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Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
Which is, totally impossible.
A Warhammer 40k movie would be at least 7 hours long, and it's protagonist would be ether be a fanatically racist, xenophonic, ultra religious zealot bent on purging the unpure by committing genocide and mass murder (general Imperials), or we do the same except it's more elegant and lacking in the fanaticism (Eldar). That or we do daemon worshiping pillagers who rape, slaughter and set fire to everything in site, or we have a film about beings that make people's minds explode by the sheer thought of their existence. Or we do a movie about....etc....wedidn'tstartthefire.mp3.
What id do is make the movie based on an imperial guardsmen fighting a rebellion on another imperial world and committing untold horrors and crimes etc and at the begining he is all fine with it and things its for the best but starts to question what he is doing etc and the plot can based on that kind of moral bases. Doesnt need to be about marines or anything as in my opinion those movies would fail horribly. Keep it human based and give it depth and story (less fighting) and i would love to watch it. Or even make a big push on to the futility of what the imperium is trying to acheive etc.
I think if its a thoughtful insiting movie not a hack and slash it would be great.
^^
I think orks would be good for da comedy as da orks ar da best!
Despite being a murderous race of monsters who see amusement in basic brutality and cruel acts.
Again, a 40k movie is simply impossible to properly do since no real relatable protagonist is available. Any movie attempt would end up like the Star Wars Prequels.
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
Which is, totally impossible.
A Warhammer 40k movie would be at least 7 hours long, and it's protagonist would be ether be a fanatically racist, xenophonic, ultra religious zealot bent on purging the unpure by committing genocide and mass murder (general Imperials), or we do the same except it's more elegant and lacking in the fanaticism (Eldar). That or we do daemon worshiping pillagers who rape, slaughter and set fire to everything in site, or we have a film about beings that make people's minds explode by the sheer thought of their existence. Or we do a movie about....etc....wedidn'tstartthefire.mp3.
This, annoyingly, is pretty much the case.
To get anyone to understand wtf is going on in the film, somebody would have to explain the setting. In quite some detail.
And then convince everyone that it's okay to have a character who "fanatically racist, xenophonic, ultra religious zealot bent on purging the unpure by committing genocide and mass murder", and is still to be considered the "good guy".
We could go with following an IG's struggle to survive, but he'd still be incredibly racist and xenophobic, whose answer to all problems is a detpack, a lasgun and cold steel.
Start with a TV series, focus on humanity (i.e. overpopulation, viral underworld, cannibalism, hivecities), and have movie tie-ins...
I remember being introduced to WH40k fully through the PS2 game Fire Warrior, you fight Imperial Guard most the game and when you finally see a Space Marine, it's like "holy gak" that thing is huge and scary.
They would want capture this for viewers for the first time, like isolated Tyranid horror (alien movie, ripley), infectious chaos heresy, wise but extremely radical and racist eldar, I think humans have more of a Xenophobia before racism and would team up (have before on many occasions, sometimes without consent) with The Eldar if they could get passed both the phobia and Eldar racism. Necrons are pretty freaking scary as in terminator armegeddons, what you basically have is near-infinite possibilities for sci-fi movies and TV series with this Universe. I've never seen anything like it.... Orks would be saved for a movie (WAAAARGH, and so would the Tau Empire (another possible human ally ignoring the stupid xenophobia) most likely... I think Dark Eldar are probably the only race that is off limits to the public. The whole raping and pillaging by the chaos, can be referenced (they dont have to cover everything) kinda like the Reavers from firefly, and let them focus on the mutilation, mutation, cannibalism and heresy...
But yeah, deffs use a Hive City, starting with humanity and perhaps the underbelly, then branch out from there slowly implementing other races and movies imo...
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2013/11/13 21:11:17
"The traitors shall fall; the Emperor granted us a vision of triumph."
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
Which is, totally impossible.
A Warhammer 40k movie would be at least 7 hours long, and it's protagonist would be ether be a fanatically racist, xenophonic, ultra religious zealot bent on purging the unpure by committing genocide and mass murder (general Imperials), or we do the same except it's more elegant and lacking in the fanaticism (Eldar). That or we do daemon worshiping pillagers who rape, slaughter and set fire to everything in site, or we have a film about beings that make people's minds explode by the sheer thought of their existence. Or we do a movie about....etc....wedidn'tstartthefire.mp3.
What id do is make the movie based on an imperial guardsmen fighting a rebellion on another imperial world and committing untold horrors and crimes etc and at the begining he is all fine with it and things its for the best but starts to question what he is doing etc and the plot can based on that kind of moral bases. Doesnt need to be about marines or anything as in my opinion those movies would fail horribly. Keep it human based and give it depth and story (less fighting) and i would love to watch it. Or even make a big push on to the futility of what the imperium is trying to acheive etc.
I think if its a thoughtful insiting movie not a hack and slash it would be great.
^^
I think orks would be good for da comedy as da orks ar da best!
Despite being a murderous race of monsters who see amusement in basic brutality and cruel acts.
Again, a 40k movie is simply impossible to properly do since no real relatable protagonist is available. Any movie attempt would end up like the Star Wars Prequels.
At Least let us dream! Even if we know this will never happen!
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
Which is, totally impossible.
A Warhammer 40k movie would be at least 7 hours long, and it's protagonist would be ether be a fanatically racist, xenophonic, ultra religious zealot bent on purging the unpure by committing genocide and mass murder (general Imperials), or we do the same except it's more elegant and lacking in the fanaticism (Eldar). That or we do daemon worshiping pillagers who rape, slaughter and set fire to everything in site, or we have a film about beings that make people's minds explode by the sheer thought of their existence. Or we do a movie about....etc....wedidn'tstartthefire.mp3.
This, annoyingly, is pretty much the case.
