Gear Krieg Paper Models

This is very nice — simple papercraft models of the various Gear Krieg walkers. Very useful to test out scenarios, or to include vehicles that have not been released in miniature form (the Japanese and Russian machines, for example).

Custom Talisman Board

Talisman is an old Games Workshop boardgame from the time before Warhammer and its ilks hit big. It was a pretty fun game, and many people still play to this day. This fan took things a step further, and recreated the playing board in miniature model form.

RPGnet Gaming Index

It’s the largest English-language indexing of roleplaying books in existence: it currently contains more than 8500 games and over 1100 individual magazines (with articles listed!). It runs from a single product published in 1973 to 599 products published in 2007, then 89 thus far this year.

Best of all, it’s like a (moderated) Wiki: you can enter new items at this page, which is also available from the Index home page. If your favorite book is missing, add it!

Among the neat things contained in there are the first 100 issues of White Dwarf magazine (before it became a GW catalog) and 296 issues of Dragon Magazine.

That's Just So Wrong

But in a good way. Take a look at what’s behind the scene in the old arcade classic Space Invaders.

Geek Love

In the end, it all comes back to gaming. Or so this New York Times article says, in regard to Gary Gigax’s passing.

(Via BoingBoing)

Dungeons & Dragons co-creator Gary Gygax has died

I saw earlier today that Gary Gygax died this morning at his home in Lake Geneva. In case you’re not a gamer, this is the man who co-created Dungeons & Dragons and helped start the role-playing phenomenon.

I think it’s safe to say that Gary had a huge influence on modern gaming beyond RPG, as many of today’s computer gamers first cut their teeth on dice and paper.

WIRED article
SlashDot article
RPG.Net forum

GenCon Woes

The organization behind the biggest gaming convention is filing for Chapter 11. Now this isn’t as bad as an outright bankrupcy, but it’s still worrysome.

I hope they can pull out and keep going. If not, well, at least I’ll remember fondly the various GenCons that I attended in the 1990s…

Figures...

I leave EA and now that I don’t have free Game Points to spend anymore, they go and announce Spore’s release date. Gah…

Guess I’m going to have to pay for it like everyone else.

Luckiest Shot Ever

You just can’t plan a shot like this.

Japan Secretly Training Future JSDF Mecha Pilots

Remember the Virtual Worlds centers, where you could play networked Red Mars and Battletech? We had one of the nicer ones here in Montreal, decked in a full steampunk atmosphere (it’s closed since).

Well, trust the Japanese to better the concept, especially if mecha are involved. You can now play in panoramic mecha simulators across Japan, using the Gundam designs.

Good thing we don’t have this over here, it would cost me a fortune.

The Science of Videogame Design

While mobile gaming is still some way from most of the issues listed in this article, we’re going to get there at some point.

And by the way, I really hate crunch time.

Rackham Woes

They are going into bankruptcy protection due to slow AT-43 pre-painted miniatures’ sales.

I hate to say this (because the AT-43 models are really nice), but I told you.

Live Halo Warthog

The special effect house WETA (Lord of the Rings) has built a life-sized, functional Warthog buggy for Bungie’s Halo short movies. Neat!

Project Silpheed

Spent the afternoon playing this cool space shooter at a friend’s place. Highly recommended — the story is totally a cliche, right down to the factions (Earth vs. Colonies) and color codings (White/Blue for Earth, Red/Green for ADAN), but it’s part of the appeal!

For the Warcraft Addict in Your Life...

A set of accessories to see yourself in third person perspective, just like in many video games.

Dynasty Warriors Gundam?!

Dynasty Warriors + GUNDAM = Teh Awsum

AT-43 September Releases

The September releases for French game AT-43 are being shown on a Polish fan site. The Rackham crew is doing nice work with their “retro” mechanical designs. That stuff would be right at home in Gear Krieg (and vice-versa, of course).

