Advanced Squad Leader – The Next Generation by David Garvin
By David Garvin
There is a perception among gamers that (ASL) is for old people. There is some truth to that, given that the game has been around since 1985. Almost 36 years since it was released, a young adult who played it since the beginning would be in their mid to late 50s. And if they started with when it came out in 1977, then they would be in their 60s!
The surprising thing is that there is a significant population of ASL players who are younger than the game itself. I am talking Millennials and Zoomers, or those born after 1981, who are avid ASL players. These generations, Generation Y and Z, were the first to grow up in an information age. These generations have always lived in the age of the home computer. Their members were also the first to experience the internet at a young age. Gen Xers like myself learned to adapt to the internet, but for Gens Y and Z, its always been there.
I first noted the younger generation playing ASL when I was at in 2018. Two friends, both named Will, were playing. Both are Gen Y Millennials and both are avid ASL players. I decided to find out what motivated them to play ASL. I know for people like me, board games were all we had growing up and as such we were easily exposed to war games, such as , and of course Squad Leader.
But I did not know what would motivate a child of the Internet to play a board-based game. I reached out to the greater ASL community, seeking people who were born after the release of ASL. I was surprised by the results and found a few commonalities among almost every respondent.