Wednesday 2 March 2011

Recreational Conflict Zombies 01

It's March already and I haven't reviewed any zombie figures this year. To set this oversight to rights I'm going to review a bunch of zombies from a company that I've not mentioned before - Recreational Conflict, a US based company who produce a fine range of 28mm scale horror figures (zombies, werewolves, civilians, survivors and zombie hunters). To start with, I'm going to look at eight of their hospital zombies, i.e. doctors, nurses and patients.
At the far left of my first two photos is a zombie doctor with a rather unnerving and maniacal grin. I ask myself, what's he got to be so cheerful about? It is so rare to see a zombie smiling so perhaps it is a rictus grin, caused when he died. With his balding head and grey hair he was probably a surgeon or senior consultant. He has a massive hole in the right side of his stomach, so it is abundantly clear how he died.
Next up is probably my favourite zombie out of this batch, the almost headless nurse. Someone has tried to hack her head off but hasn't quite succeeded. Her head is still attached to her neck by a few sinews and a scrap of flesh. She has also lost her right arm, possibly to the same assailant. In the film Land of the Dead, George Romero proved that such a near headless zombie could still pose a viable threat! Because medical staff would be in the front line when the zombie apocalypse kicks off, I have assumed she was attacked whilst she was still human, so such wounds would produce a mass of blood to be spilled, hence I went over the top with the gore on her uniform.
Third in line is the first of two porters. This chunky looking female has what looks more like a headband than a bandage around her head. She has been bitten in the throat and has a hole where her right knee is. I covered her hands in blood as if she made some attempt to stem the blood flow from her neck wound. She is no beauty, despite her wounds but so what? Zombies have no respect for age, beauty or race; they're just after one thing - fresh meat.
Last in line for the hospital workers is a male porter zombie. He has a mid-sized hole in the right side of his torso, which has bled profusely. So again, I assumed he received the wound prior to him becoming another member of the undead. He is tall and lean, the very opposite of his female colleague. It's great to see such a disparity of heights amongst the figures as this truly reflects real life.
Next up are the zombie patients, starting at the far left with the only male patient in the group. By the way, that last photo with all four of them baring their backsides loses any sense of eroticism due to the amount of blood and missing limbs amongst them! Anyway, back to the male, and he has been bitten in the left side of his face and has puncture wounds to his right hip and lower right thigh. More than likely they are all bite wounds. He wears a pair of fluffy slippers, which I painted green.
Second in line is the first of three female patients. I had to look closely to see if she was visibly wounded at all and I found a small bite on her left leg. She, too, wears fluffy slippers, which this time I painted bright orange. They almost look fluorescent!
I had no such problems with determining the wounds of the next zombie in line. Her left arm has been bitten off, leaving a piece of bone clearly visible. She also has a diagonal wound running from her right hip to her left shoulder from which a length of her intestines is dangling. Nasty! She is a very shapely and attractive female and she also wears a headband. Her feet are bare. I like her best of all out of the zombie patients.
Lastly we come to a zombie with an extraordinary sense of balance. By all rights, she should be lying on the ground, trying to drag herself forward with her chin. Her right arm has been bitten off at the elbow; her left arm has been severed at the shoulder and her left leg has been chewed off at the hip. I suppose it is possible that she could stand, if she had some help, but I think I'd have prefered to see her as a zombie crawler, which would have made a lot more sense. I have no complaints against the sculpting of the figure, it is merely the logic of such a pose that I question.
These are a great set of zombie figures and from a scale perspective will fit in well with zombie ranges by the likes of Cold War, Hasslefree and/or Studio. I applaud their decision to make hospital related zombies. More than any other type of building, hospitals will spawn the most amount of zombies as soon as the infection starts to spread and in the early days of the outbreak will only get worse as more victims arrive there, only to succumb to the zombie plague.
You can buy the figures singly at a price of $2.50 each from the Recreational Conflict website or alternatively, you can do what I did and buy a multipack of 16 zombie figures (A Crate of Zombies is what the pack is called) for just $36.00, saving you $4.00 over buying them individually. All 16 figures in the pack are different. Next time on my blog, I'll review the other eight zombies that are available from this range.
On a personal note, I'd like to thank Richard Brooks of Recreational Conflict for keeping in touch with me about the orders and in the speedy delivery of the orders. I received my last parcel of Recreational Conflict figures within six days of ordering them. This was the first time I have ever received a parcel from the USA within a week. Outstanding service and I can only say that it has been a pleasure dealing with Richard. Oh, and the fact that he has visited my neck of the woods just last year earns him massive brownie points from me!

