When was the 'Golden Age' of airsoft?

[Dentonboy]

I'll not deny that I have been nostalgic of late about airsoft. I'm currently stuck at home in half-term with round 2 of the 'rona so have had plenty of thinking time whilst the kids have been entertaining themselves. I don't know a lot about the airsoft skirmishing scene around the early to late 90s. I started buying RiFs at the War and Peace Show, Sussex Model Centre and Battle Orders from about 1995 onwards. Most RiFs on offer were TM. The move from springers to gas felt like going from a Spitfire to a Tornado.

For me, the pre-VCRA era of airsoft, around when I started (2005), was the best time. It felt like all of the mainstream AEGs where on a fairly level playing field performance-wise, there were dedicated magazines showing us weird and wonderful new releases, it was easier to buy what you wanted, especially from Asia and there were amazing retailers like GnG2, Battle Orders and such. There were several forums which were taking off and were a hive of knowledge and insight (obviously this one still is). High end surplus kit is eye-wateringly expensive and fairly hard to source. I got my first AEG in this time - TM Beta Spetsnaz AK47 - and it was like going from a Tornado to a Typhoon.

Then, Facebook arrived, along with very affordable ACM AEGs. This my be, for many, when airsoft really became 'Golden'. Between 2007-2016, airsoft seemed to massively grow (in my eyes). The costs dropped, and importing was still pretty straight-forward with a UKARA number. But a few big brands started to disappear - at least from these shores - Systema, Western Arms, Tanio Koba, Classic Army, G&G, whereas others emerged; ASG, Real Sword, A&K etc. There also seemed to be a widening gulf between out of the box performance (QC?) and what could be achieved through tinkering. It is getting easier to buy high end surplus kit.

Post 2016 to present day and the effects of Brexit, a weak Pound Sterling and costs have affected, for me at least, the ability and ease of importing from abroad, especially from the once cheap Polish retailers. But the technology, innovation and range of available high-end models has increased. Bolt, E&L and LCT have grown. High end surplus kit is very easy to find on ebay. This could be other people's 'Golden Age'...

When was yours?

 

[Cr0-Magnon]

I think mostly you hit the nail on the head with the last line. It's obviously a matter of opinion and yes age/experience, predominantly sway that.

I bought my first Airsoft gun in 2016, age-wise I could have started playing around fifteen years earlier.

When I started looking at other RIF's, it was right when Glock had kicked-off about using their trademarks and anything bearing it, dried up pretty quickly. Leaving me feeling like I'd missed out! Also I don't remember looking at any Western Arms models and it seemed like the last of the G&P aegs were rapidly going out of stock.

Having spoken with people who were playing several years+ before I started, it does seem like it was smaller groups meeting up to play and everyone's gun was about the same level. Basically just having a laugh.

It seems a bit like cars, the classics are way cooler but realistically can't compete with modern, high-end stuff.

So I'm a relative Newbie but I have been feeling more and more players emphasis is on "DESTROYING the enemy with this OVERPOWERED BEAST!!!!" rather than tactics....and yes I do blame YouTubers for that attitude.

 

[Dentonboy]

I think YouTube has a lot to answer for...!

 

[Cr0-Magnon]

I can't remember the last time I attended a skirmish and it took longer than ten minutes to hear "Those cheaters aren't calling their hits!"

When did that become so prevalent?

 

[Impulse]

It's a tough one for me, honestly, and so this is going to be a long post. I think I'd say that personally I enjoyed airsoft the most around when I started in 2004 up until about 2010 when I took my first break. The VCRA was a bit of a kick in the nuts, but it wasn't the end of the world, but I remember game days fondly from back then. However, I'll be talking about the reasons why the modern day is still good. Airsoft is a constantly evolving thing and that comes with both positives and negatives. Anyway, I'll list the reasons why 2004 - 2010 was my golden age:

• Social media wasn't as prevalent. This is THE big one for me as social media breeds a lot of what's wrong with airsoft these days. Whether it's people like Kicking Mustang making yet another "I RUIN NOOBS DAY WITH SAVAGE HEADSHOTS FROM OVERPOWERED PISTOL" video, or the milsim-elitist-geardo crowd showing off their ridiculous loadout with real NVGs and a thermal imaging drone and real-steel everything and telling you, directly or indirectly, that your gear is shit (you know the types). I think social media is the root of a lot of negative things, not just with airsoft but that's a discussion for another time  
  
• I never had anywhere near the number of issues back then than I did today, with the only glaring example being when a bunch of guys from the year below us at school decided to come to a game day and rampantly didn't take their hits, but they didn't last long and after another game day or two they were completely gone. We were slinging .2s and *maybe* .25s if you were going heavy, but people still were able to take their hits reliably.
  
