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Games Workshop
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Games Workshop Group plc (often abbreviated to GW) is a British game production and retailing company. Games Workshop is one of the largest wargames companies in the world. The company is listed on the London Stock Exchange with the symbol GAW.
Overview/History
Founded in 1975 at 15 Bolingbroke Road, London, by John Peake, Ian Livingstone, and Steve Jackson (later known for their Fighting Fantasy gamebooks), Games Workshop was originally a manufacturer of wooden boards for games such as backgammon, mancala, Nine Men's Morris, and Go which later became an importer of the U.S.
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Encyclopedia
Games Workshop Group plc (often abbreviated to GW) is a British game production and retailing company. Games Workshop is one of the largest wargames companies in the world. The company is listed on the London Stock Exchange with the symbol GAW.
Overview/History
Founded in 1975 at 15 Bolingbroke Road, London, by John Peake, Ian Livingstone, and Steve Jackson (later known for their Fighting Fantasy gamebooks), Games Workshop was originally a manufacturer of wooden boards for games such as backgammon, mancala, Nine Men's Morris, and Go which later became an importer of the U.S. role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, and then a publisher of wargames and role-playing games in its own right, expanding from a bedroom mail-order company in the process.
In order to promote their business, run postal games, create a games club, and provide an alternative source for games news,the newsletter, Owl and Weasel, was founded in February 1975. This was superseded in June 1977 by White Dwarf.
From the outset, there was a clear stated interest in print regarding "progressive games," including computer gaming which led to the departure of traditionalist Peake in early 1976, and the loss of GW's main source of income.
However, having successfully obtained official distribution rights to Dungeons & Dragons and other TSR products in the UK, and maintaining a high profile by running games conventions, the business grew rapidly. It opened its first retail shop in April 1978.
In early 1979, Games Workshop provided the funding to found Citadel Miniatures in Newark-on-Trent. Citadel would produce the metal miniatures used in role-playing and table-top wargames. The Citadel name became synonymous with Games Workshop Miniatures, and continues to be a trademarked brand name used in association with them long after the Citadel company was absorbed into Games Workshop. For a time, Gary Gygax promoted the idea of TSR, Inc. merging with Games Workshop, until Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone backed out.
The company's publishing arm also released UK reprints of famous American RPGs such as Call of Cthulhu, Runequest, Traveller, and Middle-Earth Role Playing, which were expensive to import, having previously done so for Dungeons & Dragons from 1977.
In 1984, Games Workshop ceased distributing its products in the USA through Hobby Games Distributors and opened its Games Workshop (US) office. Games Workshop (US), and Games Workshop in general, went through a large growth phase in the late '80s, listing over 250 employees on the payroll by 1990.
Following a management buyout in December 1991, the company refocused on their most lucrative lines, namely their miniature wargame Warhammer Fantasy Battle (WFB) and Warhammer 40,000 (WH40K). The retail chain refocused on a younger, more family-oriented market. The change of direction was a great success and the company enjoyed growing profits, but the move lost the company some of its old fan base. The complaints of old customers led a breakaway group of GW employees to publish Fantasy Warlord in competition with GW, but this met with little success. Games Workshop expanded in Europe, the USA, Canada, and Australia, opening new branches and organizing events in each new commercial territory. The company was floated on the London Stock Exchange in October 1994. In October 1997, all UK-based operations were relocated to the current headquarters in Lenton, Nottingham. This site now houses the corporate HQ, the White Dwarf offices, mail order operations, production, and distribution facilities for Europe, and the creative teams behind the miniatures and games designs.
By the end of the decade, though, the company was having problems with falling profits, blamed on collectible card games such as Magic: The Gathering and Pokémon.
In recent years, Games Workshop has been attempting to create a dual approach that will appeal to both older customers while still attracting a younger audience. This has seen the creation of initiatives such as the "Fanatic" range that supports more marginal lines with a lower cost trading model (the Internet is used widely in this approach, to collect ideas and playtest reports). Games Workshop has also contributed to designing and making games and puzzles for the popular television series The Crystal Maze.
