So they are announcing the blank box on the homepage today during the opening of the new gaming center. My bet is it is going to be a new expansion for TOI. The outline of the box looks the same shape as Fox and Normandy expansions, and the recent "Stay Tuned" posts makes me think this is it. I am pretty excited and am hoping to see the Russian front come into play.

Anyone else have any last minute guesses of what the mystery game is?

Well, I'd be nice! Is it going to be posted on the Home page news? ER what.

Well i for one have my fingers, toes, eyes,arms and legs crossed in hope that it is!!

Could be anything... but hope dies at last...

Siegfried

I seriously doubt it has anything to do with TOI. I don't think they would make a big deal about an expansion, besides they clearly state "game" not expansion. My money is on Gears of War.

It turns out to be a new battlelore game. Hahaha, I'll believe they will come out with a TOI expasion when I see it. Too bad FF cant do a "state of the game" for TOI like they did for Tannhueser.

Gah! My hopes are crushed yet again... perhaps we will see something by Christmas...

Christmas of 2011 that is.

And Finally

Am not surprised. For me, a relative newb to TOI, it is not a big deal .....YET,,... After another year it will be.

Well. Good for whatever game it was that was disclosed. As for us wargammers. There is the new Panzer general- Allied Assault, as well as many others.

I am used to bad news,...after being into AAM for so long....wait..wait...wait..and then CRAPPY minis.

ToI is a good game, and the official word was stay tuned and more is coming. While I too was looking forward to seeing that next box revealed as an expansion, I am willing to take their word and wait and see what they have in store for us. What would be great to see would be an occasional new official scenario released using the existing components. Publishing a scenario now and again on the website would certainly make folks happy.

Face it, the reason we want to see an expansion is because we want more. Lack of a new expansion takes nothing away from enjoying the game that we already have available to us.

All we have is a little message stating "stay tuned for more TOI", what do you think they are going to say? "No we cancelled the game". They most likely said that so they can sell remaining stock of the games. They pretty much abandoned the scenerio editor, they have posted no new scenerios, they can atleast tell us what they are working on WITHOUT having to give a release date. But all they have done in the last year is nothing.It seems to me that they care very little about the TOI fanbase. Oh well thats just my .02

SgtWaka said:

I am used to bad news,...after being into AAM for so long....wait..wait...wait..and then CRAPPY minis.

Oh lordy, I was into the AAM thing hot and heavy too, there until they changed the scale of the vehicles. I was talking to a friend of mine the other day about TOI, and I think a decent way to describe it is a blend of M44, AAM & CoH.

For me, AAM kinda blew itself up in the rules and gameplay department with all the special abilities and such. From that point of view, the game just lost any kind of foundation it may have had. on top of that, the bone head moves like not being able to pick a scale that they wanted from the start, and some of the quality of the pieces, well that kinda kills it for folks like myself. I dropped this one.

CoH may wind up being a good system down the road someday, IMHO, but right now it appears to be a game still under developement. Not big changes, but smaller ones that have a big impact on gameplay. The thing about changes though, is that it doesn't matter if they're big or small, changes are changes. Whats going on with CoH is that the game designers are trying to perfect their system, and they should have done that before they released the game. By my way of thinking, that's just poor planning and lack of play testing. But who knows, that whole thing could gel up and become a good system, but I think it will be some time before they get a couple games released that have the same rules set. If they keep tinkering around with the rules, they'll never get anything consistent going, and that's a big consideration for someone like myself looking to buy into a game system. That one is still a ? in my book, but the whole CoH V1.0...V1.1...V1.2 thing gets old real fast. I still have CoH AtB, or V1.0, but after hearing that TOI is not dead, I'll be taking this one down to my FLAGS soon to see what kind of trade I can get for it.

M44, well, that's a dandy game, and a gem. Fast, fun gameplay, and a versatile system. The big strength there is the campaign system, but they've covered all the theaters too, and the rules are consistent. I have this whole sytem, and twice over in many cases, great game, done right, just like TOI.

TOI has the best of all of these games systems rules, components and ideas.

