February 17, 2025

‘Non-Wargame Historical Games’ with Paper Time Machines: Critical Game Design and Historical Board Games

RockyMountainNavy, 16 October 2024

When writing these comments, the first thought that jumped out at me was, “Wow, Maurice really wrote a time machine. How else did they get a copyright date of 2025?” Which is to really just say that Maurice W. Suckling’s book Paper Time Machines: Critical Game Design and Historical Board Games (New York: Routledge, 2025) is a timely contribution to the world of historical hobby board gaming. Above all else, it is also important to make it clear that Paper Time Machines is not exclusively about wargames. The subtitle of the book is “Critical Game Design and Historical Board Games” not “Critical Wargame Design” or “Historical Board Wargames.” As a member of the hobby wargaming community that associates at times with wargame practitioners supporting government agencies, including the U.S. Department of Defense, those few words make a world of difference in my understanding—and reception—of the book.

As noted on the back cover, Paper Time Machines is intended, “primarily for designers of historical board games” (Suckling, back cover). According to the back cover the key features of Paper Time Machines are:

    • “Guides new designers though the process of historical board game design.”
    • “Encapsulates the observations and insights of numerous notable designers.”
    • “Deeply researched chapters on the history and current trajectory of the hobby.”
    • “Chapters on selected critical perspectives on the hobby” (Suckling, back cover and front matter).

 

Hobbyist over practitioner 

While there have been many books on wargaming history and design written over the past several decades, Paper Time Machines is one of the few that is more closely aimed at designers of hobby wargamers vice wargame practitioners who design wargames for clients. For example, The United States Naval War College Fundamentals of War Gaming by Francis J. McHugh (3rd Edition: March 1966 (Reprint) (U.S. Government Printing Office) is directly intended for wargame practitioners designing for the U.S. Navy.

 

James Dunnigan’s Wargames Handbook: How to Play and Design Commercial and Professional Wargames first published in the summer of 1980 is a rare exception which was aimed at both hobby wargamers and practitioners, but the trend toward supporting wargame practitioners certainly continued in Peter Perla’s The Art of Wargaming (Naval Institute Press, 1990) and through Philip Sabin’s Simulating War: Studying Conflict Through Simulation Games (Bloomsbury, 2012, 2014).

Zones of Control: Perspectives on Wargaming edited by Pat Harrigan and Matthew G. Kirchenbaum (MIT, 2016) mixed wargame hobby and practitioner perspectives but has certainly found more use in the practitioners world1.

The Craft of Wargaming: A Detailed Planning Guide for Defense Planners and Analysts by Col. Jeff Appleget, USA (Ret.), Col. Robert Burks, USA(Ret.), and Fred Cameron (Naval Institute Press, 2020) and editor Sebastian Bae’s Forging Wargamers: A Framework for Professional Military Education (Marine Corps University Press, 2022) makes no attempt to portray themselves as aimed in any real fashion towards hobby wargamers. 

 

Playing with Paper Time Machines

For hobby wargame players, the most interesting parts of Paper Time Machines will likely be the Introduction and “Part 1: Context.” In the Introduction, Suckling discusses the intersection between board games and history as well as why historical board games matter. They address head on the question of “What is a wargame?”. I must admit I am personally very interested in the discussion here because both myself and Armchair Dragoons Regimental Commander Brant are quoted within. For the record, though Suckling acknowledges there is no single definition, they offer this one for consideration: “A wargame is a strategy game where the focus of play is predominantly concerned with the execution of military or political-military operations of some kind” (Suckling, p. 10).

Both hobby wargaming players and designers will likely enjoy “Part I: Context” of Paper Time Machines. In these chapters, which are delivered in a very scholarly tone, Suckling addresses games and critical game design concepts. Suckling also mentions historical simulations where they provide a very useful passage from S. Prabhat on the differences between games and simulations that I consider worthy of repeating here:

“For the general public, games and simulations have no differences …. While a simulation is designed for evaluative or computational purposes, a game is designed for entertainment and educational purposes. While accuracy is the upshot of simulations, clarity is the upshot of games. While a simulation is a serious effort to precisely represent a real phenomenon in another, a game is an artistic representation of some phenomenon …. When games are stylized, simulations are very detailed. Games are known to suppress details whereas simulations elaborate on all the details” (Suckling, p. 42).

