Editing Play-by-mail game (section)

==History==
[[File:Postcard-for-correspondence-chess (trimmed image).png|thumb|right|Postcard for international correspondence chess]]
The earliest play-by-mail games developed as a way for geographically separated gamers to compete with each other using [[postal mail]]. [[Chess]] and [[Go (game)|Go]] are among the oldest examples of this.<ref name=McLain93>[[#Mcl93|McLain 1993]]</ref> In these two-player games, players sent moves directly to each other. Multi-player games emerged later: ''[[Diplomacy (game)|Diplomacy]]'' is an early example of this type, emerging in 1963, in which a central [[game master]] manages the game, receiving moves and publishing adjudications.<ref name=Babcock13>[[#Bab13|Babcock 2013]]. p. 16.</ref> According to Shannon Appelcline, there was some PBM play in the 1960s, but not much.<ref name=Appelcline14>[[#App14|Appelcline 2014]]. loc. 2353.</ref> For example, some wargamers began playing [[Stalingrad (wargame)|''Stalingrad'']] by mail in this period.<ref name=Appelcline14/>

In the early 1970s, in the United States, [[Rick Loomis]], of [[Flying Buffalo Inc.]], began a number of multi-player play-by-mail games;<ref>[[#Loo13|Loomis 2013]]. p. 38.</ref> these included games such as ''[[Nuclear Destruction]]'', which launched in 1970.<ref>[[#PBM23|Rick Loomis PBM]].</ref> This began the professional PBM industry in the United States.<ref>[[#Mcl93|McLain 1993]].</ref> Professional game moderation started in 1971 at Flying Buffalo which added games such as [[Battleplan (play-by-mail game)|''Battleplan'']], ''[[Heroic Fantasy]]'', ''[[Starweb]]'', and others, which by the late 1980s were all [[Play-by-mail game#Computer versus human moderated|computer moderated]].<ref name="Townsend1988a">[[#Tow88|Townsend 1988]]. p. 20.</ref>{{efn|John W. Kelly, Jr. and Mike Scheid also noted that Jim Dutton "decided to write a short story for each turn and the narrative game was born".<ref>[[#Kel85|Kelley and Scheid 1985]]. p. 26.</ref> Kelley and Scheid did not identify the timeframe or which company Dutton worked for.}}

{{Quote box
| quote  = "[[Rick Loomis]] is generally recognized as the founder of the PBM industry."
| source = — ''The Editors of Space Gamer Magazine, 1985''.<ref>[[#Edi85|The Editors 1985]]. p. 35.</ref>
| width  = 27%
| align  = left| style = padding:8px;
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For approximately five years, Flying Buffalo was the single dominant company in the US PBM industry until [[Schubel & Son]] entered the field in roughly 1976 with the [[Play-by-mail game#Computer versus human moderated|human-moderated]] ''[[The Tribes of Crane|Tribes of Crane]]''.<ref name="Townsend1988a"/>{{efn|Schubel and Son first entered the PBM field in 1974.<ref>[[#Pap84|Paper Mayhem 1984]]. p. 18.</ref>}} Schubel & Son introduced fee structure innovations which allowed players to pay for additional options or special actions outside of the rules. For players with larger bankrolls, this provided advantages and the ability to game the system.<ref name="Townsend1988a"/>{{efn|Mark Hill of ''[[Wired Magazine]]'', stated in June 2021 that, "gamers have hated pay-to-win mechanics since the 1970s, when serious players of ''Tribes of Crane'' dropped hundreds of dollars on turns".<ref>[[#Hil21|Hill 2021]].</ref>}} The next big entrant was [[Superior Simulations]] with its game ''[[Empyrean Challenge]]'' in 1978.<ref name="Townsend1988a"/> Reviewer Jim Townsend asserted that it was "the most complex game system on Earth" with some large position turn results 1,000 pages in length.<ref name="Townsend1988a"/>

