Over the weekend I was printing and cutting some game prototypes, and I put the latest season finale of Welcome to Wrexham on in the background. I didn’t expect the confluence of those two activities to bring me to tears.
In this episode, the Wrexham football team is preparing for a game at the end of the season that will decide whether they are promoted to the second-highest level of English football. The team’s co-owner, Rob McElhenney, gives a speech inspired by a text conversation he had with some unnamed, highly successful athletes.
Here’s most of McElhenney’s speech, almost verbatim (thanks to this transcript). Also, if you have Hulu, I highly recommend watching the speech, as it’s brilliantly edited in a way that splices footage of the final game with the players during their childhood days.
“I want you to picture a time in your life. Maybe you’re eight, maybe you’re nine, maybe you’re ten, maybe you’re six, maybe you’re 12, but you’re out there and you’re playing football. You’re just kicking the ball around. You’re playing with your friends, your dad, your mom, your sisters, your brothers, your buddies. You’re just playing football.
And it’s fun. And you fell in love with that feeling.
Of course you’re grateful for the support that you’ve had along the way, your family, your friends, and everyone, but you’ve already honored that. From this point, the only person you owe something to is that ten-year-old kid who fell in love with football, who could not wait to be in the position that you’re in right now!
The point is, there is a moment or a series of moments in which you were in love with this game, and that is all that matters. I want you to go out there and play like you’re ten years old and have the time of your lives because I promise you that is the only thing you will remember.”
I’m watching this speech unfold while cutting and sorting prototype cards, something I also did as a 10-year-old. I played and created games then purely for the fun of it. Now I’m very fortunate to run a tabletop publishing company as my job, but sometimes I need the reminder that I do this for the love of games.
I also played soccer as my primary sport from a young age up until college, and I still occasionally play pickup games. Even though I never played at a high level, there was definitely a tonal difference between playing for fun with my friends and starting for my high school team. To practice for hours every day can feel like work, even though it’s a game.
So as I listened to McElhenney’s rousing speech, I found myself in tears. I was transported back to those days when there was no marketing and metrics and planning and budgeting and customer service and project management and proofreading. It was just me sitting on the floor in my bedroom, drawing maps, cutting cards, and writing rules. It was just me juggling the soccer ball outside at sunset with my late father.
This isn’t to bemoan any of the business aspects of my job. I genuinely enjoy them, and I appreciate the variety they offer. I like that game design is only a small part of my job.
But with all the complications we make for ourselves and that come with being adults, the speech was a helpful reminder that there is a child in all of us who once did it for the love of the game. It’s worth honoring that child by seeking and spreading joy.
This may not resonate with your career compared to your childhood passions, but perhaps you can still relate to the concept of doing something purely for the love of it you first discovered when you were young. What does this speech make you think about?
Yesterday was our biggest launch day since Wyrmspan (just barely edging out Vantage’s first 24 hours), and the combination of Wingspan Americas and Viticulture: Bordeaux will soon start to ship to customers worldwide. The webstore launch discounts are available through Sunday.
Across our 5 webstores (US, Canada, Europe, Australia/NZ/Asia, and US retail), we’ve sold 14,692 copies of Wingspan Americas (along with 618 sets of vision-friendly cards) and 4,794 copies of Viticulture: Bordeaux in the last 24 hours, and our fulfillment centers are ready to ship them to Champions starting early next week.
One of the reasons I share these numbers is because they’re a good reminder that early adopters–whom we greatly appreciate–can be just the tip of the iceberg. Our forecasts for the first printing of these expansions (numbers determined from past data and distributor estimates) resulted in us making 100,000 Wingspan Americas and 25,000 Viticulture: Bordeaux to cover demand in the first half of 2026.
Ultimately, it isn’t sales numbers that determine the success of a Stonemaier game or expansion: All that matters to us is that we make something that brings joy to your tabletop. I love what designer Elizabeth Hargrave created with the new hummingbird mechanism in Americas, and I had so much fun reimagining the Viticulture board in Bordeaux with an “expert” upgrade for each action across 4 seasons of worker placement.
I truly hope you have fun with these expansions, whether you order from our webstore to receive them over the next few weeks or if you pick up a copy from your favorite retailer in early March!
The slides shown in the following infographics are also found individually (larger text) on Instagram.
I write these articles and create videos in the hopes of adding value to readers, creators, designers, gamers, and entrepreneurs, so as we begin 2026, I thought it might be a good time to check in with you to see if I’m accomplishing those goals and how I can do better.
Stonemaier Games is a tabletop game publisher, first and foremost. We create (and reprint) games in the hopes of bringing joy to your tabletop. But I believe that the power of games extends beyond the tabletop. That’s community, and that’s why I devote some time to these articles and videos each week.
Plus, one of the amazing things about community is that it’s an opportunity for me to learn from you. Each of these articles and videos is a forum for discussion, and I appreciate you for joining the conversation. I also really appreciate the Champions whose annual $15 contribution directly supports the creation of 100+ articles per year and 300+ videos.
Website
I write 2 articles per week (Monday and Thursday), with the actual writing happening almost always on the same day that I post. Over the last few years my articles have focused primarily on the marketing and entrepreneurship of tabletop games, highlighting examples from Stonemaier Games and other publishers. I occasionally feature guest posts and interviews if someone has insights that I haven’t previously shared. Also, after most articles I record an audio version for those who prefer listening over reading.
These articles aren’t about game design (I reserve that topic for videos), and they’re less about crowdfunding than 10 years ago (I still pay attention to crowdfunding through the lens of a backer and creator, but my last project as a creator was in 2015). I’d also like to do a better job of linking new articles in relevant groups (e.g., on the Entrepreneurship & Marketing page) to help someone who wants to learn about a specific topic.
Revenue: There are no ads on the website, though this is the Stonemaier Games website, so it is a discovery tool for our games. Shopify’s analytics indicate that $1.6 million of our webstore sales over the last 12 months are attributed to this website, though not necessarily related to the blog.
Stats: While my motivation for writing these articles isn’t likes and views, I wouldn’t keep writing if people stopped reading. Views per article seem to vary widely from 300 or so to 15,000+, with most of the conversation happening on the Facebook page crossposts.
YouTube
I record on average 6 videos per week, with most of the actual filming happening on Tuesday using StreamYard, a Blue Yeti mic, and a Logitech Brio 4K webcam. The most consistent YouTube videos I film are “my favorite mechanism” about a game I recently played, top 10 lists, the weekly livecast, and the Positively Board Gaming podcast. Most videos are unedited; my coworker Joe adds a quick bumper at the beginning and text on the top 10 videos.
I also sometimes talk about expansions, digital games, the design process, games I’m excited to play again, and insights about Stonemaier game/product design. Every month I stream a Rolling Realms playthrough, and now each week I also feature a sponsored playthrough by another content creator. While it’s mostly me talking at the camera, I include other perspectives in the form of panelists on top 10 videos and lots of audience participation on the livecast.
Some notable updates to the channel in 2025/2026 were me adding relevant end-screen links and using premiere links a little more often for livecasts. I generally don’t like the premiere feature–if I see a video in my feed, I want the option to watch it now–but I think it works well for the participatory nature of livecasts.
I’m not a reviewer, so I do not accept free review copies of games. I’m always working on being more precise, eloquent, and succinct in my videos, including examples and inviting conversation.
Revenue: Prior to 2025, I had turned off all monetization options on our channel. However, after the channel was briefly hacked last year, I heard the advice that YouTube might be more responsive to situations like that if they had some vested interest in the form of paid advertising. So I turned on monetization, adding an ad at the beginning of top 10 videos and sometimes linking to our webstore on relevant videos. After doing this for 6 months, we’ve received just over $1,000 in ad revenue (total).
Stats: As I mentioned above, my motivation for any video isn’t likes or views; it’s to create something I enjoy making and is true to me while hopefully adding value to you. Views vary widely depending on the type of video; the least-viewed videos are watched around 400 times, while the most-watched videos might have upwards of 20,000 views. Overall, the channel currently has around 56,000 subscribers.
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I’d love to hear your thoughts about what you’d like me to keep doing in these articles and on the videos, along with anything you’d like to me improve or try. I make this content for you, so your feedback really is important to me.
Our mission is to bring joy to tabletops worldwide. Approximately 20% of the world speaks English, so if Stonemaier Games only published products in that language, we would miss out on serving on 80% of potential tabletops. We currently work with 40+ other publishers around the world to accomplish that goal, amounting to around 13% of our annual revenue.
Specifically, my coworker, Susannah, coordinates with those publishers (aka localization partners). For example, when the Viticulture: Bordeaux Expansion English files were approved by our manufacturer in mid-2025, Susannah shared the source files for translation and the price per unit at different quantities with our localization partners. For any who decided to participate, Susannah kept them (and me) up to date with any potential revisions found during the translation process.
Important: Every localization partner is a publisher, completely independent from Stonemaier Games. Any information about localized games is for localization partners to share when they’re ready. You’re always welcome to express interest in any Stonemaier product with our localization partner for your preferred language.
I last wrote in detail about localization in 2016. The original article is still relevant, hence why I haven’t updated it, but today I’ll outline the process we’ve refined over the years. This is not the only way to coordinate localization; it’s just what we’ve found works well for Stonemaier Games and our partners. This is roughly in chronological order:
I don’t try to make our games language independent (i.e., all icons), as I find that a complex mesh of icons almost always impedes accessibility, limits the scope of creative abilities, and decreases thematic flavor. I greatly prefer a mix of icons and text. As an unintended side effect, some amount of language dependence increases the appeal for localization partners.
Late in the development process, Susannah pitches the product to localization partners in confidentiality so they can discuss if they want to join the first printing. Sometimes they ask to see prototype files, which I provide. We typically work with the same partners for each language to build trust and communication through consistency; it’s only if a partner continually doesn’t serve us or their customers that we look for someone new.
When the English first printing is in production, we get a quote from Panda for a batch of smaller quantities (1000-4000 units) to calculate localization partner prices. Typically they amount to a roughly 70% discount on MSRP (enough for us to cover manufacturing costs and make a small profit).
To ensure that partners receive the most printer-ready versions of the product, we wait until Panda has created the digital proofs and we’ve approved them before sending the source files for translation to partners. Each localization partner handles their own translation and proofreading. They typically have 2-3 months to provide printer-ready files (PDFs created from the InDesign source files) to join the first localized print run. Sometimes translators find mistakes that we missed, typically in time for us to update the English files; Susannah communicates those revisions to all active translators and I answer rule questions.
Each partner uploads their final files to Panda’s file management system and goes through Panda’s pre-press checks. If they don’t finalize and approve the files by the deadline provided, they must wait for the next printing.