The balance of Part 1 in Paper Time Machines is perhaps best described as a scholarly review of why people play games, and especially historical games. Following the historical simulations discussion are further thoughts on counterfactuals, game studies, historical game studies, and adaptation studies all in relation to simulations. Suckling then discusses historical games as models. In doing so, I am pleased to see their response to James Buckley’s article “Wargames – simulation or stimulation?” in issue #36 of C3i Magazine which I took exception to. Suckling also discusses historical board games in terms of roleplay or simulation, apparently channeling again similar thoughts of mine which I term Adventure Wargaming.

SPI, 1979

 

Suckling continues in Part 1 of Paper Time Machines to review the history of historical board wargames. The most interesting part of the history review to me is Suckling’s division of the different eras of the hobby. One can agree—or disagree—but the division of “Before Gettysburg” to “1958-1981: The First Rise of Wargaming” to “1982-1999: Wargaming Destroyed Itself” to “2000-2023: The Second Rise of Board Wargaming” is just one interesting way to look at the history of the hobby. Of interest, Suckling provides many reasons as to why the wargame industry collapsed in the very late 1980’s and 1990’s but my personal observation is that the impact of ‘The Great Magic Extinction Event’ that started in 1993 with the release of Magic: The Gathering (Wizards of the Coast) is underplayed in Paper Time Machines. Interestingly. Suckling ends his historical review by describing, “the current time as a new golden age” (Suckling, 103). 

 

Courtesy thenerdist.com

 

The next chapter of Paper Time Machines touches on a topic that some hobby wargame players may find uncomfortable: the issue of Confederate or Nazi glorification in wargames. Those topics arise in Suckling’s discussion of a subset of wargames which they term Pol-Mil wargames. Pol-Mil wargames are those games, “committed to the concept of the integrated nature of politics and warfare” (Suckling, p. 111) Suckling makes it clear that they consider the early days of Pol-Mil wargaming, that is prior to the 1994 publication of We the People (Avalon Hill Games), as highly problematic.
The problems, according to Suckling, stem in great part from wargaming’s association—specifically through the individuals of James Dunnigan, Peter Perla, John Prados, and Randal Reed—with systems analysis in the Robert McNamara and Vietnam eras of the U.S. Department of Defense which led to a situation where, “the biases of a segregated political-military mindset were inbuilt into the foundations of the wargaming hobby” (Suckling, p. 111).
Suckling acknowledges that prior to 1994 there were some Pol-Mil games that explored the topic in a worthy manner—Diplomacy from 1959 is called out—but they were usually not associated with designers or publishers that worked with the Department of Defense.
The publication of We the People in 1994 was, according to Suckling, not just notable for the development of card-driven game mechanisms but also for how the game design incorporated political dimensions (Sucking, pp. 118-119). They go on to quote Jason Matthews (co-designer of Twilight Struggle) from a 2021 podcast where they, “noted that this reintegration of politics back into (at least some) wargames occurred after the failures of US policies in Vietnam had become obvious and were being more fully digested. Matthews suggests that the McNamara era of a kind of engineering-oriented approach to political problems was exposed for its shortcomings” (Suckling, p. 120).

Returning to the theme of Nazi fetishizing in hobby wargaming, Suckling goes all in on Aaron Trammel’s thesis from their book Privilege of Play: A History of Hobby Games, Race, and Geek Culture (2023) which explores the “ideological racism” of wargame publisher Avalon Hill based on their “conscious flirtation with white supremacist tropes and … the repeated valorization of such on front covers and in articles of The General (Suckling, p. 111).

In Paper Time Machines Suckling sees the future of Pol-Mil wargames as bright because:

“If Sun Tzu is right, and the greatest victory is that which requires no battle, then Pol-Mil games facilitate ways of enacting this truth. Therefore, any strategic-level game that incorporates political dimensions to forestall wars, or reformulate objectives, or recalibrate resources in line with dynamic political agendas gives players access to a grander strategic-level experience. Without the human and messy elements innate to politics, the military dimension alone is narrow and the history we are exploring is vastly restricted and distorted. This area is ripe for game designers to set to work” (Suckling, pp. 121-122).

