Echo Station: The West End Games Crisis

The West End Crisis
by Reuben Israel Beattie

A Gamemaster's thoughts on the Star Wars RPG
August 5th, 1998

THE WEST END CRISIS
Any hopes of West End Games resurfacing after the recent bankruptcy are growing dimmer and dimmer in light of recent news. Much as I hate to say it in the face of such an excellent creative staff, it appears that the company that brought Star Wars fans into the world of Role-Playing Games will never again be able to do such. The decision on July 3rd to lay off the creative staff has taken on a ring of certain finality.

Despite interviews with company president, Scott Palter, that indicate otherwise, all is not well in Honesdale. Palter made a statement to the WEDGE webzine that everything will be back to normal in response to the news in the Daily Illuminator on July 4th that West End had gone belly up. This comment was, as they say in the industry, a nice piece of spin control. The DC Heroes game that West End is supposedly going to base a third of their operations upon is unlikely to come to any fruition, following a statement on July 21st that the game was officially suspended.

In light of this, there's still the possibility that WEG might come up for air, right? I can hear the hopeful fan out there clinging to this distinct possibility. You won't like what I'm about to tell you; frankly, it doesn't make me feel any better, either.

ARE YOU SITTING DOWN?
The following is excerpted from an article in the Wayne Independent (the Honesdale local paper), somewhere around the 20th of July:

Please note that none of these suits includes money owed to freelancers or to Lucasfilm, DC Comics, MGM/UA Consumer Products, Sony/Amblin, or equipment leasing companies.

(Point of clarification: Bucci Imports is the shoe import company with which West End was intertwined and that most people blame for the bankruptcy. Palter claims that the "intercorporate transactions" between WEG and Bucci were not the sole reason, but his credibility has become a little dubious in light of things...)

That's a hell of a lot of money owed, not to mention the money Palter owes his writers and licensees. When coupled with the initial report that the bankruptcy was caused by the bank not approving a loan to meet the payroll, things become more and more murky. West End can't afford to pay the writers, but more importantly, they cannot afford to pay the money to LucasFilm for Star Wars, let alone the money for the Xena/Hercules, Men in Black, DC Heroes, or StarGate SG-1 rights.

Okay, maybe they could produce Paranoia (their own license, for once), but this requires writers. And from the look of things, that's unlikely to happen.

IT JUST GETS WORSE...
Here's an item I got from a qualified source, along with the Wayne Independent excerpts:

Former West End Games Star Wars RPG creative director, Eric Trautmann, recently posted to the Star Wars RPG Mailing list that -- as a result of West End's continually worsening financial situation, and a general distrust of WEG management -- he is surrendering a pair of computers that were previously "given" to him by West End Games in order to pay off an outstanding freelance debt of several thousand dollars. Apparently, the computers had been given to Trautmann, but in fact were leased equipment. In light of WEG's recent Chapter 11 filing, the leasing company has the right to repossess the equipment.

"The computers were supposed to belong to me, but Scott (Scott Palter, owner of West End Games) leased them instead of purchasing them outright. According to Scott Palter's brother, Steven -- who has somehow become entangled in this whole wretched mess, despite his utter unfamiliarity with what we do and how we do it -- these computers must be returned, as Scott is defaulting on the lease," Trautmann said. "Steven has continually assured me that West End is making every effort to make sure I can keep my machines. Of course, for the last two years I have also been assured by West End management that clearing up the steadily-mounting freelance debt was imminent, that staffers' pay scales would increase, and that Lucasfilm -- which is owed such a substantial amount of money that several months ago they refused to approve any West End manuscripts until the matter is cleared up--would be paid. Given the veracity of those statements, well, frankly I'd be a fool to even suspect that there's a grain of truth to it. As a result, I'm forced to contact an attorney to see what legal options I have -- if any -- or simply kiss off thousands of dollars' worth of equipment that I truly need.

"So, to add insult to injury, not only do I lose my job (through gross managerial incompetence), but I also lose the money I'm owed--I expect to see none of it. And as a bonus, I lose the tools I need to continue making a living. Frankly, I don't really care anymore; I just hope that word of West End's generally unethical and underhanded dealings with all facets of the industry -- printers, writers, artists, licensors -- reaches enough ears that no other freelancer ever attempts to wrest work out of the company. Nobody needs this kind of grief."

ANGER, FEAR, AGGRESSION...
Quite honestly, I don't believe that there's much more that I can say about this while retaining any glint of neutrality. While I believe that West End produced some of the best games in the industry while they were solvent, I see less and less that I can comfortably agree with in its corporate structure and policy. Writers and artists (including Echo Station contributors Mike Vilardi, Pablo Hidalgo, and Jordi Ensign) spent more time trying to get their money out of the company (which should not have had financial difficulties in light of the immensely popular Men in Black game and its staple, Star Wars) than they did writing and drawing. The company defaulted on nearly $1.5 million dollars in loans, and they wrote up illegal documents to assuage their unpaid writers.

Apparently the West End crisis had only been a matter of time. Rumors earlier this year reported that Lucasfilm was uncertain if they were going to reapprove the license for the RPG, but this had been veiled as a decision on the part of Lucasfilm to limit its license; there were dozens of other companies producing Star Wars goods and perhaps it was a slowdown to keep quality control. The fabled Jedi Sourcebook (withheld by Lucasfilm to keep certain info in the hands of Lucasfilm only) fell into that category. Instead, the reason seems to have been purely financial, based on Trautmann's statement.

West End, despite the quality in its game rules and content, has always been lacking in certain areas of its corporate management. Evidence for this can be taken from their previous record, with its failed MasterBook line (which included such games as Tank Girl, Species, Tales From The Crypt, and Indiana Jones) and the entire Torg game. These games were very well written and thought out, but suffered from a horredous lack of advertising. One needs only look at the Indiana Jones RPG to know that something could have been done. It's a Lucasfilm inspired game, after all; why couldn't it have been as big as Star Wars? The other movie-based games had such bad promotion that only one or two books for each were produced before the line was completely abandoned. Add in the fact that proposed games such as the Mission: Impossible RPG were nixed in the conceptual stages (currently, there is no RPG on the market that involves espionage; the M:I game would have filled a very notable niche, even if you don't consider that the movie made stacks of money), and a complete picture starts to come forth.

An interview with several former WEG writers is in the works, and with any luck, the rest of the picture should be forthcoming.
There is a case to be made, I believe, that a person should quietly play his RPG games and not wonder what goes on behind the scenes, else the enjoyment goes away. I'm beginning to feel like the poor kid who finds out what really does go into hot dogs, after the hot dog company goes out of business.

(Reuben Israel Beattie amuses himself by playing strange music far too late at night and handing out Dark Side Points as though they were candy. Beyond this, it is said that he's a fairly decent sort.)