Localization partners pay us 50% before production begins; they pay us the other 50% when their products are ready to ship from Panda a few months later. Each localization partner coordinates and pays for their own freight shipping, which may include language-independent add-ons like upgraded tokens. It’s very rare that a partner doesn’t make the second payment; if that happens, we don’t release the products to them. We rarely have written contracts with localization partners.
We provide an announcement schedule and marketing materials to localization partners (including photos of the English version). If we commission a teaser trailer video, we provide a version to partners without a voiceover so they can post it in their language. Some partners tell us it’s okay to list their name on the product page for our website upon the initial announcement; others wait until later.
Again, this is just one way to do things. If you’re a newer publisher who is starting to hear from potential localization partners, I recommend looking at their portfolio of other localized games. Ask for data, talk to their customers, and do your research–their work is a reflection of you. You can also consider working with companies that publish in multiple languages (e.g., Publishing Technology Solutions).
Likewise, if a publisher contacts you to consider localization of their game, feel free to ask anything you want. Request the rules, playtest files, and any available data (e.g., crowdfunding results). Keep a close eye on any early red flags in communication.
I invite any other publishers to share their localization methods in the comments–I like hearing different perspectives. If you have any questions, please share them in the comments as well.
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Bordeaux will be available on the Stonemaier Games webstores in English along with Wingspan Americas on Wednesday, January 21, with shipping throughout February. You can sign up for a notification here: https://stonemaiergames.com/games/viticulture/newsletter/
I just spent a delightful weekend at Geekway Mini here in St. Louis playing tabletop games–including several play-and-win games–with a variety of wonderful people. Among some new-to-me favorites, I also taught and played Origin Story, Viticulture with the new expansion board (subscribe here for more info), and an epic 7-player game of Scythe on a friend’s stunning custom board.
With many game conventions big and small happening around the world in 2026, I thought this might be a good opportunity to shine the spotlight on the amazing play-and-win system that originated with Geekway many years ago. Also, tickets for the bigger version of Geekway will be available starting this Friday–I’d love to play a game there with you in May if you decide to attend!
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My favorite way to market our products is to facilitate and encourage them to get to the table more often. Your table, my table, the tables of reviewers, ambassadors, etc–any table will do. The more our products get to the table, the more they’re exposed to people, and hopefully the more fun people can have with them.
This is a big part of the reason why we support our products with reprints, expansions, and ongoing reviews, as well as focusing on accessibility (Watch It Played videos, ability to teach to new players on the fly instead of frontloading rules, etc). Our goal is to bring joy to tabletops worldwide, but a key element is that our games must actually get to the table.
One of my favorite ways to accomplish this goal is through play-and-win donations for game conventions and 100+ person events.
Play-and-win is a convention concept where people can check out a game, play it, and then enter their name in a lottery to win that specific game at the end of the convention. If I donate a play-and-win game to a convention, it can be experienced by dozens and dozens of people in a short amount of time. Only one of those people will win it, so if other people liked the game, they’re now informed in their decision to purchase it later.
I’ve been talking about play-and-win on this blog for a while after discovering it at St. Louis’ own Geekway to the West (which I’m attending again this year–I highly recommend it), and I’ll post those links at the bottom of this entry. Stonemaier Games sends dozens of games each month to support conventions around the world.
Today I’m going to focus on the play-and-win Google Doc that I created and maintain, as well as my current approaches to maximizing the potential of play-and-win for publishers, conventions, and gamers.
Publishers
If you’re a publisher who likes the play-and-win system, but you don’t like getting solicitations from hundreds of conventions, the Google Doc is for you. You can simply enter your information on this tab, which communicates to the participating conventions that you’re in the know and don’t need to be contacted individually.
As a publisher myself, my process for sending out play-and-win games is that I have a calendar alert late each month to remind me to check the Google Doc for conventions happening 2-3 months in the future. For example, today (mid-January) I’m looking at conventions happening in March and April. Conventions have told me that this advance notice is really helpful, particularly so the coordinators can tell vendors which games are coming in time for them to stock up via distributors.
The number of games I send to a convention depends on the size of the event. Sometimes the play-and-win coordinators enter their information on the Google Doc and forget about it, so I help to remind them of what the package is by including the words “play-and-win” as part of the address label.
I try to keep our ambassadors informed about the various conventions that feature our play-and-win games. If any of them attend those conventions, they can make sure to drop by from time to time to see if players have questions. Otherwise, you don’t need to be worried about having teachers present–people who use play-and-win are usually comfortable to learn the game from the rulebook, and random fans of the game often stop by to help out.
Last, while we donate our games to play-and-win sections for free, it’s perfectly reasonable for you to offer a convention a discount instead of a free game. This can actually be helpful to the convention, as it lets them buy exactly what they think will be the most exciting for their attendees (instead of letting you choose).
Conventions
If you’re completely new to play-and-win, read this blog entry about the core details (or these instructions on the Geekway website). Then take note of the following:
Please enter your convention on the Google Doc (use open rows at the bottom of each month or insert a new row). In doing so, you’re committing to use any contributed games for play-and-win, and you’re committing to actually having a play-and-win section with at least a dozen total games (even if it means allocating part of your convention budget towards buying games specifically for this purpose). You can now indicate if you prefer different games or multiple copies of the same game.
In filling out the Google Doc, there’s no need to contact publishers–particularly publishers on this tab–to solicit donations. You will either receive games 30-45 days before your event…or you won’t, in which case you have plenty of time to purchase games to fill your play-and-win section.
At least several weeks before the convention, tell vendors which games were donated for play-and-win so they can stock those games at the event. The play-and-win section should close (and winners announced) before the vendors close their booths.
When you receive the games, prepare them to be played (i.e., punch the punchboards, open shrinkwrapped decks of cards, sort tokens, etc). This serves the attendees hoping to show up and start playing.
It never hurts to follow up with a publisher after a convention to let them know how their games did in the play-and-win section (number of plays and ratings from participants). I understand that this is extra work, and I won’t ever hold it against a convention for not doing so, but it’s really nice when conventions do this.
I recommend only letting each person win at most 1 game for the entire event–that way you spread out the prizes among the most people. Also, instead of interrupting the event to announce the winners, simply post them at a few key places around the convention hall or on an online forum designated for attendees to check.
If you like the idea of play-and-win, feel free to check out the conventions listed on the Google Doc. You might discover a nearby game convention that you haven’t heard of.
If you’re new to game conventions, you might be pleasantly surprised by them–especially the type of convention where you just play lots of games for a few days. I’m an introvert who does not get excited about big events, but my experience at Geekway is consistently amazing. I really appreciate people who have invited me to join their game or when someone teaches a new-to-me game, and I’ve tried to be just as welcoming to others. If you attend Geekway in May and you see me, please say hi–I’d love to play a game with you!
After months of status updates on the World of Wingspan newsletter and a brief visual preview on last week’s livecast, yesterday I fully revealed the Wingspan Americas Expansion via our website, the Wingspan Facebook group, BoardGameGeek, and a newsletter. Over the next few days I’m sharing stories, mechanisms, photos, Instagram posts, and YouTube videos about the expansion, followed by third-party media starting on January 16. The expansion will launch on our webstores on January 21 (shared via our newsletter and ads) and arrive on tabletops around the world in February. Local retailers will release the expansion in late February, then online retailers in early March. Throughout 2026 the expansion will feature at conventions, release in various languages, and be reviewed by a diverse array of content creators.
Why the long paragraph listing these milestones? I realized recently that this method is quite similar to something I’ve experienced by searching for homes on Zillow.
Over the last few months, we’ve casually been looking at homes in St. Louis. There’s a certain joy in low-key browsing without any immediate pressure to buy (we’re perfectly happy at our small condo).
Like similar websites, Zillow lets you set some parameters, and it will notify you about homes that meet those parameters. You can also favorite specific homes that you’d like to follow more closely.
What has impressed me about this system is that it creates so many opportunities for contacting and engage potential customers (like me):
coming soon
new listing
open house
plan your weekend
price cut
take the next step
pending sale
sold
As I’ve received these notifications–which walk a fine line between not enough and too many–I’ve found myself wishing there was something like this for tabletop games. I could list the parameters of the types of games I love the most, follow the games that intrigue me, and get notifications for key milestones.
In the meantime, this is essentially what we do for people who choose to follow our games. We have our general monthly newsletter (plus Instagram, YouTube, and a Facebook page), and anyone who wants to follow a specific game or brand can do so via that game’s newsletter (or its Facebook group, BoardGameGeek, or Discord). This is followed by the various touchpoints I mentioned in the opening paragraph.
Cast a wide net, then engage deeper with those who want more info about specific products. The repeated points of contact are designed to avoid overwhelming you all at once, yet at any time you could choose to read the rulebook (or opt out if you decide the product isn’t a good fit).
Honestly, it’s also fun for the publisher: We’ve been working on this expansion for years, so I appreciate the opportunity to share it from different angles over weeks and months.
What do you think about the Zillow method? Have you seen it used well for tabletop games or other products?
I strongly believe in the importance of providing review copies to a vast variety of content creators so they can share their unbiased opinions with the audiences they serve. There were a lot of great games published in 2025, and I’m truly grateful for those who chose to play and feature Stonemaier products. I estimate that we send around 1,000 free Stonemaier products each year for reviews and other content via the system described below.
I genuinely hope content creators continue to seek joy in games (opposed to it feeling like a task, chore, or obligation). You have an amazing opportunity to add value to the people who value your insights and perspectives; it’s your choice to serve your audience instead of serving an algorithm.
If you’d like to sign up to potentially receive review copies of Stonemaier games, please read following article in full to understand our guidelines and procedures (within the article there is a link to a signup form). If you’re a relatively new content creator, please also read this post.
Overall Procedures
If you’re a reviewer or content creator on our list, I will contact you when we have review copies available. At that time, you will receive a message from me listing the products currently available for review, and you can choose one to receive (free product with free shipping). If you’re not on the list, you can sign up for consideration via the form linked in this article.
I kindly request that you follow this process rather than directly soliciting me for review copies, as it allows me to continuously provide products to hundreds of different content creators. For every product we offer numerous opportunities for you to receive review copies from us; if your schedule differs from ours, Stonemaier products are widely available for you to attain or play (on our webstore, from retailers, on digital platforms, and in non-English languages from localization partners).
Whenever I let our list of reviewers know that we have review copies available, I preface the email with these guidelines:
You do not already have a review copy (or an incoming review copy) from Stonemaier Games for which you haven’t posted substantial content.
You are available to feature the product you select in the next few months.
You don’t already have easy access to the product.