The release of Games Workshop's third core miniature wargame, The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game (LoTR SBG), in 2000 signalled their intention to capture a younger audience with a simple, yet effective and flexible combat system.
Other key innovations have been to harmonize their core products, and to branch out into new areas of growth. The acquisition of Sabretooth Games (card games), the creation of The Black Library (literature), and their work with THQ (computer games) have all enabled the company to diversify into new areas which have brought old gamers back into the fold; plus, it introduced the games to a whole new audience.
In the 25 years since the first edition of their flagship game Warhammer Fantasy Battle, the cost of some like-for-like game components have risen steeply. For example, a metal "Goblin Fanatic" miniature has increased from 40pto £2.67, an increase of 667%.
In early 2008 Playthings magazine reported that retailers selling Games Workshop's products had seen a reduction in sales due to market saturation and price increases.. In addition, the current fuel crisis has meant it is more expensive to export miniatures, and prices recently increased for metal miniatures and books on September 29, 2008. At the same time, the cost of metal miniatures has increased, as new technology for the creation of molds for plastic models has led to a significant decrease (up to a 50% price drop in some cases) in the retail cost of plastic miniatures. For example, five metal-plastic hybrid Chaos Knights were priced at 45 US dollars previously; the new all-plastic models are priced at 22 US dollars for the same five Chaos Knights.
Licensing
Alongside the UK publishing rights to several American role-playing games in the 1980s (including The Call of Cthulhu, Runequest and Middle-earth Role Playing ) Games Workshop also secured the rights to produce miniatures and/or games for several classic British science fiction properties such as Doctor Who and several characters from 2000 AD including Rogue Trooper and Judge Dredd. Alongside the rights to reprint ICE's Middle Earth Role Playing Citadel Miniatures acquired the rights to produce 28mm miniatures based on Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.
In conjunction with the promotion of The Lord of the Rings film trilogy in 2001, Games Workshop acquired the rights to produce a skirmish wargame and miniatures, using the movies' production and publicity art, and information provided by the original novels by J.R.R. Tolkien. (Although it should be noted that the current line uses 25mm scale). The rights to produce a role-playing game using the films' art and both the book and the movies' plots and characters were sold to another firm, Decipher, Inc.. Games Workshop was also able to produce a Battle of Five Armies game based on a culminating episode in The Hobbit, although this game was done in 10 mm scale.
Games Workshop Group PLC
Games Workshop has expanded into several divisions/companies producing products related to the Warhammer universe.
- Games Workshop now produce the tabletop wargames, Citadel miniatures, and the Specialist Games range.
- Forge World make complementary specialist resin miniatures and conversion kits.
- BL Publishing is the fiction, board game and roleplaying game publishing arm of Games Workshop. They comprise several separate imprints; The Black Library, Black Flame, Solaris Books, and Warhammer Ancient Battles publisher Warhammer Historical. Warp Artefacts used to produce merchandise based on Games Workshop's intellectual property; they are now folded into BLP as BL Merchandise.
The company is seen to have hard-to-reproduce, unique Intellectual Property, a good export record, and a distinct lack of quality competitors in their market.
The group reported sales of £136,650,000 sterling in 2005 and employs around 3200. Sales decreased for the fiscal year ending in May 2006. "For the fiscal year ended 28 May 2006, Games Workshop plc's revenues decreased 16% to £115.2M. Net income decreased 78% to £2M. Revenues reflect a decrease in sales from Continental Europe, United Kingdom, Asia Pacific, and The Americas geographic divisions"
In 2007 the group showed a pre-tax loss of over £2 million. after issuing profits warnings, closing non-profit-making stores, undertaking management restructuring and laying off staff in order to cut costs. According to CEO Tom Kirby the company had become complacent due to the relatively easy profits brought about by the popularity of their licensed Lord of the Rings products.