[[File:Empyrean_Challenge_1000-page_(double-sided)_Simulated_Game_Turn.jpg|thumb|right|Turn results for ''Empyrean Challenge'' could be 1,000 pages in length.<ref name="Townsend1988a"/>]]

Chris Harvey started the commercial PBM industry in the [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|United Kingdom]] with a company called ICBM.<ref name=Harvey2003>[[#Har03|Harvey 2003]]. p. 26.</ref><ref name=Palmer2003>[[#Pal03|Palmer 2003]]. p. 4.</ref> After Harvey played Flying Buffalo's ''Nuclear Destruction'' game in the United States in approximately 1971, Rick Loomis suggested that he run the game in the UK with Flying Buffalo providing the computer moderation.<ref name=Harvey2003/> ICBM Games led the industry in the UK as a result of this proxy method of publishing Flying Buffalo's PBM games, along with KJC games and Mitregames.<ref name=Palmer2003/>

In the early 1980s, the field of PBM players was growing.<ref>[[#Har84|Harvey 1984]]. p. 21.</ref> Individual PBM game moderators were plentiful in 1980.<ref name=TSG1980>[[#TSG80|The Space Gamer 1980]]. p. 13.</ref>{{efn|''The Space Gamer's'' "first annual survey of play-by-mail companies" stated that "[i]ndividual [PBM] moderators are much too numerous to list".<ref name=TSG1980/>}} However, the PBM industry in 1980 was still nascent: there were still only two sizable commercial PBM companies, and only a few small ones.<ref name=Popo90>[[#Pop90|Popolizio, Leblanc, and Popolizio 1990]]. p. 8.</ref> The most popular PBM games of 1980 were ''Starweb'' and ''Tribes of Crane''.<ref name=Popo90/>{{efn|In their April 1981 issue, the editors of ''[[The Space Gamer]]'' magazine published their 1980 Game Survey results, listing the following PBM games in order of reader ranking from 1–9: ''[[Universe II]]'' (7.2), ''[[Pellic Quest]]'' (6.3), ''[[Wofan]]'' (6.3), ''[[Starweb]]'' (6.2) ''[[The Assassin's Quest]]'' (6.0), ''Star Cluster Omega'' (6.0), ''[[Warp Force One]]'' (5.7), ''[[Nuclear Destruction]]'' (5.5), ''[[Battle Plan]]'' (5.1), [[Starmaster (play-by-mail game)|''Star Master'']] (5.1), ''Galaxy II'' (5.0), ''[[The Tribes of Crane]]'' (5.0), ''[[Empyrean Challenge]]'' (4.7), ''[[Arena Combat]]'' (3.8), and ''[[Lords of Valetia]]'' (1.8).<ref>[[#TSG81x|The Space Gamer 1981]]. p. 9.</ref>}}

Some players, unhappy with their experiences with Schubel & Son and Superior Simulations, launched their own company—[[Adventures by Mail]]—with the game, ''[[Beyond the Stellar Empire (play-by-mail game)|''Beyond the Stellar Empire'']]'', which became "immensely popular".<ref name="Townsend1988a"/> In the same way, many people launched PBM companies, trying their hand at finding the right mix of action and strategy for the gaming audience of the period. According to Jim Townsend: <blockquote>In the late 70's and all of the 80's, many small PBM firms have opened their doors and better than 90% of them have failed. Although PBM is an easy industry to get into, staying in business is another thing entirely. Literally hundreds of PBM companies have come and gone, most of them taking the money of would-be-customers with them.<ref name="Townsend1988a"/></blockquote>