If you choose an expansion to review, you already own (or have access to) the core game.
If you are a content creator who wants to be considered for Stonemaier Games review copies, please read the following guidelines and sign up on the form within this article. Once you’re on the list, we’ll contact you when we have products available for review.
Here’s how we handle the various stages of review copies:
We only send 100% final versions of our products to reviewers, not prototypes.
Advance Review Copies: I typically receive 10-12 copies of new products via airmail from our manufacturer, Panda, a few months before we launch the product on our webstore. While I sometimes choose a few well-established reviewers for advance review copies, I also include some growing and underrepresented content creators. I provide a media date for those reviewers when they can start sharing their primary content about the product; the reason for this date is that we do not want to rush reviewers–we want them to have ample time to play the game, evaluate it, and compose their thoughts so their reviews can best serve their audience.
Early Review Copies: When our fulfillment centers receive the full ocean-freight shipments (typically a few weeks before the product launch), I reach out to a handful of content creators to see if they’re interested in receiving an early copy of the game. This is a marketing effort to reach as many people as possible, so typically these are reviewers with 20,000+ Instagram followers, 10,000+ YouTube subscribers, 1000+ podcast followers, hundreds of views per article (self-hosted or on BoardGameGeek), and/or who have medium-sized audiences with high levels of engagement.
First-Run Review Copies: After the initial product launch and fulfillment but before the retail release date, I contact more reviewers–most with smaller audiences than the early reviewers, but still good engagement from their audiences–to see if they would like the product. At this point, around 200 reviewers will have received a review request from me, and typically around 50-75 of them respond with interest. Your opinions are just as valid if your video, article, or podcast isn’t posted until a few days, weeks, months, or even years after the game’s announcement/launch/release. Your audience subscribes because of your insights and the quality of your content, not because you’re the first to get a new game.
Reprints and In-Stock Games: I don’t want all of the buzz and visibility of our products to only happen at the beginning of their lifespans, so I regularly offer review copies of reprints and in-stock games. This is typically when I reach out to content creators with small, growing audiences with less engagement (views, likes, comments).
New Signups and Newly Discovered Reviewers: Like any gamer, I discover new-to-me reviewers all the time, and if I really like their content or just want to make sure they’re better represented in the hobby, I may contact them directly to introduce myself and see if there are any Stonemaier products they’d like to review. We also receive new signups on the reviewer form all the time, so I give those reviewers a few chances throughout the first year to accept review copies and to share a link with me of the content they create for that product. If I don’t ever hear (via email) from reviewers who signed up for the list with a link to the content they create about the review copies, eventually I stop contacting them.
Damaged Games: Sometimes our customers report that they receive a damaged copy of one of our games (purchased from our webstore). In those cases, I often send them a mailing label to send the ding-and-dent game to a reviewer, and we send the customer a new game. Reviewers don’t need a perfect box to assess the experience of playing the game.
Other notes about our methods:
I Don’t Read/Watch/Listen to Reviews of Stonemaier Products: I highly value constructive criticism, of which I get plenty from playtesters and gamers. But for reviewers, I want to remain entirely unbiased and impartial to their tastes so consumers can get honest opinions from a wide variety of reviewers. I truly want all reviewers to know they can say anything they want about the Stonemaier products they play without feeling like I’m looking over their shoulder.
We Do Not Pay Reviewers to Express Their Opinions, Nor Do We Charge Reviewers for the Products They Review: If a content creator selects a free product from Stonemaier Games to feature, we ask that they disclose that information with full transparency in all related content. On some platforms, the only way to do this is to tag the post as a “paid promotion,” which, while not entirely accurate (we’re providing cardboard, not cash), is necessary until those platforms offer more accurate tags about material connections between reviewers and tabletop publishers. Here is an extensive survey of reviewers that reveals how exceptionally rare it is for publishers to offer reviewers money for their opinions.
Social Media vs Journalism: Simply being on social media does not make someone a content creator, reviewer, or journalist. I have the greatest appreciation for people who are consistently willing to spend time and effort to learn/play our games, publicly share their unbiased opinions in great detail, and contact us directly (and/or other sources for research) to ask questions about our business practices instead of making unfounded assumptions. That’s journalism. My email is jamey AT stonemaier.com.
We Ship to Reviewers the Same Way We Ship to Customers (from within their region): We ship from fulfillment centers in the US, Canada, Europe, and Australia. However, if a reviewer is ever charged customs/fees by their courier, we ask that they accept the package and then contact us so we can refund those charges.
Standard vs Deluxe: I clarified in an article the reasons that we only send content creators free copies of standard versions of our games (even if there are deluxe alternatives/add-ons). If you’re a content creator who chooses to purchase and showcase deluxe components, that’s totally fine–please just be sure to make it abundantly clear to your audience whenever you’re showcasing something that isn’t standard (to avoid any possible confusion).
I Consume a LOT of Review Content (Just Not for Our Games): At this point, I subscribe to around 750 different game-related articles, podcasts, and YouTube channels. I love hearing other people talk about games, whether they’re individuals or multiple hosts. You can see some of my favorites on our stuff we love page (see the archive section) and among our annual charity auction selections.
Feature and Focus: I’ve mentioned several times above that I ask content creators to select products of ours that they want to “feature.” From a publisher perspective (and, honestly, as an avid consumer of gaming content), I’m less interested in a podcast or video that’s about a bunch of different unrelated games (or a game haul Instagram post) instead of primarily featuring one or two specific games (or focusing on a specific category). “Featuring” a game also means going beyond just making a quick Instagram post or an unboxing clip.
A Distaste for Consistent Negativity, References to “Hype”, Clickbait, and Ragebait Tactics: I truly want reviewers to offer their honest feedback about games (whether their our games or games from other publishers). However, if a reviewer is consistently negative–for example, lists about games they hate or games that disappointed them–or is focused on “the hype,” as in “Does it live up to the hype?” (see this video and this video), I steer away from that content as a viewer (and such reviewers thus drop off my radar as a publisher too). To be clear, I have no problem with negative reviews of a game that a reviewer didn’t enjoy, especially if they take ownership over their dislike (“I didn’t enjoy it” or “it wasn’t for me” rather that “This game is bad/overrated/terrible”). But if you’re going to spend time making a top 5 or top 10 list, I simply can’t relate to someone who spends that time focusing on games they strongly dislike rather than games they enjoy. I also have a strong aversion to clickbait (titles and images) and ragebait tactics that don’t seem genuine to the creator or their content.
Brand-New Reviewers: If you’re excited to start reviewing tabletop games or you’ve only been posting for a few weeks, I highly recommend that you build up a solid base of content and an engaged audience using the games you already have access to before you request that any publisher send free games to you (as a rule of thumb, if you haven’t already created content for many games in your collection, it’s too soon to ask for free products). A mutually respectful and beneficial relationship between a reviewer and a publisher goes both ways. There’s more on this topic here.
Conventions: Attending conventions is incredibly expensive for publishers. There are so many expenses to have games, staff, and a demo team at conventions that we need to sell every possible copy to have a chance at breaking even. For that reason, please do not ask us for free review copies at conventions.
Permanent discoverability: Reviewers spend invaluable time and effort to play, photograph/film, and compose their thoughts–I believe that their content is worth finding months and years after the original post. So I greatly prefer when a creator’s content is permanently discoverable. Specifically, if you post reviews on Instagram, (a) build up an audience of at least 5000 engaged followers before requesting a free game AND (b) post your reviews somewhere that a search engine can find them long after the day when you first post (like an article or BoardGameGeek).
Written Reviews: We send hundreds of review copies to content creators focused on the written word, but for a few bigger releases we didn’t send any advance copies or text-focused journalists. After posting this article on the subject and reading the demand for such reviews in the comments, we committed to sending at least 1 advance copy of each product for a written review (followed by many more in subsequent waves).
Social Media Tags: If you post an article, podcast, or YouTube channel, a quick post on Instagram tagging @jameystegmaier makes it very easy for me to share the news (though I don’t see every post and thus can’t promise I’ll share ever post–I try my best!). Sidenote about Instagram: A personal pet peeve of mine is when I open an Instagram story and am blasted with music. I don’t want to blast anyone else with music, so it’s very rare that I share posts with audio.
Weekly roundups: Every Friday, I post on Facebook a list of all Stonemaier review links emailed to me by reviewers over the previous 7 days. While I’ve always posted these links on our website (and continue to do so), I’ve found this to be a more active way to share review content for the benefit of both the reviewers and our followers.
Featured content: If you accept a free review copy, we’re looking for substantial featured content. That is, we’re looking for more than a quick tweet or Instagram post (a series of such posts is more in line with the idea of “featuring” content). Featured content consists of more than a brief discussion among a number of other games and more than just a 1-2 minute standalone video.
I Say Yes to Every Interview: No matter the size of your channel, podcast, or website, if you want to chat with me to post a public interview on your platform, I’m happy to join you (and I think you’d be surprised by how many designers, publishers, and artists will do the same). There are a few small caveats to this–for example, you need to have some body of work posted publicly for me to first take a look at–but odds are very high I’ll agree to join you. Read more about this here.
Forge Your Own Path: There are many ways to approach content creation–your style and methods don’t need to copy what [insert your favorite famous reviewer] does. For example, I have a YouTube channel where I talk about games (mostly games by other designers/publishers). But I’m not a reviewer. Instead, I primarily focus on mechanisms: When I play a new-to-me game or expansion, I select my favorite mechanism and create a video about it. I also post weekly long-form videos (e.g., top 10s) that usually highlight a specific mechanism. I record every video in a single take using a webcam and a decent mic; most are completely unedited (I use StreamYard to share images of the game while I’m talking). I also decided a long time ago that I’m not a reviewer–just a publisher/designer who likes to talk about games–so I do not accept free copies of games (with very rare exceptions, I only play games I buy or that friends own).
Size Doesn’t Matter: I believe that review content is relevant whether you have 300 subscribers or 300,000. The only impact of size is how often I contact you about available review copies.
Why isn’t a content creator you know on this list? It’s probably some combination of reasons: They’ve been inactive for a long time, they don’t actually feature content for a free product they accepted (or they didn’t email me links to the content), they didn’t accept any review products for a long time, they’re on our private list but asked not to be on the public list, they never signed up for the list, their content doesn’t meet the above guidelines (too new, no permanent discoverability, clickbait tactics, etc), they’re in a region that is prohibitively expensive for shipping (we accept alternative addresses in regions we do ship to, though), or they consistently exhibit such high levels of antagonism to us and/or others that I simply want no association with them.
We understand that some reviewers receive hundreds of games, and it’s their choice to accept (or not accept) a free review copy from us given these stipulations.
