Up Front is live on Kickstarter

www.kickstarter.com/projects/1325766284/up-front-the-card-game

Man, that is a fuckton of cards! I would be all in at the M/SGT level...but..

www.boardgamegeek.com/article/10541546#10541546

Ok, that can't be good. Without a comment for Valley Games on this issue, this one is looking kinda risky. Too bad, an Up Front reprint is long waited for and high anticipated. Could this die on the vine again (see MMP circa year 2000)

I kind of wonder how a civil judgement in the US is going to be enforced on a canadian company. Not a lawyer, nor did I stay at a holiday inn last night, but it strikes me that VG simply ignored Phil Sauer's suits and will continue to do so until it ends up in a canadian court, which is the one thing he seems to have not done at any point.

Dogmatix wrote: I kind of wonder how a civil judgement in the US is going to be enforced on a canadian company. Not a lawyer, nor did I stay at a holiday inn last night, but it strikes me that VG simply ignored Phil Sauer's suits and will continue to do so until it ends up in a canadian court, which is the one thing he seems to have not done at any point.

With a signed Judgment the next step is, provided that VG have no assets on American soil, to head to the Canadian court with jurisdiction. Since its a Judgment Federal court, not state, my guess is that the court with push it through without too much hassle.

Yeeesh. Let's just say I'm hanging on to my copy and not holding my breath.

Rliyen wrote:

Dogmatix wrote: I kind of wonder how a civil judgement in the US is going to be enforced on a canadian company. Not a lawyer, nor did I stay at a holiday inn last night, but it strikes me that VG simply ignored Phil Sauer's suits and will continue to do so until it ends up in a canadian court, which is the one thing he seems to have not done at any point.

With a signed Judgment the next step is, provided that VG have no assets on American soil, to head to the Canadian court with jurisdiction. Since its a Judgment Federal court, not state, my guess is that the court with push it through without too much hassle.

And, out of curiosity, if VG has ceased to exist? Up Front looks like it's being published by Rik Falch's "new" company (Radiance/Radiant Games?). This looks like a shuffling of LLCs...

Considering that I really like Up Front, it's the only squad-level game that my wife likes, and I sold mine in anticipation of this: I really hope this all goes smoothly. That said, I don't think I'm going to back this. I really couldn't give a shit about getting all these extra armies like the fucking Bulgarian Resistance or whatever, so the stretch rewards are unexciting; Valley Games sucked ass when I preordered Hannibal; and they are in general just SKETCHY. But the game is awesome, and the mere fact that I would consider kickstarting a Valley Games game, when I have never KSed anything before, says that it's a good project.

There is no universe where the words "Kickstarter" and "Valley Games" belongs on the same page. I sincerely hope it works out for all of you, but I remain skeptical.

Assuming the game makes it to print, is this one of those "old" games that assumed a lot of time to become familiar with the whole thing? I don't mind that, but almost everyone else I game with does. If my experience with Titan is any indication, this looks like one that I would love and no one else would ever play with me. (Face to face, anyway).

Valley's previous kickstarter experience with D-Day Dice went well. I'm presuming Airborne in Your Pocket will also go smoothly since the game has basically been fully developed for several years to this point.

This being Up Front, however, "smoothly" is probably unlikely...

$125 for the stuff you get with the base game and expansions. I paid less than that for my Avalon Hill copies.

Schweig! wrote: $125 for the stuff you get with the base game and expansions. I paid less than that for my Avalon Hill copies.

You got a deal for yours (as did I on mine because some guy bundled Desert War along with a 2nd Ed. base game in one of the worst ebay listings of all time. He refused to verify it was complete though it was requested a dozen times; I ended up paying $78 for a punched but unplayed copy that turned out to be missing only the Desert War rules.)

Anyway, going rate on the Desert War expansion still hangs around $100 most of the time. Banzai, for no apparent reason, has gone ape-shit over the last 2 years. It used to sit around $75 most of the time; now it seems to be fetching in excess of $125. Even the base game can be hard to score under $75.

I'm *hoping* that this announcement will cause rampant dumping, which will drive the prices back down as I'd like to upgrade my Banzai set.

I'm going to wait for a physical version to show up, tell myself that I'm going to buy it, then talk myself out of it because I just have funner, better WWII games sitting on the shelf unplayed.

Avalon Hill used to sell Desert War with (inside of) copies of Banzai for a while. I bought one of these of German ebay for €65, in shrink actually. That's probably a good deal, but it actually was a rather contested auction.

I still don't get though why someone doesn't just apply the Up Front system to a different setting, say a SciFi one. Up Front is actually quite adaptable, because at its core the system is very abstract. Range, fire power, terrain modifier, etc. are all intangible. Also that way you'd easily avoid any licensing troubles. Moreover, creating a new setting would probably be a more creative endeavour than adding a gazillion interchangeable armies to the game.

I might actually try this and convert just the first scenario. I'd call it Zap Front.

Yea, that's an outstanding deal Simon. I should have kept a closer look on euroEbay for this one but I had no idea that's how they marketed it in Europe. I actually would be thrilled to buy a shrink copy of Banzai just to upgrade my ratty cards.

As for the game, I suspect just changing the names on the personality cards--which they're clearly already planning on doing--and using new art (which they have to do due to the original art being long lost) will suffice to skirt US copyright laws. Shame because everyone should have experience the horrors of Pvt. Beck under direct fire (I SO want a "Cowering Beck Fan Club" T-shirt.)

I really believe Valley wouldn't do anything when MMP held the rights because, well, MMP held the rights and who could have thought they'd not push the game to market. But once it reverted to Hasbro? Pffft. They've already got notable experience with cutting it fine when it comes to US copyright laws and games. Like their last few releases, this game *exists* in a perfectly playable form right now, so they need a lot of new art but zero playtesting. Hell, there are also already a dozen minor-nation expansions, between VAIPA, Relative Range, and those Italians who did the Folgore "Supermen" set, as well as different environment sets (desert, jungle, urban etc.) that have been published with playtested rules that could be immediately added with nothing but some minor rewriting to the rules to avoid outright plagiarism claims.

I'm also compelled to thank Simon publicly in any thread about Up Front in which he's present for re-teaching me how to play the damn game. For those scared of the rulebook (and it *is* kind of miserable), it really does only take 1 or 2 games to be taught how to play to a competitive (i.e., "not get blown off the field immediately") level. I've only tried adding the AFV rules once so far and found the rulebook particularly obtuse, but there's plenty of game to be had even without tanks.

San Il Defanso wrote: Assuming the game makes it to print, is this one of those "old" games that assumed a lot of time to become familiar with the whole thing? I don't mind that, but almost everyone else I game with does. If my experience with Titan is any indication, this looks like one that I would love and no one else would ever play with me. (Face to face, anyway).

Let me put it this way: Titan has *always* scared me away. Up Front, on the other hand, got a lot of play with a WWII-antipathetic tactical-antipathetic wife. To become familiar with the WHOLE thing? Sure, that'll take a lot of time. But to become familiar with the core stuff? Nah, that'll take maybe 3 plays at max.

And Simon's claims are ridiculous; I sold my not-shrinked Up Front + Banzai for $155, so $100 for the two of those is *clearly* a better deal than eBay.