Townsend emphasized the risks for the PBM industry in that "The new PBM company has such a small chance of surviving that no insurance company would write a policy to cover them. Skydivers are a better risk."<ref>[[#Tow89|Townsend 1989]]. p. 55.</ref> W.G. Armintrout wrote a 1982 article in ''[[The Space Gamer]]'' magazine warning those thinking of entering the professional PBM field of the importance of playtesting games to mitigate the risk of failure.<ref>[[#Arm82|Armintrout 1982]]. pp. 31–32.</ref> By the late 1980s, of the more than one hundred play-by-mail companies operating, the majority were hobbies, not run as businesses to make money.<ref name=Townsend12>[[#Tow12|Townsend 1988]]. p. 19.</ref> Townsend estimated that, in 1988, there were about a dozen profitable PBM companies in the United States—with an additional few in the [[United Kingdom]] and the same in [[Australia]].<ref name=Townsend12/> Sam Roads of [[Harlequin Games]] similarly assessed the state of the PBM industry in its early days{{efn|Roads did not give an exact year, but discussed a period prior to widespread use of email when PBM players used telephones to conduct diplomacy.}} while also noting the existence of few non-English companies.<ref name=Roads2003/> 

By the 1980s, interest in PBM gaming in Europe increased. The first UK PBM convention was in 1986.<ref name=Mulholland>[[#Mul89|Mulholland 1989]]. p. 1.</ref> In 1993, the founder of ''Flagship'' magazine, [[Nick Palmer]], stated that "recently there has been a rapid diffusion throughout continental Europe where now there are now thousands of players".<ref>[[#Pal93|Palmer 1993]].</ref> In 1992, Jon Tindall stated that the number of Australian players was growing, but limited by a relatively small market base.<ref>[[#Tin92|Tindall 1992]]. p. 12.</ref>{{efn|Flagship listed 19 Australian PBM companies in the same year.<ref>[[#Fla92a|Flagship Editors 1992]]. p. 53.</ref>}} In a 2002 listing of 182 primarily European PBM game publishers and [[Zine]]s, ''Flagship'' listed ten non-[[United Kingdom|UK]] entries, to include one each from Austria and France, six from Germany, one from Greece, and one from the Netherlands.<ref>[[#Fla20t|Flagship Editors 2020]]. pp. 50–51.</ref>{{efn|This selection does not include two listed U.S. Zines, nor does it account for countries of PBM game publishers with no listed physical address—only a web address with a .com-based URL. In a 1995 issue of ''Flagship'', its "Galactic View" list of PBM game companies listed a Brazilian company.<ref>[[#Fla95b|Flagship Editors 1995]]. p. 48.</ref>}}

[[File:List_of_Game_Ratings_from_Nov-Dec_1993_Issue_of_Paper_Mayhem_Magazine.jpg|thumb|right|List of PBM Game Ratings from the November–December 1993 issue of ''Paper Mayhem'' magazine]]

PBM games up to the 1980s came from multiple sources: some were adapted from existing games and others were designed solely for postal play. In 1985, Pete Tamlyn stated that most popular games had already been attempted in postal play, noting that none had succeeded as well as ''[[Diplomacy (game)|Diplomacy]]''.<ref name=Tamlyn85>[[#Tam85|Tamlyn 19853]]. p. 33.</ref> Tamlyn added that there was significant experimentation in adapting games to postal play at the time and that most games could be played by mail.<ref name=Tamlyn85/> These adapted games were typically run by a [[gamemaster]] using a [[fanzine]] to publish turn results.<ref name=Tamlyn85/> The 1980s were also noteworthy in that PBM games designed and published in this decade were written specifically for the genre versus adapted from other existing games.<ref name=Croft85>[[#Cro85|Croft 1985]]. p. 41.</ref> Thus they tended to be more complicated and gravitated toward requiring computer assistance.<ref name=Croft85/>