Overall, I’m really grateful for the wide variety of content creators who take the time to share their perspectives with the gaming community. If you’re curious about my favorite content creators, I’ve most likely featured them on one of our annual charity auctions (like these creators in 2024,2023,2022, 20212020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, and 2013). There are also members of the media who cover gaming news, which I also appreciate.
Below is a list of all reviewers who have given me permission on the form to share their information with you. Over 25% of this list is comprised of underrepresented content creators–I’d love to further improve the diversity of this list! All you need to do after reading the above article is fill out the form; later, if/when you accept a review copy, please feature content for that product and send me a link.
This list doesn’t auto-update–it’s something I manually update once a year using our private list. In case scrolling within the list below is annoying, a full-page version is here. The data on the list may not be 100% accurate, as many reviewers filled out the form a while ago, so their stats and answers may not be up to date. I’m happy to update them upon request.
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If you’re a publisher, what’s your approach to reviewers and other content creators? If you’re a gamer, how do reviewers impact your decision to buy games, expansions, and other products?
Typically I wait to announce new products until a few weeks before we’re ready to launch and ship them, but yesterday I tried something different: Taking inspiration from Nintendo Direct, Marvel Studios, and Garphill Games, I revealed our full 2026 product lineup on a YouTube and Facebook livecast, quarter by quarter.
There are a few reasons I did this:
I like to experiment with methods and approaches we haven’t tried before to see if they feel right to us and are useful/fun for our audience.
Based on the status of our 2026 products, I have high levels of certainty regarding the schedule. This isn’t always the case, even with our typical rough 3-year release roadmap.
Our 2026 is largely driven by expansions and new editions, so people already have a lot of context for the various reveals.
Previewing these products helps me learn how to talk about them clearly and succinctly while I gauge people’s responses to different information and phrasing.
The method I used for the reveals was a premiere video via Streamyard (livecast simultaneously on YouTube and Facebook), with the link posted around a day in advance and in a newsletter I sent 15 minutes before the livecast. I spent around 15 minutes per quarter, using tangible visuals (cards, boards, art, etc) from almost every product to convey the idea that these are real products that do/will exist.
During the reveals, I intentionally didn’t show the box covers or even the product names. This was just a preview; the full reveal for these products will come much closer to their respective launches, and I think it’s far too soon for them to appear on BoardGameGeek. I answered some questions about the products, but I didn’t get into the weeds of card quantities, sizes, pricing, etc.
At the end of the video, I asked people for feedback on the format, and people universally said they liked that it offered things to look forward to throughout the year and the ability to plan ahead (especially for expansions). Some said that the preview felt like the opposite of a FOMO tactic, which isn’t something I had thought about, but I was happy to hear that.
Here’s a quick recap of what I revealed in the video:
Q1: Wingspan expansion (based on the birds of Central and South America and the Caribbean; vision friendly cards are available as an add-on) and a Viticulture expansion (a new 4-season board with the original board on the back)
Q2: Euphoria Essential (combines the expansion with the core game and offers a new board layout with some rules tweaks; the board and rules will be available separately for those who already have Euphoria) and the first Finspan expansion (I previewed a shark card and a colorful fish)
Q3: Scythe vs Expeditions 2-player dueling game (this content expands Scythe and Expeditions, and all Scythe factions/player mats and Expeditions mechs/characters are compatible with the dueling game; there will be add-on packs containing metal versions of the mechs and a plastic airship [which isn’t used in the dueling game]), a small-box, lighter Wingspan bird experience playable in around 3o minutes, and a mini-expansion to Origin Story (many more superheroes)
Q4: The first Smoking Bones game from artist and worldbuilder Andrew Bosley and a debut designer (see some info about the world here) and our version of Namiji (combines the core game and the expansion in a normal box size with accessibility updates)
reprints for the Nesting Box and Rolling Realm promos (other reprints for out-of-stock products are dependent on demand as indicated by back-in-stock requests on our webstore)
There are visuals and details in the video, and I’m happy to answer some questions in the comments.
We send semi-monthly newsletters for many of our games that include future teasers and details, recent reviews and content, and more. Here is the most recent edition of each update; each includes a link to subscribe if you’d like to stay in touch.
I’m entering my eighth year of using Instagram as a publisher, and I continue to really enjoy the community, engagement, and photos there. I say that both as a publisher and someone who enjoys scrolling through to see what others have posted–I’m inspired as a designer by the way people talk about and photograph games there.
Back in 2019, I wrote a post that discussed different strategies used by publishers on Instagram and how they impacted follower counts and engagement (likes and comments). I followed it with this 2023 post in which I shared a sheet of publisher Instagram links and stats.
Before I get to the updated list (which is both embedded below and found here), here are a few observations and some examples of recent posts that I think provide a good strategy for Instagram engagement:
My preferred Instagram strategy is of enthusiasm, variety, elevation, and a personal touch. While I’m happy to show off our games in different ways (specific components, games in action, staged thematic photos, etc), I think it sends a powerful and welcoming message to augment those posts with photos of other things I love–things that have an impact on me as a publisher and as a person.
I try to invite engagement by asking a question on nearly all of my Instagram posts, as I genuinely want to learn what other people enjoy too.
I find that consistency is key. I post once every morning on Instagram.
Only the first 10 words or so of an Instagram post are visible when someone is scrolling, so I try to use that precious space to share (a) the name of the game and (b) impactful words that will inspire further reading.
When I recently asked people what they most value from publishers on Instagram, they mentioned a focus on artwork, info about ongoing releases, posting about other publishers’ games (i.e., not just your games), and positivity.
Since my previous post, short videos have become significantly more common on Instagram. Big Potato Games has embraced this format, and they’ve had the biggest growth of nearly any publisher on the list.
Instagram now actively encourages users to add music to their posts. I highly recommend against doing adding music to posts, as many people scroll through Instagram in places where they don’t want an unexpected audio blast.
Instagram is a highly visual platform. Taking and choosing the right photo(s) makes a huge difference, which is tough to do when you’re trying to play a game (I don’t want to turn casual gaming into photoshoots).
Instagram Stories are an easy way to share (and appreciate) the Instagram posts of fans and content creators who are talking about your games.
You’re allowed to put one URL in your profile name, and I think Linktree is the best link to use there, as it’s essentially a link to other links (your website, other social media, current project, etc).
Here is the list. I’ve sorted the top 10 most followed publishers at the top, then the rest are in alphabetical order. You’ll see that there isn’t necessarily a correlation between a publisher’s level of financial success and their Instagram follower count. There are some heavy hitters among the top 10, but there are also some major publishers for whom Instagram just may not be a priority. And that’s okay! There are many ways to reach people.
I’ve kept the 2023 stats for any publishers that were on the list then so you can see which publishers have seen a big change over the last 3 years:
Whether this is the 1st or the 100th article you’ve read on the Stonemaier Games blog this year, I’m so thankful that you’ve decided to read along (and sometimes join the discussion in the comments). Today I’m going to share my most-read articles of 2025 and a key takeaway from each.
We Now Sponsor a Professional Athlete!: In a fun twist to something that started as an April Fools product, in 2025 we sponsored disc golfer and huge Wingspan fan Jeremy Koling (“Big Jerm”).
Introducing the Third-Party Accessory Showcase: We now offer a way for creators who make Stonemaier-related products to feature their products on our website (they are the seller, not us).
The other substantial content I make is found on our YouTube channel. Other than Stonemaier-specific trailers and videos, the top 5 most popular videos from 2025 were as follows:
Is there an article/video–from anywhere–that provided good food for thought this year? If so, I invite you to share a link and your key takeaway in the comments.
Typically this is a joyful post, a celebration of the past year and hope for the future. But tragedy struck over the weekend: Gosia, aka wingspangirl on Instagram, passed away suddenly, leaving the community awash with grief. My heart especially goes out to her sister, Magda.
As you can tell by her screenname, Gosia loved Wingspan, and she often posted about the game. Her enthusiasm for it was contagious, even for me. She also talked about a bunch of other games–that was the level on which I knew her, and I always appreciated the endless bounds of her positivity.
However, as I’ve learned by reading many of the memorial posts about Gosia, her sense of community went so much deeper. Countless people have expressed how Gosia always took the time to talk to them privately about any topic ranging from games to family/friendships to personal struggles. To Gosia, the social media community wasn’t about views or likes–it was about meaningful connections with people around the world.
With that in mind, the focal point of this year’s post about actions for 2026 is on meaningful connections. In a way that is true to you, how would you like to connect with people in 2026? This could be in the tabletop gaming community or beyond.
For me, I’m looking forward to connecting deeper with my coworkers when we’re all together in the same place for a few days this winter. I also invited my mom to join me, Megan, and a few friends on an Iceland trip later in 2026, and I look forward to the connections that emerge from that trip.
Also, I’m trying to give myself the grace and permission to focus more on the people I connect strongly with, especially at gaming events. For years I’ve felt this inner obligation to try to connect with as many people as possible (at Geekway to the West, Design Day, the gaming cruise, etc), but sometimes I just really enjoy certain people and wish I could spend more time with them. I’m hoping to do better at that in 2026.
Here are the questions I asked last year, with the addition of the new question inspired by Gosia:
What will you create in 2026 that is meaningful to you? This can be something completely new or something you’re continuing to create from the past year. What’s the first step you’ll take?
What will you play in 2026 that is meaningful to you? This could focus on the game/sport itself, the location, the people, etc.
Who or what will you elevate in 2026 that is meaningful to you? This could be anything you love or value that you want more people to know about.
How will you connect with people and the community in 2026 in a way that is meaningful to you?
I’ve added a special mention of Gosia in a Wingspan product coming later next year. To everyone whom Gosia touched, I’m so sorry for your loss–for our loss–and I appreciate you sharing how she impacted you.
“In the past two weeks last copies of Imperial Settlers and Alien Artifacts sold out from our website. Games are gone. There is no reprint planned. Gone forever. It makes me sad on so many levels…. I am brutally honest – this is no longer an industry with possible reprints. Games come and die fast, you put a title on the market and a few months later it is considered old.” —Ignacy Trzewiczek, Portal Games
I’ve read this message (click the link for the full version) several times on different forums. Before I dig into it from a publishing perspective, I just want to say that I feel for Ignacy. I can relate to putting love, time, effort, and resources into something that doesn’t last as long as I hoped. While Imperial Settlers has been around for over a decade, Ignacy also says that much newer Portal games like Thorgal and Eleven also won’t be reprinted.
So is this really the end of reprints for all game publishers? From my perspective, definitely not. Spanning from Charterstone all the way through Origin Story, 17 out of 19 Stonemaier games have been reprinted at least once, and most of them more than once.