Spanish Gear

Neat — this is a Spanish Heavy Gear Web site with some cool vehicle designs. (HG was licensed in Spain through Edge Entertainment.)

Command Post Gamma

For an OGRE fan like me, it’s always fun to come across cool Web sites like Command Post Gamma. Check it out.

Update: when you start looking, you find more. See Tristan’s Ogre/GEV site for scenarios and other bits. There’s also DATAPULSE, which is cool not only for OGRE but military science-fiction in general.

Strange Mechanisms

Here’s a cool page I stumbled on recently: The Strange Mechanism Museum. Great stuff for modelers and alternate history gamers — I sure wish I had access to that when I worked on Gear Krieg.

Cheap

This kind of thread is exactly why I got out of tabletop gaming as a primary career.

You can’t make a living when people expect you to work for free (or worse).

Game of the Month

The mobile Tetris title I produced was named “Game of the Month” by IGN Wireless. Nice!

End of an Era

I get sick for a couple of days, and what do I see when I get back online? Dragon Magazine is ending publication.

Being the D&D magazine, Dragon was thus the RPG industry’s flagship. I remember reading early issues as a lad, sitting in my Gamemaster friend’s basement. While I was never a customer (having abandonned the dungeon for SF a long time ago), I still browsed it regularly at the bookstore.

Oh well…

God of War II

My wife and I just completed the first part of the new God of War title on the PS2, as a change of pace from finishing up Final Fantasy XII.

I think this comic accurately summarizes our impressions of the game.

Zombies!!!

Boxhead More Rooms is a fun little Flash game where you messily kill cubic zombies and devils by the bucketful, using anything from a pistol to a railgun. Great stress reliever if you don’t take it seriously. See how long you can last!

(Hints: move around a lot. Exploit the fairly stupid AI. Change weapons often.)

Baneblade

That’s one heck of a big radio controlled tank! It’s a 1/6th scale version of the Baneblade superheavy tank from the Warhammer 40 miniature game from Games Workshop.

I refuse to imagine the size of the table you’d need to play a game with this, though.

2007 Predictions: Tabletop Gaming

I made these last year and the year before that, so why not do it again?

So, here are my predictions for 2007 for the tabletop game industry:

- There are still going to be poorly-financed startups getting into the business and folding a few months later. There will, however, be fewer of them loosing their shirts this time around, because they will use e-book publishing and print-on-demand technology, reducing both the size of the customer pool required for success and the overall risks (no need to print 3000 copies of the core book, for example).

- Despite the above, there will still be too much supply and not enough demand in 2007. The existing, frontline-oriented “publish or perish” philosophy will keep filling the channels way above the capacities of the market to absorb any of it. Gamers will be happy; those who try to make a living selling games, not.

- The industry shrinkage that occurred since the start of the new millennium will continue in 2007. Again, most of the losses will be in the retailing tier: unless it’s highly diversified and/or double as a “club house” for gamers, a brick-and-mortar shop can’t compete with the convenience, selection and prices of online retailers (or eBay, for older stuff). As for distributors, I don’t think there are that many left; the remaining ones may survive yet. We’ll have to see how exclusivity deals (like the one WizKids just announced) will change the power structure.

- An easy one: the companies and stores that do survive will make efficient use of e-commerce (and online communications in general). Those that do not, or that begrudge the “e-efforts” of others — like brick and mortar stores complaining that manufacturers are “taking money from their pocket” when they sell exclusive stuff on their Web site — are going to face a rough road ahead.

- Corollary to the above: in the old days (1975-1995), the retailers (and to some extent the distributors) had power since they controlled access to the customer pool. The Internet, along with the mainstreaming of gaming conventions, has changed all that — game manufacturers do not need the retailers to reach gamers anymore. Retailers must now find other ways to earn their share of the price tag: merely providing shelf space is not enough anymore. Those that do not recognize this new reality are doomed to die off.