To get anyone to understand wtf is going on in the film, somebody would have to explain the setting. In quite some detail.
And then convince everyone that it's okay to have a character who "fanatically racist, xenophonic, ultra religious zealot bent on purging the unpure by committing genocide and mass murder", and is still to be considered the "good guy".
We could go with following an IG's struggle to survive, but he'd still be incredibly racist and xenophobic, whose answer to all problems is a detpack, a lasgun and cold steel.
Start with a TV series, focus on humanity (i.e. overpopulation, viral underworld, cannibalism, hivecities), and have movie tie-ins...
I remember being introduced to WH40k fully through the PS2 game Fire Warrior, you fight Imperial Guard most the game and when you finally see a Space Marine, it's like "holy gak" that thing is huge and scary.
They would want capture this for viewers for the first time, like isolated Tyranid horror (alien movie, ripley), infectious chaos heresy, wise but extremely radical and racist eldar, I think humans have more of a Xenophobia before racism and would team up (have before on many occasions, sometimes without consent) with The Eldar if they could get passed both the phobia and Eldar racism. Necrons are pretty freaking scary as in terminator armegeddons, what you basically have is near-infinite possibilities for sci-fi movies and TV series with this Universe. I've never seen anything like it.... Orks would be saved for a movie, and so would the Tau Empire most likely... I think Dark Eldar are probably the only race that is off limits to the public. The whole raping and pillaging by the chaos, can be referenced (they dont have to cover everything) kinda like the Reavers from firefly, and let them focus on the mutilation, mutation, cannibalism and heresy...
But yeah, deffs use a Hive City, starting with humanity and perhaps the underbelly, then branch out from there slowly implementing other races and movies imo...
Hmm...
That could work. Inter-human drama in a Hive setting.
Stick in some plot involving the PDF training for invasions/uprising etc.
Have a small heretical uprising be defeated by the PDF in series 1...
Start with a TV series, focus on humanity (i.e. overpopulation, viral underworld, cannibalism, hivecities), and have movie tie-ins...
I remember being introduced to WH40k fully through the PS2 game Fire Warrior, you fight Imperial Guard most the game and when you finally see a Space Marine, it's like "holy gak" that thing is huge and scary.
They would want capture this for viewers for the first time, like isolated Tyranid horror (alien movie, ripley), infectious chaos heresy, wise but extremely radical and racist eldar, I think humans have more of a Xenophobia before racism and would team up (have before on many occasions, sometimes without consent) with The Eldar if they could get passed both the phobia and Eldar racism. Necrons are pretty freaking scary as in terminator armegeddons, what you basically have is near-infinite possibilities for sci-fi movies and TV series with this Universe. I've never seen anything like it.... Orks would be saved for a movie, and so would the Tau Empire most likely... I think Dark Eldar are probably the only race that is off limits to the public. The whole raping and pillaging by the chaos, can be referenced (they dont have to cover everything) kinda like the Reavers from firefly, and let them focus on the mutilation, mutation, cannibalism and heresy...
But yeah, deffs use a Hive City, starting with humanity and perhaps the underbelly, then branch out from there slowly implementing other races and movies imo...
Hmm...
That could work. Inter-human drama in a Hive setting.
Stick in some plot involving the PDF training for invasions/uprising etc.
Have a small heretical uprising be defeated by the PDF in series 1...
Have Series 2 see an eldar pirate raid....
Then expand.
Yeah totally man, personally I would start him (origin) as an upbeat "street rat" who fights to survive in the depths of the hive city underworld, he makes many contacts in that environment, and has fought in many gangs. This is pre-existing history about the protagonist which is revealed over tiem as we learn more about him (and he meets old contacts from the underworld during his service), the first season would start where he is recruited by a secret headhunting agency (lore tie in? not sure...) for the Imperial Guard PDF....
Deschain wrote: No matter what you do, it will be dark, the universe is dark and that's okay...
Just don't make the pilot toooooo dark or it will the guy the way of Firefly...
Mmm. You need some humour in there, else there will be nothing to compare the grimdarkness to.
Yeah, of course, you would drip it in when you focus on the characters, like how The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones have done it successfully, as well as Breaking Bad (yes I just quoted 3 of the best shows out atm)
Which are really dark worlds...
This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2013/11/13 21:27:02
"The traitors shall fall; the Emperor granted us a vision of triumph."
Azazelx wrote: 1) Not that important. The game lives on it's visuals, not it's ruleset.
Among its current audience, yes. But that's because 40k's current audience consists of the small minority of people who love the fluff/models enough to put up with the awful rules. For 40k to get any kind of mass appeal they need to dump the unprofessional garbage and make a good set of rules.
I'm not sure what you define as "mass appeal" here. Pick me the best, tightest, most balanced set of wargaming rules out there. More popular than 40k? Nope? What attracts us to 40k in the first place? The rules or the visuals?
3) The figures are the money makers - they've just jacked up the prices of the rules and supplements to match since they're nearing the point of no return on model prices.
The idea with that is to make the rules free/cheap to drive sales of the models, not to just increase model prices. GW would take a loss on the rules (though not much of one since most people willing to settle for a downloaded pdf of the rules probably just pirate the books anyway) but make up for it by increasing sales of their high-profit models.
I'm sure can very easily get all of the current rules for free in under an hour. Many, many teenagers and people in their 20s possess these same skills - particularly those who would be into stuff like 40k. The ones that don't I'm sure can work a USB drive. Now, while I like to buy the books, I do that because I like books. I'm about to get the Horus Heresy FWbooks which are expensive but also easily ...aquired online. The books and even the BRBs used to be reasonably priced. With diminishing space to jack up model prices, they've done it to books instead. Dropping the book prices would sell more books to the converted, but it wouldn't change the fact that the models are the big profit-makers.