Miniature games
Games Workshop previously produced miniature figures via an associated, originally independent, company called Citadel Miniatures while the main company concentrated on retail. The distinction between the two blurred after Games Workshop stores ceased to sell retail products by other manufacturers, and Citadel was effectively merged back into Games Workshop.
Current Core Games
The following games are in production and widely available.
All of these games systems have had expansion rules and supplements for them, including Warhammer Realms: Lustria for Warhammer Fantasy Battle and the hugely successful Cities of Death and Apocalypse for Warhammer 40,000.
Specialist Games
Link to the dedicated page for the Specialist Games division.
These games are aimed at the "veteran" gamers. These are gamers who are more experienced in the core games produced by Games Workshop. This is because the rules and the complexity of tactics inherent in the systems are often more in-depth than the core games.
Warhammer Fantasy universe
Warhammer 40,000 universe
- Battlefleet Gothic - a game based around spacecraft combat
- Epic - a game for fighting larger battles with smaller (6 mm) miniatures.
- Inquisitor - a skirmish game using larger (54 mm) more detailed miniatures
- Necromunda - a squad-based skirmish game,located in the underhive of Necromunda
The Lord Of The Rings Strategy Battle Game universe
Forge World
Forge World has recently released its first in-house game:
Warhammer Historical Wargames
Out of print
Warhammer Fantasy universe
- Advanced HeroQuest
- Kerrunch - a simplified version of Blood Bowl.
- Man O' War - a game of naval combat in a fantasy world. Two expansions were also released, Sea of Blood and Plague Fleet.
- Mighty Warriors
- Warhammer Quest - a game of dungeon exploration and questing, effectively an updated version of Advanced HeroQuest.
Warhammer 40,000 universe
- Adeptus Titanicus (original game in the Epic series, which concerned combat between Titans.)
- Codex Titanicus - expansion rules for same
- Advanced Space Crusade
- Bommerz over da Sulphur River (Board game using Epic miniatures.)
- Epic 40,000 (precursor to Epic Armageddon, although some people still use the terms interchangeably, alongside Epic.)
- Gorkamorka (a skirmish game detailing gangs of orks)
- Digganob (an expansion for Gorkamorka)
- Lost Patrol
- Space Fleet (Simple spaceship combat game from before Battlefleet Gothic)
- Space Hulk (two editions were published, expansions below were for 1st edition)
- Deathwing (expansion boxed set)
- Genestealer (expansion boxed set)
- Space Hulk Campaigns (expansion book in both soft and hard-cover)
- Space Marine (original Epic-scale game concerning troops and infantry, 1st edition is a pair with Adeptus Titanicus, 2nd with Titan Legions)
- Titan Legions (effectively an expansion of Space Marine, though it extended the game system)
- Tyranid Attack
- Ultra Marines - introductory game in same series as Space Fleet
Licensed games
These games were not made by Games Workshop but used similar-style models, artwork and concepts. These games were made by mainstream toy companies and available in standard toy and department stores rather than just in Games Workshop and speciality gaming stores.
- Battlemasters (published by Milton Bradley)
- HeroQuest (published by Milton Bradley)
- Kellar's Keep (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- Return of the Witch Lord (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- Against the Ogre Horde (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- Wizards of Morcar (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- The Frozen Horror (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- The Magic of the Mirror (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- The Dark Company (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- HeroQuest Adventure Design Kit (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- Adventure Design Booklet (Expansion for Hero Quest)
- Space Crusade (published by Milton Bradley)
- Operation Dreadnought (Expansion for Space Crusade)
- Eldar Attack (Expansion for Space Crusade)
Role playing games
Several of the miniatures games (e.g. Inquisitor) involve a role playing element, however Games Workshop has in the past published role playing games set within the Warhammer universe. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay was first published in 1986 and returned to print with a new edition on March 29 2005. It passed to a third party publisher, Hogshead Press, where it remained for some years before being published by Black Industries, part of GW's fiction imprint BL Publishing.
