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This page indexes lists of games (board and card games, wargames, miniatures games, and tabletop role-playing games) by their years of release. For video games, see List of years in video games.
This decade saw the board wargame gain a level of popularity. It also saw the appearance of the earliest, simple video games, and the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.
Major shake-ups occur in the who's-who of US game publishing and distribution. Wizards of the Coast, which started the decade as a small West Coast publisher, buys veteran Avalon Hill later in the decade, only to be bought up in turn by industry juggernaut Hasbro. TSR and Iron Crown Enterprises both collapse.
The collectible card game (CCG) became a dominant business model, first by Magic: The Gathering then by several rivals. By the mid-nineties, hundreds of CCGs competed for market share, and most of these products were culled for weak sales. Collectible gaming also expanded from cards into dice, tiles, and miniatures.
The Settlers of Catan breaks Eurogaming into the American market, becoming an overnight bestseller and gateway game. Publishers such as Mayfair Games and Rio Grande Games begin meeting the new market demand with titles from Europe.
Online retailing begins to pose a challenge to "brick and mortar" game stores, though the full effects of e-commerce will not be felt until the following decade.
The internet continues to shake up the publishing and distribution of games. Online retailing becomes a serious threat to "brick and mortar" retailers. Desktop publishing proves to be a boon for hobby game designers, and the door is opened for many small publishers producing their own game designs. Z-Man Games and Fantasy Flight Games become major players in the US hobby game industry. Miniatures games dominate the collectible games market.
A wargame is a strategy game in which two or more players command opposing armed forces in a realistic simulation of an armed conflict. Wargaming may be played for recreation, to train military officers in the art of strategic thinking, or to study the nature of potential conflicts. Many wargames recreate specific historic battles, and can cover either whole wars, or any campaigns, battles, or lower-level engagements within them. Many simulate land combat, but there are wargames for naval and air combat as well.
TSR, Inc. was an American game publishing company, best known as the original publisher of Dungeons & Dragons (D&D). Its earliest incarnation, Tactical Studies Rules, was founded in October 1973 by Gary Gygax and Don Kaye. Gygax had been unable to find a publisher for D&D, a new type of game he and Dave Arneson were co-developing, so founded the new company with Kaye to self-publish their products. Needing financing to bring their new game to market, Gygax and Kaye brought in Brian Blume in December as an equal partner. Dungeons & Dragons is generally considered the first tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG), and established the genre. When Kaye died suddenly in 1975, the Tactical Studies Rules partnership restructured into TSR Hobbies, Inc. and accepted investment from Blume's father Melvin. With the popular D&D as its main product, TSR Hobbies became a major force in the games industry by the late 1970s. Melvin Blume eventually transferred his shares to his other son Kevin, making the two Blume brothers the largest shareholders in TSR Hobbies.
In collectible card games, digital collectible card games and collectible miniature wargames, a booster pack is a sealed package of cards or figurines, designed to add to a player's collection. A box of multiple booster packs is referred to as a booster box.
Miniature wargaming is a form of wargaming in which military units are represented by miniature physical models on a model battlefield. The use of physical models to represent military units is in contrast to other tabletop wargames that use abstract pieces such as counters or blocks, or computer wargames which use virtual models. The primary benefit of using models is aesthetics, though in certain wargames the size and shape of the models can have practical consequences on how the match plays out.
An expansion pack, expansion set, supplement, or simply expansion, is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game, video game, collectible card game or miniature wargame. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, characters, adventures or an extended storyline to an already-released game.
InQuest Gamer was a monthly magazine for game reviews and news that was published from 1995 to 2007. Originally, the magazine was named InQuest and focused solely on collectible card games (CCGs); InQuest, along with its competitor Scrye, were the two major CCG magazines. Later, the magazine changed its focus to cover a wider range of games, including role-playing games, computer and video games, collectible miniature games, board games, and others. The magazine was published by Wizard Entertainment.
Miniatures games are a form of tabletop game which prominently features the use of miniature models or figures.
Privateer Press is a role-playing game, miniature wargame, acrylic paint, board game and card game production and publishing studio. Privateer Press is based in Bellevue, Washington, United States, where they have their headquarters and American factory/distribution center. They have also licensed a factory in the United Kingdom to increase production capacity for worldwide markets.
BL Publishing was a division of Games Workshop, and was split into three sections:
Collectible miniatures games (CMGs) are a form of miniatures game that is also similar to collectible card games (CCGs) — the primary difference being that while CCGs are card-based games, CMGs feature miniature figures.
A gaming convention is a gathering centered on role-playing games, collectible card games, miniatures wargames, board games, video games, or other types of games. These conventions are typically two or three business days long, and often held at either a university or in a convention center hotel.
The history of role-playing games begins with an earlier tradition of role-playing, which combined with the rulesets of fantasy wargames in the 1970s to give rise to the modern role-playing game. A role-playing game (RPG) is a type of game in which the participants assume the roles of characters and collaboratively create stories. Traditionally all the participants but one take on characters and determine the actions of their characters based on their characterization and the actions succeed or fail according to a system of rules and guidelines, and one of the participants takes on the role of game master who narrates the story, plays all the non-player characters and determine the challenge rating and the outcome of various actions. Within the rules, the participants may improvise freely; their choices shape the direction and outcome of the games.
SCRYE was a gaming magazine published from 1994 to April 2009 by Scrye, Inc. It was the longest-running periodical to have reported on the collectible card game hobby. It was also the leading print resource for secondary-market prices on Magic: The Gathering. The name, a registered trademark, is adapted from the Middle English word scry meaning "to foretell the future through a suitable medium".
Fantasy Flight Games (FFG) is a game developer based in Roseville, Minnesota, United States, that creates and publishes role-playing, board, card, and dice games. As of 2014, it is a division of Asmodee North America.
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.
Chessex Manufacturing is an American company that sells dice, primarily for the role-playing game (RPG) and collectible card game (CCG) market. It also offers other accessories used in RPGs and CCGs. The company also has a Chessex Europe branch office.
A tabletop role-playing game, also known as a pen-and-paper role-playing game, is a classification for a role-playing game (RPG) in which the participants describe their characters' actions through speech. Participants determine the actions of their characters based on their characterization, and the actions succeed or fail according to a set formal system of rules and guidelines. Within the rules, players have the freedom to improvise; their choices shape the direction and outcome of the game.
A collectible card game (CCG), also called a trading card game (TCG) among other names, is a type of card game that mixes strategic deck building elements with features of trading cards, introduced with Magic: The Gathering in 1993.
A digital collectible card game (DCCG) or online collectible card game (OCCG) is a computer or video game that emulates collectible card games (CCG) and is typically played online or occasionally as a standalone video game. Many DCCGs are types of digital tabletop games and follow traditional card game-style rules, while some DCCGs use alternatives for cards and gameboards, such as icons, dice and avatars. Originally, DCCGs started out as replications of a CCG's physical counterpart, but many DCCGs have foregone a physical version and exclusively release as a video game, such as with Hearthstone.