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How do!

Publicly released earlier today, at Constant Currency GW have had another record year of takings and profit.

https://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/2021-22-press-statement.pdf

Right, have at it.

So I only skim read fast as I'm doing other stuff - but do they mention Warhammer + the media at all?

Loads of generally positive manufacture and core business focus and the whole "our licence makes money" and such. All generally sounding positive (92% of stores being profitable right now is darn impressive after covid!).

But nothing about Warhammer +

 Overread wrote:
So I only skim read fast as I'm doing other stuff - but do they mention Warhammer + the media at all?

Warhammer+
In the year we launched Warhammer+. It is only now approaching its first anniversary and so it is still in very early development. The exciting content delivered through Warhammer+ will remain an integral part of our digital offer and how we share our IP.

Also:

More Warhammer. More Often - licensing business

Towards the end of the year, I appointed a new creative director, putting IP nous at the heart of our licensing opportunities. Warhammer IP is rich, vast and endless so as we do more projects, it’s important that we are focused on exploiting it all and that its representation continues to be respectfully maintained.

Our strategy is to exploit the value of our IP beyond our core tabletop business, leveraging multiple categories and markets globally. We intend to ensure Warhammer’s place as one of the top fantasy IPs globally. The main areas of focus are:
Entertainment
It is our intent that any new partner/s will become the home of Warhammer on screen for many years to come. We acknowledge that given that they will need sufficient time to invest and deliver the quality we believe our IP deserves. A greater slice of our IP and direct access to the experts in our IP development team will allow them to invest in Warhammer with the confidence that they have our full support on the interpretation of the IP. We will keep you updated with any significant progress.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Interesting that Horus Heresy is listed as the third key brand - supports the rumours that they want it to be more than a Specialist Game.

Yeah Warhammer+ is mentioned in passing as something new and still developing.

So…pretty neutral I’d say.

Yeah if it had made a big loss or gain I'd have expected to see more mentioned and considering its an expensive new venture for GW to seriously enter the film/animation market its surprising there isn't more mention.

That said it sounds like its a slow burner and as its based on subscriptions and isn't really geared as a huge profit puller (I'm assuming, esp considering that the annual cost already has to also account for the free model which already eats several months out of the sub compared to just selling the models direct). It might just be something that isn't pulling in big money (and might be costing) that perhaps isn't a big thing to big up for the shareholders. At least not until they perhaps land licences to show outside of their own network.

We probably won't get a sense for how Warhammer Plus is doing until next month when we see the marketing push for W+ year two.

Lots of new shows and an impressive animation trailer would probably be a good sign they think it can grow and are investing toward that.

Don't they usually at least vaguely mention what big upcoming stuff is in the works? They have with the Video games at least where they say there's some unnanounced being worked on, but there's for GW themselves there's no mention of The Old World (unless I missed it) or any other tabletop games coming.

"Additional freight and carriage costs is c.2.4% of sales."

I had arguments with people on the Underworlds Facebook group about how even enormous (300%+) increases in freight costs of the Chinese-made components couldn't possibly be high enough to warrant a 25% increase in the core game's RRP. Nobody believed me. Probably people still won't believe it.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Yeah Warhammer+ is mentioned in passing as something new and still developing.

So…pretty neutral I’d say.

Look at the Risks and Uncertainties section of the Preamble, p 12.

"Media - whilst this remains an area for future growth, it is imperative that exploitation of our IP through media channels does no harm to our core business. Our IP steering team meets every month to discuss ongoing and future exploitation, to ensure that all use of our IP, through all channels, is approved, correct and consistent. It is fully supported by our in-house legal team who will act when needed."

Could read that as a declaration of war against YouTubers. Could also read that as a statement that Media is seen as an avenue for future growth, as soon as they figure out how to monetize it.

Warhammer+, to date, has been an experiment, forecasting it's growth is likely impossible. This statement says they don't have a plan except to prevent anyone from eating their lunch.

Sounds more like they’re being more targetted when it comes to telling people to Knock It Off Or Massive Kev Our Lawyer Will Sit On Your Hamster.