That said, I think it is harder than ever to create an evergreen game–a game that sells consistently year after year–though there are a few things publishers can do to increase the odds of a game becoming evergreen:
Reconsider which games you publish: Some types of games are much more likely to become evergreen than others based on price, theme, innovation, art, mechanisms, etc. While there isn’t a magic formula for these elements, there are some commonalities among evergreen games. If your game isn’t the type of game that’s likely to garner multiple reprints, that’s okay–it simply shift to a frontloaded marketing strategy.
Reconsider crowdfunding (and how it impacts retailer relationships): Crowdfunding is great for single-run games (particularly fancy versions). However, I don’t think crowdfunding lays the best groundwork for working with retailers, the backbone of evergreen games. I truly am not suggesting that creators ignore crowdfunding as a launchpad for new games, but be aware of how a crowdfunding cycle impacts your relationship with retailers and customers. Are you just crowdfunding the first printing, or are you returning to crowdfunding for expansions, reprints, etc?
Reconsider digital game strategies: It’s wonderful to have the option to play digital versions of tabletop games on Steam, BoardGame Arena, Tabletopia, etc. In some ways, I think these digital options have replaced reprints for some publishers and gamers, with very few analog sales resulting from digital plays. Perhaps this is just the future of most games’ longevity, but publishers have a choice as to how much of their games they offer digitally and when they’re available.
Reconsider new editions and sequels: I think the industry has trained customers to expect that there will always be a new edition, special edition, or sequel to any game that sells well the first time around. I still hear from people saying that they’re waiting for an all-in version of Scythe even though it will never exist (just like all our products, you can always pick and choose which expansions, accessories, and promos you want). It’s neat that publishers can breathe life into older games or that designers can revisit older games with a more experienced vision, but doing this too often may hurt the longevity of the original game.
Reconsider back catalog marketing: Customers get caught up in the cult of the new, but so do publishers. Imagine if you didn’t release or launch any new games in 2026. How would you market your existing games? If it’s different than how you currently market those older games, why? I regularly offer games to reviewers dating all the way back to Viticulture, I talk about older games on social media and YouTube, I foster online communities built around the game, and we’ve released a variety of expansions over the years.
Reconsider how you gauge demand: The minimum order quantity for many manufacturers is 1500 units, so to reprint a product, you need a clear indication from at least 500 people (ideally more) that they’ll buy the product if you make more. What ongoing opportunities are you giving customers to share their interest in a reprint? Stonemaier uses back-in-stock requests on our webstore (we’re gearing up for a Rolling Realms promo reprint based on this data), along with occasional surveys, polls, and reminders on our monthly newsletter; GMT uses their P500 program; other publishers use Kickstarter.
With thousands of games released each year, most of them will not become evergreen games. Also, games that earned multiple reprints in the past may not have the same marketability today. It’s the bittersweet nature of this industry, and I think it’s okay to sunset a game, a brand, or even a company on your own terms.
Do you view this new era of gaming as the end of reprints? What’s the last game you bought that was released prior to 2025?
This past weekend I enjoyed a brief reprieve from the cold St. Louis weather, venturing to sunny Orlando to visit Universal Studios for the first time. We also saw some friends from the Stonemaier Games Design Day and spent a day on the beach in Tampa Bay.
We spent half a day at two of the older Universal parks, but the focal point of the trip was Universal Epic Universe, the newest park. It features 5 different worlds, including Super Nintendo World, Dark Universe (gothic monsters), and Isle of Berk (How to Train Your Dragon).
I found the whole experience fascinating from a customer service perspective, as these types of parks bet big on immersing you in an otherworldly experience. Here are the top 5 things I learned and observed during my 12 hours at Universal Epic Universe and how they might apply to the world of tabletop games.
1. Dramatic Entrances
One of the smartest decisions at Epic, in my opinion, is the installation of massive “portals” through which you enter each world. When I left the hub world and walked into the giant green tunnel for Super Nintendo World, I felt like I was transported to a new place. Even the music changes.
As big as they are, the portals are small compared to the worlds they transport you into, so there’s a dramatic moment when you take that first step out of the tunnel. You’re hit with a wave of sights and sounds that are completely absent on the other side of the portal.
The closest comparison to this I can think of in tabletop game is opening a game for the first time. Some games do a particularly great job of making a thematic, intuitive, and organizationally satisfying unboxing experience (see my video on this topic). Perhaps this is also why some people love unboxing videos.
2. Interactive Fake Storefronts
In each of the worlds there’s a mix of thematic displays and fake storefronts (like a movie set) mixed in with real stores, experiences, rides, and restaurants. This makes perfect sense: You don’t need to stock a dozen stores or have every type of craftsman actively working in Berk; instead, invest up front in a rock-solid display, and it’ll last years with minimal maintenance.
However, some of these parks take the set dressing to a new level by giving you a specific way to interact with them. For a few, they’re triggered by motion sensors or your voice, and there’s some combination of programming, animatronics, and live acting behind them. For others, they’re activated by a specific device, like the armbands you can buy in Super Nintendo World that you can bop against the oversized shell blocks.
This is exactly what I was aiming for in Vantage’s first-person perspective art. I wanted it to be more than just a pretty picture; instead, each illustration has information about difficulty and your surroundings, and most of what you see is interactive. If there’s house on a hill, you can probably enter that house and see how it looks inside. When you’re inside, there are a variety of objects you can pick up that result in you (the player) gaining a specific card.
My only wish in these theme parks is for more reasons to look closely and less reliance on phones. A few years ago I went to Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge, and I liked the scavenger hunt, but eventually I started ignoring it because I wanted to immerse myself in the world instead of being on my phone.
3. Immersive Line Management
A major feature at Epic are the rides and shows, with wait times ranging from 15 minutes to several hours. The Universal app helps to mitigate this to a certain extent, as it tells you the current wait times. I was also impressed by the facial scanning technology for the express lanes (which we didn’t use) and the lockers (which we did use for some of the more intense rides).
I was mostly impressed by the queue design. It looks like a maze with several big visual barriers–short lanes that cut back and forth–so you constantly feel like you’re moving forward and so you can’t tell how much longer you’ll wait. Along the way are water fountains and some thematic displays, along with plenty of shade from the Florida sun.
My one criticism is that there really isn’t much to do while in line. I’m not entirely sure what I want to do while I’m waiting, but it could be a crowd game, some form of entertainment, or something small to do along the way that adds up to something meaningful. For example, what if in a How to Train Your Dragon line you can make a few quick personality quiz choices along the way (using facial scanning) that results in your dragon selection at the lockers or when you sit down on the ride?
I often talk about wait times and anticipation gaps, and one example of this in the tabletop space are update emails and newsletters. When done well, I find that they increase my curiosity and excitement while making the wait feel like part of the experience instead of something to endure.
4. In-Character Interactions
My most memorable experience at Epic wasn’t the result of expensive sets, thrilling rides, or fancy technology. Rather, it was 10-minute chat I had with an actor (the “owner” of a shop, pictured here) who stayed completely in character the entire time. She wandered over while I was waiting for Megan, and she talked about her background and answered some questions.
It was a busy shop, and I was surprised at several times in the conversation that she didn’t move on to other customers, but she conveyed that she was in no rush. There was no sense of “move along, next person please”–everything about the interaction was welcoming, authentic, and playful. I hope Epic values what this incredible person gives them every day.
This is an area that I’ve found difficult to balance in scaling Stonemaier Games. I want to give genuine time and attention to everyone who contacts me, but in every private interaction is information that others might want to know too (if the question were instead asked publicly). Though, as I type this, it occurs to me that while the conversation at Epic felt custom for me, it wasn’t private at all. Megan’s mom was there, and Megan eventually joined us, and we were in the middle of the shop–anyone could have joined at any time.
5. The Nostalgia Factor
Sometimes I forget about the sheer power of nostalgia until it hits me full force in the form of the Super Mario theme or the voice of Hiccup. One of my favorite and most unexpected experiences from the weekend was a 20-minute water, light, drone, and instrumental evening show at Universal Studios. Even just 20 seconds of music and a brief projected image from ET, Jurassic Park, or Back to the Future made me want to revisit those movies.
I think games do a great job of using art and themes to evoke nostalgia. Nemesis takes us to the Alien movies, Boss Monster has pixel art for those of us who grew up in the 80s and 90s, and long-running games like Pokemon create their own nostalgia cycles. Nostalgia by itself isn’t enough to sell a game, but just like the movies I mentioned above, if the content itself is great, nostalgia can elevate it.
While I didn’t delve into the food because games aren’t edible, the food (and the thematic places at Epic where we ate, like the mead hall shown here) was also a big part of the immersion for me.
I’d love to hear your thoughts about effective immersive customer experiences at theme parks, and perhaps how you relate them to tabletop games. Let me know your thoughts in the comments!
There’s no one at Stonemaier Games who travels as much as Alex Schmidt, our COO. Alex frequently flies to conventions and visit with distributors, meeting our partners face-to-face and learning how we can work together better.
Given Alex’s extensive business travel experience, I asked him if he might be willing to share some tips that might benefit other creators. Alex was kind to write the following guest post.
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Hi! I do a decent amount of travelling for my work with Stonemaier, going to various conventions and B2B events to meet with our various distributors and retailers. Here are a few travel tips I’ve learned along the way:
Upgrade (but only if it’s cheap)
This really only applies to international flights. For domestic flights I never pay for upgrades, though with loyalty rewards (see below) it’s pretty common to get free upgrades. That said, it’s always worth looking at upgrading your seats for international flights. I don’t recommend taking expensive upgrades, but when you’re travelling for work, your time is not only valuable to you but to your company. If you can arrive more rested, then you’re a more valuable employee for your company as well as personally having a better experience.
Fly at reasonable times
This one seems obvious to me but I’m always surprised just how often I hear about people taking early morning or overnight redeye flights. Sometimes it’s unavoidable (like travelling internationally), but I find that I’m a much happier traveller when I’m not getting up at 3AM to get to the airport at 4:30AM for a 6AM flight. Unless you absolutely have to, be kind to yourself and take a flight at a more reasonable hour.
Take the bus or train instead of a layover (in Europe)
In my personal experience, this suggestion only really applies in Europe where distances between locations tend to be shorter and public transportation tends to be better. Sometimes you’re travelling somewhere where there’s not a good airport with a lot of direct flights. For example, frequently the flight route from the US to Birmingham is to fly to Amsterdam to catch a layover back to Birmingham. Post Brexit this also means you’re dealing with EU and UK customs.
