WizKids New Star Wars License

[Jack of Shadows]

OK,

For those who haven't already seen, it appears Wizkids has received the license to do a Pocket Model game for Star Wars akin to their Pirates of the Spanish Main game. There seems to be some awful clever word use to make the game sound like a collectable card game and not a miniatures wargame. Check out the link here for images:

http://www.wizkidsgames.com/wk_article.asp?cid=41243&frame=company

I don't know what WotC's take on this will be but the similiarity to the new Star Wars Starship Battles game makes me think that the lawyers are sharpening their pencils.

Jack

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I'm not a collectible miniature gaming guy, but it seems to me that punch-out foam starships ain't got nothing on detailed plastic minis.

 

[CaptainChaos]

I'm not a collectible miniature gaming guy, but it seems to me that punch-out foam starships ain't got nothing on detailed plastic minis.

For me they have one big advantage: price.

 

[D.Shaffer]

...Wow.
I bet there must have been one heck of a lot of lawyer wrangling for this one. I wonder if WotC/Hasbro have found out about it yet.

 

[mhensley]

Hasbro will end up owning Wizkids after this.

 

[kenobi65]

I'm not a collectible miniature gaming guy, but it seems to me that punch-out foam starships ain't got nothing on detailed plastic minis.

Actually, they aren't foam; they're hard styrene. They'll come on cards that are roughly the size, thickness, and consistency of credit cards; you punch 'em out and assemble them. Same "technology" and material that they use for the Pirates game. While the shapes themselves are somewhat limited (you're making semi-3D models out of 2D plastic cards), the printing is probably of higher quality than the paintjobs on the plastic minis.

Clearly, they argued that this is a card game, not a minis game, and are using that technicality in the license. Interesting that this makes the third company to have the Star Wars CCG license (after Decipher and WotC).

 

[Crothian]

Cool, I might have to get some and play

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

...Wow.
I bet there must have been one heck of a lot of lawyer wrangling for this one. I wonder if WotC/Hasbro have found out about it yet.

I imagine there were howls of outrage within seconds of it going up online.

 

[Crothian]

They probably knew ahead of time.

 

[Michael_R_Proteau]

I am sure Hasbro/WotC did the research before renewing their license with Lucasfilms/Lucasarts for the Star Wars license recently. If Wizkids is in a position to announce and have sample products avilable for display, they probably acquired the license before they started the R&D on the product to make sure they were not wasting the money spent in that process. If WotC was renewing their license, I am sure that part of the process would include researching what other licenses are out there for Star Wars themed games so they could do cost/benefit anlysis and decide if they wanted the license and what it provided for at the rate it cost. It's a pretty standard part of acquiring a license. If this comes as a surprise to WotC/Hasbro, then several someones have not been doing their job very well.
-M