Weekender XLBS: Have Game Companies Lost Their Focus?
October 14, 2018 by lloyd
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![Warcradle Studios Reveal TINY New 10mm Festive Marker! [Updated]](https://images.beastsofwar.com/2025/11/christmas-kyle-main-600-338.jpg)
Happy Sunday and FIRST BABY
Happy Sunday mate!
Go on ye good thing ye
Love the design of “Ben’s Gaming Table” tm ….please VLOG it as if it turns out as I imagine it I may have crack at it myself
An interesting discussion again gents. One of my concerns with companies is when the develop games for a third party IP often at the expense of their own. A few points; Spartan games had strong IPs but it started with the HALO IP threw a lot of money at it .. withdrew from some of there classics .. they over capitalised wentb under and their creditors couldn’t even sell their HALO stuff to pay the bills because it was someone elses IP.
With Mantic (a company I love and support) I like the Mantica and Warpath IPs but they have been neglected for Walking dead (whivh frankly I’m not ar$ed about and now Hellboy) they have covered their investment but all it takes is the IP holders to withdraw support and they are laft with nothing on their years of investment.
Steamforged has me worried, I love Guild Ball and interested in Godtear and now two IPs from outside and over the last 6 months there stuff doesn’t seem as focussed.
With Fantasy Flight a lot of there time has been reccently put into the Star Wars IP at the expense of the IPs they own. Now I get Star Wars is a licence to print money but they are going to lose a metric $hit load is disney revokes the licence.
As a gamer and as Warren rightly points out a collector, I like an IP that is fleshed out AND has a range of models within MY army (oh who am I kidding, armies) to collect. At the moment in the smaller companies a lot of these ranges have holes in them and yes it does annoy me to see the compny flitting off to something else, before doing “right” by their original games. Just my opinion I may be wrong (but I don’t buy anything from CMON because it is just one new thing after another and none of them have depth enough to appeal to me)
Oh come on!!!… is no one else in the world awake … I can’t be the omly person on herev … sigh …. decides to come back later for community reactions …. *goes to make a coffee*
love how you only waited two minutes there haha. it’ll take most people longer than two minutes to read, digest and then respond to your post.
The thing I have with companies with many games (for me Mantic and FFG) is that I don’t get invested in all of them (thank god!) and then find myself losing interest in them.
The walking dead for example is one of the finest story telling games for a small band of figures I’ve played in years, ripe for house rules and mucking around with. sadly however I haven’t played enough of it because the hype around it has died and mantic have turned their attention to something else. possibly they’re winding it up, I don’t know but I don’t get the feeling its being pushed so hard. it strikes me as a kickstarter ‘rolling gap filer’.
FFG do Star Wars. lots of it, have so many games for it, imperial assault, destiny, xwing, armada, legion, roleplaying in 3 flavours and that’s just the main Star Wars games they have, obviously there are other games. they have reached a point whereby they are constantly irritating one player base (usually IA or Armada) by giving them no news, no releases, no articles for months at a time. I think armada has had the longest stretch of silence at 9 months or something ridiculous. When FFG employs its usual ruthless BUY BUY BUY tactics of aggressive marketing and selling people get worried when there is radio silence. I think that now, there are too many Star Wars games doing similar (yet different) things and as such as a whole the juggling act is starting to come apart. the Legion release and Xwing rerelease have taken a lot of resources to achieve and they don’t have the in-house manufacturing like GW do so its hard for them to deliver everything they promised as they promised. they’ve been caught out before on this model.
Just by way of explanation, I’m not quite that impatient 😉 … I finished watching the video … typing up my coment as I went … posted it …. It was now about an hour and a half since the xlbs went live … and I thought .. I know , I’ll go and read other people’s reactions, happy sundays etc. and there was nothing (aside from Warren’s cheery greeting) … just me posting 3 times….I felt a bit alone *lip quivers* …. I honestly wan’t expecting a reaction to my post in 2 minutes .. honest… 🙂
I think any company needs to develop and maintain their own IP as a baseline to securing their own future. Going into licenced ip’s can be lucrative but fickle. GW did great with LOTR until the trilogy ran out then sales slumped hard. But they had 40k/WFB underpinning the company.
Knight Models on the other hand are a company built on licencing and would very likely go broke in a few months if they ever lost their DC licence. I don’t see them ever going into plastics for this very reason.
I think prodos saw the bright lights of a Hollywood IP and went in on AvP, granted they messed it up, but Warzone suffered a great deal from them turning their attention to AvP and now they lost the license and are starting from scratch with a wholly original IP.
So I wonder what YouTube’s algorithms would have made of this week’s “vien” of humour , eh @brennon 😉
The would have shafted us mate 😉
Don’t say shaft. That makes it worse 🙂
Happy Sunday!!
Have Game Companies Lost Their Focus?
No, I don’t believe they have. Their focus is to get as much money from our wallets, as quickly as they can, for the least amount of outlay.
Quite frankly @warzan nothing is going to compete with 40K.
The company has such a head start over its competition, having existed for longer than most, employee count is probably higher, etc.
40k’s history covers more time than humans have existed.
There are more Black Library books than I can count – I included the Horus Heresy here.
There are more YouTube channels dedicated, or at least partly so, to 40K than perhaps any other game.
DnD might be giving it a run for its money now with 5th ed being so hot, but it has to overcome the split at 4th ed and Pathfinder. But it doesn’t require miniatures to play.
Happy Sunday, I´ve to say I don´t like this Shotgun design from companies. If they couldn´t focus on one IP, how could we? You can´t build a communitie without a good IP wich keeps you interessted in the game.
That’s an interesting thought – are gaming communities built around a single game?
In my experience perhaps initially yes, but they soon magpie (“oooh look shinney”) to the next hot thing when interest wanes.
Not everyone migrates to the same thing.
I know one person that has stuck with playing a particular edition of the WRG Napoleonic rules at 1/72nd scale, but the number of opponents he has has greatly reduced over the years.
Beast of War initially seemed to come together over GW products, but look at where they are now…
“If they couldn’t focus on one IP, how could we?”
From the companies’ POV they could be looking at the players lack of attention-span (shiny syndrome) and say, ” If you can’t focus on one IP, why should we?”
Yeah, as long as there are people like me who will go all out on the latest Kickstarter before I’ve even opened the one I backed 2 years ago and just received last week, it’s in their best interest to come out with new things. Wild West Exodus, for example, have come out with a lot of great new centerpieces, the likes of which Warren is talking about, but I haven’t gotten them since I haven’t actually played the game yet.
Lloyd is back.Le grande fromage returns
I think the “shotgun” effect is partly due to Kickstarters (where you basically design a small self contained game and release ALL the miniatures in the one push), after you’ve done that one….where do you go?
This in itself however these days can turn players away. For example Mantic did Mars Attacks, but a year later it was pretty much dropped and all that was left was the leavings on the warehouse shelves. Walking Dead sounds like it been more of a permanent product, but remember each “wave” is usually only about a dozen new sculpts.
Companies that don’t use KS to push their sales/marketing such as warlord start of a game with initially a smaller range at launch, but gradually add to the existing range each month. But this also allows them to compliment the miniatures with “other” products. For example Gate of Antares now has five (I think) narrative campaign books. They’ve also been slowly releasing the tanks for the game bit by bit (so it seems the game is growing and the company has it’s eye on the ball…..but will probably release the same amount of sculpts as one of the major KS schemes).
