[KICKSTARTER] Rising Tides: 28mm Spy Fi on water live on Kickstarter

[Chris Abbey]

44 years ago in 1977 I can remember going to the cinema to see the new Bond film, ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’.  It was a thrilling experience, Roger Moore’s third appearance as Bond and Barbara Bach co-starring as Agent XXX in the spirit of Perestroika and Glasnost working towards a common goal. The Spy Who Loved has remained one of my favorite Bond movies with the exhilarating down hill ski chase at the start, the Lotus Esprit that turns into a Submarine and that breath-taking climatic battle in the submarine pen constructed inside the worlds biggest container ship. I’ve always felt that battle epitomized Bond and that it would make a fantastic tabletop miniatures game, apart from… no one made the miniatures for 1970’s British, American & Soviet Submariners or Strombergs Crew in there distinctive boiler suits and berets… and the terrain was pretty challenging… until now.

Rising Tides in our fifth Classic Movies inspired Kickstarter and is all about 28mm Spy-Fi action on and under the water. We have taken ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’ as a starting point and inspired by it have produced miniatures for our favourite Commander RN, together with RN & Soviet Submariners armed with SMGS, Stongbergs Crew in Boiler Suits and Berets, the famous WetBike, a slick sportscar with a submarine version and a set of terrain that is modular and can be used to build that famous submarine pen with its gantry, stairs, control room, jetties and submarine. We have designed the terrain with modularity in mind and the pieces are all compatible with our existing Terra-Former Modular terrain, held together by rare earth magnets. The pieces can be taken apart and used to make a marina, starship hold, giant warehouse, runway and many other layouts. Check out our Terrain Video to see what we mean.



A speedboat chase is another staple of the Bond movie. Rising Tides presents three classic speedboats that have featured in one or more Bond Movie, The Sunseeker-XS2000 with a top speed of 65 knots seen in Casino Royale, The Glastron Carlson CV23HT seen in Moonraker and the Glastron-GT150 which we see taking to the air in Live and Let Die.



We have a number of stretch goals sculpted up and ready to go. Inspired by Thunderball we have some male and female scuba divers armed with fighting knives and harpoon guns together with a supporting Zodiac RIB dive support boat. Royal Marine Commandos are always a handy support option for Commander Bond, so we sculpted a set of Commandos sculpted to go inside a Zodiac and another set on foot, sculpted in beach assault rig with SLR, ’58 pattern webbing and assault vests.
Kickstarter is running until October 21st.



Link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blackstone/rising-tides

[Chris Abbey]

Two and a half minute overview video from YouTube:

[AdamPHayes]

Looks like a lot of fun, I hope it does well. (I want the Venetian villas along the canalside but I'm guessing they wont be a part of the ~Kickstarter.  )

[Commander Roj]

I’m in! 

[AKULA]

Excellent choice of a theme.

Is there a wider shot of the submarine somewhere?

Am interested to see if you can built an entire sub including the tail?

 

[Chris Abbey]

Glad you like the theme.


This is a good shot of the Submarine. When I started working on this, I discovered that a nuclear submarine is huge... like 8' at 1/56th scale, so we needed something with some flexibility and expand ability. The conning tower is the model we designed for White Out / Ice Station Zebra. The kit is MDF, card, resin and 3D-decals. The submarine body is made up of 12" segments with a pair of rare earth magnets fore and aft for joining together. There is a conning tower section with a cutout in skin to match profile of tower and some rare earth magnets to hold tower in base. There are then normal hull modules. These are made of MDF, with card skin. We then have a bow and stern section. The prototypes are 3D printed. The plan is to cast in resin. These will have magnets to attach to hull. I have only just 3D printed the stern, so will paint and take a photo of sub in open water early next week.

[Commander Roj]

I hope the sub sections will be available in store later. I couldn’t quite stretch to the sub, but hope to get it in the new year. The Spy Who Loved Me was my first Bond in the cinema. Loved it then and love it now. It is only second to OHMSS for me. I put this Bond inspired show game on in 2015. I couldn’t work out how to fit in a Union Jack parachute though:

http://www.brigademodels.co.uk/mws/ShowGames/Snowfall/index.html

[Chris Abbey]

Just added the following to the Rising Tides Kickstarter.
Combat Swimmers in Scuba Gear
Zodiac Inflatable Boat
Civilian Zodiac Crew
Royal Marine Zodiac Crew
Royal Marines on foot in Beach Assault Rig.

All fantastic sculpts from the very talented Mark Fuller
Last few days of Kickstarter, check it out @ https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blackstone/rising-tides

[Commander Roj]

Scuba divers really are my Achilles heel...

[Ultravanillasmurf]

I hope the Kickstarter went well, some of the vehicles might make it into my future purchases.

[AKULA]

will paint and take a photo of sub in open water early next week.

Thanks Chris

 

[Commander Roj]

Alas, Rising Tides has ebbed, but will hopefully come back in again stronger in the future...

[CapnJim]

Alas, Rising Tides has ebbed, but will hopefully come back in again stronger in the future...

Bummer.  Those zodiac boats looked interesting...

[Commander Roj]

Bummer.  Those zodiac boats looked interesting...

Since it appears that the masters have been made, I suspect they will turn up eventually.

[Chris Abbey]

Don't worry, everything is going to be released.

We are still very excited about the project, we've just paused it because not enough other people were, in the format of our original campaign to make it worthwhile. We are giving ourselves 4 months to get the divers, Royal Marines and Zodiacs painted up and for us to write a campaign pack that uses the key miniatures with scenarios that can be played out with Pulp Alley, 7TV, Combat Patrol, Force on Force, Spectre, Bolt Action etc. The pledges will be based on casts / platoon forces for these games.
Hopefully this will generate the correct level of interest and involvement to not only deliver what we have sculpted, but also to get a 'boat load' of additional, related stuff done as well.