- I mentioned new business models last year, but I didn’t see a lot done, both amongst publishers (ransom publishing, pay-as-you-go, etc.) and retailers (kiosks, micro-specialists, etc.). But they will happen eventually, thanks to the Internet and the need to do something different to set oneself apart in a crowded market.

- The miniature gaming market will fragment again with the widespread production of pre-painted miniatures. Outside of WizKids’ and WotC’s own lines, I count at least three or four new games by as many companies. Pre-painted minis cost a lot to setup and produce, and you have to sell more of them to turn a profit. They are only viable if you have a large player pool; fragment the market, and no one will make it (a lesson that should have been learned by the CCG rush of 1995 and the miniatures boxed set rush of 1998).

- We’re going to be seeing more cross-pollination between gaming styles and categories. I remember seeing a card-based tabletop wargame, and of course White Wolf being bought by a computer game maker will generate a lot of new titles (both tabletop and electronic).

- I thought we were due for another “big hit” in 2006, but we didn’t get it (or at least it wasn’t big enough to be noted by an outsider like me). Unless someone pulls a rabbit out of the hat, we may have to wait until 2008. It may be the release of D&D fourth edition — can WotC catch lightning in a bottle once more?

And yet again:

- No one will make it rich except the market leaders in each given category. And even then, it might not happen this year — the hobby gaming market has gotten just too fragmented, the barriers to entry too low.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think the game hobby is doomed — far from it, actually. Never before have so many quality titles and genres being available cheaply to the average gamer. The game industry, however, better be ready to scale down to a cottage industry.

Fast Cars

If you want to know why I don’t post a lot these days, it’s because what little time I have left after work is consumed with driving. I got a Need for Speed — Carbon for Wii, to be precise.

Check out my current rides after the fold.

Console Time

I don’t know why, but I got to spend time on game consoles this weekend. Saturday saw an extended session of Rainbow Six: Vegas at a friend’s house, followed by some Lumines (well, actually it was mostly the women for that, at first — we men were busy fiddling with an extensive brick collection).

My first time with R6:V co-op, and it was a lot of fun. I much prefer “tactical” first-person shooters over the usual “run & gun” ones, I find them more interesting and less “twitchy.” Not that the latter aren’t fun — I just spent an hour on Black, filling terrorists with AK-47 slugs — but I like having the option of taking bad guys by surprise with a cunning plan.

Plus, any modern FPS that doesn’t give me the option of hugging a wall or some other piece of cover while firing gets a minus now in my personal evaluation. I much prefer the new “take cover or take shock damage” model over the old “rushing tactics or lose life points,” it just seems less artificial. Plus, it avoid the hunt for health packs: I mean come on, what kind of considerate bad guy leaves first aid kits all over his secret base for you to find? (Notice that the guards and monsters never use them.)

Found time to play some Need for Speed: Carbon last night, too. I’ve got the Wii version, which you drive the car by tilting the remote. Lots of fun, but I need a lot more practice on the drifting bits. Scratch that — more practice, period.

2007 seems to be shaping well for gaming, unlike last year…

Free Games

From the golden age of the small wargame/boardgame, the early 1980s. Download the classic Heritage Dwarfstar boardgames for free, with thanks to the current rights holder (Reaper Minis).

Mostly classic stuff now (Movement Points, Hexes, etc.), but there’s some interesting stuff in there. I wonder how the turn system in Grav Armor works in practice: one side moves, the other side fires at the same time (any movement can be interrupted for an attack). This removes the need for an overwatch system. Hmmm…

Aurora Magazine

For those who said that DP9 was “dying or dead,” here’s proof otherwise: the first issue of Aurora Webzine (link goes to 4.5MB PDF) is available to download. I recognize a lot of the old Pod contributors in the masthead. Bravo!

Lightbulb Joke

Q: How many video game producers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Changing the light bulb isn’t on the critical path, so don’t expect it before Beta.

(From Greg Costykian’s blog — more over there.)

