Game Designers' Workshop
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| Corporation (1973-1996) | |
| Industry | Wargame and Role-playing game publisher |
| Founded | June 22, 1973 |
| Defunct | February 29, 1996 |
| Headquarters | Normal, Illinois, United States |
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Key people
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Frank Chadwick, Rich Banner, John Harshman, Marc Miller, Loren Wiseman |
| Products | Wargames, role-playing games |
Game Designers' Workshop (GDW) was a wargame and role-playing game publisher from 1973 to 1996. Many of their games are now carried by other publishers.
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.
The Grenadier was the house magazine from 1978 to 1990, with 35 issues. It started off as a quarterly magazine, but towards the end was published sporadically. Although it covered games from all companies, it gave most of the magazine space to GDW games.
Journal of the Travellers Aid Society was a magazine dedicated to Traveller published by GDW between 1979 and 1985.
Challenge was a role-playing game magazine that replaced Journal of the Travellers Aid Society. It covered all of GDW's role playing games, not just Traveller. It was published between 1986 and 1996.
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