I mean, if something is well done, fits the setting and isn’t being used to…You Know That Thing We Don’t Discuss On Dakka? That, if you catch my drift.

The difference between a fanimation of a Slaaneshi Cultist’s descent into excess, and a fanimation with a singularly unimaginative and bizarrely childish Adult Slaaneshi party, demonstrating not only have they the most tedious understanding of Slaanesh, but most likely little to no knowledge about that thing, but still went ahead anyway.

Meh, could have been higher.

 techsoldaten wrote:

Look at the Risks and Uncertainties section of the Preamble, p 12.

"Media - whilst this remains an area for future growth, it is imperative that exploitation of our IP through media channels does no harm to our core business. Our IP steering team meets every month to discuss ongoing and future exploitation, to ensure that all use of our IP, through all channels, is approved, correct and consistent. It is fully supported by our in-house legal team who will act when needed."

Could read that as a declaration of war against YouTubers.

I read it as wanting to grow WH+ gradually without over-investing and discovering there's not enough of a market.

Means they'll probably continue to rely on things like exclusive models or access to written digital content in order to draw subscriptions, rather than significantly increasing the number of shows.

I suspect its a warning about growing past market demand for WH+ shows AND making sure that they don't just start blindly approving garbage the way they did for computer and (especially) mobile games.
They see the streaming service as far more in public eye when it comes to (potential) brand damage.

Yeah but that works out ok for GW. Even when Dawn of War 3 failed it was Relic that took flack not GW.



Video is different though and I agree the last thing GW wants to do is promote videos that are low quality. That said they've done it a few times before and it never really hurt them save in the wallet.
I'd also say that whilst the animations could do with being longer and having more frames; the stories and presentation have been pretty spot on for lore and thematic accuracy. So right now They are doing well, if sometimes feeling a little cheap.

Interrogator was a significant development, as it involved Proper Swearing. Not the C word of course, but the F word was in there more than once.

I didn’t expect that myself!

I have enjoyed reading these reports in the past, though I haven't read one for a few years. I'll take a closer look at it tomorrow.

Just on the point about Warhammer +

I think that the small and pretty lukewarm coverage of this topic means that subscriptions are not as high as GW expected or hoped for. If they had been above projections they probably would have made a song and dance about it.

Warhammer + is very unlikely to be making a profit right now, and was probably never expected to, at least not for the first few years. So I don't think it will be disappearing any time soon, but I imagine GW hopes it will pick up some steam sooner or later.

Anyway, with an operating profit before taxation of £156.5M from a turnover of £414.8M I think GW can afford to take a risk on an expensive venture, at least for now.

Speaking of financials, can anyone enlighten me on exactly how much net profit GW have made in the last year? Looking at page 15 it states £128.4M as "Profit attributable to owners of the parent". Does this take into account the dividends paid to shareholders? Because I wouldn't count dividends as part of the net profit.

Hells bells that extra £3.4 million of supply chain costs because Brexit is fething appalling. I love their line about "we look forward to the Brexit benefits promised". Aye don't we all eh?

Interesting what they say in regards to media. Sounds like they've been trying to get a Warhammer TV show/ movie going and there's been a few things getting in the way. Likely director/studio problems.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
... GW have had another record year of takings and profit.

Time to celebrate with an across-the-board price rise. They can still blame Russia, right?

They estimated loss of sales in Russia to be around £4m

 Overread wrote:
Yeah but that works out ok for GW. Even when Dawn of War 3 failed it was Relic that took flack not GW.

DoW3's failures were Relic's failures in the same way that Total War Warhammer 3's failures are Creative Assembly's failures. Doesn't seem reasonable to blame GW for those SNAFUs.

 Overread wrote:
Video is different though and I agree the last thing GW wants to do is promote videos that are low quality. That said they've done it a few times before and it never really hurt them save in the wallet.