Warhammer 40,000: Dark Heresy, the first of three proposed role playing games set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe was released in late January 2008 and sold out almost immediately.
Shortly after the release, Black Industries announced that they would cease producing role playing supplements in September 2008, in order to focus on the more profitable Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 novels. A later announcement indicated that the game would continue to be produced, however; production had simply been turned over to a third-party publisher, Fantasy Flight Games, instead.
Out of print
Board games
Games Workshop had a strong history in boardgames development, alongside the miniatures and RPGs. Confusingly, several may have had roleplaying elements, or for that matter had miniatures included or produced.
Licensing for an undisclosed proportion of Games Workshop's back catalogue of board games was transferred to Fantasy Flight Games as part of the same transaction which included Black Library's Role Playing Games. Fantasy Flight had already republished revised editions of a number of these games. At the time of the announcement, Black Library had only one boardgame in print, the 4th Edition of "Talisman".. Fantasy Flight have announced their intention to publish a "Revised 4th Edition" of Talisman but have not yet indicated their plans for the other games on the list.
Out of print
Computer games
Games Workshop licensed or produced several ZX Spectrum games in the early years, none of which were based in the usual Warhammer settings:
- Apocalypse (1983) based on the original boardgame
- Argent Warrior (1984) Illustrated adventure
- Battlecars (1984) 2 player racing game written in BASIC
- Blood Bowl (1995), published by MicroLeague
- Chaos (1985) multiplayer turn based "board" game, written by Julian Gollop
- D-Day (1985) based on the Normandy Landings
- HeroQuest (1991) based on the MB board game
- Journey's End (1985) text adventure
- Key Of Hope, The (1985) text adventure
- Ringworld (1984) text adventure
- Runestone (1986) text adventure
- Talisman (1985) multiplayer turn based "board" game
- Tower Of Despair (1985) text adventure
Many computer games have been produced by third parties based on the Warhammer universes owned by the firm. These include (miniature game they are based on is included in parentheses after the game name):
- Space Crusade (Space Crusade) and 1 sequel for the Amiga.
- Dark Omen (RTT game based on Warhammer Fantasy Battles)
- Shadow of the Horned Rat (RTT game based on Warhammer Fantasy Battles)
- Space Hulk (Space Hulk)
- Space Hulk - Vengeance of the Blood Angels (Space Hulk)
- Final Liberation (Epic 40,000 - Space Marines, Imperial Guard, Orks)
- Fire Warrior (Warhammer 40,000 - Tau)
- Dawn of War (Warhammer 40,000 - Space Marines, Orks, Eldar, Chaos Space Marines)
- Winter Assault (Add-on)(Armies same as Dawn of War, also: Imperial Guard)
- Dark Crusade (Stand-Alone)(Same as Winter Assault, also: Necrons and Tau)
- Soulstorm (Stand-Alone)(Same as Dark Crusade, also: Sisters of Battle and Dark Eldar)
- Chaos Gate (Warhammer 40,000 - Space Marines, Forces of Chaos)
- Rites of War (Warhammer 40,000 - Eldar, Space Marines, Tyranid)
- Mark of Chaos (Warhammer - The Empire, High Elves, Hordes of Chaos, Skaven, Orcs and Goblins, Dwarves)
- Battle March (Add-on)(Armies same as Mark of Chaos, also: Dark Elves)
- Squad Command, a turn based strategy game which focuses on a squad of ultramarines fighting chaos space marines.
- Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, a Warhammer MMORPG by Mythic Entertainment.
- Dawn of War II, a sequel to Dawn of War focusing less on base-building and more on squad tactics.
In development
As of January 2006, there are also some future games in development:
- Blood Bowl, a fantasy football style game being developed by Cyanide. Cyanide developed the Chaos League series of games, similar in format to Blood Bowl.
- Unnamed Warhammer 40,000 MMO by THQ. Information is found on the site that it is in development, but not releasing information.