But wargaming or GW will never come close to touching videogame levels of popularity or market penetration. Compare the price of an XBox 360/PS3 over the last year or two with a couple of games to getting started in 40k/WFB beyond the DV/IoB boxes...
That's because you're defining "wargaming" as "GW-style wargaming". Other games are much cheaper to play, either because they use fewer models (Warmachine/Hordes, X-Wing, Infinity, etc) or cheaper models (historicals). For any non-GW game the time and effort to build an army are going to be much bigger limiting factors than the price.
No. I'm not.
I'm including everything from 40k to Crossfire. X-Wing to DBM. Bolt Action to Johnny Reb. Combine them all, then compare them to XBox or PlayStation's market size (let alone them combined, with Nintendo on top and the current handhelds for good measure).
da001 wrote: W40k should be as big as X-Men, Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. 25 years ago they were all of them nerdy things. W40h has stayed the same while the rest are really popular. I am still stunned whenever I meet someone and he (even more if it´s a she) knows who Magneto, Sauron or Darth Vader are. Time changes, the new generation is full of nerds.
So what is holding w40k down?
1) The lack of a properly playtested rule set. The fact that many things do not work as they are written. The absurd complexity of the basic rules, that involves owning many books.
2) The total lack of balance. Four flavors:
2.1: Attention Balance. It is not fun if you MUST be a Space Marine or become a second class player. I know lots of people that quit this game because of that.
2.2: Internal Balance: useless units together with overpowered ones. Also notice the lack of effort put into fixing the balance once it is clear it is broken. Vendettas, Pyrovores, Mandrakes, Flayed Ones, Heldrakes are broken, everybody knows it yet GW does nothing.
2.3: External Balance: a well known problem. Codex Creep is not fun. Seeing the Sisters of Battle not getting it because nobody in the studio cares is even worse.
2.4: Background Balance. This is getting worse and worse. There was a time when Codexes were about the faction in the title. Know most of them includes lots of stuff about how awesome Space Marines are.
3) A company trying to protect the Intellectual Property (the setting) that makes this game big. GW does nothing of the sort. They do significant changes in the setting without caring at all and waste time and money in ridiculous legal battles that fill many players with shame.
4) Stop trying to make this a game for 12 old boys. It is not working. It is too dark, and every change in this regard makes more people quit the game.
5) Price. If you want something to be popular, it must be cheap. Some starter armies are needed. Free stuff, special offers...
Yeah, out of those, I'll agree with 5, but that just deals with relative popularity within the niche of fantasy wargaming. (Which they still lead in, as it happens).
The franchises that you mention above all had a lot of marketing and some rather popular films made of them. But before that, with he exception of Star Wars that started as a film (that was very much right place right time) they were all successful and solid franchises for a long, long time - longer and more successful than GW.
The success of the original Star Wars gave Lucas enough power (money) to control the way his franchise was marketed. Also, 5 more films and a pretty fanatical fanbase that grew up with it. The first trilogy were also (mostly) very good kids' movies.
Long before the films, the LotR books and Tolkien in general were perpetual always-stocked high-sellers in bookshops, along with CS Lewis and Tolstoy, Orwell, etc as some of the books you can always find in print and in any bookshop that's not one of those OOP discount book clearance houses. It's also been the foundation of pretty much the entire fantasy gaming industry (and yes, I'm well aware of Moorcock, et al). Tolkien has always been more than a "nerdy thing", even if not incredibly well-known outside of literature. Then they made some well-received movies....
Marvel Comics. They've been around for a long time. I shouldn't have to give any details or examples here. But Wolverine who has become the touchstone for the X-Men is pretty much the perpetual teenage-boy fantasy. Also, the first film being good helped a LOT, since before the films came out, the X-Men were pretty unknown outside of comic-geek circles who tented to know Bat-Super-Spider-Man, Captain America, Wonder Woman and The Hulk - and not much else.
Games Workshop are a relatively small company that has sold toy soldiers for about 35 years, and have been about 4 distinctly different companies in that time. They don't advertise outside of their own in-house publication, and, aside from video games don't really licence their IP, which they have continued to grip so tightly that they have stayed an influence on wider creative types (I wonder how many people at Blizzard own or owned some Space Marines?) but remained relatively small. Did you know they vetoed multiplayer options from being included in their early licenced RTS-genre games? "The Tabletop game is our multiplayer." An myopic aggressive shark in a niche pond. Quite good at what they do, which is make models, but not so good at bringing that to a wider audience...
Finally, "really popular" is a relative thing. Sure, geek/nerd culture is a much bigger thing nowadays, since it ties in very broadly with video games and superhero movies and twilight books and Star Trek and on and on. Since we seem to have deep wallets and fit that 18-35 male demographic so well, things like Big Bang Theory came out of that, which has helped even more to "mainstream" the idea that geek culture is a thing that exists in a wider sense. But still, it's niche as hell compared to something like sports. The main difference is that "normal" people are somewhat familiar with the idea of people that are heavily into games and superheroes and so forth not all being freaks and weirdos.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Skriker wrote: I remember when ESPN televised Magic the Gathering tournies hoping to cash in on the popularity of the game and not only was it horribly painful to watch and listen to, they also discovered that even as new a concept as the CCG was at the time, and how popular MtG was at the time as well, it still was no where near popular enough to warrant televising the tournements and thankfully the coverage died a quick death. Imagine accouncers calling plays and actions in a Magic game as if it were a sports contest and then realize that the reality was even worse than it sounds in your head.
Oh, my....
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
The fluff is there, the problem is the movie would have to be done "right". The best way they could conceivably do this is from the eyes of a imperial guardsman. People could relate to that. The movie would need to be done with live actors.