And yet they're licensing gakky mobile games. They just signed up a big Chinese mobile developer to make what will undoubtedly be a predatory micro-transaction-riddled piece of time-wasting garbage. Seems GW are totally ok with selling out their IP to gak like that, whilst at the same time fretting unnecessarily over fan projects.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
They estimated loss of sales in Russia to be around £4m

Not to mention the in limbo 11 Million in VAT with the EU and France.

 Olthannon wrote:
Hells bells that extra £3.4 million of supply chain costs because Brexit is fething appalling. I love their line about "we look forward to the Brexit benefits promised". Aye don't we all eh?

Interesting what they say in regards to media. Sounds like they've been trying to get a Warhammer TV show/ movie going and there's been a few things getting in the way. Likely director/studio problems.

Creative Problems:

'Hey, this Angron chap is fairly tragic maybe we can add a bit of nuance to his fall to chaos?'

'Mr Wilder, your so called 'accolades' mean nothing here. Just find a way to get Primaris marines involved'.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
And yet they're licensing gakky mobile games. They just signed up a big Chinese mobile developer to make what will undoubtedly be a predatory micro-transaction-riddled piece of time-wasting garbage. Seems GW are totally ok with selling out their IP to gak like that, whilst at the same time fretting unnecessarily over fan projects.

They're not licensing gakky mobile games though. Yes they're licensing predatory micro-transaction riddled games that you and I can't stand, but these games are massively popular. And as you say, they're hiring one of the big companies to make it, not just just rushing out a barely functional heap of crap.

I'm not a fan of these games, I'm definitely not a fan of the business model, but the games work, they run, they're functional, and people seem to enjoy them.

beast_gts wrote:
Interesting that Horus Heresy is listed as the third key brand - supports the rumours that they want it to be more than a Specialist Game.

They could want that, but that statement doesn't mean that. They're referring to the overall brand, which includes the sprawling books series, other games like AT and the eventual BF Heresy, etc. Probably Warhammer+ content to come also.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Seems GW are totally ok with selling out their IP to gak like that, whilst at the same time fretting unnecessarily over fan projects.

because they get a lot of money from the one, and nothing from the other

as long as the devs pay the fees, GW does not care what the game is or if a single person plays it

 kodos wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Seems GW are totally ok with selling out their IP to gak like that, whilst at the same time fretting unnecessarily over fan projects.

because they get a lot of money from the one, and nothing from the other

as long as the devs pay the fees, GW does not care what the game is or if a single person plays it

It's not just that either.

GW doesn't just get no money from a fan project. A fan project which is generating money, eg through a "buy me a coffee" Patreon or similar; is earning money that GW isn't getting any cut of. Furthermore if GW allowed that, then those who do pay the licence fees would have a justifiable argument to pay less or go elsewhere because why should they pay if a "fanproject" can do the same kind of work; not pay the licence fee and still earn good money.

Again GW only went after the fan projects that were generating income in some form, the ones that were totally free no payments, ads, sponsors or anything were generally (from what I recall) left alone. Even then many of the projects were offered deals by GW so it wasn't just a pure shut down and removal.



Finally whilst GW are pretty open with who they allow to have a licence, they do have creative control over content. GW can pull the plug; they can say yes and no to themes and ideas included within the licenced products. This gives them the ability to ensure that someone isn't creating content that isn't in line with their creative ideas or such.

Time to celebrate with an across-the-board price rise. They can still blame Russia, right?

Saw this on twitter yesterday from someone named @Standplaats_KRK. This seems like a good place to put it.

In terms of blaming Russia, them deciding to stop selling there is a decision they made, that they didn't have to make, therefore we as consumers shouldn't suffer for it.

If they truly believe on a moral level that people in Russia shouldn't be allowed to buy their stuff, which I don't personally believe they do, fine, but we shouldn't be forced to have price rises for it.

deano2099 wrote:
And as you say, they're hiring one of the big companies to make it, not just just rushing out a barely functional heap of crap.

They save that for the Codex releases!

So on a note other then "complaining about GW" apparently they note somewhere in this report that we're going to get more paints next year