Twilight Struggle (GMT Games, 2005) is a Pol-MIl wargame…according to Suckling

 

The last chapter in Part 1 of Paper Time Machines delves into the concept of “non-wargame historical games”. [Try saying that fast three times.] In “An Even Briefer History of Non-Wargame Board Games,” Suckling looks at historical games which are, “essentially indistinguishable from wargames” (Suckling, p. 125). Though the subject of these games do not meet a strict reading of Suckling’s definition of a wargame, non-wargame historical games are similar because, “their implementation is, in essence, nothing but wargame through mechanics” (Emphasis in original; Suckling, p. 125). Suckling goes on to assert we are at an inflection point in the non-wargame historical game hobby thanks to, “a blend in wargame and Euro sensibilities and cultures” (Suckling, p. 126). They go on writing:

“Wargames bring a longstanding willingness to undertake a certain cognitive load, a willingness to attempt to engage with history seriously, and the pre-existence of an audience and publisher base around which one can coalesce. Euros bring sensibilities that incline to shorter rules, fewer and less complex pieces (carrying fewer levels of detail on each piece – perhaps just a meeple representing one thing, rather than another one-inch cardboard square carrying information on unit nationality, type, attack, defense, and movement values, together with perhaps a unit signifier and/or name in line with orders of battle), less complex boards, and a broader array of subject matter” (Suckling, pp. 126-127).

Like Suckling in Paper Time Machines, I too struggled with the intersection in wargame design where “classic” wargame mechanisms mixed with game mechanisms lifted from Eurogames. At one point I was married to the term “Waro” to describe these sorts of wargames (for example, see “A #wargame journey from hex & counter to waro through Tank Duel: Enemy in the Crosshairs (@gmtgames, 2019)” written back in November 2019 at my blog). I also question if the hobby wargame community is truly at an inflection point (a seemingly favorite term from Suckling) or has the hobby simply become more aware of a trend that Suckling themself describe started 30 years ago with We the People.

Votes for Women (Fort Circle Games, 2022), a 2022 Charles S. Roberts Best Early Modern Wargame Nominee is a non-wargame historical board game according to Suckling

 

Suckling ends Part 1 of Paper Time Machines with a look at the emergence of non-wargame historical games where they use a quote from Patrick Rael—boardgame designer and professor at Bowdoin College—to once again criticize, “this fetishization, in a way, … of military themes …” in the hobby wargaming space (Suckling, 126). Frankly, I am a bit surprised that the discussion of this topic is confined to this chapter; it seems like a topic well-suited for the final part of the book where it could sit alongside another controversy, colonialism, in historical board games.

————

[The publication of Paper Time Machines came just before an incident of Nazi glorification in gaming erupted. At the Spiel Essen 2024 game show, NAC Wargames from Spain released their newest title, The Other Side of the Hill designed by Carlos Fco. Márquez Linares. As the game describes itself:

“The Other Side of the Hill is a boardgame that simulates the effects that this struggle for power within the German High Command had on the development of the Second World War. Up to four players represent military leaders cooperating and competing as they manage Germany’s wartime strategy. To win, they must vie for Prestige by advancing the careers of their favored Army and Army Group commanders, grabbing their share of victories while the early-war pickings are easy, then avoiding responsibility for battlefield disasters as the Soviets and the Western Allies solidify and push back.” (Publishers blurb via BGG)

NAC Wargames, 2024

 

In many ways The Other Side of the Hill should be a non-wargame historical board game that Suckling seemingly should approve of; the game does not deal exclusively with the combat of World War II but instead it focuses on the politics of the German High Command using a mix of wargame and Eurogame design mechanisms. (For a balanced review see “The Other Side of the Hill – Thoughts from Volko Ruhnke” at The Boardgames Chronicle). The problem, as many wargamers pointed out, was that NAC Wargames handed out a special reward at Essen for those who purchased the game:

While some pointed out that the reward is NOT the Nazi Iron Cross, and the ribbon and shape are used by the modern Bundeswehr, the fact is it looks very similar to the Nazi version. There is a wide spectrum of reactions, but suffice it to say the extremes were not afraid to speak up.