The proliferation of PBM companies in the 1980s supported the publication of a number of newsletters from individual play-by-mail companies as well as independent publications which focused solely on the play-by-mail gaming industry. As of 1983, ''[[The Nuts & Bolts of PBM]]'' was the primary magazine in this market.<ref name=McLain85/> In July 1983, the first issue of ''[[Paper Mayhem]]'' was published. The first issue was a newsletter with a print run of 100.<ref>[[#Web87c|Webber 1987]]. p. 2.</ref> [[Flagship (magazine)|''Flagship'']] began publication in the United Kingdom in October 1983, the month before ''Gaming Universal's'' first issue was published in the United States.<ref name=McLain85/> In the mid-1980s, general gaming magazines also began carrying articles on PBM and ran PBM advertisements.<ref name="Loomis35"/>{{efn|Loomis also noted that the [[Origins Awards]] began a "Best PBM Game" category in this period.}} PBM games were featured in magazines like [[GAMES Magazine|''Games'']] and [[Analog Science Fiction and Fact|''Analog'']] in 1984.<ref name=McLain85>[[#Mcc85|McClain 1985]]. p. 38.</ref> In the early 1990s, Martin Popp also began publishing a quarterly PBM magazine in [[Sulzberg (Lower Bavaria)|Sulzberg]], Germany called ''Postspielbote''.<ref>[[#Fla92g|Flagship Editors 1992]]. p. 14.</ref>{{efn|The magazine was published in [[German language|German]].}} The PBM genre's two preeminent magazines of the period were ''Flagship''  and ''Paper Mayhem''.<ref>[[#Pad93|Paduch 1993]]. p. RC21.</ref>

In 1984, the PBM industry created a Play-by-Mail Association.<ref name=Gray38>[[#Gra85|Gray 1985]]. p. 38.</ref> This organization had multiple charter members by early 1985 and was holding elections for key positions.<ref name=Gray38/> One of its proposed functions was to reimburse players who lost money after a PBM business failed.<ref name=Gray38/>

Paul Brown, the president of Reality Simulations, Inc., estimated in 1988 that there were about 20,000 steady play-by-mail gamers, with potentially another 10–20,000 who tried PBM gaming but did not stay.<ref>[[#Bro98|Dias 1988]]. p. 33.</ref> Flying Buffalo Inc. conducted a survey of 167 of its players in 1984. It indicated that 96% of its players were male with most in their 20s and 30s. Nearly half were [[White-collar worker|white collar]] workers, 28% were students, and the remainder engineers and military.<ref>[[#Loo84|Loomis 1984]]. p. 4.</ref>

The 1990s brought changes to the PBM world. In the early 1990s, trending PBM games increased in complexity.<ref>[[#Pad93|Paduch 1993]] p. 2.</ref> In this period, email also became an option to transmit turn orders and results.<ref>[[#Mil94|Mills 1994]] p. 4.</ref> These are called play-by-email (PBEM) games.<ref>[[#Pal84|Palmer 1984]]. p. 23.</ref> ''Flagship'' reported in 1992 that they knew of 40 PBM gamemasters on [[CompuServe|Compuserve]].<ref>[[#Pro92|Proctor 1992]]. p. 23.</ref> One publisher in 2002 called PBM games "Interactive Strategy Games".<ref name=Editors02>[[#Edi02|Editors 2002]].</ref> Turn around time ranges for modern PBM games are wide enough that PBM magazine editors now use the term "turn-based games".<ref name="Mosteller 2014. p. 76">[[#Mos14|Mosteller 2014]]. p. 76.</ref><ref>[[#Mul10|Mulholland 2010]]. p. 43.</ref> ''Flagship'' stated in 2005 that "play-by-mail games are often called turn-based games now that most of them are played via the internet".<ref name="Flagship 2005. p. 5">[[#Fla05|Flagship 2005]]. p. 5.</ref> In the 2023 issues of Suspense & Decision, the publisher used the term "Turn Based Distance Gaming".<ref name="Capps">[[#Cap23|Capps 2023]]. Cover.</ref>