CGI in a setting set in the 40th millennium would be inevitable, but should be limited wherever possible. To often directors go way overboard on CGI & mistake "lots of explosions" for a good movie.
If they could capture "grimdark", it could change cinema forever & we would see a revival like never before.
Dwarf LotR? Star Wars? Star Trek?
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2013/11/13 22:12:19
Games Workshop had the opportunity to expand the fan base with the Space Hulk board game, those miniatures were AMAZING and could of sold decently in toy stores and supermarkets.
could start with some sort of PDF on a fringe world, where the xenophobia and racism are much lesser. Maybe a independent human world? Have them fight off some alien force? Greenskins? Perhaps have them stuck between fading loyalty to the emperor and a Tau empire force trying to turn them to the "greater good". The PDF would provide a good middle ground, the empire of course would have the whole grim dark thing going, and the Tau would be a more "light" force to give a contrast to the "grim dark" of the empire.
I see a lot of people here talking about a movie or a TV series... it could work.
As long as it has a good script, as long as it involves humans people can relate to, as long as it conveys what makes the setting unique...
What about videogames? The Dawn of War series did a lot to make the game more popular.
@Azazelx: good post.
‘Your warriors will stand down and withdraw, Curze. That is an order, not a request. (…) When this campaign is won, you and I will have words’
Rogal Dorn, just before taking the beating of his life.
from The Dark King, by Graham McNeill.
The thing that got me interested was White Dwarf with their play by play battle reports and pics of the action.
And I remember one being the SoB v an ork mek mob fighting it out for a small town.
So why can't there be a televised game of a themed battlefield with terrain and all?
It could be sort of like that time commander (I think that's the name?) from T.V where they did the major historic battles. But instead have the 40k ones based on say the battle for Terra during the HH, all the way up to the 13 Black Crusade so as to introduce the fluff side of the game also.
Come into my web, said the spider to the fly.
Come rest your wings, and let us talk eye to eye.
For I am a spider, and you are the fly. Now that you are here, let us sit, and say hi.
But I have have no morsel to share, nor anything to eat. But wait, what is that stickiness upon your feet.
Ah now I have you, now I can eat. Now I can enjoy you, or store you as meat.
For I am the spider, and you are the fly. How else could it have gone, between one such as you, and one such as I.
xruslanx wrote: And a high profile, well made, 40k film would be phenominally helpful. preferably inquisitor as that would have the most potential for an actual storyline rather than 'there is only war!'
Kind of like how the Hobbit gave a huge boost to GW's LOTR games and made them a mainstream thing?
Also, 40k is never going to have a good movie. One of the biggest reasons why 40k is a good setting for a game is that it's a blob of generic scifi archetypes mixed together so that no matter what army you make you can find a place for it in the setting. The downside is that 40k has very little to offer as a film, there just aren't any compelling stories or themes to work with and everything is hopelessly generic. All you'd get is another forgettable big-budget action movie with lots of battle scenes to entertain you for a couple hours but not much else. And if that's your goal then why bother with the 40k license? You can make the exact same film without giving GW a share of the profit, and the 40k brand name isn't big enough to bring in a lot of customers that wouldn't already pay to see it.
Well the original story line of Pilanius would have been pretty awesome. Overall the most unique things in 40K are also incredibly creepy; aka cherubims, adeptus mechanicum or too involved; dark eldar.
Pilanius? Really?
What story is there? He was just an ordinary soldier who happened to have the big, brass ovaries to tell a giant in powered armour "You shall not pass!", then got shot for it. Not exactly Film of the Year material.
You ever read Legion of the Damned? While it wouldn't make for a movie that would go down in the American Library of Congress archives, it'd reap in a lot of money if released as a Summer Blockbuster or a winter film.
The problem though isn't Warhammer being generic (which it isn't too much- while it "draws" from any fictions, it gives the final product a very unique feel compared to the material it draws from), it's that there's so much material to read through before you understand it. W40K isn't something you just pick up and 'hey I now understand everything', it involves trawling through mass amounts of fluff to get a good understanding of it. W40K would be hard to make a good movie off because unless you're marketing it to fans, it will take a long time to explain everything to the audience. I mean, we're talking about spending a full hour explaining everything to the audience. Unless you have a space marine serf or something serve as the avatar for the audience, eh, I just don't see how it could work.
“There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.”
Psienesis wrote: A television series would be a more-attainable goal than a Hollywood blockbuster. Mainly because the compromises required to make a Hollywood film would make a 40K film not a 40K film, which would piss off the pre-existing fans.. A true 40K film will only attract people who are already aware of the hobby.
TV can be done fairly cheaply.
Any resourceful fellows want to put together a kickstarter?
I have no idea how they would do a Hive City tho, would have to find some pretty grungy streets...
Detroit.
It is best to be a pessimist. You are usually right and, when you're wrong, you're pleasantly surprised.
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
No. 40k is really nothing special. It's adequate as a game setting and is certainly better developed than GW's competition, but when you consider science fiction as a whole it's hopelessly generic. And the setting's primary appeal is the large-scale conflicts, while movies need character-driven stories. A 40k movie would be an entertaining two hours of big-budget action scenes, and might even make a net profit, but in the long run it would be forgotten in the sea of big-budget action movies the movie industry is busy throwing out as fast as they can.
If they could capture "grimdark", it could change cinema forever & we would see a revival like never before.
"Grimdark" is not something GW invented, and it certainly isn't going to be a major revolution in movies. At best a "grimdark" movie could improve on the "grimdark" genre a bit and maybe even make it onto those "top X scifi movies" lists.
Azazelx wrote: I'm not sure what you define as "mass appeal" here. Pick me the best, tightest, most balanced set of wargaming rules out there. More popular than 40k? Nope? What attracts us to 40k in the first place? The rules or the visuals?