One could also consider Paper Time Machines where Suckling wrote:

“Even more examples of diverse historical topics are upcoming. These games might indeed be problematic in some regards or have highly problematic elements on an individual basis — which is a series of targeted case studies for another day and another book, but this should not blind us to something significant occurring in the board games hobby” (Suckling, p. 128).]

————

Todays Paper Time Machine designers

“Part 2: Design Process and Tools” and “Part 3: Designing Historical Board Wargames” of Paper Time Machines are the heart of the book and aimed squarely at historical board game designers. Hobby wargame players could also certainly learn a thing or two about the design decisions behind the games they play; that is, if they read these parts of Paper Time Machines.

Part 2 of Paper Time Machines, titled “Design Process and Tools,” is not specifically aimed at wargames historical board games but at games in general. Wargame designers are almost certainly aware of James Dunnigan’s “Ten Step Process” for wargame design that presented in the first edition of the Wargame Handbook in 1980. Paper Time Machine covers Dunnigan’s process, but also discusses another nine more recent options from more contemporary designers perhaps better known by today’s community of wargames. The more modern approaches include Mark Herman’s “Ten Points,” Reiner Knizia’s “Unfixed Process,” Cole Wehrle’s “Pre-Production Phase,” and Jason Carr’s “Five Key Categories” (Suckling, pp. 132-139).

If you are a wargame designer (or a player) that is worried that Paper Time Machines is too heavily influenced by Eurogames the next two chapters in Part 2 might assuage some your angst. Suckling makes it clear that the idea or thesis of a game (“Chapter 8 – Devising a Thesis”) must come before the game mechanisms (“Chapter 9 – Common Components and Major Mechanics”). Interestingly, the next chapter (“Chapter 10 – Major Card Functions and Metaphors”) comes ahead of the discussion of board design (“Chapter 11 – Board Design”) which should be some indication to us readers how Suckling views the value of card-driven games.

Two hundred pages into Paper Time Machines we finally get to “Part 3 – Designing Historical Board Games.” In this section, Suckling makes it a point to state that, “The intent for the next three chapters … is to cover only the most high profile and introductory topics relating specifically to historical board wargame design, staying agnostic to the levels of warfare or specific series or genre conventions” (Suckling, pp. 206-207).

“Chapter 14 – Design Conventions: Units.” Suckling discusses five major ways to depict units in a game: Unit Counters, Block Games, Minis, Cards, and Other Pieces (Suckling, p. 208). The differences between Block Games (really the use of wooden blocks for units) and Other Pieces, which Suckling describes as most anything from wooden blocks to meeples, is a bit unclear to me but I think most readers will be able to grok the key points made.

“Chapter 15 – Design Conventions: Combat Resolution. Suckling, drawing heavily on the work of Geoff Engelstein and Issac Shalev in Building Blocks of Tabletop Game Design: an Encyclopedia of Mechanisms (2022),  presents six “common” and four “less common” mechanics used in historical board games:

  • Common – “Unit Strength Ratio” aka “Ratio/Combat Results Table.
  • Common – “Cumulative Hits.”
  • Common – “Stat Check.”
  • Common – “High Number.”
  • Common – “Deterministic Resolution.”
  • Common – “Card Play.”
  • Less Common – “Physical Action.”
  • Less Common – “Prisoner’s Dilemma.”
  • Less Common – “Force Commitment.”
  • Less Common – “Rerolling and Locking.”

A final combat resolution mechanism Suckling discusses in Paper Time Machines is what they call Hybrid “combining two or more other battle resolution mechanics together” (Suckling, p. 234).

“Chapter 16 – Design Conventions: Movement, Morale, and More.” Suckling (very briefly) discusses a wide range of topics in this chapter including: Sequence of Play, Initiative, Movement Points, Zones of Control, Stacking; Move Some, All, or None; Action Points, CDG [Card Driven Games] Wargames, Chit Pull, Hidden Movement, Fixed Maneuver, Morale, Supply, Production, Research, and Bots.