23 comments:

  1. Looking promising. The medical staff as zombies is almost a must! Good review as always mate.

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  2. The only reason I hadn't ordered these yet is the bloody customs duty you get at this end for purchases over a certain amount ($25 I think) from America, they look really good painted up, very good work.

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  3. Cool figures, not too sure about the one legged Z'd with no arms. Would a zombie hop?? answers on the back of a postcard to Vampi......

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  4. @Lord Siwoc. I totally agree. Medical staff zombies (and zombie patients) are a must.

    @The Angry Lurker. If you keep the cost of an order down you won't get ripped off by our lovely customs officers. The boxed set of 16 zombies for $36.00 that I ordered was unaffected by any customs charges so if you really want them, I'd advise you to order them. I try to limit my oders to the USA to less than $40.00 and it's worked so far. There are websites that allows you to input how much your order abroad will be and it calculates how much (if any) customs duty you'll pay. I'll try and dig one out for you. It's certainly more than $25 that you are allowed, that much I do know.

    @Ray. Can a zombie hop? Frankly, I'd be gobsmacked if it could! Heck, I'm not even convinced that zombies should be able to run!

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  5. Sweet. The question I have is, who is going to be the first to make a hospital interior as a full gaming table?

    Will WWG make us a hospital set if we ask nicely? :)

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  6. The complete hospital, all levels. Mission: to survive to a certain time limit. You are not allowed to venture outside, as you will die instantly by the mass of zeds waiting out there.

    Dead bodies of guards will provide you with guns. Medicine cabinets to give you an edge and heal yourself.

    This could be pretty damn cool!!!

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  7. A complete hospital would be so awesome, guys. It has been requested on the WWG forum more than once and I was one of those asking for it. The official word is that it is something that WWG would love to do but due to how short of staff they are it could take quite a while to realise. In other words, don't hold your breath waiting for it. In a similar vein, there have been requests for an insane asylum and a morgue. My personal feeling is that they will get made, but it could take two, three or even more years before we see them going on sale. I'm with you guys on this topic. I'd love to see WWG make Mayhem Hospital. The city needs it. I need it!!!!!!!!!!!

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  8. Thank you for the positive comments. The Roman Museum in South Shields and the city art museum in Newcastle are worth a viewing, if you are nearby visit them.

    If you are interested in a relatively inexpensive hospital Bachman/Plasticville (model railroad plastic building) has a two story hospital that sometimes comes with a floor, beds and some other furniture. The hospital measures about 12 inches square. With two hospital kits you could make a three floor structure.

    You shouldn't really worry about custom duties ordering from us as long as what you order fits in a 5 by 8 by 1.5 inch box.

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  9. Those are nice. I also like the near-headless nurse.

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  10. Nicely painted Vamp, this is the 'R' Rated side of your collection, very gory.... >_<

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  11. I feel a little sick after seeing these zeds. Sure way to spot a great paint job! ;o)

    I still have to find some Tamiya clear red...

    Whiteface / Oliver

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  12. @Richard. I just have to love an American who knows his North East England geography! I've been to both the sites that you mention above and I concur, they are well worth a visit.
    I hope the Angry Lurker and anyone else feeling wary of ordering from Richard due to customs charges takes note. It is safe to order from him, okay?!
    Model railway buildings is something I've never considered buying before but I have seen how effective they look on other zombie gamers' blogs. I may look more closely into purchasing some kits.

    @Luckyjoe. As I said, I like the near-headless nurse a lot. She's a great sculpt!

    @The Extraordinarii. These certainly are amongst my bloodiest zombies. They're definitely R rated!

    @Oliver. Once you get some TCR you'll quickly discover it is your new best friend. No zombie painter should be without it.

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  13. Brilliant work as always Bryan!!

    Is the 'Zombie Hop' some type of new popular music dance in the far off chilly barbaric 'norff' of our fair land that I am not yet aware of?!?

    (Personally I'd have hacked the limbly-challenged zed about and based her as a corpse)

    And Tamiya Clear Red really is the canine's gonads for blood effects; I've redone all my WW2 casualties with it and it's made a VAST improvement to them!

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  14. @mac-and-me. Thanks and welcome aboard.

    @Colin. The Zombie Hop - LOL!
    I might well get a second zombie hopper and remodel her as either a crawler or a corpse.
    Yes, yes, yes, TCR is the dog's dangly bits for painting gore effects. Don't just take my word for it, folks.

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  15. OK, OK, I hope Tamiya X-27 is the famous Clear Red. Order sent.

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  16. @Whiteface. Congrats, Oliver, Tamiya X-27 IS the magic Tamiya Clear Red. Expect your life to change for the better once you receive it!