Tannhäuser

One thing that seems to be constant with European games and comics: they are always gorgeous-looking. Maybe it’s a matter of population density? It’s easy to find good artists when you have a lot of people nearby — the odds are better.

(BTW, this game is really the direction we should have taken when designing Gear Krieg. Use less of an historical approach. Oh well, live and learn.)

I Love My Job

We got another shipment for the staff today. I missed the first wave, but now I got my very own Nintendo Wii!

Awesome machine. I had a chance to try it out at the Montreal Game Summit last month, but it’s even better now that I have it all to myself. The only downside is that I can’t play Wii Sports with the dog around, because she keeps looking for the “balls” I’m throwing (not to mention that she wants to get into the boxing matches).

Games to look for, now: Trauma Center, Metal Slug Anthology — Zelda is a given, good as bought. Need for Speed: Carbon is an EA product, so I’ll pick it up at work. I also got to find myself a nice, firepower-heavy first-person shooter, too, now that there’s a sensible control scheme for that style of game – point-and-shoot, none of that twin-analog sticks non-sense.

I think we’re going to need a bigger TV.

Polyglot

If you’re interested in gaming news, check out Polyglot (click the link for the current issue). It’s made here in Montreal.

LEGO® Necrons

This kind of thing is what happens when you mix a bit of spare time, spare LEGO® parts and Warhammer 40K. And it’s almost exactly the right size for tabletop gaming, too.

Go on, take a look — plenty more where that one is coming from. Leave comments in this thread if you want to share your impressions (or lack thereof).

UPDATE: RPG.net discussion thread, The Miniatures Page thread.

Red Bull Strider

Phil is finally done with the new Red Bull MkII miniature (for Heavy Gear).

He’s been busy redoing the basic Gear squads, I guess — I gave him the schematics back in March! (Worth the wait, though.)

UPDATE: I added the sketches at the bottom of the Heavy Gear concept art page, in case anyone’s interested.

Interesting Times for RPGs

White Wolf, 2nd largest publisher of tabletop RPGs, just announced their merger with CCP, publisher of MMORPG EVE Online. Obviously, massive online multiplayer games based on Vampire and other WW products will be coming.

SF3D Gaming

Someone went through a lot of trouble to assemble new material for SF3D / Ma.K ZbV3000, based on the old wargames imported from Japan by TCI.

Interestingly enough, a quick read-through of the rules showed a lot of similarities with a wargame design I was tinkering with a few years ago. Purely parallel development, but it’s neat.

RoyalCon Panel Online

Remember that I participated in an industry panel at RoyalCon 2006?

The whole thing has been made into a podcast by the folks at Midnight’s Lair; the first half has been released to the feed. Enjoy and let them know what you thought on their discussion boards.

Battle for Skull Pass Review

WeeToySoldiers.com features a review of the Warhammer 7th Edition: Battle for Skull Pass boxed set, with tons of pictures.

The price is low enough that I might get tempted — I do already have a half-painted unit of Dwarves somewhere in my boxes. Gotta resist… too much stuff… unpainted yet…

UPDATE: Dropped by my local GW store at lunch time to see the models in person. Very nice, but definitely not suited for “front rank” use — the one-piece molding, used to keep the price down, definitely has an impact on the looks of the miniatures. I would need to put in a lot of work to better define them before painting. Still, an excellent value for US purchasers ($45 for 100+ models!), and a great set for beginners.

VBAM Jovian Chronicles

I see that the licensed VBAM: Jovian Chronicles is coming out soon. From what I figured out, it’s a strategic campaign system that you can drop on top of the regular fleet combat system.

(Haven’t touched Jovian Chronicles for years, but hey, it was my first published work, so I’m keeping up to date.)

WWII Superscience

More alternate reality gaming. Their WWII mecha aren’t bad, but I prefer the designs we (the DP9 folks) came up with for Gear Krieg.

No offense, just personal taste.