• It was a bit more trustworthy. Nobody chrono'd (and I'm not saying we shouldn't, definitely think it's needed these days), but we didn't really need to as there were never really any issues with people running hot guns or people getting injured (unless they came out of the box hot, which some did, but even then I don't remember seeing any injuries). I know my Dboys m4 was about 390fps out of the box or something, and I had a Warrior L96 sniper rifle without a sidearm, but I never full-auto'd people up close and never took shots within my MED. Similarly, I never had any issues with someone running some stupidly hot gun and injuring people. 
  
• When I played in Spain between 2008 - 2010 (probably my absolute favourite time playing and my true "golden age") we didn't even have marshalls as "official" airsoft sites didn't exist at that point; we just showed up to abandoned urbanisations, of which there are a LOT on the south coast of Spain, and played BB wars and it was a LOT of fun. We also hired the land next to a hotel (and booked a lot of rooms at the hotel) for a weekend event and it still remains my favourite event I've ever been to; again, we had no marshalls, we had some players who organised what the games would be and the objectives and we just had fun.
  
• As you said, it was a mostly even playing field. There were some guns that were just... really good, but even fine tuning guns didn't create such a divide. The best guns I remember from back then were... A sniper on the team I was a part of had a Tanaka m700 or m40a1 or a TM VSR-10 (can't remember exactly, but it was one of those) which he had tweaked a whole lot, two German guys in Spain had KJW m700s that they had tweaked and my Cyma m14 SOCOM were the ones that immediately come to my mind.
  
• Less ghillies. I know, me, a bush wookiee, complaining about ghillies, but they're bloody everywhere now. Back then we didn't have anywhere near the number of them and if you wanted one you had to make it. I still remember as a 17 year old going to a fabric shop and buying a bunch of burlap, dyeing it three different colours in a bucket on the outside terrace in the Spanish townhouse we lived in at the time, and then tying it onto a Webtex concealment vest, supplementing it with natural foliage on the day. Nowadays, anyone can just buy a Novritsch rifle and a KMCS and be done with it. I don't think that's a bad thing (development and offering more products is generally good) but I think combined with the social media point it's making a lot of players play timid.
  
• Guess I should touch on that as well. People weren't anywhere near as... fragile(?) as they are now. People flung themselves into games and had a laugh when they got lit up, but nowadays it feels like everyone sits out of range of each other just spraying BBs at barricades. Also, if you hit someone with more than a single BB, there's every chance they're going to throw a hissy-fit over "overshooting" because 5 BBs hit them. It's part of the reason I'm ditching my ghillie for the next few game days at least, to see if I can galvanise some activity.
  

However, I would also argue that today is the golden age:

• There are a LOT more players nowadays. A "very busy" day in my golden age was like... 30 players. Now, you're looking at over 100 at my local site and I know some get even more. New blood in the hobby keeps the hobby alive
  
• The sheer range of internal upgrades and how effective they are. Getting a 1.1J build to shoot accurately to 60m is pretty simple these days, where getting a bolt action to shoot 60m back in my golden age would've been considered witchcraft. I think my Cyma m14 SOCOM was a DMR at 420fps (1.6J) and it probably fired to 50m(ish)
  
• Accessibility for newer players. As I said when I was moaning about there being too many ghillies, it's incredibly easy for people to get into the hobby and do what they want. This is definitely a good thing and contributes to the hobby having a healthy player count.
  
• The guns are way higher quality than they were. Back then, you either paid a LOT for a TM, Tanaka, Systema etc, or you bought a Cyma that would probably break because the externals were made of pot metal, or you bought something where the internals would crap themselves after a small amount of use.
  
• Gear is way higher quality than it was. I remember Viper gear was utter shite back when I first played, so like with guns you either paid for some expensive Warrior Assault Systems kit, or you bought a Viper rig that fell apart. Nowadays, I have nothing against the repro brands like Viper or 8fields and have a lot of their kit; it's sturdy and does the job at a fraction of the cost, though I will always love my WAS stuff, since I still have the chest rig I used in Spain and it still works just fine and shows no sign of breaking any time soon.
  

I'll stop waffling any more than I already have. TLR, 2008 - 2010 was my golden era when I was living in Spain, though that's also partially down to the sites we played at!

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[BigStew]

I can't remember the last time I attended a skirmish and it took longer than ten minutes to hear "Those cheaters aren't calling their hits!"

When did that become so prevalent?

Always 

 

[mightyjebus]

airsofters come and go but I'd just wish they would bring full auto back to CQB site.

 

[Emergencychimps]

For me it's whenever the person gets their rose tinted glasses out. 

