Volume 3, Issue 10

October 2006

Businesses On Track:

Warsmith Games
5215 N Market St.
Spokane, WA
509-484-7796

By Terry Smith

In 1998 I moved to Spokane WA. For the first two years I lived in Hillyard and worked at getting established, and getting to know the city. I found that the people here were much friendlier then the people in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 2001 feeling settled in to my new home I began to get back into one of my favorite past times; Gaming and Modeling.

Gaming and Modeling consists of many different games to be played:

• Role-playing Games: a social game where a number of friends get together and take on the roles of character in an epic adventure story. These games are set in many genres (Fantasy, Horror, and Science fiction), and allow the players to use their imagination and intelligence to solve problems, defeat villains, rescue innocents and have fun doing it.

• Board games: typical board games such as monopoly, risk, and more unique board games like Blood Bowl (a game of fantasy football), these games allow the players to compete and have fun sitting down at a table for just a few hours.

• Collectible games: games where you buy collectible figures or cards and build a custom playing band of cards, or figures to compete against other players customized bands. These games have various levels of value based on the rarity of the items (cards, or figures) you are collecting.

• Table Top Miniature War games: these are games where you build an army out of miniature figures. These figures are usually put together from pewter, or plastic kits, and hand painted. There are many genres from Fantasy and science fiction, to Historical wars from all through out human history (Ancient, American Civil War, and WWII)

Checking into the local Spokane area game stores I found that at the time there was only one main store that supplied most of the needs that gamers have, supplies, new games, gaming space, and knowledgeable staff.  Over the next two years a couple more stores opened up, and service levels on all of these stores changed, some for the good, some for the bad. What I found was that each of these stores had some of the positive things gamers want, but none of them had them all. Within a year we were back down to the one original store, however most of Spokane gamers were used to a variety of stores and felt that one store wasn't giving them what they wanted most of all: a place to have fun!

To this end I began planning a game and hobby store that would cater to Spokane's gaming needs. After talking to many Spokane Gainers I found that what was wanted were the following things:

1. A safe place for Gamers both adult and children to come and games.

2. Friendly staff that is helpful in all aspects of gaming.

3. Events, demos, and tournaments run in a reasonable manner.

4. Classes teaching various modeling, and painting techniques.

5. Evening gaming for adult gamers who work full time.

To this end in 2005 we opened up Warsmith Games in Spokane. Warsmith Games has made connections with schools in the Spokane area, as well as with the Lilac City Young Marines Program and in 2006 with the help of new partners and all our Gaming friends we moved our store into Hillyard at the site of the historic Shell Oil Building at 5215 N Market St. Keeping in mind our customers wants and needs we have established the following store features. We offer open gaming most every day and evening with emphasis on certain games on certain days. We have no problem staying open later to facilitate our adult gaming customers who work hard during their days and want to enjoy a good game in the evening. Our staff is friendly and tries to be as helpful as possible. We enjoy teaching customers different games, and modeling techniques. We have weekly tournaments for Magic the Gathering, and do many demos to teach new games. We enjoy families and kids, and stress fair play and good sportsmanship over winning particularly to our younger customers. A common term heard at Warsmith is "Play hard, have fun, be a good sport, or be gone!" At Warsmith Games we craft gaming fun for all ages.

© Historic-Hillyard.com

October 2006