Fantasy Flight Swings And ... Um ... I'm Not Sure

So did you all see this thing? Several sites I read tagged it immediately as a Good Thing and have been listing it as a sign that Fantasy Flight Games "Gets it," and that it's "Forward-Looking" and "Represents the future of the publisher/retailer relationship."

Yeah. I've seen all of these on various sites out there.

The Fantasy Flight Media Center - a locked-down iPad in a special case that store owners can use to help sell FFG product.

Running under the hood of the FFMC is a custom software solution, coded from scratch by FFG’s Interactive Department.

FFG has an Interactive Department? No wonder their games are so expensive! I wonder if the software will be available in the iPad App Store anytime in the near future, or if their iPad(s) were jailbroken to get the software to work (which could void their warranty with Apple - but that's okay. If there's a problem with the system, they can blame it on the retailer and force them to pay for a replacement, right?).

I'm all in favor of FFG selling product. Don't get me wrong. But if you go to their info page, and read their contract (PDF Link), it stops looking as good.

I sent the link to several local game stores, and received a lukewarm response.  Here's what one owner had to say:

So- let me get this straight...

I have to invest $1000 in FFG product and provide a WiFi connection at my own expense, just to be considered to receive one of these nifty devices- but it's not mine; it still belongs to FFG. Ok, fine. However, if it breaks or gets stolen, I additionally have to pay $649 as a replacement cost? And if I decide to return it, my $1000 investment is completely non-returnable and non-refundable, including unsold inventory?

Additionally, the device may or may not be equipped with the ability to record audio/ video of users and the surrounding area.

PLUS, according to the contract, if I don't have the volume up to a level that FFG deems appropriate for my store, the device could report me to FFG?

I see the potential downsides to me and my business, but where's the downside for FFG and their business? I can't find one.

It's all in the contract. And that assumes you get the Media Center in a reasonable amount of time:

8.0 No Guarantee of Delivery Time
APPLICANT understands that, even if FFG has qualified it for loan of one or more FFMC devices, and even if APPLICANT has purchased the required $999 restock order(s), that FFG cannot guarantee any firm delivery date for the delivery of the FFMC device to APPLICANT.

That's right - the store can spend $1k on FFG product (which may or may not sell), and then FFG can take as long as it wants to ship the iPad Media Center to the store.

Does this device have potential? Yes, it absolutely does. Is this device going to work for all stores? No.

I think this is one of those things that will help the bigger stores out, without doing much for the little guys. It's that $999 barrier to entry that causes the problem. Small stores can't necessarily fit $999 worth of product on the shelves (and in their storeroom). Just glancing at it, that's close to a full pallet's worth of product. Your typical pallet is 40"x48". The amount of product to reach their target dollar amount would be at least two layers of boxes tall. In the neighborhood of 3-4 feet tall, if we're talking about the "Big Box" games (Games the size of Twilight Imperium, for example).

Maybe if I had multiple locations for my theoretical game store, it'd be worth it - I could spread the storage across more than one location.

But I don't expect a huge rush for this thing.

Tannhäuser

Okay, I've now had a chance to play Tannhäuser, and I don't know if I like it.

Derek put it pretty well: It's like they should have included a bit more with the base set, rather than spacing them across multiple expansions.

It's a decent game, and it has potential to be a great game - but nothing in the basic set grabs at that potential.

There are a few rules questions after a first play - there nearly always are.

I'll probably decide whether I like it or not after a few more plays.

A Quick Brain Dump

I've finished the current batch of my editing project (for now), and ordered a French copy of Hell Dorado, so I should have enough time to provide a normal update, right?

Those of you who monitor my games played (and why don't all of you?) may spot some interesting things in there.

Or not.

Tomorrow, I get to play Tannhäuser for the first time. A lot of the reviews on the 'Geek have been negative because, "It wasn't what I was expecting." I've managed to refrain from pointing out that Fantasy Flight posted the rules on their website several months ago, so people should have had some idea of what they were getting themseles into.

Pizza Box Baseball is coming. I really enjoy Pizza Box Football, so I'm going to give it a shot, even though I don't like baseball.

... and that concludes this late-night brain dump. More focused posts to follow once I've had some rest.

GenCon 2007 Post No. 3: The Buzz and What I Came Home With

GenCon has traditionally been a big convention for releases. Publishers who could release early will frequently hold off until GenCon to release new product. Others will make big announcements at GenCon. Sometimes, you need to ask questions to get the news. Here's a quick overview of what I caught (which isn't even close to everything):

The BIG news this year was (and is) D&D 4E. Wizards did a great job keeping the news under wraps, and it caught a lot of people off guard. I expect I'll have more to say about this in the future, but for now just look around the internet. There's a LOT of buzz about this out there.

Fantasy Flight Games announced that they'd picked up the rights to a number of old Eon games, including Dune (Re-themed, because the Herbert Estate will not license the setting). FFG released Starcraft: The Board Game at GenCon, as well as Dust. Several of their small-box games were there as well, and they had demos of Tannhäuser.

As I mentioned a few posts back, it seems to be a good year for zombies and the apocalypse. Apophis Consortium released Shadow Nations (which I have ordered). There was a booth for Alpha/Omega: The Game (I may have the title wrong on that, but I have the URL correct). Eden Studios continues to sell All Flesh Must Be Eaten (which is a great game). Last Night On Earth: The Zombie Game was a bit of a sleeper hit - prior to the show, it was basically an unknown. I bought it. It's fun. I do think they were partially aided by their booth location - right next to WotC.

I picked up Torg: Revised and Expanded from West End Games. They're hoping to have Torg Second Edition (using a modified D6 system) for GenCon next year.

Margaret Weis Productions had their Battlestar Galactica RPG available for purchase - I picked it up. It uses the same system as their Serenity RPG, which will also be used in their Supernatural game and in their Demon Hunters game. It's the same system Sovereign Stone used before it went d20. They also had some pre-release quick-start goodies for Demon Hunters. Having enjoyed the films, I had to pick these up.

The Lizardmen army for Battleground: Fantasy Warfare was released (and sold out) at GenCon. I missed it, but will get it at my local game store once it hits distribution.

On the Games Workshop Front (via some of their third-party/smaller publishers), Talisman was available to the first 50 people to reach the booth each day. I'm not sure if the Warhammer 40k RPG (Dark Heresy) was available or was just being demoed, but I'm certainly interested.

I haven't followed White Wolf for a while, but I couldn't miss the lines for their new version of Changeling.

And, finally, Mr. Jack saw its official US release. And sold like mad. It's a good game and I hope it continues to sell like mad.