I don’t think you can count historicals as an IP however, as this differs in that there’s no exclusivity to this “IP”. Most historical wargamers will use miniatures from differing manufacturers to complete their army if their main “source” doesn’t cover everything. All that matters is the minitures are the same height and the sculpting style is reasonably similar.
Picture of the round towers. Ok Gerry you win I’m convinced
Can’t argue with solid evidence like that. 🙂
I’m pretty sure you can buy all sorts of embossed wallpaper from model railway companies
@lloyd@avernos I salute your ingenuity
@torros yeah you can but not in the mass quantity that wallpaper provides 🙂 and the scales are a bit small with the most popular scales being HO and OO.
Happy Sunday people… I am loving the wallpaper idea, so versatile… It would make some awesome Bridges…?
Bridges are a brilliant option.
Happy Sunday!
A lot of the time companies release schedules are so rapid that games have come and gone before I can even buy them. I see something I’m interested in, think about it, do a bit of research, think some more, then decide to get into it and find the game has gone and is no longer supported.
Even the venerable GW has been guilty with Shadow War and now Shadespire moving to a new iteration. However, because they are tied to their main IP gamers can always recycle the models back into the core armies.
There are a few other games I’d like to collect but they have a restricted range and I have no confidence in them being around in a years time to keep the collection going.
I’ve backed many games on Kickstarter to serve as a replacement for 40K. This was back when GW was doing a lot of things wrong in my opinion. Now, many of those games are dead, and GW is doing a lot better than they were. There are other games that scratch an itch 40K just can’t, but I keep coming back to 40K in some form or another.
I totally lost it when Lloyd said “You make sure your flap is big enough to go over the girth”
Lime squash coming out your nose hurts
It definitely helps.
Happy Sunday!
I would have expected Star Wars Legion to have made a bigger impact by now and be seriously challenging Warhammer 40k. The IP is the best possible and the game mechanics good, but it is heavily lacking on the collectability front. The sculpts and the production quality is nowhere near GW and to be honest, there is maybe only one truly collectable piece in the range now, the AT-ST. They especially have dropped the ball on the biggest asset of the Star Wars IP, the heroes. All the hero sculpts are mediocre at best.
This is a tough question. When I saw your coverage of Dark Age I absolutely love it.. (Wild West Exodus as well). I cannot find anyone who plays anything non GW or Card games anywhere near me, unless it’s X-Wing (no Armada either). I think companies using the Shotgun method have a good reason to try new stuff they have to create buzz and hope Johnny Consumer sees the new shiney and tries to expand into their other stuff. Another thing is “Old Habits” I have a ton of 40k stuff,so if i’m going to play something it’s probably going to be that. I have seen crews for Malifaux but I’ve never seen anyone play it. Gaslands was HUGE when it came out yet I’ve never seen a single game played. I have the rulebook for it but haven’t gotten through it yet.. You have to create a buzz..an event to stay afloat.
Keep in mind I live on the West Coast of the US, so my vision may be tainted by location
Happy Sunday! How about some of the board game team return for the next one.
On to the topic at hand, it is a little strange to see how 40k has been a massive force in the miniature community. I honestly thought that Infinity would have carved out more of the star chart by this point. I have never played Infinity and know only minor elements to the fluff, but the clean designs and tech angle of it has made it at times more appealing to me.
I wonder if the scatter approach is only in result of the cosmos spread of the community. In the earlier days we did not have that many games we know about or even could get a hold of. Now it seems that anyone who has been in the larger companies will one day step away to make their own game and products. This niche market is becoming even thinner from the many more options of games but also with the possibility of the community thinning out due to other gaming avenues, or just leaving the hobby altogether. So wide nets are needed to capture what they can and hope that they stay. Another thing is that it almost seems that warzones are the flavor that is falling out of style. We don’t seem to be getting any of this in the mass media. Its ragtag groups of mercenaries or a band of anti-heroes, not regimented ground pounders.
I think Infinity has a number of things going against it, for me the major drawback is they are not plastic figures.
You can get bits and pieces from model railway suppliers
https://www.modelscenerysupplies.co.uk/scratch-build/building-paper-card-sheets
But I don’t think you can beat the stuff that Mr Knowles(Assistant manager of creation and design,Lavatory Department East Acton division) of the now bankrupt Wizzo Wallpapers produced.
What have I done?
Cheers guys I just spat coffee over my IPad, Biffin’s Bridge indeed!
Bad Andrew, Bad. see what happens. Alcohol is bad
Happy Sunday! Always nice to see Gerry on the show 🙂
Give me back my sock!
no!
Is it because you’re wearing it as a mask?
Ben and Gerry? Happy Sundae!
I see what you did there
I’m a funny man, me. At least my mum says so
This is a topic it would be interesting to hear from a game company on. In fact many of the topics require inside insight I think to form a balanced view. I can only really think as a consumer. I wonder if, having raised a topic, discussed it on screen, and got community feedback, it would be feasible to have a Part 2 follow up to some of the topics with one of your industry buddies to get their take on it? I’m sure Alessio, Chris Birch or Hawk Dave would have some very interesting views on this! Heck even get a round table going with them all debating at once. That would make fascinating viewing. I’d pay for a ticket to that!
Happy Sunday! How do you guys stay so deadpan whilst Ben is so giggled up onscreen?
I’d say practice…. lots and lots of practice.
Ben is an innocent soul and we’re slut merchants… or we’re all innocent and Ben has a dirty mind. Pick your favourite ^^
Maybe there isn’t a big player like 40K because the companies don’t have a change to grow to that scale. It takes time to grow to a scale like 40k, they didn’t start as a mass battle game like they are now.
You have to know that your game is popular and it is being bought enough to take the steps to go bigger and maybe you have to make rules adjustments to go to scale like that and keep supporting the game with releases that every player has something.
There are rules sets out there that allow that and you can see that the company show the intention to go their but maybe the players aren’t interested to do that.
Maybe there will be some that go there like comn: song of ice and fire or Star Wars legion but they are pretty young and the future will tell if they make it.
I imagine very few game companies have the built revenue to just knock stuff out as regularly as people wish them too. Kickstarter has allowed a number of companies to use it as a pre-order platform and that will no doubt continue.
I think GW as a business has so many facets to it that it would be virtually impossible for any other company to catch. Even with IPs such as Star Wars Legion. I think the best chance a company has of becoming GW’s market competitor would be from one of the large plastic kit companies from the scale modelling side. If they were to take on a none historical format using there pre-established assets they may have the chance. It would still need a very good ruleset and an in depth engaging background.
When sales begin to flatline and decline companies will tend to look around for alternatives. Also having all your eggs in one basket is risky, generating products for more than one IP can help in lean times and with the KS format there is a chance to setup without as much outlay. So is it that we are just seeing smarter business models? Why improve if the competition is of a similar standard? Keep the next generation or evolution for when its needed.
I think Asomdee may have surpassed GW in terms of capitalisation, with all of the companies it merge with or bought up.
I seem to remember that the investment firm that created that behemoth were trying to sell it for $1.5 billion, or some such….Don’t think they’ve had a buyer yet.