- Unnamed Warhammer 40,000 game by THQ Australia. (Current work in progress name is Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine, the leaked alpha footage can be found on Youtube.)
Events
There are yearly Games Day events held by Games Workshop which feature the Golden Demon painting competition, news stands for upcoming models, sale stands as well as tables to play on.
Worldwide campaigns
Games Workshop has run numerous Worldwide Campaigns for its three core game sysyems. In each campaign, players are invited to submit the results of games played within a certain time period. The collation of these results provides a result to the campaign's scenario, and in the case of Warhammer, often goes on to impact the fictional and gameplay development of the fictional universe. Although in the past, campaign results had to be posted to the United Kingdom to be counted, the more recent campaigns have allowed result submission via the Internet.
Each Warhammer campaign has had a new codex published with the rules for special characters or "incomplete" army lists. Below are listed the Games Workshop Worldwide Campaigns (with the campaign's fictional universe setting in parentheses):
- 1995 - The Battle of Ichar IV (Warhammer 40,000)
- 2000 - Third War for Armageddon (Warhammer 40,000)
- 2001 - Dark Shadows (Warhammer)
- 2003 - Eye of Terror (Warhammer 40,000)
- 2004 - Storm of Chaos (Warhammer)
- 2005 - The War of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game)
- 2006 - The Fall of Medusa V (Warhammer 40,000)
- 2007 - The Nemesis Crown (Warhammer)
These Campaigns were run to promote its miniature wargames, and attracted interest in the hobby, particularly at gaming clubs, Hobby Centres and independent stockists. Forums for the community were created for each campaign (in addition to those on the main site), as a place to "swap tactics, plan where to post your results, or just chat about how the campaign is going." In some cases special miniatures were released to coincide with the campaigns; the promotional "Gimli on Dead Uruk-hai" miniature, for example, was available only through the campaign roadshows or ordering online. As a whole these events have been successful; one, for example, was deemed "a fantastic rollercoaster", with thousands of registered participants.
Magazines
Games Workshop's best known magazine is White Dwarf, which in the UK has now passed over 345 issues. Nine different international editions of White Dwarf are currently published, with different material, in five languages. Originally a more general roleplaying magazine, since around issue 100 White Dwarf has been devoted exclusively to the support of Games Workshop productions.
Games Workshop also published Fanatic Magazine in support of their Specialist Games range, but this was discontinued in print form after issue 10. Fanatic was preceded by a number of newsletters, devoted to the particular games. After the cancellation of Fanatic Magazine, an electronic form, known as "Fanatic Online" was published from Games Workshop's . With the re-launch in 2008 of Games Workshop's global web store, starting with a revamped US site, it was announced that the Specialist Games site would no longer be updated and that Specialist Games content would be published within the Games Workshop website proper; this has also meant the end of Fanatic Online.
There was also the Citadel Journal, intended as a "deeper" magazine for modelling enthusiasts and more experienced gamers. It often featured unusual rules and armies, and was occasionally used as an outlet for test rules. Under some editors, they also published fan fiction and fan art. This is no longer published.
For a brief period in the mid-1980s GW took over publication of the Fighting Fantasy magazine Warlock from Puffin Books. The magazine turned into a general introductory gaming magazine but was discontinued after issue 13.
There was also a fortnightly series called "Battle Games in Middle Earth", which came with a free Lord of the Rings SBG miniature. Though the miniatures were made by Games Workshop, the magazine itself was written by SGS (part of Games Workshop) and published by De Agostini. It was published in Ireland, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, France, Germany, Spain, Austria, Australia, New Zealand, and Poland. The magazine became more popular than the publishers had anticipated, and the deadline was extended several times and ended on Pack 91. Battle Games in Middle Earth was reported as being the biggest selling part works magazine in De Agostini's history.
Other media
Many novels, and comics have also been produced based on the Warhammer universes, published by the Black Library.
Games Workshop illustrators also published artbooks covering parts of their commissioned work for the company. Amongst them, one can find Adrian Smith and John Blanche.
External links
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