Suffice it to say that Suckling in Paper Time Machines views historical board games as something more than the “conservative” hex & counter with a CRT [Combat Results Table] designs that critics often accuse wargamers of being too enamored with. Suckling’s more expansive, neigh inclusive, view of board wargame design is even more evident in the final chapter of Part 3 titled “Design: Unconventions.” Here you will find some of the “wargames” hailed by self-proclaimed “progressive” members of the hobby wargaming community get called out, including Uboot (Phalanx, 2019), Undaunted: Normandy (Osprey,2019), and Atlantic Chase (GMT, 2021). Churchill: Big Three Struggle for Peace (GMT, 2015) gets a special callout by Suckling for being a wargame design that demonstrates, “developments that challenges the status quo in terms of what power structures, agendas, unsupportable assumptions and biases consciously lie behind – or are unconsciously wrapped up in – design conventions” (Suckling, p. 249).

 

Resting the case

“Part 4: Designing Non-Wargame Historical Board Games” of Paper Time Machines is actually three case studies looking at “non-wargame historical games.” This section is in many ways a set of designer’s notes for the chosen games. Case Study #1 is Operation Barclay (Salt & Pepper Games, 2024) designed by Suckling themself. As they note, “It perhaps applies the most stress to the definition of a non-wargame … it is set during a war, and it is concerned with the conduct of the war, but the operations are military intelligence based with ramifications on military strategy, rather than the conduct of military or political-military operations per se” (Suckling, p. 255). Case Study #2 is Crisis: 1914 (Worthington Publishing, 2024) again designed by Suckling. Case Study #3 is Peace 1905 (Fort Circle Games, forthcoming in 2025) where Suckling was a co-designer. While I certainly appreciate the insight into the design of these games Suckling offers—which I am sure other players and designers will likewise benefit from—I am less sure what my takeaway form this part of Paper Time Machines was supposed to be aside from a better understanding of the design decisions behind the chosen games.

Courtesy IG: @doctor_meeple via BGG

 

Publishers and Paper Time Machines

While earlier parts of the book Paper Time Machines are aimed at historical hobby game players and designers, “Part 5: Selected Critical Topics” of Paper Time Machines addresses four potentially controversial topics that should be of interest to not only those groups but also to publishers. The first controversy, detailed in “Chapter 21: Two Unsolvable Problems in Historical Board Game Design,” looks at the perennial controversy of playability versus historicity and its associated distortion from hindsight. Suckling also discusses historical plausibility. It is clear to me from this chapter that Suckling is a proponent of playability over historicity, in no small part because of the problems hindsight brings to making historically plausible games. Likewise, publishers must consider these same issues, especially as it pertains to marketing potential (i.e. sales) of a game.

The next chapter in Part 5 of Paper Time Machines looks at the issue of storytelling and board wargame design. Suckling clearly aims this chapter at designers by asserting, “storytelling helps inform the world of wargame designers” (Suckling, 294). As a player, however, my view of storytelling and wargaming is much simpler; to me an enjoyable wargame is one in which a compelling narrative emerges through play. Publishers will likely also be concerned with storytelling in a game, in no small part because of reputation considerations when it comes to having their name or brand associated with a particular view or representation of history.

CMON, 2015

 

The penultimate chapter of Paper Time Machines is perhaps bound to be the most controversial of the final part. In “Chapter 23: The Post-Colonial Turn” Suckling looks at what they term two “traditions” within the hobby; that of “strategic-level colonialism” and “tactical-level colonialism” (Suckling, p. 296). Suckling defines “strategic-level colonialism” as those games where indigenous people are given no agency. Risk (1959) and Diplomacy (1959) are called out as, “a form of ‘pure’ strategic-level colonialism: every agency-infused polity is either colonizing or it is nothing, and every agency-infused colonizing polity is either better at it than others (winners) or worse (losers)” (Suckling, p. 296). “Tactical-level colonialism” is found in games, “where indigenous people are given agency at a tactical level, being a playable faction in a battle that is often noteworthy within the context of a colonial narrative about ultimate military conquest” (Suckling, p. 297). 