Would a big tower not just be advertising get you’re gold here ? like a shop sign.
yeah. Prevailing opinion for a long time was that the vikings generally had an aversion to sieges (even more so than pitched battles) as those attrition losses would have a much greater impact on them in the long run (difficult to raise replacements hundreds of miles from home). Spend considerable time and resources attacking a strongpoint or move on to an easier target elsewhere? That prevailing philosophy does seem to have contributed to the English adoption of the burgh system (the Germans would actually adopt a similar strategy in combating the Magyars) but I guess it all depends on the environment you find yourself in. An isolated monastery, a weeks march from the nearest garrison? Yeah, why not. Lets have a go at cracking it open.
@bigdave Later when the Vikings had a foothold fortifications was probably the best way to go to slow them to get troops to fight them to go/run away, but like the reavers on the Scottish English border’s raiding each others fortified house’s/land it can work.
The burghs ended up developing in an interesting way, some beginning as refuges for the local civilian population – soon as you start to permanently garrison them with the local fyrd you hive the beginnings of a proper fortress and administrative centre – some of the burghs occupying old Roman forts were big enough to sustain themselves with areas turned over to agriculture while Gloucester became a fortified commercial and religious hub for the Mercians. Lot of English institutions had the crap kicked out of them, fortifications not only had a practical use in battle but were strategically important to bolster the institutions that could lend weight behind the defence of the realm (the church in particular, but also customs and excise, civic granaries etc). Your point about the reivers is interesting – chucking in gunpowder technology and small but professional royal armies would massively change the dichotomy in that kind of warfare which as a Kerr of the Middle March I know a fair bit about! 500 years on and we can’t forgive the Percy’s for razing Roxburgh to the ground, or for Tudor’s attack on Ferniehurst Castle in 1547. Bastard. Our women raped and thrown into the street naked, men butchered.
Yup chaotic times.
Haven’t finished the xlbs yet, jut popping in to throw this link https://youtu.be/spdescYFqIE in @warzan ‘s general direction. I bet you’ve already seen tons of gaming table builds, but this one has a real nice frame for the legs to get it sturdy. Also the idea with electrical plugs for the gamers could maybe be useful for your guys equipment. Okies….back to watching 🙂
I’m with Ben – far too much flap-related innuendo to keep a straight face!
Pedantic interlude: Martello tower is the type of tower, though the surviving ones do tend to be called “Martello Tower”. They’d be made of whatever stone there was in the area, so it’s anything goes as far as painting your wallpaper.
second that. Originally built in Corsica, they can be found wherever the British had a substantial interest and while they follow roughly the same design, materials were subject to availability in the local environment.
Plenty of them on the south coast of England and in the channel itself
put to use all the way through to the end of WW2 – a lot of them couldn’t take the weight of modern coastal artillery but they were incredibly useful observation posts
Happy Sunday! Another intriguing XLBS lads, certainly has me thinking.
In my eyes the scattergun approach has a lot to do with the importance of brand recognition these days, particularly in the case of newer or younger hobbyists. GW is recognised by an increasingly wide swathe of British society, especially with the growth of the multimedia presence over the years with games like Dawn of War, Ultramarine etc. Mums, dads, nans and cousins, many people will have been exposed to the IP without even having any direct contact with it. ‘Young Timmy plays those games doesn’t he? I’ve seen him on his console and I’ve seen those shops in places…’ Developing the brand and building that loyal fan base is increasingly crucial to long term sustainability and success, with Workshop arguably at the very peak of that pyramid. There are so many companies producing awesome stuff now, retaining that customer loyalty is vital to your long term prospects, as soon as people get bored they will inevitably drift away – this is driving more companies into taking risks with big name IP’s, it’s encouraging rapid development, rapid release schedules, innovate, innovate, INNOVATE!!! It’s incredibly stressful, incredibly risky from a financial standpoint but is none the less the prevailing strategy right now. As Gerry pointed out, when so many English firms have ex-GW employees at the core it’s no surprise a lot of the philosophy and business practices have followed through, and in my opinion, it is possibly to the detriment of some of these smaller companies when they could perhaps be focusing instead on producing a solid, well supported range. It’s difficult for a behemoth like GW to maintain rapid release schedules and to maintain those levels of reinvestment, never mind a small firm with a fraction of the resources and name recognition.
There are kernels of hope, however.
Small companies are all hurt by the same issues, the enormity of distribution costs, increasing levels of competition, the cannibalisation of the consumer base, the battle to generate a recognisable and reputable brand. They are also hurt by the need to produce a fully fleshed out game, with add-ons, expansions and the like, what I find interesting is that the criticism of Fireforge was that they weren’t taking the same holistic approach to forming a range as other brands would be expected to. It’s here where I think you’ve missed a trick, historical miniature companies have no need to produce full ranges of everything. That sense of ‘completeness’ doesn’t NEED to apply – Fireforge’ Mongols and Crusaders are awesome, but you know what? Gripping Beast do such a tremendous range of plastic arabs that it would be financial stupidity to spend huge amounts of money in duplicating a plastic range that already exists. Likewise with siege towers etc, why should every manufacturer have to make their own when there are already plenty out there?
What the industry needs is greater collaboration.
We’ve already seen what can be done when 4ground or Sarissa team up with Warlord and others, Gangs of Rome showing the perfect synthesis of miniatures and terrain manufacture to produce a lovely universe. We need more strategic alliances so the ‘gaps’ of respective ranges can be filled. Encourage GBP to stock Fireforge Games miniatures (and vice versa) and you have cornered the market in plastic Crusades miniatures, more partnerships = more opportunities for these small firms to target their limited funds into real innovation.
Warlord were inadvertently quite good at this for a time, as they cobbled together miniatures and scenery from different manufacturers to produce a Dark Age range. A one stop shop approach drove interest into the period, and really ought to be something Warlord should reconsider. As distributors, they are second to none, but to expect them to roll out and flesh out countless armies for their various historical games is nonsensical.
A similar approach can be taken with generic fantasy and generic sci-fi (Frostgrave plastics for example can be used for a myriad of games if presented correctly). Showcase the combined labour of various manufacturers in a handful of collectively acknowledged and supported online market places (like Warlord Games) and watch as distribution costs potentially fall, the cannibalisation of the consumer base ceases to be such a large issue (so long as the customer has access to variety they will keep coming back, you may lose a sale to a partner but guess what, that traffic will be returned for as long as you continue to produce miniatures, terrain and other products to a high standard).
Bit of a rant but hey ho, been a while.
As for Fireforge’s fantasy range, if I’d known sooner I would probably have skipped CMON’s Song of Ice and Fire kickstarter, the opportunity to kitbash existing kits with the new fantasy stuff would have been far too alluring.
Great Post lots to digest 🙂
Do shareholder’s have a issue in this guys they won’t want to fund a project if they think the risk high an lose money love the walling paper Lloyd a brilliant tip, the great wall of @lloyd on the book’s ?
@zorg – maybe more small walls of Lloyd.
That wallpaper is brilliant stuff for fort’s up to massive citadel’s as well as walls an cottages.
Good morning, everyone. Happy Sunday! 😀
@oriskany – good to see that you seem to be fine after your latest big storm 🙂
damn right, believe it was still a category 3 by the time it crossed the pan-handle and reached into Georgia, sounds bloody terrifying…
Thanks very much, @lloyd and @bigdave. Fortunately for us here in Ft. Lauderdale, the storm missed us completely (Florida is a big place). In fact, I almost feel guilty for saying this, but because of how hurricanes work, they pull all the low-pressure nastiness into their cyclone, those in the “near miss” zone actually enjoy absolutely gorgeous weather.