Again, 40k's current market is the people who love the visuals enough to overcome the awful rules. But that's a limited market, and one that is probably exploited as much as possible right now. Expanding beyond the current market requires better rules because someone who isn't already drawn in by the visuals is going to toss the game in the trash once they spend a few minutes trying to figure out how to play it and failing miserably.
Now, 40k isn't going to get mass appeal just because GW fixes the rules. It's a necessary condition, not a sufficient one.
Dropping the book prices would sell more books to the converted, but it wouldn't change the fact that the models are the big profit-makers.
Again, you're making the mistake of looking at GW's current customer base instead of why people don't buy GW games. Right now the rulebooks are a major barrier to entry, you're spending $100+ just for the rules of the game before you buy a single model. A potential customer who isn't already determined to buy the game is going to be reluctant to pay that $100 just to see if they like the game enough to spend another $500 for the models. If GW instead released the rules (including codices) as a free download everyone who is even slightly interested could read them and (hopefully) be interested enough to take the next step.
No. I'm not.
I'm including everything from 40k to Crossfire. X-Wing to DBM. Bolt Action to Johnny Reb. Combine them all, then compare them to XBox or PlayStation's market size (let alone them combined, with Nintendo on top and the current handhelds for good measure).
I was replying to your comment about prices, not market size. Wargaming is only more expensive than video games if you define "wargaming" as "GW-style wargaming". Other wargames (X-Wing, Infinity, etc) are much cheaper than video games. You can buy a whole X-Wing or Infinity army for the price of a couple new releases, and a nice collection of armies (in multiple systems even) for the price of the hardware to play those games on. Price is only a barrier to entry for GW games because of GW's unbelievable idiocy in making it a barrier to entry.
There is no such thing as a hobby without politics. "Leave politics at the door" is itself a political statement, an endorsement of the status quo and an attempt to silence dissenting voices.
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
No. 40k is really nothing special. It's adequate as a game setting and is certainly better developed than GW's competition, but when you consider science fiction as a whole it's hopelessly generic. And the setting's primary appeal is the large-scale conflicts, while movies need character-driven stories. A 40k movie would be an entertaining two hours of big-budget action scenes, and might even make a net profit, but in the long run it would be forgotten in the sea of big-budget action movies the movie industry is busy throwing out as fast as they can.
If they could capture "grimdark", it could change cinema forever & we would see a revival like never before.
"Grimdark" is not something GW invented, and it certainly isn't going to be a major revolution in movies. At best a "grimdark" movie could improve on the "grimdark" genre a bit and maybe even make it onto those "top X scifi movies" lists.
Azazelx wrote: I'm not sure what you define as "mass appeal" here. Pick me the best, tightest, most balanced set of wargaming rules out there. More popular than 40k? Nope? What attracts us to 40k in the first place? The rules or the visuals?
Again, 40k's current market is the people who love the visuals enough to overcome the awful rules. But that's a limited market, and one that is probably exploited as much as possible right now. Expanding beyond the current market requires better rules because someone who isn't already drawn in by the visuals is going to toss the game in the trash once they spend a few minutes trying to figure out how to play it and failing miserably.
Now, 40k isn't going to get mass appeal just because GW fixes the rules. It's a necessary condition, not a sufficient one.
Dropping the book prices would sell more books to the converted, but it wouldn't change the fact that the models are the big profit-makers.
Again, you're making the mistake of looking at GW's current customer base instead of why people don't buy GW games. Right now the rulebooks are a major barrier to entry, you're spending $100+ just for the rules of the game before you buy a single model. A potential customer who isn't already determined to buy the game is going to be reluctant to pay that $100 just to see if they like the game enough to spend another $500 for the models. If GW instead released the rules (including codices) as a free download everyone who is even slightly interested could read them and (hopefully) be interested enough to take the next step.
No. I'm not.
I'm including everything from 40k to Crossfire. X-Wing to DBM. Bolt Action to Johnny Reb. Combine them all, then compare them to XBox or PlayStation's market size (let alone them combined, with Nintendo on top and the current handhelds for good measure).
I was replying to your comment about prices, not market size. Wargaming is only more expensive than video games if you define "wargaming" as "GW-style wargaming". Other wargames (X-Wing, Infinity, etc) are much cheaper than video games. You can buy a whole X-Wing or Infinity army for the price of a couple new releases, and a nice collection of armies (in multiple systems even) for the price of the hardware to play those games on. Price is only a barrier to entry for GW games because of GW's unbelievable idiocy in making it a barrier to entry.
I'll real quick point out here that something being 'generic' (which more or less doesn't exist as media goes) won't prevent it at all selling in theater or becoming big. Star Wars, one of the largest Sci Fi brands of all damn time that is an absolute monster as the franchise goes- is a fairly generic sci fi world drawn heavily from sci fi from the forties and fifties.The reason why people forget about this is that despite Lucas ripping from a lot of material, he managed to make it iconic enough that people completely forgot about this and simply left gawking who then bought into it. I think the reason why W40K feels 'generic' isn't that it draws from a lot of other material (nearly everyone does), but that GW has yet to actually meld it all together. The only factions that fit well as a style together are the Imperium and Chaos. They're Gothic Dystopian Sci Fi mixed with some Lovecraft. The other factions seem more like they were more tossed in, and despite being extremely old, the Orks, Necrons, Tau, Tyranids, and even the Eldar have yet to be smoothed out. While the Imperium and Chaos have a very smooth molding that work well together, the others feel kinda thrown in and don't seem to be coherent. Less 'here's another faction stylized to fit with everything' and more 'hey guys, you know what we need? Elves!'.
