Sunday 16 January 2011

Wargames Factory RIP?

Unfortunately I didn't spend as much time painting this morning as planned as I was somewhat distracted by the news (or more correctly lack of) about US plastics producer Wargames Factory.

It appears there is some sort of corporate takeover going on with what looks like is going to result in a train wreck. A takeover announcement has been made by one party which has been refuted to some extent by another. The worse thing is that some customers have paid money for product they still haven't received...

Quite what the future is is unclear, but it doesn't look good from the battle that is going on. From the various forums it seems the situation could get worse with IP rights being owned by one party, the moulds by another. All in all it's a shame as the company had some promising releases lined up including classic Orcs, Amazons and Spartans (all of which appealed to me). Whilst they may not be up to Perry standards model wise you can't deny WF tried to produce something different.


From a personal point of view there is the issue of model availability for projects underway. I probably have enough Celts having picked up a couple of boxes of cavalry last week and I have ordered some German cavalry of eBay last night for use as Republican Roman auxiliaries. I'm unsure whether to stock up on Ancient German warband boxes. They were a third force I was planning once the Celts and Romans were done as they could fight both the Republican and EIR, no sure what to do.


The other project is Saul's Shock Troops. He has two boxes, so that's 36 troopers which is enough for a platoon, but there are no heavy weapons. WF were planning them but working on a worse case scenario that we never see them perhaps I should get an extra box in and use them for conversions. I'll have a ponder as I watch the footy...

4 comments:

  1. Oh man, this is dire news indeed. These guys are coming around to the position of being excllent on all fronts; economical, great sculpts, variety...I truly hope they get it all worked out.

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  2. This is disappointing news, I really liked the range of historical miniatures that they were developing. Good luck to you sorting out the problems this will cause for your projects already underway.

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  3. This is the worst news! If Tony Reid and Co. get booted I don't think that I could still support WF. I'll probably switch back to metal.

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  4. I started to read the report on TMP, but it all seamed a little sordid, the Open Letter not really explaining the whole situation and I am afraid that I lost interest!

    The ranges put out by WF are not really to my taste and so I would not expect to be a customer, but as stated above - the story is certainly developing and I believe will run and run.

    Tony
    http://dampfpanzerwagon.blogspot.com/

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