Topps Company Closing WizKids
The Topps Company announced today that WizKids will immediately cease operations. Catalyst Game Labs has already been informed this should in no way affect Catalyst’ publication of the Classic BattleTech and Shadowrun game lines. “We’re still completely dedicated to the Classic BattleTech and Shadowrun game lines,” said Loren Coleman, co-owner of Catalyst Game Labs. “We’ve got a great line of products coming out heading into 2009 and so see no reason why the 25th [BattleTech] and 20th [Shadowrun] anniversary years for these brands won’t be fantastic for our great fan base.”
As more information becomes available additional announcements will follow.
November 10th, 2008 at 14:43:28
Is the Topps Company then the ultimate holder of the Shadowrun universe IP? I know that Catalyst licenses SR from WizKids, so I’m wondering what the arrangement structure is there. Is there a chance that Catalyst/InMediaRes will get the opportunity to become the “true” owner of the Shadowurn universe IP?
November 10th, 2008 at 16:08:37
As the press release says, our license with Topps is sound, and we are continuing to produce Shadowrun and BattleTech. Anything else would be speculation, and we do not engage in speculation about business matters.
November 10th, 2008 at 22:13:41
I just hope next year wouldn’t be a final year…
November 10th, 2008 at 22:23:53
Well, if Topps is smart, they will continue to license with CGL even after the current contract, since, well, CGL is making the games profitable, and I am sure Topps is getting nice royalty checks as part of the sale of every book, miniature, etc.
November 10th, 2008 at 22:42:30
Well in theory Topps should have no issues with Catalyst continueing to make the various games it does as again in theory it costs Topps nothing Catalyst pays them.
November 11th, 2008 at 00:53:50
Man, am I wrong or is the speed of companies having to do with SR and being shut down accelerating?
November 11th, 2008 at 01:41:42
Let’s just hope they don’t want to kill the game … I’ve already experience such a thing and believe me that’s really bad. I don’t know if you guys have heard about In Nomine Satanis/Magna Veritas commonly called INS/MV, it was the only 100% French RPG and the printing was stopped.
November 11th, 2008 at 02:48:19
One word: Dragons. They are behind everything. You’ll see..
November 11th, 2008 at 05:32:31
As long as translation services regarding europe are not affected by this step I´m happy
November 11th, 2008 at 06:48:26
Bad news. How are the folks at WizKids taking it? I’m guessing there are going to be layoffs.
November 11th, 2008 at 07:57:54
@ Yann:
I loved In nomine Satanis and this year I payed a lot of money to finally get a copy of it ;)
but there are other 100% french rpgs, polaris for example, written bei the author of SR France, Phillippe Tessier.
sorry for the OT
November 11th, 2008 at 09:27:40
Are/where the Mulvihill’s still part of WizKids at the time of this announcement? I wonder where they’ll end up…
November 11th, 2008 at 09:39:43
“continuing to produce BT and SR”: does it mean other products such as Chtullutech may be dropped?
November 11th, 2008 at 09:52:40
Mark: Both Mike and Sharon are at Smith & Tinker, Jordan Weisman’s new company, and have been for awhile.
Tony: Uh, no. CthulhuTech, Eclipse Phase, Paparazzi!, and every other game we are working on are not owned by WizKids/Topps. Why would they be dropped? They aren’t relevant to this announcement, which is why they weren’t mentioned.
November 11th, 2008 at 11:27:49
Technically Jordan Weisman still owns the licence to Shadowrun Battletech right? Wizkids was just his company he used to distribute the games after Fasa or so I thought.
November 11th, 2008 at 11:29:35
Wow, well at least SR will continue. I’ve no idea what WizKidz makes anymore so I can’t really comment on any of their other lines.
November 11th, 2008 at 12:39:00
Terence: I didn’t approve your most recent comment — please don’t post off-topic comments. Thread drift is normal, but when you know something is off-topic when you’re writing it, please don’t post them, or post them attached to a more appropriate blog entry. You may want to take the more extensive questioning/theorizing about the Sixth World over to Dumpshock or RPG.net, also.
November 11th, 2008 at 14:07:29
OK no prob.