It doesn't help either that the Black Library is practically singuraly devoted to humans (Loyal and Chaos), yet barely touches on the xenos, or assigns bad authors to do so. Despite them being there from the start, I've never really felt the other factions fit as well together as the Imperium and Chaos. They just feel copypasted into W40K rather than a developed faction. The only iffy one is the Eldar, as I do feel they fit somewhat, just they need to be molded more. Meanwhile, the Tau and Necrons are so heavily different it's a bit jarring to go between them.
It probably results from W40K being first and foremost, a tabletop game. They need to be different, but in order to sell to a larger consumer base, they need to make them fit better. Anyone else understand me or feel the same way?
“There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.”
Well... because they are. 40K started out as Fantasy In Space. So you have "good guys" (Imperium), "bad guys" (Chaos), Elves (Eldar), Orcs (Orks), Dwarves (Squats) and, in a few mentions, mixtures of one or two (like the half-Eldar Ultramarines Librarian). Then you got "aliens" (Tyranids).
It wasn't until much later that someone decided to try to forge a consistent narrative out of all of this.
It is best to be a pessimist. You are usually right and, when you're wrong, you're pleasantly surprised.
leotau1991 wrote: War machine seems to be the place to go. The shop is pushing it, its a new game, though the models are about the same price, you need less of em. That is my under standing.
Sounds like the problem isn't mass popularity then, it's people deciding they're done with GW's awful games and finding something better to do. So, again, the answer is that 40k will only become more popular when GW goes bankrupt and someone else buys the IP.
Yes I agree with you.
For as long as gw owns 40k it won't get popular. I once was telling a non-wargammer about the hobby, he thought it was cool until I told him the prices. So the prices are also a turn off.
i got some friends interested in it way back (late 90s). their parents laughed at it and shut it down promptly when they saw the price tag.
one friend got into it. painted a few guys and liked it. then he started to dislike the painting once he finally finished his second rank of chaos warriors in unit 1 of 3. dislike turned to hatred once he realized the game play was a pile of crap and that he spent 70 bucks on a metal chaos dragon. he kept saying "i cant believe i wasted that much money" lol
Wyzilla wrote: I'll real quick point out here that something being 'generic' (which more or less doesn't exist as media goes) won't prevent it at all selling in theater or becoming big. Star Wars, one of the largest Sci Fi brands of all damn time that is an absolute monster as the franchise goes- is a fairly generic sci fi world drawn heavily from sci fi from the forties and fifties.The reason why people forget about this is that despite Lucas ripping from a lot of material, he managed to make it iconic enough that people completely forgot about this and simply left gawking who then bought into it.
The difference is that Star Wars had the advantage of being released at a time when no comparable movie existed. Scifi in general was an under-exploited market, and nobody had the kind of visuals that Star Wars offered. 40k, on the other hand, can't sell itself by revolutionizing the special effects industry. There's no equivalent to the OMG WTF THAT IS AMAZING moment of stunned speechlessness when that first star destroyer passed overhead back in 1977. Sure, you can still make money by providing a movie full of impressive big-budget action scenes, but that alone isn't enough to make a movie memorable anymore. And the 40k setting itself just doesn't have enough to stand out in a crowded market.
There is no such thing as a hobby without politics. "Leave politics at the door" is itself a political statement, an endorsement of the status quo and an attempt to silence dissenting voices.
Wyzilla wrote: I'll real quick point out here that something being 'generic' (which more or less doesn't exist as media goes) won't prevent it at all selling in theater or becoming big. Star Wars, one of the largest Sci Fi brands of all damn time that is an absolute monster as the franchise goes- is a fairly generic sci fi world drawn heavily from sci fi from the forties and fifties.The reason why people forget about this is that despite Lucas ripping from a lot of material, he managed to make it iconic enough that people completely forgot about this and simply left gawking who then bought into it.
The difference is that Star Wars had the advantage of being released at a time when no comparable movie existed. Scifi in general was an under-exploited market, and nobody had the kind of visuals that Star Wars offered. 40k, on the other hand, can't sell itself by revolutionizing the special effects industry. There's no equivalent to the OMG WTF THAT IS AMAZING moment of stunned speechlessness when that first star destroyer passed overhead back in 1977. Sure, you can still make money by providing a movie full of impressive big-budget action scenes, but that alone isn't enough to make a movie memorable anymore. And the 40k setting itself just doesn't have enough to stand out in a crowded market.
a 40k movie would come off as cliche and just generally be bad.
and to the guy that said it could top avatar, no, just no. avatar had a 237 million dollar budget.
edit: i think the closest we got and will ever get to a halfway decent 40k movie will be starship troops. it's basically guard vs tyranids.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2013/11/14 02:49:29
Commissar Benny wrote: If Games Workshop could produce a movie that could capture the 40k universe, I promise you would see a massive increase in popularity like nothing you have seen before. It would dwarf LOTR, Avatar, everything.
No. 40k is really nothing special. It's adequate as a game setting and is certainly better developed than GW's competition, but when you consider science fiction as a whole it's hopelessly generic. And the setting's primary appeal is the large-scale conflicts, while movies need character-driven stories. A 40k movie would be an entertaining two hours of big-budget action scenes, and might even make a net profit, but in the long run it would be forgotten in the sea of big-budget action movies the movie industry is busy throwing out as fast as they can.
Can someone please tell me how a hybrid of classic fantasy literature (tolkenism) and deep space empires, settlements and frontiers (star ship trooper) is generic?
Cause I've never heard of anything like this universe, on this scale, or with this much depth before in regards to "science fiction as a whole".
Orks in space? Yep not original.... Elves in space? Heard that so many times.... The game has a metric-gak-ton of unique stories and lore to draw from, you probably just haven't read it.