As far as the mystery boxed game, i'm not too worried about that. I'm good with the tiny tidbit that we got regarding TOI not being shelved, and having gotten the word that more is on the way. I'd really love to see this game make both the Russains and the Pacific into expansions. TOI is fun to play with the AFVs, and it is equally fun to play the mainly infantry fights. If the Russain front makes the scene soon, obviously we'll have lots of the armor engagements, and it seems to me that the designers have positioned the game thus far for the Russain expansion by the inclussion of all the German tanks so far.

The Pacific then, obvoviously should have more of the infantry type fights, and I think that would be a super expansion. I hope both of these make the scene, along with some more scenario books, map expansions and campaign type stuff. So as long as there is some type of confirmation regarding the future of the game, like we saw a couple weeks ago, I'm good. No hurry.

Also, something to consider, that Napoleon game just kinda suddenly popped up here all of a sudden like, and I'd been watching that over on BGG so long that I'd forgotten about it. I'm into the Wings of War, and a whole bunch of that stuff showed up on their Upcoming page all at once too, not long ago. So I keep an eye on things, and so long as there is some knowledge that the game is alive and kicking, and that there is more on the way, I'm sure I'll be pleasantly suprised one of these times when I check in.

Art Vandelay said:

I was the one who posted that thread, and I posted darn near the same thing over on BGG. I can tell you that I got a couple heated PMs from one of the FFG guys nearly throwing a fit about the game having not been cancelled. I'm talking adamently, and within about 30-40 minutes of my even posting the thread to start with.

Now the other fellow, I think it is Christian Peterson, he was more laid back about the whole thing with his "stay tuned" comment. Say and think what you want, but between those two responses, and the shere quickness of them, leads me to believe that they are both genuine. Had there been nothing but silence, well, I'd have been pretty concerned.

My guess is that we'll see an expansion by May, just my gut feeling. Who know though, maybe we'll see something sooner.

I am also hoping an expansion is released in the near future, but I would rather have it done well and released later than see a flawed product released prematurely. One of the selling points of TOI was that it was put on the market in a finished form. Think of all the games you've purchased that had so much promise, but when taken out of the box, were obviously released before all of the significant problems were ironed out. You, as a paying customer, became an unpaid play-tester, providing feedback to the designer and developer in the hopes that what was bought would eventually become a useable product.

TOI has done an incredible job of portraying all of the subtleties and nuances of WWII combat in a form that can take in the differences in nationalities, troop quality, etc. No game system can perfectly replicate combat on this scale - too many details, too much chaos - but TOI does manage to put players in the role of a company or battalion commander, making the important decisions in a fluid and cahaotic environment. I'll still play this game if they don't release another expansion, but it sounds like something is indeed awaiting us down the road. FFG is a business, and if the demand is there and the product can be produced and sold at a profit, it is in their best interests to do it.

Koa Kahiko said:

Great point right there. I couldn't agree more. When I was at Origins in 09', the designer of CoH was demo'ing that series first release, AtB. Uwe gave me the sales pitch himself in about a 20 minute preview. Great guy, BTW- Uwe. Anyway, one of the things he said that day that stuck in my mind was in response to a question I posed to him. I told him that I was at Origins actually looking for Ln'L, as I wanted to buy into a WWII combat game "system" that covered all the theaters and used the same rules. Aside from mentioning that he was friends with the designer of Ln'L, he said that CoH had been in play test for 3 years up to that point. Originally, he went on, CoH was inspired as an easy "system" for the Marines to use as a tool to teach their platoon and company officers concepts in battlefield asset management.

3 years in play test, quite impressive. Here it is now in final form, WWII style. The impression he created was that the game was thoroughly tested, and had been put through its paces well beyond what was needed to put it in final form. So on an impulse, I plunked down $80 USD, and took a chance on it. What I didn't realize at the time, was that I'd just bought CoH V1.0.

One lesson my grandfather always stressed; "buyer beware". Within 6 months of having bought the game, and playing it, I saw on the forums at BGG that they were going to "clean up" the rulebook. Well, that's a good idea I thought, the rule book was kinda unclear on a couple items, so that will be a good deal.