I’ve been in my share of Cat 2s, 3s, and even two 4s in my time (on the outskirts of a 5 once) – and yeah, definitely not fun. Last year Irma was a Cat 4 that was more or less a direct impact much closer to us, we were on the storm’s right flank so catching Cat 3 winds. You may remember my hobby time that week, first fortifying my house into “zombie proof 1:1 scale” – then digging our way out of the rubble for a week afterwards.
Price you pay for living in a place that’s basically Scarif from Rogue One. 🙂 The Panhandle is definitely feeling it, though. We’ve all been there. They helped us last year, now its our turn to help them where we can.
Nice to see you @oriskany
Thanks, @zorg – apologies I didn’t get to your PM earlier. Things here are very busy. We’re trying to hit an “anniversary deadline” for an upcoming article series, and the boot camp put us a few weeks behind. Lots of catch up. 😀
No worries @oriskany
Sally 4th do quite a bit of siege equipment
@stevec – will have a look thanks.
Really enjoyed this weekender. Lots of good hobby content.
On the big topic. I don’t really fully understand why, I don’t have a theory, certainly don’t have a solution.
Definitely feels to me as though there are too many games, none of them really grow enough to ever realise their potential, they all have really short life-spans, and before you know it, nobodies playing the game you’ve collected stuff for any more.
It really puts me off getting into games, because I won’t really invest in something unless I think it has a good chance of lasting at least 5 years.
That’s probably the main thing that determines that the majority of my hobby money still goes to GW.
@tachycardia – can’t beat a good old bean tin tower 🙂
@lloyd = I have an old round tin abouy 14″ high that originally contained a gift bottle of liquor –
some gray primer, some extra bits and piping, some rust effects, some weathered signage, made for a great 20mm grain silo in Moderns. 🙂
Perhaps I am the odd ball out, but I feel that 40K is a lifestyle game. I know people who play 40K that is pretty much all they play. I am not sure another 40K like game can make it. I myself am not a collector. I want to play and if I cannot bring it out to the table, I may drool over the item but I am not spending the money for it.
Second, there is so much money, so much time and so much space that most people have and everything is getting expensive. I stopped being a collector a long time ago. I will not invest in anything that I cannot find others who will play along with me and I rather go deep on one or two systems than have six systems that sit on a shelf. Things are getting expensive and the piece of the pie is getting smaller. It is a lot easier and cheaper to play board games.
I see a lot of systems come and go because there is a limit on the number of players that pay into the system.
Right now at least in my area is Star Wars Legion. There is a lot of room for growth and the rules already have army building rules for more vehicles which I expect to see in future years. It will never be a 40K killer but it does not have to be. It is a nice size with a good IP and is easy to get into. Star Wars still has an appeal that will last for years.
What will be interesting to me is who remains when the next fiscal crash occurs and it will. There will be much less disposable cash available. Of the limited dollars that will remain during that time, who will get that money?
I think there’s an argument to be made that 40K’s expansion to bigger and more powerful vehicles/fliers, etc. have actually been detrimental to the game experience. How many times have people complained of the unbalanced games in 40K because things have grown more powerful?
I was actually thinking about this today, we dont see as many vehicles from GW either these days.
Perhaps they are just not popular but are a necessary luxury to fill out the collect ability of a range?
Perhaps the fewer vehicles being released is because of Adeptus Titanicus? Releasing 40K vehicles alongside Titans might be seen as too many? Collectors would want them all, so you have to ration your releases.
possibly despite the perceived size of GW the design team is relatively small as the vast majority of staff are in retail and operations. So maybe it’s just a quiet period by design.
Equally maybe they are not a great profit centre in isolation. (we dont often buy multiples and the design and tooling costs are definately higher)
@warzan I normally agree with you, but you’re talking nonsense here, man! The reason we’re not seeing anything to challenge 40k or provide a similar breadth of product is all down to resources. GW have cash, employees, and production facilities orders of magnitude greater than anyone else in the industry.
I know you said that Kickstarter has altered that, and now anyone can compete, but let’s look at the reality… last year, tabletop games on Kickstarter took roughly £105 million, which was split between 2037 different projects. In the same period, GW took roughly £158 million in revenue. So as a single company, they have greater financial resources than the entirety of Kickstarter’s tabletop projects.
Plus, they’ve had turnover in excess of £100 million per year for well over a decade, with has allowed them to build the 40k range to where it is now. This includes things like owning their own plastics production facilities, which brings all sorts of design and lead time benefits.
In all seriousness, expecting someone else to compete is crazy; the difference in available resources is vast.
Also, I have to question whether we’re really seeing a scattergun approach in the tabletop industry; I think it looks that way, because right now there are a huge number of tiny companies, with a huge number of small games. I think we’re seeing small games suffering in a saturated market, not getting traction and dying, but the guys and gals who make them would love to provide more support, and simply can’t, because without sales, there’s no cash flow.
If anything, it’s GW that are taking the scattergun approach; Shadow war Armageddon, Necromunda, Kill team? How many small skirmishes in the same setting do you need?
@brennon Thanks for the Burrows & Badgers shout-out mate! 🙂
Your point was spot on; when we do RPG minis Kickstarters, they make more money for us than the B&B projects do (5e’s huge, after all!). But people have bought our game, and so we need to support them, which means I’m sculpting and writing for B&B for the forseeable future. Plus, it’s more fun!;)
Although I’m itching to finish that co-operative urban fantasy minis games I’ve been working on… but if I switch my focus to that, I’ll just be proving @warzan‘s point for him!
ok let me have a go at pushing this one back to you 😉
Take your annual KS value and think about the number of years KS has been around also remember it’s not spread evenly between projects. And some of those projects do also get retail sales as well.
I’m not suggesting everyone should have built somthing to compete, I’m expressing my surprise that given the opportunity that presented itself over the last 6 years NO ONE did! 🙂
Oh, there’s money in Kickstarter, sure. Just not enough. Even the biggest, Kingdom death, at £9 million, is a fraction of GW, and it was a one-off financial gain – Adam Poots isn’t getting that £9 million year after year, whereas GW are consistently over the £100 million mark.
Take just GW’s Primaris range; not all Space Marines, just Primaris. It’s not a huge range, but consists of various infantry, characters, and two vehicles. It comes to just over 30 sprues; to replicate that as a small company, you’re looking at about half a million in tooling costs alone. You could raise that on KS, sure – but you’d need at least prototypes to show. And even then, you wouldn’t get people to buy in, because what good are Primaris on their own? Without the 40k universe and the wider range of models, they just wouldn’t have the pull needed. GW’s resources aren’t just financial; it’s the existing player base and IP that allows the kind of investment they can commit, and that’s not something that Kickstarter pledges can replace.
You’re saying that no-one’s done it in the last six years; fair enough, but getting 40k to this point took over 30 years! To see actual competition, a company would need to have been developing for years. You’d need the kind of financial investment to let you develop a universe, a game, books, and a huge array of plastic kits, all before getting any kind of cash from customers. I honestly can’t see it happening.
But if there’s a generous billionaire reading, I’d be happy to have a go! 😉
The 30 year thing is not as significant as people think, in the last 10 years most of the issues that were barriers during those 30 years have been greatly reduced.
Design – much cheaper thanks to cad and 3d metering etc
Tooling vastly cheaper
Production vastly cheaper if you want to risk China, not cheap but at least possible if you dont (Hawk did it in the uk)
Distribution no longer need a retail chain can self distribute.
