B-MOVIE BOARDGAMES

In the late 70s and early 80s, American boardgame design was going through a bit of a renaissance. Commercial wargames -- attempts to recreate historical military operations on the tabletop -- had been in existence since the early 1950s, and in the intervening years the field attracted more and more talent, expanding the boundaries of design and content. What had started as a hobby with a very limited scope -- the Civil War, the Napoleonic Wars, the World Wars -- began to bend and break and blossom with possibility. Simulated conflict was still the mainstay, but at the height of their productivity (circa 1980), great publishers like Avalon Hill, Simulation Publications, Inc., and Game Designers' Workshop were turning out games about aliens invading from Andromeda, giant monsters destroying cities in Michigan, pirates a-plundering in the Caribbean, and innumerable other non-traditional subjects.