We have not posted an update to Total War in some time and we sincerely apologize for the delay. For several months we had not been able to assemble a quorum of the shareholders/investors needed to approve release of any Total War announcements/related material. This week, however, has brought an extended redefinition of the relationship and roles of our investors, including a more expedited/relaxed process for issuing updates and game samples.
What is the status of Total War: The investor issues that had been delaying completion of the game are now resolved. We are finishing printing of last of the paper components and are accumulating the money needed to ship the game via sales through our eBay store. The counters/maps/boxes for the game have been printed for some time. We expect to be shipping the game no later than Christmas of this year.
Why doesn’t HMS release a PDF of the rules/OBs/charts for Total War right now instead of just samples? Because this has been prohibited by our investors — and they control the HMS board regarding all Total War issues until they are repaid in full. Some of our investors are concerned that early release of all of this material would negatively impact sales of the game from which they expect to be repaid. We have convinced them to allow posting of samples to continue, but no more than that.
As announced earlier this year, we purchased a large estate at low cost and have been selling the items from this via our eBay store:
http://stores.ebay.com/arthuredwardgoodwin?_rdc=1
These sales have allowed us to bring payments to our investors up to date and have helped to accumulate the funds needed to finish printing/ship Total War. We have held out hundreds of quality historical books and military wargames from that estate for sale in October of this year. Europa members (everyone who has an active subscription to The Europa Magazine or who has a Total War pre-publication order) will be given access to these items at a reduced price via an eBay store promotion code. Overseas customers will further benefit in that we have access to much lower Priority Mail International parcel prices through eBay than we have elsewhere. We will announce in advance the items going on sale on eBay through the HMS website and the EuropaAssociation yahoo group.
The Unit Identification Chart (UIC) has been one of the most requested components from Total War to be shown as a sample. Most of the changes to the Europa counters were displayed on the front side of the UIC that was put up as a sample earlier this year. The backside of the UIC, showing the large number of unit types in the initial invasion of Russia in 1941, is appended below.