My preferred alternative has been to fly to London directly from the US and then catch a bus to Birmingham. The train is possible too, but the bus station is right in the Heathrow airport. The result? I get to Birmingham just as fast if not faster, it’s cheaper with a bus instead of the layover, and the last part of the trip is more relaxed without the need to go through customs a second time.
Stick to one hotel chain and one airline when you can manage it
There are books worth of content on maximizing travel and credit card points. I’m not going to attempt to expound too much, but if you’re travelling a lot and when you can stick to one airline and/or one hotel chain, you get perks and those perks do add up. Upgrades on flights and rooms are fairly common. So are things like free breakfast. So, when you’re travelling for work, it benefits your company as well as you.
Plus, even when you’re travelling for work, you do get points for airlines and hotel chains which you can turn into free personal flights or hotel rooms when they add up. If you split things up more, you’re going to get fewer points and fewer perks. Plus the points you do have will be spread out in ways that make it difficult to actually use them.
Add days to explore
Your company sent you to a distant location for work. That’s great! But you just spent the entire time working there. Maybe you had some different meals. But, you’re already there. It doesn’t cost your company anything to have your arrival flight come in a few days early or your return flight a few days late. You’re already there. Take advantage of where you are to take a cheaper vacation and explore a different part of the world.
Plus, if you’re going to the same location year-after-year, well that’s a chance to explore more nearby places and get even more familiar with it. Maybe even ask your company if they’d be willing to fly you in to a different nearby location and then you can get yourself from there to your destination at the end of your vacation. Italy’s a lot cheaper to get to the UK from than the US is.
A few purchases to consider
Comfortable shoes go a long ways, but that’s as much about walking around at a convention or sightseeing as it is actual travel. A battery pack as a backup to charge your phone/kindle/earbuds/etc is always a good idea. Travelling is what got me to finally adopt a kindle versus physical books just because it’s smaller and takes up less space for travel.
Relax
This may be more important than all of my other recommendations. Travel is stressful. And you’re generally surrounded by other people who are also stressed out. Figure out what lets you relax when you’re travelling, and lean into it. For me, personally, I’d much rather get to the airport early and let myself read a book while hanging out and waiting for my flight.
I always check my bag. Yes, it might get lost, but if it does I’ll figure that out when it happens. And in the meantime, I’m not trying to manage keeping track of and moving around a roller bag. Yes, I could be more efficient about all of my travel, but I’d much rather have a more restful, relaxing experience while I am travelling. It’s going to take time. But I’d rather it took a bit more time and have the quality of that time be better than being done faster while being more stressed. Relaxing looks different for everyone, though. Just take the time to ask yourself how you can relax best while you’re travelling.
***
Thanks so much for these insights, Alex! I’ll open the floor to readers as well: What’s your #1 business travel tip?
Last week on the Stonemaier Games monthly e-newsletter (subscribe here), I shared a demographic survey with our subscribers. I’ve done this a few years in a row now, with the intent being to learn more about our followers so we can better serve you in the future. I try to focus on questions with actionable results.
As usual, I’ll focus on data where a significant change happened compared to previous years, as well as new/revised questions. First, a few quick notes:
You can see my analysis of previous years’ data here (2024), (2023), here (2022), here (2021), here (2020), here (2019), here (2018), and here (2017).
This data is specifically from those who choose to follow Stonemaier Games AND choose to reply to the survey (around 8,000 people), so it is not necessarily representative of the greater gaming community. I welcome the sharing of results of any other similar surveys in the comments.
Our audience was highly motivated by the prospect of a prize to reply to the survey.
Most years when I send the demographic survey, we get a few thousand responses–an average of around 3,000. This year, for every 1,000 respondents, I offered a chance at a $100 gift card for our webstore to use on any 2026 products. The number of respondents doubled as compared to last year, with 8,446 surveys submitted as of this writing. I’ve already contacted the winners and sent them their gift cards (it was interesting to see that 4 of them have never made a Stonemaier webstore purchase despite being newsletter subscribers).
Our audience indicated an increased reliance on reviews for purchasing decisions.
This is a question I asked because I wanted to make sure we are allocating our resources properly when sharing information about new products. Last year, 31% of people said they use playthroughs when deciding whether to buy a game, leading to us sponsoring a total of around 40 playthrough videos from 8 different content creators in 2025.
This year, the survey results showed the use of playthroughs dropping to 26% and reviews increasing by the same amount, up to 42%. While this is significant, I don’t think it will change our strategy, as we already offer thousands of review copies to a variety of content creators each year (with around 1,000 products accepted for review).
A minority of our audience sleeves cards in every game.
Our survey shows that 18% of people sleeve cards in most games, a decrease compared to last year’s 23%. Perhaps people are trusting the quality and durability of the 310 gsm ivorycore cardstock we use (usually with linen embossing), along with our lifetime replacement parts service.
Our audience is patient (and busy with the games they already have).
Over the last few years I’ve asked subscribers how long they prefer to wait between paying for a new game and receiving it. I thought maybe there might be some crowdfunding burnout–it’s tough to spend $50-$100 on something that you don’t receive for 1-2 years, especially when there are many great games available right now.
However, every year more people seem fine with waiting. This year, the number of respondents who are happy to wait 6-18+ months for a game they’ve already paid for went up to 47%. You might think this indicates an increased interest in crowdfunding, but wait until you see the next insight.
Our audience wants to buy more from local retailers and way less from online stores and crowdfunding campaigns.
I typically include the question, “Which place did you use the MOST for buying games this year?” This year the results showed 37% from online stores, 21% from local stores, 20% from publisher webstores, and 16% from crowdfunding campaigns.
But I also added a new question this year: “If it’s different than your previous answer, which place are you hoping to use more for buying games in 2026?” The answer was vastly different than the previous question. Taking into account that 27% said that their answer wouldn’t change, I think it’s still statistically significant that only 2% said crowdfunding campaigns. Local stores are the big winners here, jumping up to 33%.
Of course, Stonemaier Games already doesn’t use crowdfunding, and we strongly support the vast ecosystem of local game stores. When you buy from a local store, not only are you supporting the local economy, but also don’t have to pay for shipping, you might discover something unexpected, and there’s a good chance they might even be able to teach you how to play. Plus, it combines well with the idea of patience as I noted above: Just recently I ordered Agent Avenue and the Mandalorian pack for Star Wars Deckbuilding from my local store, and I was totally fine that they said it might take a few weeks–I have plenty of games waiting to be played and replayed in the meantime. If you’ve been waiting to get the new Wingspan promo birds from your local retailer, they’re now available!
***
Huge thanks to everyone who took the time to fill out the survey! What do you think about these results (and how creators could act on them to better serve you)?
I haven’t run a crowdfunding campaign in 10 years, but Stonemaier was built on the foundation of the 7 campaigns I ran from 2012-2015, raising around $3.2 million to fund games like Viticulture, Euphoria, Between Two Cities, and Scythe, among some expansion and accessory projects.
It was a very different time on Kickstarter, as the gaming category there was much less populated than it is now. While I was fortunate to have success on the crowdfunded games frontier, I made a bunch of mistakes that likely would sink a project in 2025 (especially if I were a first-time creator):
I didn’t build enough of a crowd for the first game prior to launch. I actually put quite a bit of effort into this before the campaign, but I was still learning the tools and skills to spread the word effectively.
I didn’t budget carefully enough. I got caught up in the excitement of Viticulture and added a stretch goal that likely would have sunk the campaign if we had reached it. It was a big wake-up call that I needed to budget much more carefully (and with a healthy buffer) and not make reckless decisions even when things are looking good.
I didn’t have a production-ready game heading into Kickstarter. I got better at this over time, but Viticulture still needed several more months of playtesting, development, art, and graphic design after the campaign ended. Entering a campaign with an incomplete game puts the burden of uncertainty on backers, who I think are much more savvy to avoid such projects today.
I offered exclusive content. This was such a standard practice in those early days that I didn’t think through the long-term implications. I was thinking about 3,000 customers, not the potential of 300,000 customers in the coming years. After Euphoria, I realized just how poorly I was serving the majority of customers through exclusive content, and I stopped offering it. Instead, I shifted to a model of offering free promos to backers that I could sell in the future to anyone.
I got too fancy with stretch goals. Even after 6 campaigns, I was still making mistakes, as this happened on the Scythe campaign (my final Kickstarter). I was worried about blowing past all of the stretch goals on the first day, so I waited until after 24 hours had passed to announce the stretch goal levels, which greatly irritated backers. I heard their feedback and fixed it, but it was a good reminder to keep core elements like stretch goals clear and simple.
I didn’t invest in great graphic design. I had a shoestring budget for Viticulture, so I hired a college student for the graphic design, and I used my rudimentary InDesign knowledge to construct the project page. It wasn’t terrible, but nothing about it conveyed that the final product would be polished and professional. That’s when I brought in Christine, who is still with us today.
I offered early bird rewards. While this isn’t a huge dealbreaker–I still see plenty of projects offer a little reward for people who follow the pre-launch page or back within the first 24 hours–I wish I had instead used the method of, “If we reach X goal in the first 48 hours, everyone gets this special bonus.”
I used crowdfunding universally instead of selectively. Not every game is a good fit for crowdfunding, but I couldn’t see through any other lens at the time. I think crowdfunding is best when you can truly tantalize backers with several major hooks (component, art, etc). I’m glad that Between Two Cities worked out on Kickstarter, but in hindsight it would have been a great way to start building strong relationships with retailers and distributors. The same goes for the Viticulture reprint in 2014, which I reprinted as part of the Tuscany campaign; I don’t think it’s bad to use an expansion campaign to reprint the game, but it was another lost opportunity to form stronger bonds with retailers.
Despite those mistakes, there are a few things I did right in those early, foundational campaigns: I invested in art (even taking money out of my meager 401k/IRA so I could pay the Euphoria artist up front), I tried to offer a great value for the reward pricing (which even included shipping fees, which was standard at the time), and I focused on the people by inviting conversation, replying to every message within a few minutes, and thanking each backer individually during my first campaign within a few hours of their pledge.
What do you think about these mistakes? Are there other common mistakes you see crowdfunders making that deter you from backing their projects?
Today I’m looking at the act of gift-giving for the gamers in my life. This is about putting myself in the recipient’s shoes to find the type of gift that makes them feel cared for, seen, and loved. Only 1 of the 5 love languages shared here involve tangible gifts, which I think is a really important distinction at this time of year.
