Saturday, August 14, 2010

Wargames Factory: Zulu warriors


Today, I'm presenting to you the earlier this year released plastic Zulu warriors made by the Wargames Factory.

General information

As mentionned earlier the miniatures inside are made of hard plastic and are scaled 1/56 which is approximately 28mm. The miniatures inside are the fierce Zulu warriors, these warriors fought against the British rule in South Africa. However they lacked modern weapons they fought fiercely and were able to inflict the British Empire some severe blows such as the battle of Isandlwana and earlier border skirmishes. But even with these victories, the British eventually scattered the zulu army near Ulundi. However the miniatures are ment to represent the Zulu warriors from the Anglo-Zulu war they could easily pass for generic natives or islanders!

The Box

As previously mentionned the box contains 30 plastic Zulu warriors. These warriors come with a variety of unique bodies, heads and arms. Because of this approach you are able to assemble your miniatures in several poses such as fighting, defending, standing, charging or shooting. The variety of heads is due to the hierachical nature of the Zulu nation with heads avaible for married, unmarried and Iduna warriors. Here you can see the body sprue packed with everything you need to build your Zulu warrior. One box contains 6 of these sprues and enables you to build 30 warriors!


But what's a warrior without weapons? That brings us to the next sprue of the box. The weapon sprue contains all sorts of native weaponry such as shields, spears, assegais and knobkerries. The assegais are short stabbing spears used for close combats as the longer spears were used as throwing weapons. But my most favorite weapon must be the knobkerrie a multipurpose native weapon which can be used as throwing weapon or to club your enemy's head!

But these weapons are only half of the weaponry! Also included are some modern fire arms such as Henry Martin rifles and muskets which were extensively used by the Zulu's after the british defeat at Isandlwana and Shaka's reign.


Opinion

My opinion about this generic kit is very positive due to the details and the conversion possibilities! This kit is really useful for who wants to assemble a affordable native force for as well historical as pulp settings. Which takes us to the acceptable retailprice of $19.95, €20 or £15!


Greets,

2 comments:

Al said...

Quite cool, it would be nice to see more 1/72 figures done in this way

Wargame News and Terrain Blog said...

Me to but Ican't compete with this site, the unbeaten champion of the 1/72 reviews:

http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com

Greets and thanks for the comment!