The Gamemaster Series of board games consists of five war simulation games released by the game company Milton Bradley beginning in 1984. The games were not developed "in-house" by Milton Bradley, with each game initially published in limited runs by smaller game publishers in the early 1980s before their rights were acquired by Milton Bradley. Despite this, some modern reissues of these games refer to the Milton Bradley versions as the "first edition" of each game.
The first three games were designed by Larry Harris, while the last two were designed by Mike Gray, though neither were credited for their creations until their subsequent re-releases. Of these five, Axis & Allies was the most successful, spawning several revised versions, spinoffs, computer games, and a miniature game series, though Conquest of the Empire, Fortress America, and Shogun also saw some success. Broadsides and Boarding Parties was the most significant departure from the strategic focus of the other titles in the series, instead featuring a two-player duel between naval vessels.
The rights to four of the five games in the series are currently held by Hasbro. Though all five games were released under the Milton Bradley umbrella, by the 1990s Axis & Allies was the only game being continually updated. In 1999, Milton Bradley's parent company, Hasbro, moved Axis & Allies to its Avalon Hill imprint, which specialized in board wargames. In 2004, Avalon Hill was made into a subsidiary of Wizards of the Coast, another Hasbro imprint that specialized in board games for a more dedicated "gamer" audience. Shogun is also currently published by Avalon Hill, but retitled Ikusa.
Reissues
Avalon Hill began publishing Axis & Allies spin-off titles in 1999, focusing on the Europe and Pacific theaters as well as tactical recreations of specific battles. The 1984 edition of Axis & Allies remained the flagship product in the series until the 2004 release of Axis & Allies: Revised, introducing to the main game some units and rules that originated in the spin-off titles. Axis & Allies was later chosen as one of three board games re-released to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Avalon Hill in 2008, with that anniversary version of Axis & Allies featuring board set-up options to start the game in 1941 instead of 1942. From that point onward, additional revised editions of the main game as well as spin-offs focusing on theaters or battles would include a starting year in the game's title. In 2013, Avalon Hill published the first game outside of the series' World War II setting called Axis & Allies: WWI 1914. Computer game adaptations of the original Axis & Allies were released by Hasbro Interactive in 1998 and Atari in 2004. A miniature wargaming series was introduced by Avalon Hill in 2005.
Shogun was renamed twice to avoid confusion with other board games of the same name, first becoming Samurai Swords in 1995 while still carrying the branding of Milton Bradley's Gamemaster Series and then becoming Ikusa in 2011 when reissued by Avalon Hill. Conquest of the Empire was re-released by Eagle Games in 2005 with updated rules. Fortress America was reissued with slightly revised cover art to remove Saddam Hussein while the game was still under the Gamemaster Series, and was later licensed to Fantasy Flight Games for a 2012 re-release with new and updated rules.
Acquire is a board game published by 3M in 1964 that involves multi-player mergers and acquisitions. It was one of the most popular games in the 3M Bookshelf games series published in the 1960s, and the only one still published in the United States.
Avalon Hill Games Inc. is a game company that publishes wargames and strategic board games. It has also published miniature wargaming rules, role-playing games and sports simulations. It is a subsidiary of Hasbro, and operates under the company's "Hasbro Gaming" division.
Milton Bradley Company or simply Milton Bradley (MB) was an American board game manufacturer established by Milton Bradley (1836-1911) in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1860. In 1920, it absorbed the game production of McLoughlin Brothers, formerly the largest game manufacturer in the United States. It was acquired by Hasbro in 1984, and merged with their subsidiary Parker Brothers in 1998. The brand name continued to be used by Hasbro until 2009.
Axis & Allies is a series of World War II strategy board games. The first version was initially published in 1981 and a second edition known colloquially as Axis & Allies: Classic was published in 1984. Played on a board depicting a Spring 1942 political map of Earth divided by territories, players take the role of one or more of the five major belligerents of World War II: the Axis powers of Germany and Japan; and the Allied powers of the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Turns rotate among these belligerents, who control armies of playing pieces with which they attempt to capture enemy territories, with results determined by dice rolls. The object of the game is to win the war by capturing enough critical territories to gain the advantage over the enemy.