Words of Affirmation: Share your appreciation and kind words with the person.
play their favorite game (in person or remotely) and talk about the highlights afterwards
if they’re a game designer, playtest their prototype and offer helpful feedback (share what you enjoyed the most and why, along with an example of one thing that didn’t work as well for you)
reach out to a designer they admire for a video clip that celebrates your favorite things about the recipient
Acts of Service: Do something that saves the person time or convenience.
learn and teach a game (this is my favorite)
babysit (if they have kids) to give them time to play a game
make a thematic meal or dish to go with a gaming lunch/dinner
Quality Time: Bond with the person over a meaningful, connective activity.
give them a miniatures painting set and paint together
go to a game cafe or store together
devote time to playing a game you both love
Quantity Time: Spend a longer period of time with the person.
host a game day
play a longer game that they love but rarely get to play
commit to and start a campaign game
Tangible Gifts: Give the person a tangible gift.
consider their preferred player count, cooperative vs competitive preference, classic vs new hotness
go deeper into games they already have and love (expansions, accessories)
if their shelf space is limited, give a digital game (Inkborn, Dispatch, and Blue Prince are some of my 2025 favorites)
If you’re curious about non-gaming gifts, here are some of my favorite things I bought in 2025: an easier way to read on my Kindle, a Dropout TV subscription, Jackery backup power source, metal cups, and Ritual zero-proof whiskey for mocktails.
In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’d like to express my gratitude for various types of people who have had a positive impact on me and Stonemaier Games this year. Perhaps some of these people will be good resources for you as well.
I’m incredibly thankful for…
Supporters, Fans, and Followers (Facebook, enewsletter,YouTube, Instagram, Discord, Bluesky): None of this would be possible without you. I truly hope our games, content, and interactions have brought you joy this year. Thank you for supporting our games, and thank you for sharing them with others. Our 2025 releases were Vantage, Origin Story, Finspan, Tokaido (and expansions), Tokaido Duo, Smitten 2, Between Two Castles Essential, Wyrmspan: Dragon Academy, and the Wingspan promo birds, plus various accessories, disc golf discs, and new Rolling Realms promos.
Stonemaier Champions: I’m incredibly grateful for the 15,000+ Champions who support the 100+ blog entries and 250+ YouTube videos we film each year for creators and designers, and having Champions use their 20% discount on every order (among other perks) to buy directly from us has been a huge help in stabilizing the sustainability of Stonemaier Games.
Coworkers (Alan Stone, Joe Aubrey, Alex Schmidt,Susannah Eisenbraun,Dave Deenik, Christine Santana, and Erica Sanders): It’s so helpful for me to always have people who know the business as well as I do to bounce ideas off of, playtest with, be accountable to, and delegate to, especially in areas where I am weak and they are strong.
Independent Contractors Who Feel Like Coworkers (Morten Monrad Pedersen, Dave Hewer, Shannon Lentz, Karel Titeca): These are people who have other clients and jobs, but they do a lot of amazing work for Stonemaier Games, and I’m incredibly grateful for them.
Retailers and Distributors (see retailers who sell our products): You are the backbone of our supply chain. Thank you for being the bridge between Stonemaier and customers.
Shareholders: We’re fortunate to have a few dozen investors who believe in what we’re building at Stonemaier Games and who share excellent advice, questions, idea, and insights. I’m really grateful for our shareholders.
Independent Contractors and Freelancers: Notable artists for 2025 releases were Clementine Campardou (Origin Story and Wyrmspan: Dragon Academy); Emilien Rotival, Soren Meding, and Valentina Filic (Vantage); Naïade (Tokaido); Ana María Martínez, Catalina Martínez, & Mesa Schumacher (Finspan); the Mico (Smitten 2); along with ongoing support in the form disc golf art (Miles Bensky), realm art (Marius Petrescu), 3D sculpts (Heriberto Martinez), videos (JC Trombley, Pixel Potion Creative, and Emmanuel Ho), voiceovers (Megan Selke), music composition (Joel Winbigler), photos (Tim Chuon and Erica Sanders), Henry Seymour (game teaching), and Andrew Cook (advertising). I’m so grateful that these people communicate quickly and effectively–-I highly value that.
Lawyers, Accountants, Bookkeepers, Advisors, and Payroll (Michael Hargis, Zachary Strebeck, Justin Marty, Leigh Reiter, & Brandi Ruhland at Anders Accounting, Stephanie at Timely Totals, Drea at Execupay, Chris Fleming and Tara Blunt at our bank, Tony Aiazzi and Brian Hires at Moneta, and Benjamin Arana covering insurance): I’m very grateful to have these lawyers to help us create tight contracts, secure solid trademarks, and protect our IP, as well as a great accounting, bookkeeping, and financial advisors.
International Production Partners (Igromag, Feuerland, Maldito, Phalanx, Matagot, Delta Vision, Arclight, Surfin’ Meeple, Ludofy, ALBI, Ghenos, 999 Games, Rebel, and many others): Thanks to these partners, we’ve been able to reach tens of thousands of gamers who wouldn’t otherwise have access to our products.
Replacement Part Helpers (Helen, Mark, Devon, Christian, Dave, Austyn, Xander, Mark, and Yannis): To date, we have received and responded to over 40,000 replacement parts requests. I’m incredibly grateful to have these diligent helpers positioned around the world to take care of lost, missing, and broken components from our products.
Automa: The inclusion of robust solo variants in our games thanks to Morten, David, Lines, and other members of their team has been instrumental in extending our reach to solo gamers. I’m constantly amazed by how well Automa Factory is able to capture the feeling of a sentient opponent without requiring much upkeep or rules overheard.
The Mill and Positively Board Gaming: I really appreciate that Carol and Molly maintain a sponsored YouTube channel specifically to talk about Stonemaier Games from a fan perspective. Our Facebook groups are great for those conversations, but they really breathe life to our fanbase through The Mill, and we’re proud to support it. I’ve also really enjoyed the conversations I’ve had this year with Mitchell on our co-hosted podcast, Positively Board Gaming.
Digital Platforms (Tabletopia, Monster Couch, The Knights of Unity, Acram Digital, Digidiced, Board Game Arena, and Boardspace.net): The skill to take a tabletop game and translate it to the digital space for more people to discover, enjoy, and learn from is astonishing to me. I’m so impressed by and grateful for these folks. I’m also really grateful for Paul Hart, the developer of the free Stonemaier Scores app and Jans Carton, creator of Rulepop.
Shipping and Fulfillment Companies (ARC Global, Spiral Galaxy, Let’s Play Games, Miniature Market, and Asmodee Canada): While most of our games are shipped in bulk to distributors, we offer more direct shipping to those who order on our webstore thanks to these fulfillment companies. We also offer local pickup in St. Louis!
Co-Designers and Game Designers (Ben Rosset, Matthew O’Malley, Hoby Chou, Kai Starck, Ryan Lopez, Elizabeth Hargrave, Morten Monrad Pedersen, David Studley, Travis Jones, Alexander Schmidt, Mike Young, Paolo Mori, Francesco Testini, Mihir Shah, Chris Scaffidi, Connie Vogelmann, Paul Salomon, David Gordon, Michael O’Connell, Antoine Bauza, Ryan Davis, Pete Wissinger, and others to be revealed next year): The talent and dedication of these designers is astounding, and they are integral to our ability to bring joy to tabletops.
Manufacturers (Shannon at Panda Game Manufacturing and Chris at Innova): It’s a true blessing to work with a manufacturer like Panda. Their communication, quality, care, and willingness to work with us on things like making our games more eco-friendly makes them the only manufacturer I ever want to work with. It’s also been fun to continue to make custom discs with Innova this year!
Proofreaders: Using our proofreading and oversight process, a dedicated group of proofreaders can see every step of a product’s evolution during the proofreading process. I’m incredibly grateful for the time and effort that Dana, Michael, Josh, Ian, Brian, Inga, Justin, Crystal, and others have put into our products this year.
Ambassadors: Our ambassadors have made our community and games so much better by answering questions on forums, playtesting our games, making suggestions for my top 10 lists (Aryn, Skiler, Abagail, Kari, Kaitlyn, and Dillon), and welcoming people into our games at game stores, events, and conventions. We currently have around 750 active ambassadors–I love that I can trust this group with ideas while they’re still being formed to get their feedback. A few ambassadors are particularly helpful on an ongoing basis are Josh Ward, Travis Willse, Garrett Feiner, and Julie Bode (though I should really stress that there are many, many active ambassadors who offer their time and talent in incredible ways).
Reviewers, Journalists, Podcasters, and Video Bloggers: I can’t play every game, but thanks to the variety of perspectives from other content creators, I’m able to listen a variety of perspectives from the comfort of my office. I’m also truly grateful for all of the reviewers who create compelling content to help people decide if our games are a good fit for them, and I appreciate reviewer who understanding that we can’t send every product to all 550 reviewers on our list. Also this year I’m grateful for the YouTubers who accepted our sponsorship for playthroughs.
Convention and Event Coordinators/Volunteers (Geekway to the West, Gen Con, Essen, TantrumCon, any convention that uses the play-and-win system, BGG@SEA, etc): It takes a lot of work to put together a convention, and I’m grateful for my coworker, Dave, for coordinating our convention presence (and with the support of the wonderful people at Meeplesource and Inside Up Games). I’m so grateful for the people who create such welcoming environments for old and new gamers to commune with each other, as well as the volunteers who help us at those events. You can always check here to see if we’ll have a presence at a convention. I had fun briefly attending Gen Con this year, at Geekway, Design Day, and the Finspan event, and going on the BGG@SEA cruise to Norway.
Design Day Attendees: The creative energy and generosity of time and talent at our annual Design Day is always inspiring for me. Thank you to all of the designers and playtesters who attended in 2025, and especially to Pieces Board Game & Cafe for being awesome hosts.
Fellow Creators: I love that there are so many brilliant, innovative creators and game designers. You all truly inspire me to be a better creator and a more interesting game designer. I’m particularly grateful for fellow publishers who share their advice, insights, and insights (publicly and privately)–I learn so much from you!
My Gaming Groups: Gaming is my main social outlet, and I’m really grateful to have a few consistent game groups filled with people who love a wide variety of games (including disc golf). I like that these people try to win but focus on having fun, and it’s been fun to play every other week with local friends in person and every other week on Board Game Arena with friends outside of St. Louis.
Charity Auction Participants: The extremely generous donors (along with other contributors like Fulfillrite and participating content creators) who placed winning bids on our annual charity auction enabled us to donate $22,354 to 10 different charities, putting our total donation amount over all charity auctions at $211,216. We also donated hundreds of games this year to organizations that feature tabletop games to serve communities who can’t buy games.
Friends and Family: I’m very grateful for the many ways my friends and family support me in my passion for gaming, for Stonemaier Games, and for serving you.
What are you grateful for in the tabletop gaming community/industry this year?