RoyalCon Summary

I just got back from my visit at RoyalCon 2006. The panel was a lot of fun: I shared the microphones with author Lucien Soulban, Sean Punch of Steve Jackson Games, and Louis Girard(?) of gaming magazine Polymancer. We talked about the game industry, its strengths, weaknesses and future.

I’m told the whole thing will be made into a podcast by the folks at Midnight’s Lair, so keep an ear out for it.

I just hope we didn’t sound too foolish — we had entirely too much fun.

Reminder: RoyalCon

Just a reminder that (barring incident) I will be making an appearance at RoyalCon 2006. I’ll be there Saturday afternoon: I have a panel at 4PM.

Pod Answers, Updated 3

I had lunch with some old friends today and we updated the list of ex-Podders and their new occupations once more. Check the revised table after the fold if you’re curious.

Here we go, to the best of our knowledge:

Of the original crew of 1993, only Robert Dubois remains. He’s backed by a fresh new team, though (Phil Leclerc, John Buckmaster, and others), so the company continues to publish new material.

RoyalCon

I just confirmed my attendance with RoyalCon 2006, a gaming convention that will take place on September 23-24 at an hotel about 30 seconds from my place.

That, and they invited me nicely as a GoH — how could I say no?

I won’t be running any game (I just don’t have time to prepare anything), but I was thinking about doing a seminar on the “behind the curtain” workings of the game industry. Basically, just sharing my accumulated “wisdom” ([coughcough]) of gaming.

I’d welcome any suggestions you might make regarding what I could cover… simply leave them in the comments. Thanks!

Convert

I was dusting this afternoon, moving about stacks of console games, when I realized (much to my shock) that most of the games in this household where bought and played by my wife. That’s correct: I, a lifelong gamer and a producer in a video game company, play less games than my better half.

She just finished Grandia III with all characters on Level 99, and she’s currently whooping ass and taking names on the latest Soul Calibur. Me? I played about two hours of Dead Rising and ChromeHounds yesterday. That’s it since last week, when I played about two hours of SSX: On Tour. Pathetic.

It’s even funnier when you take into account the fact that she barely played any games before we started dating. I guess it’s true what they say, it’s always the converts that are the fanatics.

Midnight

I see that Fantasy Flight Games have created a media division, Landroval Studios, and produced their first movie, Midnight Chronicles. It’s a feature film set in the world of FFG’s dark fantasy role-playing game “Midnight.”

This is pretty much what was intended for DP9 back in the days, with the creation of DPE. I guess FFG had access to more money and thus were able to push things even further. They had a few hits, such as DiskWars and a couple of well-received boardgames; in the game industry, there seems to be a fuzzy line where once you reach a certain level, you can get off the monthly release threadmill and do the things that need to be done to grow further. Such as, get an actual sales department.

Alas, DP9 never got to that level. It’s why DPE is doing grunt work on other productions, rather than home-made ones. It’s also part of why I left — showbiz is very time-intensive unless you’re in the driver’s seat (and even then). Designing Heavy Gear movies would have been a blast, but doing set works, meh…

Granted, Midnight Chronicles’s not a new LOTR, but from the trailer it compares favorably with many TV movies. If they didn’t overspend on the production, it should turn a profit. Kudos!

Stompa!

Back in the Old Days (1988-1991), the boyz and I used to build all sort of stuff for our Warhammer armies, GW being nowhere as well-supplied then as it is today. Orks were favorite, since you can put all sort of fun stuff together and it will still look “orky.”

This guy has us beat by a mile.

Bigger and better

This isn’t a spam, silly. Rather, it’s what Phil Le Clerc is doing to the Heavy Gear miniatures. Making the proportions more heroic is a good move, as is molding all the accessories directly on the model. Having packed my lot of blisters in the old days, I can tell you the latters caused a lot of headaches.

Good job!

She did it!

Unlike the wimps at Penny Arcade, my wife has just completed Kingdom Hearts II at 100%, hence unlocking the secret ending. Congrats, hon!