Community, no longer need a huge team of volunteers as web based support was possible.
Marketing KS and social media now exist
So let’s just put the 30 years into perspective as it doesn’t take 30 years to develop a company in this industry any more.
Also let’s look at the 150m turnovers, do you know how much of that is invested into the design studio? Sure it’s a big headline figure but realistically how much of that counts in the discussion we are having here?
30 sprues multiple miniatures all done in advance? Did you see KDM, Conan, Mythic battles, JoA, Some of the CMON kickstarters.
Small companies can achieve a lot, unfortunately some I’ve mentioned above didn’t get the full benefit of the last 6 or 7 years of opportunity as they were not around. Others were around though.
’30 sprues multiple miniatures all done in advance? Did you see KDM, Conan, Mythic battles, JoA, Some of the CMON kickstarters.’
Of course I did – and I even said above that you could do that on KS. But doing it doesn’t make 40k; it just makes a tiny piece of 40k. 30 sprues was just Primaris; 40k as a whole is more than a hundred times that!
I’m not disputing that small companies can achieve a lot – we’ve seen amazing things in recent years. But they can’t achieve the breadth and depth of 40k’s product line and IP from a standing start.
Who has tried?
Actually I can answer that. 🙂
GW have with Age of Sigmar
I’m fairly certain another company would have given up on it, to their credit GW didn’t (perhaps they couldn’t afford to, to protect their reputation!)
I’d say only Mantic with Warpath and to a lesser extent, Warlord with Gates of Antares, although the Dakka’s Maelstrom’s Edge was a brave attempt too!
I reckon the problem is that 40k exists; to compete is a massive investment of time and money, combined with a massive risk. To tempt the 40k customers away it would need to be ‘better’ in some way than 40k. Most companies will look at that and decide to release a skirmish game instead; the lower investment – both for the company and the players – makes it a more attractive prospect.
And there’s always the possibility that a game like that might attract enough interest long term to make a big battle version viable one day!
It’d be interesting to see Rubicon have a go at it though; they’re cracking the WW2 plastics out at a phenomenal rate. If they teamed up with a good writing team, I reckon they could be a contender.
I would like to see that too mate 🙂
A market works best when it’s not dominated, keeps everyone on their toes!
I have followed this interesting little conversation between you two and I have a few points I would like to throw out.
Do companies really want to try to compete with 40k or are they just happy to get some pieces of the pie and expand their range within a limit that they see people are buying so that they don’t have to take big risks?
We are talking about the companies here but what about the gamers, how many 40k gamers try different games or give other games a change. I have seen in several comments and posts on different locations people saying “I play 40k (40k related)and I don’t need anything else and I don’t want to see anything else”.
How many retailers are willing to stock something that they are not sure of selling if they know that they can sell 40k that people will almost certainly buy. I can see this in my local hobby store. They offer 40K (GW) a lot and FFG, including the miniatures games but they don’t have a lot. They tried a bit of dust and something else but it didn’t sell so they dropped it.
I think a lot of companies would have liked to compete with 40k a few years back, but the newly resurgent GW has put a stop to that. The quality of their current ranges is just fantastic, and trying to exceed that would be a big ask, no matter what resources you have. Warmahordes had a go, but GW really upped their game.
If I was running a game store, I’d be stocking MtG cards and GW, and not much else, TBH!
I think the dissatisfaction that many gamers had with GW has greatly diminished in the last year or two, so the window of opportunity for someone else to come in and really take a bite is gone.
@warzan loving the table design, I would be interested in seeing the build, have you considered Veneered Plywood for the top or is that too expensive. Gerry’s cobblestone streets look fantastic, I am very much impressed with them and Lloyd’s tower is very nice, just waiting for the rest of the castle.
On the topic of should games companies focus on a one or two IP’s, I wonder if it’s that the companies feel that if they focus on a couple of IPs’ there isn’t enough of a market to keep them going if they just do that. Is it more a case that players are moving more towards skirmish/smaller self-contained games? Even GW has had more than a few goes at it with Kill Team and its predecessors and Mantic is having a go with Vanguard, is there still a market/appetite for several games of the size of 40k?
With the use of Kickstarter this allows small companies access to risk free funding (well financial risk free, not sure its reputation risk free) as @warzan says, is that the end of the project? Do companies have the funds to continue on after the Kickstarter has delivered and develop their IP? Not really being in the industry just player I don’t know if any of this true but my own feeling is that the we have so much choice at the moment it difficult to get enough traction over time behind one game so that it gets to be as big as 40k. The only one that might have a chance at the moment is Star War Legion.
Am I surprised there isn’t a non-GW 40K? No. I think Justin was right: the market just isn’t shaped that way. Something you didn’t really touch on though was GW’s size and approaching monopoly.
Even in the ‘dark times’ they remained by far the largest operator in the miniature wargaming market, with by far the largest infrastructure (which didn’t always work to their advantage) and with by far the widest and deepest pool of customers.
During these times we saw some companies have successes which had they been sustained for another decade might have enabled them to challenge GW’s position. FoW might be an example. Warmachine / Hordes probably a better example. But GW eventually got their act together and in doing so killed off at least some of the market for alternative ‘giant’ games.
Something else which I suspect pushes companies – large and small – to diversifying their ranges is the nature of hobby purchases. Even if most hobbyists spend a fairly regularly-sized amount each month (and I’ve no idea if that’s the case, but suspect it’s not), there is still a limit to what most people are willing to spend on their army. Even if a company was able to keep pumping out new releases for every faction in their range, most gamers probably couldn’t keep up.
This means two things. Firstly, that there simply isn’t a market that makes it worth any company putting out new releases for every range every month. And secondly, that there IS a market for ‘one off’ releases. This market can be catered to by board games, little games from start ups / kickstarters and/or by ‘Specialist Games’ produced by the companies that have core ranges. So why wouldn’t these companies try to compete in the market for these ‘non-core’ purchases? This market is going to include people who just happen to be waiting for a new release for their army, as well as people who are not, but who are willing to be suckered into impulse buying something and spending an amount of money that they wouldn’t have considered shelling out on their core game / army.
So I don’t think – certainly with hindsight – that anyone has really had the time to develop something that can compete with GW’s scale (including the scale of its player base). And given that you can probably make more money by diversifying your ranges than you can by doubling down on a relatively niche game, the market is not likely to support something like a competitor to 40K that is genuinely of a similar scale.
The B&Q I have to drive past on my way home from work happens to have this in stock…
There is a *chance* I might not make it past without going in…
@killcrazy – The Range is selling it cheaper.
@lloyd Which B&Q did you go to as the one in Boucher Road in Belfast has been shut for ages
@torros – the one out near IKEA.
I love watching Ben lose it in the background. Mostly because I’m laughing about the same thing.
Same ?
There#s been many a fine battle over Biffens Bridge. No retreat, no surrender – push foward 🙂
Coffee.. flaps… I’m in tears lol! Pringles? Ok, im going to make a coffee, happy Sunday.
I’ve researched those towers a lot, some the of the names are darn near impossible for a Canadian to say, maybe if you’re from the east coast. 😛
God forbid if Corvus Belli goes the path of flyers and tanks. Flyers and tanks look nice and shiny for collectors but are terrible for gamers. Yes in far future humanity can only make tanks shoot across the table. No no no, you want tanks, change scale. Period.
