Convention Report: New York Toy Fair 2008 – February 18 (News Scoop!)

By W. Eric Martin
February 19, 2008

I’ll continue with the general Toy Fair coverage in a later post or two, but I wanted to call out two announcements of note involving Z-Man Games and ElfinWerks.

First, Z-Man Games will release the second edition of Neuroshima Hex! (the one that Portal Publishing sold at Spiel 07) in English in Summer 2008. The retail price will be $50, and Zev Shlasinger is doing his own printing so the game shouldn’t have the miscut tiles that appeared in some copies sold at Spiel. The Doomsday Machine army given out as a preorder bonus at Spiel will not be included in the game as the designer feels that army has balance issues, but the Z-Man edition will include some kind of new material. If you have suggestions, Zev wants to hear them. (Note that he already nixed my proposal of real working lasers.)

Second, ElfinWerks – the English publisher of Kingsburg – will be involved with the distribution of Conflict of Heroes, designed by Uwe Eickert and published by Academy Games (not L2 Design Group as noted on BGG).

Conflict of Heroes is a WWII squad level wargame (both infantry and armor), and the base game is set on the Russian Front. William Niebling notes that the goal of the design is to combine elements of both wargames and Eurogames. Conflict of Heroes uses a command point system to regulate actions, and each action can bring a counteraction from the opponent, creating more interaction and immediacy. Aside from the base game, which will include an undecided number of scenarios at this point, there will be stand-alone expansions that can be played as mini-scenarios in their own right or combined with the base game. Scenarios are designed to be played in 60-90 minutes.

The components are on the level of modern Eurogames with 1” square, full-color chits with rounded corners and a linen finish and gameboards with reverse folds so as not to create gulleys in the midst of your battlefield. While the base game is for two players, rules will be included for team play of 2 vs. 2 and 3 vs. 3 with each player taking command of some of the resources. Conflict of Heroes will be available in April or May 2008 and retail for $70.

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There will also be a French version for Neuroshima Hex by a new editor (Iello). Posted by Olivier Reix on Feb 19, 2008 at 05:21 AM | #

Regarding Conflicts of heroes that must be really brand new information and publisher change, because all I read about stated L2 as publisher. Even the CoH webpage promenently shows the L2 logo as of 12:20 GMT+1 Posted by Klaus Knechtskern on Feb 19, 2008 at 06:21 AM | #

Klaus, yes, Will Niebling of ElfinWerks clarified that L2 is not the publisher and the L2 name was not listed on the info sheets that he showed me. Eric Posted by W. Eric Martin on Feb 19, 2008 at 10:52 AM | #

Art Lupinacci (of L2) has posted at CSW that Elfinworks is the European distributor while L2 is the North American distributor. http://talk.consimworld.com/WebX?14@394.5u2Gd4dNMcS.494@.ee6f163/28427 Posted by Rich Pardoe on Feb 19, 2008 at 02:14 PM | #

All right, I’ll have to clarify this with ElfinWerks as I thought I had the story straight. Eric Posted by W. Eric Martin on Feb 19, 2008 at 02:22 PM | #

Art posted as response of me asking about it ;-) Klaus Posted by Klaus Knechtskern on Feb 19, 2008 at 04:01 PM | #

Klaus, Academy Games is the publisher for Conflict of Heroes and ElfinWerks is acting as the rep in charge of distribution to dealers and wholesalers world wide. Academy Games is working closely with L2 Design Group, which will distribute the game to their pre-registered customers. Art Lupinacci has been very supportive in this initiative to guarantee the highest quality product possible. Sincerely, Uwe Posted by Uwe Eickert on Feb 19, 2008 at 09:21 PM | #

Thanks Uwe. I t was not clear that L2 indeed is not the publisher but the producer of CoH. Klaus Posted by Klaus Knechtskern on Feb 20, 2008 at 12:21 AM | #

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