Game Designers' Workshop

{{Infobox company

| name = Game Designers' Workshop

| type = Corporation (1973–1996)

| industry = Wargame and Role-playing game publisher

| products = Wargames, role-playing games

| logo = File:Game Designers' Workshop (logo).png

| foundation = June 22, 1973

| defunct = February 29, 1996

| key_people = Frank Chadwick, Rich Banner, John Harshman, Marc Miller, Loren Wiseman

| location = Normal, Illinois, United States

}}

Game Designers' Workshop (GDW) was a wargame and role-playing game publisher from 1973 to 1996.{{Cite web |url=http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/327/on_game_design_a_history_of_video_.php?page=2 |title=On Game Design: A History of Video Games |last=Jason Weesner |date=2007-01-11 |publisher=Game Career Guide |access-date=2007-09-14}} Many of their games are now carried by other publishers.{{Cite web |url=http://www.farfuture.net/ |title=Far Future Enterprises - Home |publisher=Far Future Enterprises |access-date=2007-09-14}}

History

Game Designers' Workshop was originally established June 22, 1973. The founding members consisted of Frank Chadwick, Rich Banner, Marc Miller, and Loren Wiseman. GDW acquired the Conflict Games Company from John Hill in the early 1970s.

GDW published a new product approximately every twenty-two days for over twenty years. In an effort to bridge the gap between role players, board wargamers and miniature wargamers, the company published RPGs with fantastic settings alongside games with realistic themes including rulesets for 15mm and 20mm miniatures set during the American Civil War, World War I, World War II, and the modern era; and boardgames involving these eras such as the Air Superiority series and Harpoon.

The company disbanded February 29, 1996 after suffering financial troubles.

Products

=Role-playing games=

En Garde! (1975): Dueling game set in 17th-century France, often run as a play-by-mail game.
Traveller (1977): A science fiction game originally intended as a ruleset for generic space adventures. Revised and reissued as Megatraveller (1987) and with completely different rules and a greatly changed setting as Traveller: The New Era (1993)The Traveller Bibliography, page 25
Twilight: 2000 (1984): An alternate history game set in a Europe devastated by nuclear war, with adventures and supplements also dealing with the U.S. and Bangkok.
Traveller: 2300 (1987): A hard science fiction roleplaying game, set 300 years after the Twilight War featured in Twilight: 2000. Traveller: 2300 was later renamed to 2300 AD in (1988) with the release of the second edition.
Space: 1889 (1988): Victorian-era spacefaring game which provided for roleplay opportunities, steampunk aerial gunboat engagements and "colonial" miniature warfare with retro-futuristic elements such as Martian brave warbands and odd space creatures.
Cadillacs and Dinosaurs (1990): Based on the underground comic book Xenozoic Tales.
Dark Conspiracy (1991): a near-future horror role-playing game (RPG), created by Lester Smith
Dangerous Journeys (1992): Roleplaying game created by Gary Gygax, the co-creator of the original Dungeons & Dragons system.

=Board games=

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! Game

! Year

! Designer

! Category

! Notes

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|1940

|1980

Game Designers' Workshop

History

Products

=Role-playing games=

=Board games=

=Miniatures rules=

=''Grenadier'' Magazine=

= ''Journal of the Travellers Aid Society'' =

=Challenge=

=Video games=

Awards

References