In terms of the universe as a whole in regards to the genere, I've never seen anything this dark before, the extreme racism, xenophobia, cannibalism, vices, "openly torturing society's", the only thing generic about it is the Space Marines and the Tyranids, the rest is relatively fresh.
Wyzilla wrote: [
I'll real quick point out here that something being 'generic' (which more or less doesn't exist as media goes) won't prevent it at all selling in theater or becoming big. Star Wars, one of the largest Sci Fi brands of all damn time that is an absolute monster as the franchise goes- is a fairly generic sci fi world drawn heavily from sci fi from the forties and fifties.The reason why people forget about this is that despite Lucas ripping from a lot of material, he managed to make it iconic enough that people completely forgot about this and simply left gawking who then bought into it. I think the reason why W40K feels 'generic' isn't that it draws from a lot of other material (nearly everyone does), but that GW has yet to actually meld it all together. The only factions that fit well as a style together are the Imperium and Chaos. They're Gothic Dystopian Sci Fi mixed with some Lovecraft. The other factions seem more like they were more tossed in, and despite being extremely old, the Orks, Necrons, Tau, Tyranids, and even the Eldar have yet to be smoothed out. While the Imperium and Chaos have a very smooth molding that work well together, the others feel kinda thrown in and don't seem to be coherent. Less 'here's another faction stylized to fit with everything' and more 'hey guys, you know what we need? Elves!'.
It doesn't help either that the Black Library is practically singuraly devoted to humans (Loyal and Chaos), yet barely touches on the xenos, or assigns bad authors to do so. Despite them being there from the start, I've never really felt the other factions fit as well together as the Imperium and Chaos. They just feel copypasted into W40K rather than a developed faction. The only iffy one is the Eldar, as I do feel they fit somewhat, just they need to be molded more. Meanwhile, the Tau and Necrons are so heavily different it's a bit jarring to go between them.
It probably results from W40K being first and foremost, a tabletop game. They need to be different, but in order to sell to a larger consumer base, they need to make them fit better. Anyone else understand me or feel the same way?
Yeah, well those races haven't really had enough time to smooth over, Orks are never going to feel smoothed into it, because they were conformed to the "wrong genre" if you believe that it is a Sci-Fi universe instead of a Tolkeinist-Sci-Fi setting, Tau is based on feudal japan, so that's alien in itself to this western workshop without and real understanding of their culture (assuming this is true), not sure about necrons but the rest feel pretty coherent, if anything the Tyranid is the most well placed xeno as the unknown threat beyond the fringes of space.
On a side note of everything ripping of everything, you shouldn't get too caught up in this petty bs, everything has an influence and unless it completely rips it off without it's own unique flavour (which 40k hasn't) then it can usually be considered creative, if not partially original as well. At certain point in time creativity will inevitably peak, which is why you are seeing so many saturated markets.
This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2013/11/14 03:42:19
"The traitors shall fall; the Emperor granted us a vision of triumph."
In Warp Transit to next battlefield location, Destination Unknown
It is my opinion that 3 main reasons keep WH40K from becoming mainstream.
The first and most important reason is cost. Just to field the bare minimum army 1 HQ, and 2 Troops, it costs a beginning player 15 to $20 for thier HQ. $30 for each box of troops. $75 for the Basic Rulebook. $35 to $60 for thier codex for the army they choose to field. So its $185 minimum to play the game and have the basic materials.
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I've mentioned something similar to the past relating to what the OP is saying. I also saw some people suggest a well done 40k film. To add to that argument, I feel that a TV show of HBO production quality would go a long way further than a film. Maybe the dudes from the Starz series Sparticus can make a comeback as Space Marines lol
Well there's some good points made on here already so I ment say them over but here's how I think this could get more popular:
1) They have to first make the sets cheaper obviously but come painted (with unpainted kits available) because not everyone has the time to spend painting little plastic figure
2) Make the mini rulebook available separately at 30 bucks or so because you can buy it on eBay for that brand new and people will still buy the Brb for fluff if they want
3) bring the kits to big stores eg. Walmart target etc because not every town has a game store that people know about but most people have a big block store
4) make the rules a bit more starter friendly with a scenario book that comes separately because the scenarios in dv are good but there's only 5 and the scenarios would help people learn faster
That's all I can think of right now but I don't think 40k will ever be like poker... Because nobody wants to watch people push around little plastic men, it would be like watching someone play risk on TV... People wouldn't watch it (at least not enough)
SYKOJAK wrote: It is my opinion that 3 main reasons keep WH40K from becoming mainstream.
The first and most important reason is cost. Just to field the bare minimum army 1 HQ, and 2 Troops, it costs a beginning player 15 to $20 for thier HQ. $30 for each box of troops. $75 for the Basic Rulebook. $35 to $60 for thier codex for the army they choose to field. So its $185 minimum to play the game and have the basic materials.
I'd argue that the biggest reason is the cost. However, I feel it flawed to only look at the physical price of it. Don't forget the time it takes to build it to actually be able to play it. The time taken to understand all the contradictory rules, to discover all of the other rules that every codex gets taht isn't even in the main rule book, and then painting which is expected by many players and even more so in tournaments. Also, the rules are mediocre at best. A game like X-Wing can do wonders. Cheap entry, although expansions are pretty pricey in comparison to a game, they still are at a reasonable price. Also, you hardly need to do anything to set up the models and painting them is an option since they are already prepared for you. A game that has such easy acccess is far more capable of gaining mass popularity even if it wasn't Star Wars.
Deschain wrote: Can someone please tell me how a hybrid of classic fantasy literature (tolkenism) and deep space empires, settlements and frontiers (star ship trooper) is generic?