Rusty Necrons

This is several shades of awesome. Rather than buy the plastic Necron models, the guy approximated them with random junk. It fits!

(via RPGnet forums)

Pod Answers, Updated 2

Someone asked once more, Whatever happened to Dream Pod 9?

I wrote an extensive post on my blog on this subject (link to the expanded edition).

Since it’s an old blog entry the comments are locked to prevent automated spamming, but feel free to post here.

Is there nothing sacred?

Pfeh.

In my Battletech days, the ‘Mechs stopped at 100 tons, and we liked it, dagnabit.

Two Nice sites

While surfing the Web, I came across WeeToySoldiers.com and Newtype: The Next Evolution, two gaming/modeling blogs. Well done and fun to read.

Mass Effect

I just saw the trailer for Mass Effect, a new game in the work from Bioware.

[sigh] This is what CORE Command should have looked like, if I had had the original Pod team to work with.

Creation is so much easier when you have a budget…

Pod Answers, Updated

Fellow ex-Podder Ghislain Barbe has updated my previous post and put it online on his own page, updating the info as he went.

(For those not in the known, Ghislain was the guy who drew all. Literally. He also did my portrait up in the right corner, and is the sole ex-Podder to have his own Wikipedia entry.)

I Guess that's one way to save money

A paper Samurai army for the DBA historical wargame ruleset. Cheaper than pewter, and easier to carry!

(Via RPGnet)

Public Advisory Post

My wife wants the world to know that Magna Carta: Tears of Blood, while good looking, is a badly designed, boring, purposeless and needlessly lengthy console RPG game.

That has been a Public Advisory Post. Thank you.

Civ IV Musings

So I tried an experiment with Civilization IV: I wanted to see how the application was balanced, so I started a new game at the “Immortal” difficulty level. Then I set the planet at Tiny (2 Civs only), Pangea (to get some nice coastlines), good weather, etc. Everything to make it easier, except for the difficulty level.

Well, I didn’t even get to 1000BC before getting my ass handed to me. And I got lucky with the placement, too: huts, resources, no barbarians. The other civ simply burst forward and crushed me within two turns.

I’m a veteran civ player, I know the rules. I did everything right (not much chance of mistakes when you have a handful of cities). And yet I got utterly annihilated.

Has anyone ever managed to win games above the Noble level? Anyone? Is it even possible without a massive amount of luck in the initial conditions?

That game is rapidly boring the heck out of me.

Civ IV - A Mind of its Own?!

Games in the Civilization genre are dangerous for me: the second one almost destroyed my college career. So it’s with great apprehension that I let a colleague lend me his copy of Civilization IV to “try it out.”

It’s a great game, though there are a bunch of things I would have done differently (like all Civ titles, I hate how they handle wars and military units). But it’s keen at first glance.

I’ve encountered, however, a strange and annoying issue. I’m in a city screen, and I want the city to grow fast; I thus unselect all specialist citizens and assign them to work the food tiles. (Or, a city is starving so I change some artists back into workers to get some food growing. Slackers.)

The problem is thus: I go to adjust another city, and when I come back to the first one, all my staffing changes have been undone and there are specialists galore again (and the city is usually starving again, too). I switch everything back, go to the main map to make sure everything is set for the new turn, and… the city is staving yet again, because the specialists are back. Grrr.

Are the automatic specialists activated because of a certain civic? (I first noticed this in the Modern age.) Or is the game just playing by itself? Specialist automation is turned off!!

This (along with the fact that pure melee units like samurai that can apparently strike easily through a city’s stone walls) is slowly making sure I’m not going to buy this when my “trial period” (i.e., my friend wants his game back) is over.

Thoughts? Hit the comments.

The Hive Fleet Lies Dormant

Which is really sad, because my beloved got me a metric ton of greenstuff and some sculpting tool for Xmas, not to mention a few more beasties. But with the dog around, there’s really no place I can put the minis down to work on them safely.