15mm or 10mm are great for tanks and flyers.
This is outrageous! How am I supposed to cancel my trail now with that @avernos You evil man! I call foul! REFEREE!
About Warren’s comment about the quality of sculpts not improving. How should sculpts improve? Do you mean that you would have expected the rest of the industry to have caught up to GW/Citadel? My guess is that most of these companies can’t afford/justify the investment when traditional methods produce miniatures that are good enough.
It’s my firm belief that companies should always invest as much as they can afford into the best sculpt they can get.
It will save them a fortune later in marketing and redoing a substandard product.
Now its a bit horses for courses and every company is different, but there are some who don’t seem to get how important the investment and quality control is at that stage… when they really should.
Happy Sunday. Thanks for the show.
Thanks for the mention, @avernos – Yeah, the mechanics of that Crusades-era game look verrry familiar. Definitely “Command Tactical” (Level 2) wargaming. 🙂 Still tactical on the battlefield, but now unit-based. It’s not just a question of WYSIWYG or not WYSIWYG, but now combat, morale, and movement ae all handled by unit, i.e., averages over a set period of time, rather than individual actions that are individually resolved.
1) I shoot, I hit, I do damage.
2) x men fire for y minutes and z target, over a range, using b ammo, in c terrain. Crunch that all together for an “envelope of probability” of potential effects. Is the target UNIT pinned, destroyed, routed, no effect, confused, etc …
The left, right, and centre sectiosn and strategy cards look VERRRRY similar to the combat resolution system used in the advanced rules for Avalon Hill’s 1776 game. It was an operational – stragetic game, but if players wanted to use the advanced rules, they could use something very similar to this almost as a combat resolution “mini-game” within the larger campaign game to actually resolve the clash of armies, rather than simply rolling d6s on a combat results table (ahh, CRTs … the blessing … and bane … of 1970s wargames). 😀 😀 😀
Great discussion (both in xlbs n comments). As others have said, times have changed and GW is kinda like the highly established, very well known Microsoft Windows of gaming. There’s stuff out there that plays better and looks better, but to claim a spot alongside them a company would likely need a time machine. Kickstarter has opened up funding, but it’s also really added fuel to the smaller companies competing with each other and pushes that scatter shot approach. There are so many cool looking games and minis these days, it’s very hard not to have your head turned 5 minutes after getting the shiny you previously turned your head for ?
I’d be tempted to say that gw themselves have been following suit…if you look at their amount of releases lately (and a whole bunch of big ones too), they’re stretching many gamers I know across multiple games to point of being unable to keep up. Perhaps a strategy of drowning customers within gw to keep them away from pretenders? Leaves a lot less in the wallet anyway ?
Hello Backstagers!
On the Scattergun debate, the major problem for companies is finding a persistent orderers, customers that forsake the popular and drag their mates into your customer base because you have produced an all round winner that beats the allure of GW.
To beat GW you need to tick A LOT of boxes. You would need;
1) An interesting and immersive IP eg. 40K, The Old World, The AoS realms and all the sub-locations, such as Necromunda, Mordheim, Shadespire etc.
2) A clear, concise ruleset that if simple to learn yet hard to master, and that’s fast and fun to play, eg an 8 page rule book like AoS, etc
3) A model range that’s affordable, good looking, open to individualization.
4) A system that allows the players to play at an individual, a gang, a company or an army level scale so that they have an easy level of entry and a reason to continue ever growing their collections. eg, Kill Team, 40K, Epic
5) To give them more hobby options than they will ever be able to afford
6) To have a mechanism that continually spawns ideas and hype about the latest thing in your customer base ie White Dwarf, Podcasts, multi-media channels and a host of fan-boy media releases
In the end, no-one has or will challenge GW for supremacy because they need to do ALL of the above just to compete. GW can afford to scattergun, and often does. That’s why they have/had Kill Team, Necromunda and Shadow War Armageddon and yet haven’t gone broke. Is there another company out there that could produce 3 different skirmish rulesets in the same IP and not go broke?
Run down that list and apply it to any non-GW game system and ask yourself how many boxes they tick. There is only non-GW game systems that come close to it for my mind, are Bolt Action and the Star Wars games by FFG and even these are miles behind at this stage.
Oh hello and happy sunday everyone finaly I have something interesting to say 😀 The inspiration for martelo towers came from corsica from torra di mortella and the battle that tok place there. So I made a comment yeey 😀
ha ha awesome mate
great piece of info!
@avernos yeah yeah it’s all my fault…… hmmm 😉
Glad we agree
Biffens Bridge gets a mention and you broke Ben, best XLBS of the year!!!!
Ahhh @warzan
No other company will ever reach GW level, because no other company will get the ideal conditions GW had to grow the way they did.
Good days, bad days, new Renaissance, nobody can truly appreciate the impact GW has on the hobby and the gambles they took on their way to success.
The fact you and everybody else speaks about “plastic models”, vehicles and huge stuff as centrepieces is because of GW and their “indoctrination”.
Earlier in their history they had to differentiate themselves from their competition and it can be seen in the Rogue Trader era white dwarfs they way they chose to do it was to invest in plastic models production, a risky proposition especially at that era, but one that was heavily advertised and pushed to the consumer aggressively as the best thing ever and to their credit it worked, plastics successful introduction was what lead to the vehicles since this was another differentiating factor with the competition and of course were pushed hard to the point were everybody could have a Rhino.
but their biggest strength always was and always will be they stick to their own original IP, the company that almost equalled them target games/ harbringer with Warzone showed the perils of not been your own company but a subsidiary and the problems on not owning the IP you make your money from, after their demise GW was unrivalled for 10 years nobody to take their market share, nobody to contest them, this will never happen ever again and no other company will ever have that luxury, the fact that at the end of this era GW was dragged screaming and crying to sign up the LOTR deal, if interviews with Rick Priestly are to be believed, only reinforced their position on the market lead, yes GW reached a dark point where they themselves almost damaged irreparably themselves but it was not because of competition, but extremely bad management.
Fact is to be GW you need to be your own manufacturer and distributor, make so many money to the shops that you can dictate your own terms and have enouph capital to take big risks without impacting your company.
Kickstarter or not you will not find any company that can do all the above or part of the above.
A side note CMON and FFG are publishing companies not manufacturers, FFG in particular is a subsidiary, CMON is just in stock market, they do not care about having their “own” IP since they are publishing games not producing games.
Licencing IP has shown time and again it is to be avoided by the companies especially the small ones, except the LOTR bubble that is a mismanagement on GWs part if the company cares for long term sustainable growth, even FFG was hit by WOTC taking away Android Netrunner when it reached a critical mass of success, DUST, AVP, Warzone, Netrunner and many more show the risks and limitations for a company to trade an IP they do not own and in that sense you are right a company should create their own IP and stick with it, that does not mean they cannot or should not diversify within their IP, GW and CB are good examples of creating products within their IP, they can create new sources of revenue and can be treated as separate departments for the company, not necessarily as gateway games, but gateway to the IP and this is far more important that anything else the IP and the ways to make your consumers to talk about your IP when they do not play, is what will eventually make them loyal and invested.