While playing a tabletop game, has the game ever instructed you to do something that leads you to connect mechanically or thematically with other people playing the game around the world?
Examples are rare (and I’m hoping you can share some in the comments that I don’t know about), but here are a few that don’t involve spoilers:
KeyForge: In the original version of KeyForge there was a format called “Chainbound” that looked at the reported power level of each deck (in KeyForge, every deck is a unique combination of cards). If a deck performs well, it gains “chains” that decrease your starting hand size in subsequent games; likewise, if a deck performs poorly, it can lose chains.
Legend of the Five Rings: In the original version of this card game, the outcome of major tournaments (i.e., the winning faction) had a significant impact on the game’s world. Those outcomes became part of the official lore, leading to the rise and fall of various factions, along with the creation of new cards and abilities. I’ve heard the newer game Sorcery is doing something similar.
Raxxon: In this pre-pandemic game about a rapidly spreading virus, upon opening the game you unlocked a few codes that you could give to other people to buy the game (which for a while was the only way to buy the game).
Before I get to some tabletop spoiler examples, here are a few from digital games that may better explain the concept of “meta-connective”:
Helldivers 2: In this sci-fi video game, you fight to capture planets from alien control. If your mission is successful, you contribute to incremental progress made by players around the world on the same planet (there’s even a website that tracks this progress). Eventually this may add up to the planet being 100% liberated. If that happens to enough planets, the scope of the world increases to include more planets (new content for everyone).
Elden Ring: In this gritty open-world game, there are certain places where players can leave messages for each other. You might stumble upon a warning like “turn back” or “a chamber lies under the ruins” that helps you find a hidden area. There are limited text options designed to avoid hate speech and obscenities, though players still find creative ways to combine words for comedic attempts.
Why does any of this matter? Maybe it doesn’t–maybe it’s just me. I really like that other people are playing (or have played) the same game I’m playing, and I’m enamored by the idea that something I do in the game may have a small impact on someone halfway across the world. The small downside is that these involve a brief digital element (web interface, not a dedicated app), but I think the pros outweigh that con.
With that in mind, here are the two places that meta-connective elements have appeared in Stonemaier games. Click to expand if you’re okay with these spoilers (it’s more of a story spoiler in Charterstone and a small discovery spoiler in Vantage).
Charterstone
In Charterstone, players competitively build a village in the kingdom of Greengully over a 12-game legacy campaign. In each session, the Forever King gives the village something to accomplish, making him either happy or angry. At the end of a specific game, you’re instructed to go to a website where you see your village on a map of Greengully (you name it there), along with thousands of other villages created in other games of Charterstone.
The website instructs you to log the sum of your scores for that game, and it compares your average (weighted by player count) to the average of the other villages (real scores reported in other campaigns). If you’re above average, the king is happy; if you’re below average, the king is angry–both lead to different mechanical consequences.
Vantage
In Vantage, there are a few dozen giant, glass-like orbs scattered throughout the vast planet. If you interact with an orb in a specific way, the game gives you the option to go to a website where you can see limited-text messages scrawled on the surface of the orb by other real people who have previously visited that orb (ala Elden Ring). You then have the option to leave a message of your own. There’s no mechanical impact other than gaining information about your surroundings and how to interact with them, which is a major aspect of Vantage.
I think this is just the tip of the iceberg of what meta-connective elements could be…if they’re something that people enjoy. They don’t even require narrative games to work. For example, imagine an economic game where you log the end-game value of goods and resources on a web app. During setup, you check the app to see the current worldwide value of those goods and resources, applying them to your board before starting play.
I’m fascinated by these elements, but again, it might just be me. :) What do you think? Have you seen meta-connective elements in tabletop games? Are there certain types of them that you could see yourself enjoying?
A budgeting and marketing puzzle for any crowdfunding campaign is determining the funding goal. Today’s article is a back-and-forth dialogue on this subject between Ira Fay (Far Off Games) and me (Jamey, Stonemaier Games).
***IRA***
The first printing of Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread had a successful Kickstarter campaign by any reasonable measure (10K+ backers, $1.3MM raised), but the Kickstarter algorithm did not highlight it as “project we love” or anything like that. We can’t know for sure why not, but Cody and I have a hypothesis: The time it took to reach the funding goal was too slow (2.5 days!) and the ratio of funds relative to the funding goal was too small (less than double).
Cody set the goal for the first campaign at a whopping $720,000 because that was the amount of money he calculated he would actually need to manufacture the game and fulfill all his commitments. It was a real number and it was scary big!
As we approached the second printing campaign, we had the opportunity to talk with various marketing and campaign advisors. One bit of advice we received was to set the threshold artificially low, far below what we actually would need to fulfill the project. In the worst case, the advisors said, we could simply cancel the campaign and refund the money. By having an artificially low funding goal, we please the algorithm while potential backers see that the project has funded and thus feel more confident backing.
As Cody and I discussed this advice, we felt uneasy. If the campaign goal isn’t the real goal and instead it’s just an imaginary number, the whole system loses credibility. Backers gain a false sense of what’s actually needed to manufacture games and fulfill projects. Publishers face unrealistic expectations, striving for practically instant funding. And when a campaign gets cancelled after reaching its artificially low funding goal, backers (who didn’t realize it was a false goal) are rightfully disappointed.
This idea of using artificially low thresholds to get engagement isn’t new. This appears in auctions with a reserve price. For example:
Bidders might initially feel excited that they could get that car for $630, but to avoid disappointment, they must understand the fine print. There is a hidden reserve price that must be met before they actually get the car. At least in this auction situation, people are told explicitly about the hidden reserve!
To be clear, I don’t believe that either of the campaigns shown above are using artificially low thresholds – they are well-deserved, extremely successful campaigns! But one can easily see how the system is encouraging creators to keep thresholds low by reporting scores like this. If the system instead reported “percentage of satisfied backers” or “percentage of followers who actually backed” or “eco-friendly manufacturing score,” it would immediately incentivize different behaviors by publishers.
The current reality of crowdfunding is that the algorithm does reward projects that reach their goal quickly. It makes the project seem popular and successful. I understand the impulse, but at the same time, I don’t think it’s a trend that benefits backers or publishers in the long run. Hiding the realities of the project undercuts one of the big transparency benefits of crowdfunding.
This is a small issue relative to many other things discussed on Jamey’s excellent blog (environmental issues, tariffs, etc.). I hope by shining a light on this topic, everyone can see the algorithm’s influence on publisher behavior, and publishers can perhaps be encouraged to show accurate funding goals despite short-term incentives to the contrary.
***JAMEY***
Thanks for sharing this, Ira! I largely agree with the idea that creators and backers benefit from a funding goal that reflects the real amount needed to create and manufacture the game.
Where I’d push back a little is how that number is calculated. For example, if Arydia had only raised $700,000 instead of $720,000, would that truly have tanked the project? What about $650,000? And so on.
Let’s talk numbers for a hypothetical game. If you want to make a game with a landed cost of $20 (manufacturing plus freight shipping) with a trusted long-time producer like Panda, you’ll have a minimum order quantity of 1,500 units (or 2,000 if plastics are involved). Ideally you’ll make more, but that’s the bare minimum you need to cover that MOQ. So that’s $30,000.
Of course, you’ll need to pay artists, graphic designers, playtesters, and proofreaders–those costs can vary greatly based on the complexity of the game and the quantity of the art. At Stonemaier Games, I would say that those costs add up to around $75,000 on average. Added to the landed costs, that’s $105,000.
However, if we’re investing so much money, time, energy, and other resources, we’re not looking to make only 1,500 units of the game. Our real MOQ is 20,000 (i.e., if we don’t think we can sell at least 20,000 units of a game, we won’t make it). So that puts this hypothetical calculation at $475,000.
Now, if I were to use crowdfunding, would I use $475,000 as the goal? I would not. My reason is because it’s aspirational–just because I want to sell 20,000 units doesn’t mean the game isn’t feasible at 1,500 units. Also, I’m not a first-time creator, so I’m prepared (financially and otherwise) to bet on myself. Like you and other publishers, I’ve already done a lot of the work to create the game before I’ve presented it on a crowdfunding campaign. Essentially, I’ve already decided that the game is worth a certain amount of investment no matter what backers can provide. So if I’ve already spent $50,000 on artists, graphic designers, playtesters, and proofreaders, it isn’t my expectation that backers should reimburse me for that investment. That drops the goal down to $55,000.
My last thought is about transparency. I love your focus on transparency, though I don’t think it solely rests on the funding goal itself. In the hypothetical example above, I might list the funding goal at $55,000, but somewhere else on the project page I might discuss that I’ve already invested $50,000 in the game and that the additional $55,000 is for an MOQ of 1,500 units even though I’m really hoping to make at least 5,000 units.
I’m not claiming that any of this applies to Arydia specifically (in fact, I’m 100% sure that Arydia’s landing costs and sunk costs are significantly higher than the example I provided). Rather, I just wanted to point out that an accurate funding goal is relative to various factors and that transparency extends beyond the goal itself.
What do you think? Feel free to close out the article with anything else you want to counter or share. ***IRA***
Drawing the Line: After doing all the math and calculations, let’s say we end up with a goal of $52,000. I can always ask myself, what about $51,999? Surely that would still be OK. What about $51,998? etc. It’s quite tricky to find where exactly to draw the line. One approach is to pick a number substantially lower, like $40,000, and convince yourself that it’s really too low. Then you can go up from $40,000 and down from $52,000 until you feel like you’ve found the lowest reasonable goal.
Stretch Pay: If you’re offering an expensive game, many backers may want to pay via installments, which Gamefound calls Stretch Pay. I don’t know the data across all of Gamefound, but to share a single data point (since I really appreciate how Jamey shares real data here): As of Day 1 of the Arydia reprint campaign while I’m writing this, 47% of pledged dollars are in the form of Stretch Pay! That means we won’t actually get the cash flow until much later in the process, after we’ve needed to make payments to the manufacturer. If you’re going to offer Stretch Pay, be sure to plan out the payment schedule to align with your manufacturing bills!
Thanks again for the opportunity to discuss this topic!
***JAMEY***
Thanks for sharing these thoughts, Ira! I wish you the best with the second-printing campaign (currently $476,408 raised for a $200,000 funding goal).
I’d love to hear what other backers and creators think about the funding goal calculation. Let us know in the comments below!
Anmelden
“I want you to picture a time in your life. Maybe you’re eight, maybe you’re nine, maybe you’re ten, maybe you’re six, maybe you’re 12, but you’re out there and you’re playing football. You’re just kicking the ball around. You’re playing with your friends, your dad, your mom, your sisters, your brothers, your buddies. You’re just playing football.