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  17. Bryan- So Rec. Conflict figures are good figs? Cool I have been thinking about getting their Zeds and the Bio-Hazard team and the Whole SPRU sets. Though it will probably have to wait a few months, have other things like a working vehicle that are higher up on the list. Sad thing is the cost to replace the transmission on my truck it more then it would cost me to buy a cheap used car to get me around town.

    Most my recent works been building stuff from the Ebbles Archive DVD and the newer stuff like the Jeepvee, Apevee, and Onager since they don't cost much if you have the files, cardstock, glue and ink already. Plus one can take an entire afternoon just building a couple of the models. I am though going to have to start working on some of the WWG stuff, I have had most their Urban Mayhem sets (missing Urban Grind and Junkyard) and Shelendrak manor (also missing Wildwood Grove and both the Cathedrea Noctic sets which are multi-genre sets that I want to eventually get).

    I did just get the Ebbles paper Craft Starter set (ordered Tuesday arrived today), containing an Olfa SRV-2 Knife 2 different packs of replacement blades, Elmers tacky Glue and No-Wrinkle glue, a Re-Stickable Glue stick, A metal ruler, a cutting mat, a Gatorblade II ( multi-purpose tool for burnishing/scraping/etc...) and a Blade Disposal Can (does same thing as the prescription bottle I use for old x-acto blades), Mel is also throwing in a 40 pk of the 80lb cover stock he has for sale on his site. So far I am loving the mat and the ruler they are better then the ones I was using before getting the starter pack, the Olfa Knife I havent drawn any concrete opinions on it since only used it once so far, but so far it feels like a nice little knife. The Gatorblade II looks to be nice since I can use it to smooth over sandwich folds better then my fingers. I should hopefully have a mini review over on my blog here in the next couple days or so depending on whether I get the chance to use the stuff or not. Just a small FYI Mel only has a limited number of the kits (he had 5 assembled and I bought one of them).

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  18. Wow! I think these are even too much for me. My kids would freak.

    Where did Alexis go?

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  19. Cool Figures, so is the Zombie roll playing game on or what? i mean Call of Chuthlu tries to establish that but the Sanity meter kills it if you want to go Blasting zombies away

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  20. @Doug. I have nothing but praise for Recreational Conflict. I'll be reviewing a lot of their stuff over the next few weeks so keep on watching.

    The Ebbles models that you've posted on your blog looks great, even the Hello Kitty pink Jeepvee! Actually, you're not missing much from the WWG store. I'd highly recommend Shellendrak Manor. It's great for furniture and interior props.

    I didn't know about the Papercraft Starter set. I doubt very much if I'll buy it as I have everything I need for modelling card buildings and scenery, etc. However, from your description it sounds ideal for novices. I'm glad you like it and I'd love to see a more indepth review on your blog-site. Thanks for sharing that, Doug.

    @Willy. To quote The Extraordinarii, these are the R rated side of my collection. I don't normally slap so much gore on my zombies but for these I felt the extra blood was justified.

    Where's Alexis? LOL! You crack me up, Willy! She is standing proud in front of my computer monitor and her impressive boobies are also standing proud, pointing at me like two car headlights!

    @Malkavian. Hi and welcome to my blog. It's great to have you on board! The game I play is called All Things Zombie by Two Hours Wargames. It is not a role-playing game but neither is it a wargame. It falls somewhere inbetween with elements of both. With ATZ you can blast away at zombies to your heart's content (and much fun is derived from doing just that!) and you don't have to worry about Sanity Loss. If you want to know more about how ATZ works check out my posts listed under the label ATZ Campaign in the sidebar to the left. if you have any further questions, feel free to ask.

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  21. Bryan- Don't know how soon I will be getting that review done, Just started a brand new job today. Working at a local Olan Mills Photo Studio selling introductory packages in the store they are located in.

    As for the kit being geared towards novices, yeah, but i have been looking at getting a new cutting mat, the small little green GW one I have is starting to show its wear and is a little small for some projects (makes a nice mouse pad though), and I needed a new ruler since the one I was using ended up getting bent when my cat tried to use it as a spring board. As for the knife we all know that you can never have to many knives for this hobby (both Cardstock and miniatures). Was also looking at getting a Gatorblade to try out so the package was actually up my ally.

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  22. Doug, many congrats on getting a new job. I hope it eases your financial worries. It sure is nice to hear a bit of good news when there is so much doom and gloom about.

    I had to smile about your cat and your metal ruler. Cats are such great fun! When I had my two cats, my parents and I would be entertained for hours just watching them play with a paper bag, especially when they were kittens. They were far more entertaining than anything on TV. Ah, happy days!

    Anyway, I'm glad to hear you got everything you wanted from your package. I'm very happy for you, Doug. Well done, mate!

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