Also, since Layka’s still a puppy, we have to watch her all the time — trust me on that one. I really can’t be busy modeling a fine detail and yet still be ready to sprint up in a split-second and rescue one of our possessions from The Jaws of Cruel and Unusual Maiming Death®.

So those Zoanthropes remain in their packs, reduced to sending me seductive psychic whispers… “buuuild us, yesss, make the Devourer reeeeal, yessss…”

It might explain the headache, at least.

The Mnemosyne Files

Old-time DP9 and Jovian Chronicles fan Wil has a new blog called The Mnemosyne Files where he unearths all sort of old goodies based on years of forum publications and fan communications.

It’s a blast from the past for me, that’s for sure.

Pod Answers

While we were oversea in Japan, someone on RPG.net asked the following question:

“Also, what the hell happened to Heavy Gear and Dream Pod 9?! They used to be so popular, now their Internet presence has dwindled to next to nothing.”

An answer would have taken too long at the time, but I did promise I’d write one once we got back. So here it is.

What happened was… life. That is, people change, interests change, markets and industry alike change, stuff happens. The tabletop gaming industry, while an exciting place to work in, is a harsh mistress. The hours are long, the pay is lousy, and many of your customers have a love/hate relationship with you. It’s neat when you’re young and full of energy, but the novelty of seeing your name in print eventually fades off. And when you realize you can’t buy a house or feed a baby with unsold sourcebooks, well… You move on.

Fortunately, there was another industry that was just as much fun but better paying, right next door. Off the top of my head, ex-Podders who moved on and their new occupations:

Still at DP9:
Jean-François Fortier
Pierre Ouellette
Robert Dubois
(Though there’s probably new folks that I don’t know about)

As you can see, not a lot of people. When personnel start to split off, much of the gestalt is lost and with it the ability to make things happen quickly.

And to answer the rest of the RPGnetter’s question: most of the online communications for the company were taken care of by myself, Hilary, Jean, Phil and Stephane B., with some by Robert. It was easier when there were lots of people sharing the task, though I did do a lot of it (obviously, I don’t, anymore). Now that it’s just Robert, well, his time is better employed taking care of the business, the stuff that pays the rent (admin, shipping, the movie side biz, etc.). Priorities and all that. At least many of the freelancers contribute to online forums.

So, does this mean that the company is dead? Far from it. They are still publishing, they are putting out more minis that I ever thought possible (we made up a lot of vehicles and variants throughout HG’s first ten years) and you’ll find them at most major conventions. Sure, they may not be putting out much RPG material anymore, but can you blame them? With the current state of the RPG market, 500 copies sold is a good run, and you simply cannot make a professional living on that. (Don’t take me on faith: call a printer and make a few calculations.) I hear the entertainment arm (DPE) is making the bulk of the cash now, with the gaming supporting the downtime between movie projects.

Still, look at the back catalog — can you honestly said you’ve tried it all? :)

(Full disclosure: I don’t make a cent off future HG-RPG sales. But it might keep my name as designer in the limelight a little longer. [grin])

So there you have it. Nothing sinister, nothing evil, just life taking its course.

2006 Predictions: Tabletop Gaming

Better late than never, here are my predictions for 2006 for the tabletop game industry:

- We’re still going to see poorly-financed startups get into the business and fold a few months later, their dreams crushed and their savings depleted.

- The industry shrinkage that occurred in 2005 will continue in 2006. Thanks to the rapid growth of the PDF and direct-to-consumer markets, expect most of this year’s losses to be in the retailing (and possibly, distributing) tier.

- We’re going to see a lot of new business models, both amongst publishers (ransom publishing, pay-as-you-go, etc.) and retailers (kiosks, micro-specialists, etc.).

- The companies and stores that do survive will make efficient use of e-commerce (and online communications in general).

- We’re about due for another “big hit” in 2006. Don’t expect it to be a traditional RPG, card or boardgame, however. It may be a hybrid, or possibly something totally new.

And again:

- No one will make it rich except the market leaders in each given category.

