Spartan sadly failed, apparently due to mismanagement and overextension. All existing employes were let go, all manufacturing ceased, and the remaining assets went into recievership. The Halo Fleet Battles/Ground Command IP immediately reverted back to Microsoft/343 Studios, while Warcradle won the bid for the IP for Dystopian Wars, Firestorm Armada, and Uncharted Seas. Out of those three IPs, Warcradle (WC) is focusing on Dystopian first. Activity for Firestorm Armada is probably at least a year out, I would guess.
Anyway, WC had also purchased the IP for Wild West Exodous, and decided to combine elements and characters of both WWX and Dystopian Wars into a new timeline they are referring to as the Dystopian Age. This setting is a completely new continuity that is distinct from Spartan's Dystopian and Outlaw's WWX settings. As I said, it has elements of the old; characters have carried over, the factions are somewhat similar (though also very different), and some of the tech works in a similar fashion. WWX has already been re-released, and an open beta has started for the new version of Dystopian Wars (DW 3.0).
Regarding the obsolescence of models, a brand new model range is in the works for the eventual re-release of DW 3.0. WC has stated their intentions for the range to feature plastics, though I doubt it will be 100% plastic. WC has repeatedly stated that they intend for all the old naval and air models to still be usable in the new version of Dystopian Wars. It remains to be seen whether WC will follow through on that statement, though. In the mean time, WC has been doing limited runs of Spartan-era models for gamers looking to fill out their collections; these models are being referred to as WC Classics, and their release is somewhat slap-dash as WC is just releasing models that it finds good molds for as it sorts though the massive pile of material left over from Spartan's closure. One thing to note is that land models will be more obsolete than naval and air, as WC is taking most of the ground element out of DW, moving it to a new game to be called Armored Clash, and changing the scale to 10mm. However, the medium and large land models will still be large enough to be used as proxies in Armored Clash.
All of that being said, there are sizable portions of the DW playerbase that have committed to sticking to older versions of the rules. They congregate both here and on Facebook!