In the early 1990s, the PBM industry still maintained some of the player momentum from the 1980s. For example, in 1993, ''Flagship'' listed 185 active play-by-mail games.<ref>[[#Pro93|Procter 1993]]. p. 51.</ref> Patrick M. Rodgers also stated in ''[[Shadis]]'' magazine that the United States had over 300 PBM games.<ref>[[#Rod94|Rodgers 1994]]. p. 91.</ref> And in 1993, the ''Journal of the PBM Gamer'' stated that "For the past several years, PBM gaming has increased in popularity."<ref name="ReferenceA">[[#Pap93f|Paper Mayhem 1993]]. p. 4.</ref> That year, there were a few hundred PBM games available for play globally.<ref name=Rogers40>[[#Rog93|Rogers 1993]]. p. 40.</ref>{{efn|PBM commentator Patrick Rogers stated that PBM popularity was highest in the US at the time.<ref name=Rogers40/>}} However, in 1994, David Webber, ''Paper Mayhem's'' editor in chief expressed concern about disappointing growth in the PBM community and a reduction in play by established gamers.<ref>[[#Web94|Webber 1994]] p. 2</ref> At the same time, he noted that his analysis indicated that more PBM gamers were playing less, giving the example of an average drop from 5–6 games per player to 2–3 games, suggesting it could be due to financial reasons.<ref>[[#Web94|Webber 1994]]. p. 2.</ref> In early 1997, David Webber stated that multiple PBM game moderators had noted a drop in players over the previous year.<ref>[[#Web97|Webber 1997]]. p. 4.</ref>

By the end of the 1990s, the number of PBM publications had also declined. ''Gaming Universal's'' final publication run ended in 1988.<ref>[[#Web88|Webber 1988]]. p. 2</ref> ''Paper Mayhem'' ceased publication unexpectedly in 1998 after Webber's death.<ref>[[#Mui13|Muir 2013]]. p. 14</ref> ''Flagship'' also later ceased publication.<ref name="Mosteller 2014. p. 29">[[#Mos14e|Mosteller 2014]]. p. 29.</ref>{{efn|Charles Mosteller, the editor in chief of ''Suspense and Decision'', noted in its November 2013 inaugural issue that ''Flagship's'' final issue had been previously published without providing a date.<ref name="Mosteller 2014. p. 29">[[#Mos14e|Mosteller 2014]]. p. 29.</ref> ''Flagship'' magazine's webpage lists its most recent issue (No. 130) with a copyright date of 2010.<ref>[[#Fla11|Flagship 2011]]; [[#Fla10|Flagship 2010]]. p. 3</ref>}}

The [[Internet]] affected the PBM world in various ways. Rick Loomis stated in 1999 that, "With the growth of the Internet, [PBM] seems to have shrunk and a lot of companies dropped out of the business in the last 4 or 5 years."<ref>[[#Loo99|Loomis 1999]]. p. 5.</ref> Shannon Appelcline agreed, noting in 2014 that, "The advent of the Internet knocked most PBM publishers out of business."<ref>[[#App14|Appelcline 2014]]. loc. 2706.</ref> The Internet also enabled PBM to globalize between the 1990s and 2000s. Early PBM professional gaming typically occurred within single countries.<ref name=Roads2003/> In the 1990s, the largest PBM games were licensed globally, with "each country having its own licensee".<ref name=Roads2003/> By the 2000s, a few major PBM firms began operating globally, bringing about "The Globalisation of PBM" according to Sam Roads of [[Harlequin Games]].<ref name=Roads2003>[[#Roa03|Roads 2003]]. p. 40.</ref>

By 2014 the PBM community had shrunk compared to previous decades.<ref>[[#Mos14a|Mosteller 2014]]. p. 33</ref> A single PBM magazine exists—''Suspense and Decision''—which began publication in November 2013. The PBM genre has also morphed from its original postal mail format with the onset of the [[digital age]]. In 2010, Carol Mulholland—the editor of ''Flagship''—stated that "most turn-based games are now available by email and online".<ref>[[#Mul10b|Mulholland 2010]]. p. 42.</ref> The online Suspense & Decision Games Index, as of June 2021, listed 72 active PBM, PBEM, and turn-based games.<ref>[[#Zac21|Zachary 2021]].</ref> In a multiple-article examination of various online turn-based games in 2004 titled "Turning Digital", Colin Forbes concluded that "the number and diversity of these games has been enough to convince me that turn-based gaming is far from dead".<ref>[[#For04|Forbes 2004]]. pp. 14–15.</ref>