first time… that was it…. We bought the Xbox version and iOS version, along with their expansion and seasonal dlc. We typically play several rounds of those per day… it’s nice to have access to play together whenever we want, especially if we aren’t able to get the physical copy out for some reason. Everdell is another one I feel this way about.
Laura: Thanks for sharing, and I completely agree about tutorials on BGA. I like tutorials in any form to help onboard me into a game.
I wonder what the response would be to the question, “how many digital versions of tabletop games did you play this year that caused you to get rid of the physical game?” I certainly had a few but I’m in the saturation nearly downsizing category.
I am curious what benefits Stonemaier (or other game companies) get from putting games on Board Game Arena (or other subscription services, such as GamePark). I understand how you benefit from publishing games on Steam or iOS, since people buy those versions (I own many of your games there). But BGA subscription fees are really low and must support a huge catalog of games plus BGA’s own expenses and profit. Do you mainly release games on BGA to increase exposure and thus increase physical sales? Or does BGA actually generate enough revenue for game companies to make the direct returns from subscribers the main reason for releasing games there?
Definitely! I talk about those reasons in detail in this article: https://stonemaiergames.com/the-truth-about-digital-board-games/
As a respondent, a few follow-on comments from this:
As someone in the refining/enhancing stage of my gaming career, I think your description of that stage as “carefully cultivating your game collection to make sure you have exactly what you want for a variety of circumstances and gamers” is exactly right. I’m not looking to just buy a bunch of games and see if I like them, I’m looking to buy or enhance games that I’m either confident I will love or that fill a hole in my collection.
And because of that, I really prioritize trying to play games digitally before buying them physically if at all possible–this year I’ve bought Beyond the Sun and Tapestry because I first played them on BGA and determined that I really love them. But also, I’m still not buying a lot of games, so even games that I love on BGA I often will put on a long-term wishlist as opposed to just buying it right then (which I did with What a Wonderful World after a few great BGA sessions–maybe I’ll buy it one day).
It’s interesting to hear how those two elements tie together!
Super cool that you share these, I love seeing the data. Thanks!
“…respondents are becoming even more selective about any new games they consider buying, which to me means that we shouldn’t publish more than one game that scratches the same itch.”
I wonder about this, actually. Sometimes I think about certain designers / publishers that seem to get away with publishing game after game that DO scratch the same itch – or, if not exactly the same, a very closely adjacent itch. Garphill Games comes to mind, publishing literally trilogies of games that are variations on a single motif, in both theme and gameplay. They’re fabulous games, and I love many of them. And I wonder how fans of the publisher justify buying them all, or even more than one of them.
My guess is, for someone who loves historically themed worker placement games, getting the new Garphill Game IS part of the process of “refining/enhancing” their collection. Each one might scratch around the historical worker placement itch in a different way, but who knows, maybe this next one will be the full on itch-scratcher, and maybe it offers one or two things the last one didn’t. Maybe it’s slightly heavier, or slightly lighter, or has an appealing sub-mechanism that means it’s slightly more likely to get to the table than the last one, and so it might be EVEN better.
You might be right, and publishers should widely diversify their offer so that they can have a product for every occasion. But maybe it’s the opposite; maybe customers prefer a publisher to stay in a lane, so they know what to expect, and they can cycle out the last iteration to cycle in the new one, all in the name of refinement and enhancement.
Just thinking about loud since this has been on my mind recently. Would love to hear what others think as well.
Malachi: Thanks for sharing your analysis–this is really interesting, and Garphill is a great example. You may really be onto something here: “But maybe it’s the opposite; maybe customers prefer a publisher to stay in a lane, so they know what to expect, and they can cycle out the last iteration to cycle in the new one, all in the name of refinement and enhancement.”
I think you’ve hit on a very interesting train of thought. I was surprised to see Jamey consider avoiding duplicating game experiences because it made me worried that Stonemaier would no longer make games I’m interested in. The funny thing is that Stonemaier is one of only two publishers that appear at least twice in my list of games that I give a 9 or higher. The other is FryxGames/Stronghold because I like both Terraforming Mars and Ares Expedition that much. (I love Paladins of the West Kingdom, but I only ‘enjoy’ the other Garphill games I’ve played.)
I think it could be useful for a publisher to be clear on what their vision is for the company. Garphill could say “We are a company that want to make games that are X”, with X being worker placement, historically themed euros, etc. Another thing to do would be to clarify WHY they want to focus on that. Is it because that’s what they think they’re good at? Is it because that’s what they already know how to do and they think they can succeed best by honing their skills rather than start from scratch with other types of games?
Jamey, I don’t know that I’d say your designs all provide the same game experience, but I know they tend to scratch at least a similar itch for me. If you announced that you are in fact avoiding publishing games too similar to the ones you’ve already made, I’d be (to some degree) less excited to hear about new releases. But maybe others feel differently.
Thanks for your thoughts, Alex! I definitely want to keep making medium-weight Euro event games, so it’s more about scratching different itches within that specific category of games.
Wow, when you put it that way I get more excited!
My thought on the digital questions was “How many digital versions did you buy because you loved the tabletop game?”
I have bought multiple games for my phone to play at work on break because the tabletop version is awesome.
I like that way of putting it, Nathan!
Really cool to see the replies and data. I hope you and everyone at SM can use the data and refine the games and company:)
I hope so too! :)
I dont want to buy Isle of cats based on attempts to play digitally. I’m sure the game is great but handling physical pieces is actually part of an experience.
In general my experience of digital games is seriously lacking.
I think people don’t have the time for games with a massive commitment.
Actually I don’t think people have commitment to ok games. Obviously Frosthaven will be met warmly so to speak and will have a huge following. So its kind of go big or go bust.
Steven: That’s interesting; I would think that would make you want to try The Isle of Cats on the tabletop so you could handle the pieces freely.
I’m curious to see if Frosthaven is good!
Sorry what I mean is I haven’t experienced Isle of Cats as it was supposed to be intended. Its really hard to get a feeling of involvement when you are just placing tiles with no interaction. Maybe that’s an issue for all digital games. But the negative experience has put me off buying it and because there are soooo many games out there then it’s those small influences that makes the difference between buying and not buying.