I Think Joshua From "War Games" Said It Best….

the licencing of Oprah would be too high…

Even if you think the theme is lame, the game isn’t.  The public does have the game, its been previewed at 3 national events and several hundred people have played it, including myself.

by public, I meant the general public, not event goers who for the most part are well versed in playing A&A.

I am looking for reviews of have little to no experience with A&A as they will rate the game on its own merits and not compared to other A&A games they’ve played.

I’m on the fence about the theme. It is  a high risk move which will either be great for A&A by selling very well or it will bomb and Hasborg will shelve the series for 10-15 years.

Unlike Risk, Pandemic, Zombicide, Red Dragon Inn –these all have been very successful at serializing their products and keeping fans and new players alike adopting that business model – Axis and Allies doesn’t appear to have anywhere close to that broad appeal or growth potential so in my view the game is targeted toward people who were already AxA or wargame fans.

Axis and Allies doesn’t appear to have anywhere close to that broad appeal or growth potential….

Right it has about 20 times the sales of those games combined. Axis and Allies has been around since 1978-2018. Its the exact opposite meaning its for new players, using the perfect module for this , the 1941 map and rules….except to bring the fat pimply kids, they add ZOMBIES  thinking this will bring new players to future AA games. Unfortunately, it appears that these future games will also have strange things like Godzilla, Super Chicken of death, Moe Howard, etc added in with Axis and Allies and this is troubling. It will turn off the AA people and they wont keep buying into the scam.  All they need to do is expand on some of these games that are already proven.

there are places to expand A&A which could/should have been tried before Zombies, that is for sure.

Different eras/revisiting WWI/individual battles/campaign modes/even going to space.

It will be interesting to see how well it sells from now till the end of the year. (X-mas and boxing day will see huge spikes)

I think a large map, say anniversary size, of Stalingrad would be really cool. You would have inf./tanks/art./mech inf./planes/transports all fighting throughout the city.

The subtle implication that people who are going to play AAZ are mentally handicapped in some way is funny coming from the people foaming at the mouth over veterans allegedly being disrespected by plastic zombies in a board game.

hehehehehehe thanks for that, it made my morning.

The entire community is eating itself alive with this game. Either play it or don’t and bitc#ing about a game that is coming out regardless if you like it or not is not only foolish and just shows your IQ is somewhere in the 40’s. The game is fun, it was created by Wizard’s with the intent of driving new interest into an IP that is dying.

It is interesting how this A&A title has brought out such strong opinions in the community, both for and against….  To paraphrase P.T. Barnum; ‘There’s no such thing as bad publicity’

I think they should have gone for a bigger swing.  I mean they control D&D where is the D&D A&A?  Even if D&D players dont bite en mass, a well done fantasy area movement game is in order.  With the world of D&D at thier disposal they could release a whole string of games!  How about this:

A&A Europe 1940 chasis (box, board, internal boxes)
-new dice debut D4, D8, D10, D12, D20 of course
-new sculpts for 6 “nations”
-7 base unit types w special abilities etc
-6 nation specific special units w sa etc

Maybe leverage the wonderful sculpts Wizkids has been doing  -  print them in smaller scale, use Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms…
You could launch army boxes in waves or maybe just do so with another game depicting a different area I dunno.  Make it on the Global board, that would be great.
And dont go all “Axis & Allies is too complicated and loong…”  goddamn WotC been sayin that shit for years as they over see game slike D&D and MAGIC LOL…
Let Larry Harris go nuts with the whole D&D universe at his fingertips, it will sell out.

@Paper_IPC:

I think they should have gone for a bigger swing.  I mean they control D&D where is the D&D A&A?  Even if D&D players dont bite en mass, a well done fantasy area movement game is in order.  With the world of D&D at thier disposal they could release a whole string of games!

Maybe leverage the wonderful sculpts Wizkids has been doing  -  print them in smaller scale, use Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms…
You could launch army boxes in waves or maybe just do so with another game depicting a different area I dunno.

Ask and you shall have received over the past several years already. From BoardGameGeek.com;

Dungeons and Dragons Adventure System Board Games:

Based on Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition, this series of tile exploration games bring the basics of RPGs to the Board Game realm.

Using pre-generated characters and random monster encounters with defined tactics, no Dungeon Master is required. Explore castles, mountain caverns, and the realms of the underworld in this fast paced game.

The core games in the D&D Adventure System Series can be combined to expand one another. All heroes, monsters, treasures, tokens and tiles are fully compatible.
Games in the D&D Adventure System Series can be expanded with sets from the Dungeon Command series. Dungeon Command sets include Adventure System style cards to allow the included miniatures to be immediately integrated into any of the Adventure System games, and the Dungeon Command tiles can be connected to the tiles found in the Adventure System games (although house rules would be required to determine their use in the game).

D&D Adventure System Core Games:

Dungeons & Dragons: Castle Ravenloft Board Game (2010)
Dungeons & Dragons: Wrath of Ashardalon Board Game (2011)
Dungeons & Dragons: The Legend of Drizzt Board Game (2011)
Dungeons & Dragons: Temple of Elemental Evil Board Game (2015)
Dungeons & Dragons: Tomb of Annihilation Board Game (2017)
Dungeons & Dragons: Dungeon of the Mad Mage (2019)

Then there are the other board games they have based on the D&D world such as Lords of Waterdeep that goes into other mechanisms such as worker placement and Betrayal at Baldurs Gate that is a retheme of Betrayal at House on the Hill using a co-operative-turned-all vs 1 traitor mechanic, rather than area control.

From what I recall from the conversations at WotC this game tested well with people who have never played Axis & Allies. Give the negativity a rest. You’re all just speculating without even talking to anybody about any of it.

Bottom line is that you ALL should be rooting for an overwhelming success. If this game succeeds, then we’re more likely to see more A&A games that you want than if the game fails. (There, I threw in my speculation as well).

Finally, if you play it and don’t like it, don’t play it again. But I literally had 2 people tell me its their new favorite version of A&A. These 2 folks play a lot of other games including Euros, collectible card games, and other wargames. It definitely has appeal to the gamers that are NOT hardcore A&A.

WotC has little interest in making games for small hard core fans.

They are in the business of making money using the latest pop culture theme.

However, like just posted, if it is a hit, the A&A community will benefit with more main stream A&A games being produced.
(some off the wall stuff too)

Hopefully they will revisit the battle series or do a campaign game.

Regardless, we will know soon enough what this game brings as it is close to Oct 31st.

As I said before, the CEO of Wizards is a huge Axis and Allies fan so we know AnA isn’t screwed with what the grown adults whining on these boards could called “childish” zombie games. And as I said before, they have ideas on the table, none that they would talk about and I did “try” to pitch two games I wanted to see with AnA; Korea and some kind of global cold war.

@robert:

They are in the business of making money using the latest pop culture theme.

They are in the “business of making money,” is exactly correct. That’s the function of a business.  :-D

Not sure I agree with the pop-culture reference. At the WotC event Scott relayed the story as to how this game came to be. He’ll explain it an upcoming post, but IIRC it was not really planned… somebody said something, they tried it, tested it, and it “worked.” Again, that’s the terrible re-telling of the story. Stay tuned for the details.

I think most games, especially euros, are wrapped in a thin layer of the latest crazes happening.

mankinds survival/space/medieval/fantasy are all popular themes right now.

It surely played a role in Scotts likes/dislikes at the time.

Possibly. My “interview” of Scott, which included a question about how the game came to be, is arriving soon.

@Imperious:

Or just buy 1941 for about $25?

Take out the zombies and AAZ is still a richer game than 1941. More unit types, more territories, and Recruitment Centers.