November 11th, 2008 at 14:18:24
Okay, good to know. I thought WK had something to do with all the IP CGL is working on. Guess it’s better not to have all the eggs in the same basket, anyway.
November 11th, 2008 at 15:44:48
To speculate on the demise of companies and subsidiaries associated with SR:
My observation has been that companies will buy up entire companies, licenses, etc. only because of interest in either a small fraction of the properties or to use the IP in their own way, only vaguely related to the origional property.
This tends to flop, for reasons that should be painfully obvious but appearently escape executives who make these bonehead decisions.
Examples:
Microsoft was interested in the BattleTech IP for their MechWarrior video games. After licensing BT from FASA for 2 versions, Microsoft purchased FASA, sold the RPG rights to WizKids, and kept Videogame rights. They didn’t even care about SR video games at the time, they just wanted to make sure competitors didn’t make one (like the SR games for Sega or NES). Fast Forward to recent history, their “FASA” subsidiary makes a bad FPS multi-player (not MMORPG, just multiplayer), that violates SR cannon and has neither solo campaign nor MM options. Don’t forget that it requires downgrading to Vista in order to play. Needless to say, the game is a flop with fans of SR and the bigger draw genres of MMORPGs and single-player/multi-player campaign based games. Hence, the last remnants of FASA are kicked to the curb.
WizKids was a Collectible Card Game company who delved into a collectible miniature game called HeroClix. The concepts in SR are cool, so they bought the remaining rights leftover from the MS buyout of FASA, in order to make SR HeroClix miniatures (well, big minis, but I digress). Turns out, the Collectable Card Game craze didn’t expand into collectible miniatures as much as they hoped. At least they published a few books, but they mostly let it lie fallow. And now Topps is appearently tired of them, and trimming the fat.
As long as InMediaRes and Catalyst stay true to their product and fan base, I think things will continue to go well for them. It sounds like they have an efficient business model, and the Catalyst division is focused on RPGs only, not various spin-off catagories.
November 11th, 2008 at 15:56:52
Brian: You have some heavy mistakes in your timeline. I hope the following corrections help you better understand the history, even if you reach the same conclusions:
* Microsoft didn’t buy FASA, they bought FASA Interactive, a distinct company.
* FASA announced their closure and then WizKids bought some of their assets; WizKids didn’t buy all of FASA.
* WizKids published Mage Knight [2000] — a collectible miniatures game — before they bought FASA’s IP [2001], before they released HeroClix [2002], and well before they published their first CCG [High Stakes Drifter, in 2005].
* Catalyst Game Labs doesn’t just publish RPGs; BattleTech is a board/miniatures game, and we have our first card game [Paparazzi!] due out soon.
November 12th, 2008 at 00:01:16
Apaprently it is effecting you guys to some extent, as the novels releases have been delayed according to Amazon(the only place people will be able to get the novels, since Books A Million will not be carrying them)
I do, however, see one small problem: Me and the person who runs my FLGS JUST got their distributors to believe that Battletech was going strong after the hiatus thing for MechWarrior…now, I have to begin two years of fighting with Alliance…AGAIN.
November 12th, 2008 at 10:19:04
1. I don’t believe that any major chain has made a final decision on whether they will be carrying our novels or not.
2. Why would there be any fighting with Alliance? They’re our primary distributor, and have been since day 1. If your store orders from Alliance, your store can get our stuff no problem. If your store doesn’t order from Alliance, other major distributors carry our lines, too.
November 12th, 2008 at 15:27:37
I’m so glad you posted this. I was really afraid when I first read this over at Wil Wheaton’s blog that it meant SR was gone. My brother and I just started really getting into the 4th edition a few weeks ago (we stopped when 3rd ed came out because we didn’t really like it too much). I’ve first played Shadowrun when it came out (first edition) and really liked the setting and ideas, and sort of drifted away as second edition came out and moved in what I felt was the wrong direction, and then third made it even worse, so at first I was afraid to even look at 4th. But once I did, I found I really liked the changes and have liked the fact that new books have generally expanded things without making core rules obsolete the way previous editions had.