Playing Oppression: The Legacy of Conquest and Empire in Colonialist Board Games

 

Suckling continues their analysis of colonialism in Paper Time Machines by asserting the hobby has entered a new postcolonial turn given the emergence of historical games incorporating three key design elements:

    • “A strategic-level agency is given to a colonized/would-be-colonized people.”
    • “There is a representation of complex strategic-level asymmetries of multiple (e.g., political, cultural, economic, technological) assets of the historical situation.”
    • “There is a representation of conflict asymmetries between the colonized and colonizers modeled on the operational and tactical levels” (Suckling, p. 299).

While hobby wargaming is often maligned as too conservative, it is interesting to read Suckling’s observation in Paper Time Machines that—with regards to any Postcolonial Turn—historical board wargaming may actually be more advanced than Eurogames:

“As we saw in chapters earlier this book, wargames derive from military and colonialist traditions. As we also saw, eurogames emerged as a movement away from and a counter to the direct conflict-driven focus of wargames. Eurogames sit within a commercial space associated with broad accessibility, with families, and tend to focus on interpersonal interaction (Woods 2012, 155). Eurogames now sit at the heart of what we might describe as mainstream board gaming (Woods 2012, 6, 83). Yet mainstream board gaming is sorely afflicted with critiques of colonialism (Faiduti 2017; No Pun Included 2021: Shelf Stories 2021). The niche space of historical board wargaming, despite the irony of its military and colonialist provenance, is reaching its postcolonial moment well ahead of mainstream board games” (Suckling, p. 304).

Cancelled by GMT Games in 2019; evidence of a wargaming Postcolonial Turn

 

Suckling uses his postcolonial exploration in Paper Time Machines to pivot into the issue of diversity and inclusion in hobby wargaming with an indirect appeal to publishers: “There is a certainly a great deal of work to encourage marginalized designers into this space” (Suckling, p. 308). Personally, I am disappointed that Suckling choose to raise the issue of diversity and inclusion as a dependency within the hobby’s postcolonial turn. As recent discussions over a particular YouTube video shows, this is a larger issue given some hobby wargamers still have much to learn about how other segments of wargaming, like wargame practitioners, address these concerns. Likewise, publishers need pay attention to how they conduct themselves and again decide what reputation they want to have across the industry. 

“The Games Behind Your Government’s Next War” from People Make Games; self-describes as a “lighthearted documentary” Oh, really?

————

[A Needed Wargaming Derby]

[All too often, arguments regarding diversity in the wargaming hobby are clumsy attempts to use identity politics to pit “conservative” hex & counter wargamers against “progressive” gamers. Rather than play the identity politics card, one could simply call on all to pledge to the Derby House Principles. These principles, laid out by the wargame practitioner community, are eminently usable by the hobby wargaming community:

THE DERBY HOUSE PRINCIPLES

We believe that promoting diversity and inclusion is the right thing to do. 

Diversity and inclusion are more than just words for us. They are the hard-and-fast principles guiding how we will build our teams, cultivate leaders and create a community that supports everyone in it. No one should ever feel excluded or less welcome because of gender, ethnicity, religion, disability, or background. Experience and social science have shown that diversity can generate better results, in analysis, insight, and professional decision-making.

As professional gamers we are committed to the Derby House Principles:

  1. Promoting inclusion and diversity in professional wargaming, through the standards we set, the opportunities we offer, and access to activities we organise.
  2. Making clear our opposition to sexism, racism, homophobia, and other forms of discrimination across the board, as well as in wargaming.
  3. Encouraging a greater role and higher profile for colleagues from underrepresented groups in our professional activities.
  4. Seeking out and listening to the concerns and suggestions of our colleagues as to how our commitment to diversity and inclusion could be enhanced.
  5. Demonstrating our commitment to diversity and inclusion through ongoing assessment of progress made and discussion of future steps. 

