Scourge of War series going away Sept 1st

[JasonPratt]

Anyone who hasn't bought Scourge of War yet, in its Waterloo + DLC (from Steam or Matrix directly), or its Gettysburg + DLC (from Matrix only), had better do so pronto:

From September 1st, we will be delisting all the Scourge of War games from our sites and all other 3rd party sites. The games will no longer be available for purchase, and we will consequently stop all support and assistance.
You have one week to add the titles to your libraries. Once bought, the games will remain in your libraries, and you will still be able to recover purchased games from download links. Steam keys will no longer work to redeem the product, so make sure you download your copy on Steam before the end of this month.

Here's a full list of games that will be going off sale from September 1st:

Redeemable on Steam
Scourge of War Waterloo
Scourge of War Waterloo Collector's Edition
Scourge of War Wavre
Scourge of War Ligny
Scourge of War Quatre Bras

Non redeemable on Steam
Scourge of War Gettysburg
Scourge of War Gettysburg 150th Anniversary Collection
Scourge of War Chancellorsville
Scourge of War Brandy Station
Scourge of War Antietam
Scourge of War Pipe Creek

Obviously, the 150th Anniversary Collection is the way to go for the ACW, although the three main packs are Getty, Chance, and Antietam. (The others are more minor, and I'm not sure any mods require them.)

As sad and kind-of troubling as this is, I hope it means the devs (perhaps reconciling with the original Take Command dev...?) are clearing the way for a new game system for these Age of Rifle battles.

[ArizonaTank]

Hopefully they go on to a productive after-life on GoG :dreamer:

[JasonPratt]

Sounds like they won't be sold on any 3rd party markets at all...  :'(

[Philippe]

I interpret this as Matrix/Slitherine saying they're no longer carrying the Scourge of War series.

Have we heard anything from Norbsoft ?

Something seems to have happened.

[GeneralHawk]

Thanks for heads up! Just picked up the Gettysburg 150th Edition!

Is Waterloo worth it?

[CaptainKoloth]

Bizarre how they're saying that but also maintaining the eye-watering price on it. Never understood why publishers actively delist things like this. Obviously there can be licensing issues and such but ultimately a case like this often seems more like spite- after all, no one can make money at the end of the day if it isn't being sold, and it's not like keeping something listed on Steam takes tremendous active effort.

[Sigwolf]

I interpret this as Matrix/Slitherine saying they're no longer carrying the Scourge of War series.

Have we heard anything from Norbsoft ?

Something seems to have happened.

Well, the Norbsoft home page hasn't been updated since 2017, and the most recent forum post in any topic appears to be over a month old, so there doesn't seem to be much information there.  This does seem extremely strange and sudden.

[The_Admiral]

From what I could read & find, the dev (Norb) is doing well and fine, giving happy signs of life very recently, seems to be in good health, so at least no worries in that regard, and I suppose it is what matters  ;)

If it was due to the end of a publishing deal, you might expect him to make these games available again through his own channels, but I suppose that time will tell. I wasn't suffering from many compatibility issues, so I deem business contracts (or rather the end of them) to be the main cause of this termination. If it's the case, after that, it's up to him. A good example might be Sonalysts, which had its games published by EA, then by Strategy First, then by themselves on Steam without too many issues (besides losing all the rights to the Jane's era cutscenes of course which is terrible, but well, ain't the game proper ^^).

But expecting lifelong service & shelf life for digital products is unfortunately a dream that will be less & less obvious as older titles & their makers fade into new lives & deeds. Fortunately still, Norb seems to be easy to get in touch with, I am sure those who might want a statement will know how to reach him.

[Destraex]

Here is hoping he is just waiting for the contract to expire and then BAM has a new related title with updated everything ready to go.

[The_Admiral]

Unfortunately that doesn't sound too likely though (I mean, the big update part ^^), from my understanding he's working full time in a totally unrelated job, or so it seems.
But one can dream, I do dream about that one too  ;)

[JasonPratt]

Well, they're still doing their 10% summer sale off the entire catalog, so there's that.  ::)

In my experience, I don't know of a single title Matrix/Slitherine has delisted which wasn't taken off by its original developers deciding to go their own way. They hold onto everything; they still have DVG's Hornet Leader digital adaptation -- they still have Steel Panthers: World at War -- they still have Korsun Pocket! These are all still for sale, not just available for owners to download and play.

The one game I can't find which might have been delisted for reasons other than the developer/designer taking back the rights, is their doomed online-necessary Down in Flames adaptation; which might have been taken down for technical fallacies. ;) (It's not impossible DVG told them to take it down, but why would DVG leave a fatally bugged version of Hornet Leader on the store...?) Come to think of it, there was an unrelated sci-fi collectable card game that was released around the same time, also online-only (even for single-player), which I don't recall the name of so I can't search for it, but I seem to recall it was also delisted for perhaps the same reasons. (I have the box copy at the house somewhere, but it can't be played anymore without the servers.)

So my guess is that this is a rights-exercise issue. But, the rights issue could be compounded by whatever the problem was between Norbsoft and the original Take Command dev -- whose TC2 game, last time I checked, is still for sale on Steam. (I used it years ago for my "Volunteers" AAR, for example.) I'm not where I can check Steam atm, so I can't confirm it's still there.

Of course, Steam (and Matrix) will still allow access to ScoW for owners (as noted in their press release). But it looks like new players won't be able to buy a Steam key off Gamersgate (like is still true for World War One: Centennial for example. WW1Gold is still for sale at Matrix, btw.)

[Skoop]

The Waterloo game totally left the dynamic campaign unfinished.  It was supposed to be a big selling point and it was abandoned with just the foundation in place.  The real selling point was the command from the saddle MP matches.  The dogs of war guys still do weekly matches with this game they are really good.

Tbh, the team headed by kepplemuller (Grand Tactitian)that built the new civil war game kind of took over this niche.  Their game is far superior and they are far better devs.  Once they add MP and new theaters/ periods, their game will pretty much make scourge obsolete.

[Grim.Reaper]

Tbh, the team headed by kepplemuller (Grand Tactitian)that built the new civil war game kind of took over this niche.  Their game is far superior and they are far better devs.  Once they add MP and new theaters/ periods, their game will pretty much make scourge obsolete.

Not sure apples to apples since Scourge much more focused on tactical, not strategic.  I find the tactical part much better in Scourge Civil war, even being older.  Maybe that will change over time.

[Toonces]

^ I'm inclined to agree with Grim.

Grand Tactician is pretty epic, though.

[JasonPratt]

The dogs of war guys still do weekly matches with this game they are really good.

Yep, I've played with them several times!  O0

Tbh, the team headed by kepplemuller (Grand Tactitian)that built the new civil war game kind of took over this niche.  Their game is far superior and they are far better devs.  Once they add MP and new theaters/ periods, their game will pretty much make scourge obsolete.

Huh, I hadn't thought of that -- good point!