Multi-Man Publishing, LLC ("MMP"), founded in 1994, is a Maryland based game company that publishes many wargame titles, including Advanced Squad Leader and Operational Combat Series.
Wooden Ships and Iron Men is a naval board wargame simulating naval combat during the Age of Sail that was published by Battleline Publications in 1974, then revised and republished by Avalon Hill the following year.
Fortress America is a strategic board wargame designed by Michael Gray and published in 1986 by Milton Bradley. The game depicts a 21st Century United States being invaded on three sides by three world powers. Fortress America was the fourth of five games in the Gamemaster series.
HeroQuest, is an adventure board game created by Milton Bradley in conjunction with the British company Games Workshop in 1989, and re-released in 2021. The game is loosely based around archetypes of fantasy role-playing games: the game itself was actually a game system, allowing the gamemaster to create dungeons of their own design using the provided game board, tiles, furnishings and figures. The game manual describes Morcar/Zargon as a former apprentice of Mentor, and the parchment text is read aloud from Mentor's perspective. Several expansions have been released, each adding new tiles, traps, artifacts, and monsters to the core system.
Conquest of the Empire is a military strategy board game set in the Roman Empire after the death of Marcus Aurelius, with 2 to 6 players pitting their armies against each other in an attempt to become the ruler of Rome. The game was created in 1982 by Larry Harris and published by The Citadel under the title VI Caesars. Harris revised the game for Milton Bradley in 1984 to be reissued under the title Conquest of the Empire as part of the Gamemaster series. The game was re-released in the summer of 2005 by Eagle Games, redesigned by Glenn Drover. The gameplay in Conquest of the Empire shares similarities to Axis & Allies, another Larry Harris project within the same series.
Broadsides and Boarding Parties is a board game published by Milton Bradley in 1984 as part of their Gamemaster series. It was the 3rd in the series of games that are all designed by Larry Harris. It is the only game of that series to feature a two player game, Broadsides and Boarding Parties is a duel between a Spanish galleon and a pirate ship. Players take turns moving their ship and firing at the other ship to sink her. If the ships collide then players may take boarding parties onto the other ship to try to win.
Shogun is a board wargame set in feudal Japan, first released in 1986 by game maker Milton Bradley.
PanzerArmee Afrika, subtitled "Rommel in the Desert, April 1941 - November 1942", is a board wargame published by Simulations Publications, Inc. (SPI) in 1973 that simulates the World War II North African Campaign that pitted the Axis forces commanded by Erwin Rommel against Allied forces. The game was revised and republished in 1984 by Avalon Hill.
This page lists board and card games, wargames, miniatures games, and tabletop role-playing games published in 1984. For video games, see 1984 in video gaming.
Larry Harris Jr. is a game designer.
D-Day is a board wargame published by Avalon Hill in 1961 that simulates the six months of the European Campaign of World War II from the Normandy Invasion to the crossing of the Rhine. It was the first wargame to feature the now ubiquitous hex grid map and cardboard counters, and was revised and re-released in 1962, 1965, 1971, 1977 and 1991.
Afrika Korps is a board wargame published by Avalon Hill in 1964 and re-released in 1965 and 1978 that simulates the North Africa Campaign during World War II.
Avalon Hill's Squad Leader is a 2000 turn-based strategy video game developed by Random Games and published by Hasbro Interactive under the MicroProse label. It is a tie-in to Avalon Hill's board wargame Squad Leader.
A board wargame is a wargame with a set playing surface or board, as opposed to being played on a computer or in a more free-form playing area as in miniatures games. The modern, commercial wargaming hobby developed in 1954 following the publication and commercial success of Tactics. The board wargaming hobby continues to enjoy a sizeable following, with a number of game publishers and gaming conventions dedicated to the hobby both in the English-speaking world and further afield.
Michael Gray is an American game designer from rural Massachusetts known for his board game designs for Milton Bradley. He eventually became the Senior Director of Global Concept Acquisition for Hasbro's games division. Game reviewer Tom Vasel has called him "the wisest man in all of board gaming."
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