You just answered your own question: it's generic because it's a bunch of generic scifi/fantasy cliches blobbed together into a single IP. This is bad for two reasons:
1) Because 40k just rips off everyone else there's no need to make a 40k movie. If you want to make elves and orks in space you can rip off Tolkien yourself and avoid having to pay GW for the 40k license and deal with all the baggage of the existing IP.
2) The slight changes GW makes to those cliches don't really inspire a revolutionary movie. There really aren't all that many story options for space elves that you can't do with normal fantasy elves, so a movie with space elves is unlikely to push the boundaries of the genre very far. It might make a decent movie, but a decent movie isn't going to make a lasting impression beyond the next few decent movies in the genre.
Cause I've never heard of anything like this universe, on this scale, or with this much depth before in regards to "science fiction as a whole".
40k doesn't really have depth. It's a pretty shallow universe: throw a bunch of scifi/fantasy cliches together, have them fight to the death. What it has is quantity, not depth. There are a lot of fairly shallow "enemy X is invading, kill them and save the planet!" stories, which is exactly what you want as background material for a wargame. But this is bad for a movie since you can't even attempt to cover that whole quantity in a single movie. So most of 40k's fluff has to be abandoned, and once you focus in on a single story you don't have anything all that impressive.
In terms of the universe as a whole in regards to the genere, I've never seen anything this dark before, the extreme racism, xenophobia, cannibalism, vices, "openly torturing society's", the only thing generic about it is the Space Marines and the Tyranids, the rest is relatively fresh.
"Horrible oppressive empire" is a scifi cliche, and not one that makes a particularly good movie. A good movie needs characters the audience can identify with, and emphasizing the worst of the Imperium just means that the audience will hate all of your characters.
On a side note of everything ripping of everything, you shouldn't get too caught up in this petty bs, everything has an influence and unless it completely rips it off without it's own unique flavour (which 40k hasn't) then it can usually be considered creative, if not partially original as well.
It's not about some moral high ground about being "true creativity", it's a question of what it takes to revolutionize a genre. 40k takes well-established ideas in scifi/fantasy and makes an interesting gaming setting out of them, but it doesn't really do anything ambitious enough to make the kind of genre-shaping movie that can drive mass popularity of the associated toys.
There is no such thing as a hobby without politics. "Leave politics at the door" is itself a political statement, an endorsement of the status quo and an attempt to silence dissenting voices.
Deschain wrote: Can someone please tell me how a hybrid of classic fantasy literature (tolkenism) and deep space empires, settlements and frontiers (star ship trooper) is generic?
You just answered your own question: it's generic because it's a bunch of generic scifi/fantasy cliches blobbed together into a single IP. This is bad for two reasons:
1) Because 40k just rips off everyone else there's no need to make a 40k movie. If you want to make elves and orks in space you can rip off Tolkien yourself and avoid having to pay GW for the 40k license and deal with all the baggage of the existing IP.
2) The slight changes GW makes to those cliches don't really inspire a revolutionary movie. There really aren't all that many story options for space elves that you can't do with normal fantasy elves, so a movie with space elves is unlikely to push the boundaries of the genre very far. It might make a decent movie, but a decent movie isn't going to make a lasting impression beyond the next few decent movies in the genre.
Cause I've never heard of anything like this universe, on this scale, or with this much depth before in regards to "science fiction as a whole".
40k doesn't really have depth. It's a pretty shallow universe: throw a bunch of scifi/fantasy cliches together, have them fight to the death. What it has is quantity, not depth. There are a lot of fairly shallow "enemy X is invading, kill them and save the planet!" stories, which is exactly what you want as background material for a wargame. But this is bad for a movie since you can't even attempt to cover that whole quantity in a single movie. So most of 40k's fluff has to be abandoned, and once you focus in on a single story you don't have anything all that impressive.
In terms of the universe as a whole in regards to the genere, I've never seen anything this dark before, the extreme racism, xenophobia, cannibalism, vices, "openly torturing society's", the only thing generic about it is the Space Marines and the Tyranids, the rest is relatively fresh.
"Horrible oppressive empire" is a scifi cliche, and not one that makes a particularly good movie. A good movie needs characters the audience can identify with, and emphasizing the worst of the Imperium just means that the audience will hate all of your characters.
On a side note of everything ripping of everything, you shouldn't get too caught up in this petty bs, everything has an influence and unless it completely rips it off without it's own unique flavour (which 40k hasn't) then it can usually be considered creative, if not partially original as well.
It's not about some moral high ground about being "true creativity", it's a question of what it takes to revolutionize a genre. 40k takes well-established ideas in scifi/fantasy and makes an interesting gaming setting out of them, but it doesn't really do anything ambitious enough to make the kind of genre-shaping movie that can drive mass popularity of the associated toys.
A TV show could however. Something a kin to the caliber of The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones.
As for 40k ripping of everything, I had no idea The Lord of the Rings was set in space?
Did those orcs (who have more in common with goblins) use guns and scrapped together machinery too?
Tbh the orces in WH40k have more in common with the Reavers from Firefly.
Game of Thrones pretty much rips off British and Eastern-Europe mythology, the major plot line is pretty much the Battle of Hastings. But this was considered original and creative, the "American Tolkein", you know why? Because it found it's niche (focus on memorable characters and the relationships/politics between them) just like Warhammer 40k. We'll just have to agree to disagree, not everything has to revolutionize a genre just to be original or creative. It just has to do something different (hence the definition of those two words)....
And are you saying that the history of the Chaos, Humans, Eldar or a factions like the Dark Angels or Dark Eldar don't have depth and multiple layers? Some of the newer factions don't, but the more established ones absolutely do.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2013/11/15 00:58:06
"The traitors shall fall; the Emperor granted us a vision of triumph."
There is no popular setting that involves a huge dystopian Empire of Mankind that's brimming with heresy and grimdark. You could draw comparisons, but you can do that with anything.
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