Derby House Principles

I like the Derby House Principles. More importantly (and directly relevant to the conversation) is what the Derby House Principles do not include:

  • I do NOT see a narrow definition of “wargame” in there; indeed, from what I have seen of the wargame practitioner community—and now further documented by Maurice Suckling in Paper Time Machines—the definitions used are rather inclusive.
  • I do NOT see the Principles labeling some community members as “conservative” or asserting only “progressive” views are welcome; instead they welcome diversity.
  • I do NOT see the intentional marginalization of some members of the hobby wargame community; instead I see opposition to all forms of discrimination.

————

The final chapter of Paper Time Machines, “Paper Beats Silicon,” makes it clear that Suckling is a tabletop over digital wargamer. Of all the points Suckling lists as to why paper time machines beat their silicon implementations the one that resonates the greatest with me is the “transparent system” argument. Here I agree that the cognitive engagement of paper tabletop boardgames is far greater than computer-based games. I also, however, acknowledge that some digital implementations of tabletop boardgames, like those using Tabletop Simulator, challenge my notion that digital is not a “transparent system” by default. 

 

Which pedestal?

In my wargaming book collection, I presently rate three titles as Seminal texts of the hobby. They are Dunnigan’s Wargames Handbook, Perla’s The Art of Wargaming, and Sabin’s Simulating War. Many of the other books mentioned above appear on my list of Highly Recommended texts which is where I ultimately put Paper Time Machines. Though Paper Time Machines is a worthy read for hobby players, designers, publishers, and (added here) even wargame practitioners, the scholarly tone is excessive in some places making it a more challenging read that may put off some board wargamers. If you are committed to the hobby Paper Time Machines will likely find use, but do not loan this book to a hobby boardgamer that is looking to dabble in wargames because it will probably chase them away instead of inviting them in.

With regard to the treatment of glorification and racism concerns in Paper Time Machines, I see that regardless of what Suckling writes in Part 1 that they actually use the publication of We the People (1994) to divide the history of the hobby into two eras; an earlier era covering pre-We the People militarily segregated and politically zero-sum wargames using staid game mechanisms and a later era marked by the publication of We the People that embraces more Eurogame-derived game mechanisms with nonzero-sum politics and a postcolonial turn that is supposed to invite a more diverse set of designers into the hobby to design “nonwargame historical games.” That appears to be the “new golden age” that Suckling talks about in Part 1 of Paper Time Machines. With that thought in mind the raison d’etre of Paper Time Machines becomes clear to me; this is a book to support “diverse” non-wargame historical game designers which encourages them to design less military-focused, more politically insightful, postcolonial historical board games.

While I agree that glorification of the Nazis or Confederates is an issue that must be addressed, I am not convinced that the hobby wargaming—and even the non-wargame historical board game niche—can rest comfortably in the thought that, “Well, at least we are better than Eurogamers!” Here I will again assert that wargame practitioners, who by Suckling’s innuendo of guilt by association are weighed down by the sins of the past because their legacy uses pre-We the People game mechanisms coming from key individuals who worked with the US Department of Defense who also failed to integrate politics into their games, are actually ahead of hobby wargamers on embracing diversity across all aspects of the hobby by doing more than just encouraging certain designers to address postcolonial issues.

That said, Paper Time Machines helpfully updates the public record of the history and “state of the art” of wargaming; even if it also exposes some of the controversies that the hobby wrestles with. I recommend you read it for yourself to see if Suckling’s arguments convince you.

 


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Footnotes

  1. ed note: we’ve got a review of this one here at ACD

4 thoughts on “‘Non-Wargame Historical Games’ with Paper Time Machines: Critical Game Design and Historical Board Games

  1. It is difficult to comment on a review without having read the book, it is like commenting on a comment without having the original post, but my take away was that the book… kinda sucked. I saw a lot of the academic red herring (forced categorizations, hobby horses, straw men, and lack of in deep research and a lot of tertiary sources… 😛 ) that often crop these days. This is particular in evidence with the attempt to link the military-political segregation in wargames to McNamara times. Jason Matthews’s idea that the period was engineering dominated clashes with more in depth studies that show how much of it instead was dominated by Political Sciences and International Relations (see Birtle’s History of US Army COIN doctrine). In the end it looked to me as one of these attempts to Pidgeon-holing things in a a way to make the authors’ look better… So the book is not on my priority list.

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