Unboxing 02 Hundred Hours
Hello,
Today we'll be unboxing the new brand new boxed game from Grey For Now: 02 Hundred Hours and taking a peek at just what the community can expect from this box of delights...
In case you didn't catch it, the most recent WSS podcast (linked here) featured an interview with 02 Hundred Hours' designer, Graham Davey, so let's take a rummage through the contents for a closer look.
Firstly, the box is well stocked. In addition to a neat and comprehensive 64-page softcover A5 rulebook, we find five sprues of hard plastic multipart 28mm miniatures (with corresponding bases) eight custom dice, cards, and two sheets of punch-cut cardstock tokens. 
Davey's rulebook is slick and well illustrated on full-colour pages throughout, with plenty of in-game shots (often - fittingly for the sneaky-sneaky theme - photographed in darkness!) and diagrams where needed. It seems sturdily bound, too, which is always a reassurance.
Custom dice maybe aren't to everybody's taste, but these aren't overcomplicated and they are of good quality; similarly the card tokens (vital for the 02 Hundred gameplay) are well well made and should stand up very well to frequent use.
Naturally, though, the aspect of this new release that many of our readers will be most excited about are the new plastic miniatures, so let's take a look at them:
Designed and manufactured by the creative powerhouse that is Wargames Atlantic, these new sprues are - put simply - things of beauty:
The two British sprues will make twelve raider miniatures - nominally SAS - with a substantial range of interesting poses, weapon choices and other raiding equipment, including silenced pistols, explosive charges, a deLisle, Brens and various SMGs. They can don backpacks and have a range of headgear choices too, with helmets, berets and the iconic cap-comforter.
The German guards in this starter set - being somewhat less elite(!) - get eighteen men across three sprues, and these are even more joyous than the Brits:
Here you'll find a brilliantly characterful range of options and combinations: we played around with some of the following, and the possibilities still seem endless:
- guards shining flashlights, surrendering, sneaking a cigarette, patrolling, slinging their rifle, bored, or walking guard dogs;
- that's right: there are six guad dogs included! These are delightful sculpts which can be modelled leashed or unleashed (notice in the photo below that the pooch can be glued to the lead or not)
- Feldgendarmerie personnel, complete with separate chained gorgets for this season's brutally unforgiving Kettenhunde look,
- snooty officers swaggering around, and
- grizzled NCOs - doubtless wondering how they got saddled with the laziest guards in the entire Wehrmacht.
The sculpting and production quality across both sprue designs are absolutely top-notch: incomparable. Are they maybe a little bit Hollywood? - yes they are, but then the game itself unashamedly draws on these conventions. There are some other lovely details too, which I won't spoil here.
Size-wise, they are all in keeping with the well-honed Atlantic aesthetic: they stand a shade taller than other mainstream 28mm plastics, but without the "heroic" proportions we might see elsewhere. In other words, they're just right, and will fit in splendidly with existing ranges; these are the sort of historical minis that everyone in the gaming club will get excited about when you show them off - I promise. Oh, and Grey for Now are also releasing some lovely metal character minis alongside, which look fab!
The sprues come with thirty-six 25mm round plastic bases - these are lightly textured with both a central hole and a recess beneath: each, we assume, designed to accommodate magnets or ballast. They're rather nice. 
Sadly, there is a notable absence of any guidance on how gamers ought to actually construct the miniatures: this would be a pain with any box of multipart minis, but for a starter set it feels like it could be a real barrier to the easy enjoyment of the game by anyone new to tabletop gaming - there's not even a key or legend detailing what each of the components is!
It could be argued that the nicely illustrated gaming cards with which gamers build their opposing forces are enough to base their minis on, but I doubt whether everyone new to the history or the genre is likely to be able to tell one tiny plastic firearm from another. Is this a silenced pistol? Does a sniper's rifle have to have a scope? Are these two knives the same or different? Does it matter if my guard has no helmet? Can I give my sergeant three SMGs? Where's the night-vision goggles? - or even on a more basic level, What glue do I need to put these together?
A little slip of paper, maybe, outlining the basics might negate some or all of these queries.
Similarly, for a game of stealth that clearly (and quite rightly) champions the use of cover, there's no advice offered on how to build up (or even how to improvise) terrain - a pity when what's on display in the illustrations is so atmospheric. It's always a poor stand-in, maybe, but even a few bits of '2D', top-down cardstock 'scenery' might have helped new gamers to get stuck in to playing.
Those are pretty minor gripes, though, for what is a genuinely smashing starter set: £46 will net you (and probably a friend) the basics of a very clever game, thirty absolutely superb toy soldiers (that can of course be used with other systems)...
...and six dogs.
You'd be barking mad not to consider it.
(sorry)