The "cleaning up" also included making a couple changes...so then we had V1.1.

The next game in the series came out recently, with more "cleaning up" on the rules. Again, the cleaning up included yet more little changes; so welcome to CoH V1.2.

Now they claim that this is it, the final version of the game. Just how long does it take to "finalize" a game? It's been out a year and a half, on top of the three years Uwe told me that it was in play test & developement...so four and a half years?!

I completely agree with the above statement on having become an unpaid playtester for that game. I was looking for a game as a part of a series, and wound up with a beta test version of the game that is going to require new counters in order to bring it in line with the series again. No good, IMO.

The real acid test here is when I took my copy of AtB down to my FLAGS, to see what value it had as a trade. Well, the game is not in line with the direction of the series now, and has almost no value on the secondary market. Anyone following that system, CoH, has moved on to SoS, and there is no demand at all any longer for AtB. It's worth about $5 USD as a trade. It's like having a PS II after PS III has come out. Sure you can still play it, but you won't be moving forward with the rest of the series with it any longer. This may wind up being the very first wargame ever, in my entire life, that gets pitched into the trash. I've previously traded all of my wargames in at my FLAGS, I couldn't bring myself to toss any of them into the trash...until now.

So yes, get the game right before you release it, then add to it, not change it. Do your play testing on your dime, not your customers. TOI has it right, and for that, they'll continue to get my business.

So let us wait for good things to come. And in the meantime, is there anyone out there who cares to take on designing scenarios dealing with the 100th battalion and the 442 RCT? That would be quite a challenge, using elite infantry and a crdefully prepared selection of cards to make it work. But what a story...

Koa Kahiko said:

Well you seem to know the story, so why don't you give it a go?

I don't mean to sound unappreciative in my previous posts about FFG taking a long time with TOI. Its just that I love the game and I am already excited for what may come in the future. With that said... I do agree 100% that taking their time and getting it right the first time makes it worth the wait.

Thanks to any FFG people that may read this. We do appreciate all your hard work on making things we love to play!

Sorry, but I'm not holding my breath on ToI. In fact, if you read here: http://www.boardgamenews.com/index.php/boardgamenews/comments/gone_cardboard_may_2010_releases_from_fantasy_flight_games/

you'll see that the May 2010 releases for Fantasy Flight include..

> a new release for Wings of War with big planes

> a new release for Arkham Horror; The Lurker at the Threshold

> and a new release, The Battles of Napoleon: The Eagle and the Lion.

My guess is that the empty box is for the last of those entries.

Sorry all you ToI fans. It doesn't look like there will be anything on the horizon for ToI. Maybe something will be leaked before Origins? Doubtful but possible.

OK - it's a deal - but it'll be a a while. First on the agenda is completing the preparations for holding a vintage base ball tournament fund-raiser scheduled for April 10 & 11 at 100-year old Warren Ballpark in Bisbee, AZ. Then I'll do a scenario for the 100th/442nd. Bruyere comes to mind...

Well boys i must say it's all about the sales volume...i don't know the current stats, but i think TOI is maybe not the HEAD GAME of FFG... so show it to your friend and hope that they buy a version to push the sales volume..then there will be an another expansion ... maybe a TOI Moderator will find a little time to give a comment about a future expansion??? Hello?....HEEEEEE...LLLLOOOOOOO??????

Siegfried

Well, we already got the word from that Christian Peterson fella, "Stay tuned". He basically implied that there would be more TOI stuff coming out.

Seeing as how the last item was a year ago, I'd guess that we'll see something by this summer.

That's good with me, as long as there is more in the on deck circle. I'm still having a blast playing the stuff already out, I'm good with just knowing the line is still alive, and that we'll see more stuff down the road.

Could be that resources for the rumored Fury of the Bear were re-allocated last year, and that whole project is still awaiting the final work to finish it up? Who knows?

Time isn't the issue for me, it's the continuation of the series.

kaufschtick said:

I love ToI. Its a great game. However, I don't think we will see any ToI by summer. You can look at FFGs 'upcoming track' They seem pretty up front about what they are working on and when to expect it.