Now we come to the odd part of the discussion collectors… we are all collectors, relegating an armies collection to “big centrepiece models” is absurd, yes GW does it because they can do it and it is a differentiating factor for them to force feed the notion of huge models, that are out of place in their games,
is what you must have, but it is not what makes a collection or why people collect armies from other ranges, GW does it because the others cannot do it and they can do it because their strategy was always “how can I differentiate myself in a way nobody else can” it is clever for the other companies to not go in competition with GW on this, it is quite clear GW does it because they cannot do it and trying to do something you cannot do is economically suicidal.
Finally I competently disagree with you on Kickstarter, kickstarter and whatever capital it may create will never create a new GW, kiclstater may create companies but not manufacturers and to be a GW type entity you need to be a manufacturer of your products.
I would love a Let’s Play of some games like Burrows and Badgers, Frostgrave, or SAGA — games constantly talked about and loved by OTT — and yea, selfishly loved by me.
On topic… I feel sad when IP’s go south, or lost. Even when game companies forget about their own. Dropzone — I miss cool updates for that one, or Wrath of Kings, which I have 2 armies of — gone dead, I can still play it, but miss seeing updates. Runewars by FFG — updates are not as forthcoming, which is too bad.
Ben is right, in the fact that Games Workshop brings out products so frequently, that the consumer doesn’t have the time to look at new game systems, because GM has the quality, and range of product that consumers feel like they need more of. GW is the Apple or Microsoft of gaming — they have been built up (as Justin says — in a bubble ie. 80’s) .. and continued through the years. They’ve had a few hiccups, but there’s no competing with them unless they royally screw up in a new edition (which they are not apt to do, because they have the $$ to keep the talent needed to stay relevant to the gamer’s wants). –It’s like the Magic the Gathering of miniature games.
Our whole society if moving towards instant gratification and consuming all the things. I think companies feel they have to bring out new products to keep generating new interest and revenue.
It certainly I think is an problem. Even I find it happening to Guildball – a game specifically designed to be tight small model count play experience. They have grown the factions and starting minor factions now, but I feel that they did not work to balance the main factions before trying to add new factions – so my concern is with game balance not model release. They have to tinker with ideas and dilute the game.
Larger games dilute themselves with factions, people moan about too few options, but for me I would rather have a limited faction choice with a number of available and interesting units and learn to be a master of a faction. I hope FFG and Legion stick to a limited factions.
For me I don’t play games a lot and buy lots more games than I play, so releases every month I don’t need and it puts me off, it makes me feel that I buy a core box set and straight away I know it’s not the game the company really wanted to realease, monthly releases to me feel like small patches to an unfinished game.
No matter how good the sculpts are, I won’t collect certain systems because either I won’t play the game (40k) or I won’t be able to find other players (Deep Wars).
Looking at my own collection of minis, I notice that I collect multiple armies for the same systems, specifically Bolt Action, Saga and Dust.
To be fair, historical games don’t have the IP issues other games do. FWIW, I have more units for my US Airborne than I’ll wver need but I can Field a variety of builds. And I’ve now started expanding on that to include Pacific war units to go with my Japanese army.
My Saga armies are quite different. Each has a distinct play style and aesthetic such as Anglo Danes, Normans, Arthurian Bretons, Late Romans, Early Byzantines (called Last Romans), and a Muslim army. At some point I’d like to add a Polish and Eastern Princes army. Maybe even a Teutonic army.
Dust is a bit different in that you can include historical and weird war minis in the same game. And the players actively encourage kit bashing and creating new units. But that system does have a great deal of depth to its various armies with lots of possible builds and, this is important, no model is ever obsolete. They will always have rules for discontinued models.
I think Heroclix is the longest running IP/mini game going, and continuing fanbase/presence. Alway a tourny happening. Of course I’ve always been a fan, because it’s superhero’s, and I can present it to kids and adults. Say what you will about pre-painted quality … fact is, I can always spend $25, and play in a closed box tourney and have fun with whatever I get.
Ug, while I’m still working on painting my horde of other mini’s
It’s no GW .. but ya gotta admire it longevity still the same.
Did in summer the same for building some bugdet streets.
Awesome btw.
I see kickstarter as part of the problem. When you invest in a kickstarter that is a new war game, be it skirmish or not, you want them to have everything thought out with the number of factions, models, rules, etc. If the kickstarter is successful that it is usually at least a year if not two until the models and game are completed and sent to the “investors”. By this point the company has used all its money generated by the kickstarter and either needs new orders or needs to run another kickstarter to continue development. New orders likely only happen if the game is actually being played and thus attracting interest in gaming clubs (ideal situation). If a company decides to do another kickstarter should it be for the same game or should it be for something new? The thing that will raise the most money is likely something new.
It is kinda unfair to compare to GW but perhaps companies can look at what they are doing right and why they are successful. It isn’t enough that they make the most popular games but why they remain at the forefront of our names. People may complain that not all the codexes are released at the beginning of a new version but the steady release of codexes and models is part of the reason it remains popular. If GW released everything and sat back for several years would it remain the dominant game played in gaming clubs? Maybe not.
It might be hard to do as GW does but perhaps things could be done on a smaller scale. I’ve noticed that guild-ball for example seems to get rejuvenated with the new season (now season 4). There are likely only a few miniature companies that could do as GW does (Privateer Press and Mantic are the two I can think of).
So “Have Game Companies Lost Their Focus?” No, they are doing what they need to do in order to compete and to raise the funds they need to stay viable. Until a game (other than GW) becomes a hit (Warmahordes is close but I don’t think they are there yet) and then can be supported on a continuing basis things will continue as they are.
Damn you @brennon, damn you, bought Goblin Quest, my kids are mad for it and want to give it a go
@warzan I am confused by the bar you set for “collectability” of a miniatures game. You mention “tanks” and “fliers” and “drop pods”. It seems to imply until a game is a “mass battle game” it can’t be collectable.
Example: Infinity – this is a game where the common rifle has a range extending most of the game board. Its a “true-future” sci-fi game, as opposed to WH40k which is basically WW2 with powered armor. Very few, if any, 40k armies use what we would consider modern weapons and tactics. Including tanks and flyers in a skirmish game of Infinity’s scale would drastically change the entire nature of the game.
Also, by that POV, games like Bolt Action and Flames of War are FAR more collectible than 40k. The variety of vehicle variants available to most WW2 armies far exceeds those available to most 40k armies.
I agree with others that say that the biggest road block to a 40k competitor these days is the market. GW grew up in a vacuum, where it was just fighting against other “nerd” hobbies for people’s cash. Now, with “nerd” culture on the rise, there are entire arrays of shows, movie franchises, licensed games, all competing for people’s money and time. Included amongst those are dozens of different gaming companies trying to each get a piece of the scraps left over from GW’s table. In many ways, it almost seems like the most successful ones are those that don’t try and bit off too much. They recognize their base, the make sure that base is happy, and they try and grow things slowly. It seems like those that try an expand and take on the “big dog” overextend and then collapse as a result.
Loving the wall paper idea @lloyd @avernos, think i
m gonna have to find a roll or two. Like what you have done so far and the walls a great idea, you have mentioned getting and using the big coffee tins. i dont have any of them but i do have a few baby food tins. There about 13cm across...16.5cm high and 40cm round, so once i get some free time ill have a go at doing one with the paper.Happy Monday or what
s left of it guys, i`m of to work night shift……Night allI was in B&Q last week and saw the exact same wallpaper. I took some off of the sample roll. I’m going to use it to make a lovely piazza square for an Italian hill top village for Flames of War. Scale might be a bit off but can’t complain for free. And no-one is going to put on their wall, surely?