I remember being new to airsoft and hearing all these stories about amazing events that happened "just" before I got into the sport were.......cut to a few years later and I am hearing these amazing stories about events that I went to that I thought were shit but had nuggets of gold in them. The stories tellers made it seem like every game'/event was pure gold and it wasn't shit was a couple of good moments. 

Chat to people now about Tier one at Stanta and lots of people will reminisce with fond memories. At the time it was basically the same event 3 times in a row at stanta with almost no variation except for a decrease in the quality of the game play and event each time. They'll chat about CAG and their events at Otterburn.....that happened like twice. Or the sandpit and how amazing it was, despite the fact they used about 10% of the site (was amazing for big event games though!). 

 I'd always encourage people to just make the best of it now, what's happening now, what events/sites are there that exist now. Sparta closed recently (never went) and people were obviously upset to lose a great venue, well.....if it's so great -  go! Don't just settle for just going to your local week in week out - get out there, vote with your feet and do the stuff that looks interesting now, before you look back on whatever site/organiser it is, cause it's just a matter of time before they close down. 

 

[Tommikka]

 Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be 

 

[Rogerborg]

but nowadays it feels like everyone sits out of range of each other just spraying BBs at barricades.

True.

Getting a 1.1J build to shoot accurately to 60m is pretty simple these days

True.

They may not be entirely unconnected.

I've only been doing it since (checks...) 2017.  Heck, I'm going to say that was the peak.  Cheap imports and good availability, CYMA were already getting their quality up, but there weren't quite as many bush wookies, DMR trigger-spammers, HPA ghostbusters and stripy-socked BB bouncers evident.

Social media and particularly YouTube are... problematic.  Great resources if you know what you're looking for, but if I open a private tab and search YouTube for "airsoft", oh dear, the top two hits.

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[Terry_Rist]

nowadays it feels like everyone sits out of range of each other just spraying BBs at barricades.

Yeah I agree. Site design has a big part to play in this, but it feels like at a lot of sites the cover can be placed just out of range of the rental/ stock gun performance and just within range of really well set up replicas. This leads to a huddle of  players behind both barricades just sat there unable to push up because there is no more cover and unable to take each other out because they don't have the range. The people with worse performing guns end up getting stuck in stalemates all the time and can cause a lot of the 'they aren't calling their hits' when they see some people can shoot that far and believe with the amount of shots they have put at the opposite cover there is no way that they could have missed even though they're just not reaching out that far.

Good layouts should have some areas at longer range like this, but they should also have alternative routes with cover stacked a lot more densely to allow those without the range to move up and not get stuck in a stalemate. It isn't just rentals and new players that this affects, anyone that wants to run anything that is 'sub optimal' say a spring shot gun (heck even a gas shotgun that hasn't been HPA tapped) or some other obscure replica that is fun to use but is never going to match the performance of the completely upgraded M4 platforms. Ideally Sites would be set up to offer opportunities for both longer range slow playstyles but not discourage people pushing up and keeping the game flowing. Now when I get people come along to play airsoft for the first time I tend to lean towards suggesting going indoors because it removes the element of new players being stuck or unable to play because they feel like they don't have the range to compete with the regulars. Yes they can still be overly cautions and end up stuck places, but that is just a mental barrier to overcome not a physical limitation of the range on the replica that they are using.

I will say that this is different for some big outdoor fields that host much longer games, but the ones that cater to generic weekend woodland skirmish's should try and do as much as they can to equalise the discrepancy in range and accuracy between those who have dumped thousands into their kit and those who have turned up with their mates for the first time and just want to have fun running around with a rental G36.

Maybe it is just rose tinted spectacles, but I am sure that people used to have more variety of guns that they ran. The M4 platform was still popular, but now it can seem like 90% of the AEGs at a game day are an M4 variant of some kind. I somewhat understand, but it still makes me a bit sad when there are so few people I can talk to about their interesting primaries. Even some more people running AK's would be a start but they seem less and less especially as a starter gun, more and more start with an M4 rather than the AK or G36 or even MP5 that used to be more common I am sure.

The whole YouTube thing bothers me because it is so far removed from what an actual gameday is like. It isn't even the fact that they cut out most of it and only show curated parts, they have to make content that is interesting to watch after all. It is that the stupid stuff they do and pass off as normal, glorifying cheating/cheater justice, making it seem like they are only going for headshots, staging things for better content or focusing on drama on/off the field gives airsoft a bad name. It makes it look like the wild west for people who have never played and gives the impression that everyone is angsty and against each other all the time. Most airsofters are nice friendly people who will help you out in the safe zone, talk about their cool kit and gear and are there to have a laugh and have fun. I guess people just hanging out, having a few laughs and a good time doesn't make for good clicks and you have to focus on the tiny amount of bad things and arguments that do happen.