Eastern Empire

Just before leaving for Japan, I came upon this cool WH40K Web site for the Tau: Eastern-Empire.

Still a bit bare but very worth keeping an eye on.

UPDATE: Much more material is up now, including very nice pictures, modeling tutorials and some animated battle reports.

Civilization IV

Just finished Civilization IV with a Space Race victory (well, duh — it’s me, the space cadet we’re talking about). Good game, kept me up late.

A longer review will appear here once I get some time to type it up. Right now, I have to catch up on some late chores…

Making a Gunfex

Okay, so I want to make a Gunfex (a Carnifex with Enhanced Senses, Venom Cannon and Barbed Strangler) to serve as the anti-vehicle support for my hive fleet. However, both the VC and the BS are supplied as right arm mounts, and I want to put the BS on the left side to balance the beast.

Anyone has hints on how to do a neat, clean job of this?

Will I have to resculpt the hands altogether (to reverse them), or is there an easier way?

The Hive Fleet Gets its Wings

I put together some pictures of the gargoyle pattern, held with bluetack. I just hope I can fit twelve of those suckers on the table. Those wings are really large…

By the way, this is meant to be a master pattern, so the posture is stiff. Each of the final casts will be suitably bent for a more life-like pose.

Tyranid Wing Work

As I mentioned before, I decided to rework the bat-like wings I’m making for my Gargoyles. I wasn’t happy with how the first try turned out. Too flat and lifeless, and something was wrong. I looked at more “bats in flight” pictures, and finally realized that I put in way too much structure and not enough wing surface. Boldly, I started over with the wing’s skin, rather than with the arm.

It works well so far, but before I spend time and greenstuff building up the digits and surface texture, I decided to check whether the shape was right. Out came the graphic program, with which I drew the missing parts (see at left).

I’m afraid I’ve got a bit too much surface area. The version on the right shows the same part, minus some skin at the trailing edge starting from the shoulder and out to the middle.

Which one looks better? You tell me.

Progress on the Hive Fleet

There are new pics on the Hive Fleet Valken page (for the Lictor and Spore Mines). Slow but steady… Right now I’m only building the models. I’ve got a group of friends that are all doing the same with different armies, and when we get about 500 points done we’ll start playing once in a while (career and family don’t allow for much more).

Obviously, I’m starting from a standard battleforce box and building from there. I’m making my own Gargoyles, Biovore, Lictor and Spore Mines, so these will be in. I briefly considered making some Guards as well, but I haven’t heard much good about them… might as well save the Greenstuff (putty) for other creatures.

I may take my Gargoyle wings and tweak them further for an assault squad of Warriors. I’m thinking of starting the wing patterns over, anyway. I want them larger and with a different structure. I got more bat pictures, especially in flight, and they’re not quite right yet.

I have a Carnifex, of course. At first I wanted to build it as a melee monster, but once I read up on the stats I realized that a “Gunfex” (two ranged weapons) would be a much better choice. Not quite sure yet how I’m going to reverse the Barbed Strangler so that it hangs on the left side, though… (both guns are righties). More putty, I guess.

Hive Fleet News

There are some new pictures of the Hive Fleet online. Check them out and tell me what you think.

Sunday Night

Quiet weekend here, with lots of sleep and not much computer use. Got caught up on stuff on Saturday (added one pic in the Snowboard section), and started the new Baldur’s Gate II computer game on Etienne’s Xbox today. Not as visually nice as the first one, but there are more character choices and a new weapon craft system. Too bad the game still only takes two players — Martin was reduced to making comments on our fighting style from the peanut gallery. At least I get my favorite class/spell combination back (Cleric with Cure Wounds and Flame Strike).

Opportunity landed without problem. I followed the event in real time, and was delighted when it touched down right on the spot. Hopefully, the rover can avoid the Flash problems that are plaguing its twin on the other side of the planet…

Now just checking the Web, with the wife-to-be… Life is good.