If you study entrepreneurship, you’ll hear the same mantra over and over: focus on the customer. As part of that focus, you’ll be told to narrow your idea of “the customer” as much as possible. The goal is to find a limited number of customers–a small market–and then design precisely what they want.

Accelemechs vs. Crashotrons was built on that principle.

From the broadest perspective, AvC is a miniatures wargame. In play, miniatures wargames can look like this:

That’s pretty amazing! Narratively, I can pick out heroes (gold armor and wings help us find them even in a small picture) and villains (the people in the lower-right are wearing skulls and spikes, which has to be a clue). From a tactical perspective, there’s infantry and some fantasy cavalry: winged troopers for the heroes, roaring monsters for the villains. Whether I’m looking for a story, a simulation, or both, it’s clearly here.

Of course, miniatures wargames don’t start out looking like that. Instead, they arrive like this:

It’s a long way from here to the winged, heroic leader in the first picture.

For some players, this is A-OK. For some it’s even great! Building the toy soldiers, modifying them, combining pieces from different kits to make new characters, painting them–these “hobby” elements are selling points for many.

To those who don’t enjoy the hobby aspect, though, building and painting is a huge barrier to entry. Across the decades, this was dealt with through a never-ending series of advice columns, podcasts, and other resources meant to get players up to speed with minimum effort. The theme of all of these was “we know you hate this, so here’s how to get through it relatively quickly.”

Does it sound like there’s an unsatisfied part of the market to you? If so, you’re thinking like an entrepreneur.

Companies spotted this division among players, and focused in on the segment of the wargaming market that wanted to play toy soldier games but didn’t like the preliminaries. Miniatures wargames started to appear with pre-built, pre-painted toy soldiers that were ready right out of the box. A decade ago we saw early efforts, like AT-43 and Confrontation 3rd ed. The big hit, though, was FFG’s X-Wing, which has become a top-selling line.

That was one hurdle cleared. However, there was another one waiting: the ready-to-play miniatures are quite expensive. Games Workshop will sell you 10 Age of Sigmar skeletons for $30. A single TIE Fighter for X-Wing retails for $20.

Admittedly, one needs fewer TIE Fighters than one needs skeletons, and the X-Wing miniatures can double as nice models for a display shelf. The sales figures demonstrate that the price is acceptable to many. Still, the question had to be asked: what if I could have good, fast, and cheap?

Gaslands is the major attempt I’m aware of to segment the market again. It’s played with Hot Wheels cars, which cost about $1 at grocery stores. What’s more, it’s great! It’s a serious miniatures wargame, played with pieces that are inexpensive, look good on the table, and are intrinsically fun to push around.

Accelemechs vs. Crashotrons tries to segment the market still one more time. Gaslands is cool, but it uses the Hot Wheels cars largely representationally. You, as a player, aren’t expected to zoom them around, and combat is resolved using dice like in most wargames. The Hot Wheels cars are cheap, fast, and good, but they’re not important.

When I play Gaslands, though, I really want the cars to be important. My personal favorite moment in the game is when they don’t sit quite where they’re supposed to because they’re on wheels rather than a static base. I’m playing with toys, and I want that playfulness to come through more strongly.

That’s what AvC is all about. It’s a game for those who want to play a miniatures wargame, are open to using toys as the miniatures because they’re good representations that don’t require preparation, and who–since we’re playing with toys anyway–want the toys themselves to matter.

I’m in that category. If you are, too, Accelemechs vs. Crashotrons releases on Itch.io this Saturday.