Also people turning up to just take pictures for their social media are just mildly annoying. So long as they aren't affecting the game play and keep them selves to themselves I don't have a problem and can't complain. But if you turn up to pose in the safe zone, then go out and pose for your mate or girlfriend to take pictures of you in game and don't actually play and then leave at lunch time why did you bother even turning up; also who is even looking at what they are posting?

 

[Jez_Armstrong]

I swear I agree so much with your first post (you started the same time as me) I could have written it myself, my dad and I also used to buy guns from the battle orders book and we still have a few to this day and I miss the days of airsoft between 2005 to about 2012ish

But for me, Social media ruined the hobby in my eyes, it has attracted a massive wave of absolute knuckle dragging knob heads also the same goes for YouTube cheat calling bait bullshit videos, memes that call people out and start drama, players putting other players down about their kit and their guns, regurgitated false tech advice and self proclaimed airsoft fame seeking wannabe idols 

Take all that shit above and throw it in the bin, then it'll be a good game again 

 

[Dentonboy]

I swear I agree so much with your first post (you started the same time as me) I could have written it myself, my dad and I also used to buy guns from the battle orders book and we still have a few to this day and I miss the days of airsoft between 2005 to about 2012ish

But for me, Social media ruined the hobby in my eyes, it has attracted a massive wave of absolute knuckle dragging knob heads also the same goes for YouTube cheat calling bait bullshit videos, memes that call people out and start drama, players putting other players down about their kit and their guns, regurgitated false tech advice and self proclaimed airsoft fame seeking wannabe idols 

Take all that shit above and throw it in the bin, then it'll be a good game again 

Great stuff, thanks Jez. I'm gutted with how much it all has changed (I know our paths have crossed at least once at Battle Lakes and it would be great to play again there if you're ever playing there again) and whilst the tech has improved, everything else, for me, has diminished.

 

[Jez_Armstrong]

The lakes is now my local, its 2 miles from my house, let's have a game together ?

 

[Dentonboy]

The lakes is now my local, its 2 miles from my house, let's have a game together ?

Absolutely must. Only about 20mins drive from me. Shout when you next know you're going and I'll make some plans! What is it like under the new ownership?

 

[Jez_Armstrong]

Can't fault it mate, definitely alot more development and progress and love being poured into it 

 

[Dentonboy]

Can't fault it mate, definitely alot more development and progress and love being poured into it 

That is great to hear. Went a bit downhill last we were there. What are the site limits now? Definitely have to go there again then. Cheers!

 

[alxndrhll]

This is all so tragically jaded ?. I've been playing for give or take about 20 years, and for the most part it's all about the same for me. The access to decent reliable GBBRs is a big win, as is my personal access to more disposable income and being able to transport myself pretty much where ever I like.

There have always been idiots, there will always be idiots. Social media is fine, its been a great way to meet like minded people to chat shit about what is, and likely always will be, a very niche hobby.

Biggest 'issue' I've seen creeping in more and more is how stand off-ish and 'clique-y' it's become. Everyone seemingly wants to find a reason to hate everyone else that isn't in the group they play with, and has an attitude going in to playing that it's going to be shit. Not that the latter is anything new, airsofters hating airsoft is a founding pillar of the hobby... for reasons unknown to me.

Edit: I guess I'm not shocked by the general concensus given we're in the land of the dinosaurs... a forum.

 

[Jez_Armstrong]

That is great to hear. Went a bit downhill last we were there. What are the site limits now? Definitely have to go there again then. Cheers!

350 for aeg 

400 for DMR 

500 sniper 

 

[Cr0-Magnon]

@alxndrhll - Seems people are more specifically referring to YouTube clickbaiters than social media as a whole. We know at least 50% (probably quite a bit more) of their audience don't play. From that I would assume a chunk will take part at some point. I'm not quite a "dinosaur" yet (seem to recall I'm within five years of you), but I did grow up without social media. We've seen from Prime "sports" drink selling for £30+ a bottle, how easily influenced a lot of young teenagers (the same age they can start playing) are. I won't believe you, if you tell me a significant percentage of those don't go in with preconceived notions or skewed attitudes, based on what they've seen online.

Edit: I will add that I've played at the same site as several YouTubers, including Kicking Mustang. Ironically there was zero drama in real life. He kept himself to himself/seemed quite humble and no-one got their eyes shot out with an air rifle etc. Although I did chuckle when I heard him say something along the lines of, he doesn't know why people find his videos so controversial.