Speaking as a long time Dropzone player and Dropfleet kickstarter backer, I feel that Hawk were right in their intention to expand the Drop Commander Universe, but did it at a point where the company was not mature enough to handle that expansion.
Hawk’s operation was overly reliant upon Dave who had to run the company and do nearly all of the sculpting & writing. If Hawk had a second (or even third) sculptor they would have been able to keep Dropzone ticking over whole getting Dropfleet out of the door. Instead the company ground to a halt.
Mantic tried to launch their first incarnation of Warpath with too small of a range ready to roll. That meant they looked under baked compared to 40k. Unfortunately for them, the second time around their kickstarter shipped too close to the new 40k landing and with their overseas production delays the full range was not ready to release in one go. And as if was a second edition, it needed to overcome the reputation left by the first attempt. Had the timing been better I think Mantic could have made greater headway than they do far have.
In short, I think that any company needs to diversify at some point, but only when their product and operation has matured enough to support doing so. If you have opportunity to create a related game that expands an IP then that has to be the way to go. Especially if you can offer players opportunities to use models they might already own such as Deadzone/Warpath, Kill Team/40k or BMG/DC Universe.
Collectible? Had people given it a chance… Warzone. Much of the style of Warzone is better than 40k. Hopefully Prodos’ new game will do better.
Is infinity really anything more than a skirmish game? Of course they don’t have flyers and heavy vehicles.
@lloyd that terrain is awesome I might have to try it myself.
Shad is definitely the best Youtuber to watch for Castle/Fortification videos I’ve learned a lot from him.
Lindybeige also has some cool videos on things like Beserkers and the term “Viking”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBUGQkpk3RE
Hey @elessar2590 – Lindybeige is also called Lloyd – the best name in the world! 🙂
I think the collector’s gene has driven this move away from mass battle games. I know this applies to me but I imagine it applies to others as well. When going to play factions we tend to want to dabble a little in everything rather than go for the classic 40K 20,000 points in one army. Having the skirmish style games or smaller scale games allows us to indulge and go for the 20,000 points in 5 different forces.
Ben’s reaction to llyod’s flap made me laugh so hard I fudged painting the black ring on my ringwraiths base!
So my gaming table board just sits on three bookcases on both sides and it provides great support and allows storage space underneath and lets you put drinks etc… on the bookshelves.
I have played around with cobble stone textured wallpaper years ago. Made a game board and a bunch of medieval houses (for Mordheim). But this texture you have found is even more awesome!
@warzan What is the obsession with vehicles and big, stompy things for evaluating collectibility? I think that just comes down to taste. Even when I was still playing 40K I hardly bought any vehicle. They just held no interest for me. Instead I focused on the special units and characters.
Now I play mostly Infinity. In my opinion this game is collectible due to the steady stream of releases. I know some people collect quite a few factions over time, even though they mostly play one faction. Adding vehicles or other things bigger than TAGs has no place in the game mechanics. They are just terrain pieces. So it is quite fitting that Corvus Belli leaves those things to the terrain makers and keeps focusing on new units and campaign books for the main game.
Since Kickstarter I think slow and steady collecting has been replaced by wait and get everything at once. It’s sort of like Christmas that can happen all year round.
It gives a different kind of satisfaction… until the Kickstarter fatigue sets in.
I definitely believe Game Companies have lost their focus! I was caught up in a lot of the hype for new games from 2012-2016. But last year I finally said enough is enough and I’ve gone cold turkey on newly published game systems. I’ve focused on a few core games and specific armies within them, WWII Flames of War, 40K Black Templars, 40K Kreig, LOTR/Hobbit and Armada. The only new game I did bite on was SW Legion (just could not pass that up). Otherwise all the new stuff I’ve just said no because the choices are just too varied. I think tons of it looks great but I know I will never get around to it. So for me companies that keep their focus are very important. Even if they don’t I’ll tend to stick with my core games like it did for LOTR while GW did not spend much effort on it.
All the other games I had and extra armies I had collected in the game systems I’ve stuck with I have offloaded.
I’m definitely a believer in keeping that core focus for a game company.
Great show guys. Looking forward to linking up with the BOW team at Essen Spiel!
I can’t for the life of me find an option in the US for that wall paper. Any help? I NEED it for my terrain projects.
Well if someone finds it I’m also interested. A while back I was looking for some textured wallpaper to make cobblestone roads and didn’t really have any luck.
I have to say the thing I find most surprising is the lack of games that have not latched on in the different styles of gaming. There is no Super big game for Space ship battles. There is no super big game for Air Combat. So much of gaming is centered around GW IPs that all that follow basically feel like they MUST do a scifi/fantasy troop based wargames. That games that deal with Ships in space or water seems to be a secondary thing. Companies are trying to get a way from that but it seems that people don’t ‘want’ those games as much? You would think that by now there will be that one BIG Ship game that everyone knows about and has a massive following. Do people just don’t want those types of games or is it that there isn’t a Great game of it out there? Could their be a great ship game out there it just that not enough people play it for it to get the that level of traction?
Well there are quite a few largish space battle games and airgames. They just don’t get mentioned on the popular gaming sites
Belated Happy Sunday all, wonderful show as ever!
I think I agree with a lot of the comments that have broadly given good reasons for disagreeing with the thrust of what was presented (and I am not talking about Lloyds tower 😉 ).
I think a lot of this comes across as “Why are the companies not making the games I want them to make like they used to back in the day.”
I doubt it’s because they aren’t thinking about how to make money, those that have survived and even thrived for a long time (Corvus Belli et al) have probably done so because these were the right decisions. Maybe a lot of players don’t want to collect big vehicles, maybe people are still collectors, but they like collecting new games more than tons of miniatures for one game (I know I fall into this category). I agree with another commentator that it would be good to get an industry view on this topic, will probably reveal a lot.
Infinity aught to be a good counter-example, for years they have focussed on the one universe and mostly the one product, and they are doing well. They aren’t beating GW any time soon, and if so, it isn’t because they were distracted due to making other things.
I love the plethora of different games out there, and I love trying them all out and seeing something new regularly. If I want huge armies, big vehicles, and a hobby big enough to last a lifetime, well 40k and now AoS is there if I want it.
Interesting topic. I think the majority of games companies are actually pretty focused on there main games and while you praised games workshop, I actually think they are the worst culprit of the shotgun approach to games closely followed by warlord.
You mentioned corvus belli with infinity but never mentioned wyrd with malifaux, privateer press with warmachine/hordes or gct studios with bushido. Those companies have consistently released poducts for the main game they produce.
While GW has released shadow war armageddon, necromunda, kill team, speed freeks, titanicus, deathwatch overkill, gorechosen, renegade, shadespire/nightvault, both horus heresy games, both warhammer quests and released new editions for both it’s core games.
Warlord are in a similar place with bolt action, black powder, pike & shotte and hail caesar being the core games but also releasing doctor who, blood red skies, konflikt 47, test of honour, project z, strontium dog.
No other company rising to the level of games workshop has quite a number of factors that can be discussed and quite a few other people posted about them so I won’t go over those too. I think a major factor is people’s investment in time/money and ability to get a game in gw’s systems. I have known many people to stick with 40k even though it was evident they did not enjoy playing the game as they had poured so much time and money into it and felt leaving the game would be a loss of that investment.