Asmodee has revealed the first slate of partner companies it has picked to make Lord of the Rings-themed board games and accessories, six months after becoming the steward of the hugely lucrative Middle-earth licence for the tabletop.
They are joined by dice and tabletop accessories maker Sirius Dice, and Game Toppers, which announced separately that it will be creating Lord of the Rings-themed gaming tables, mats and other accessories.
Individual projects from most of those publishers are still under wraps, although last month Stone Blade announced it would be bringing a Lord of the Rings-themed version of its Ascension deckbuilding game to Gamefound.
When Asmodee was given power over the tabletop licence by Middle-earth Enterprises last October, the initial reaction from some publishers was that they would struggle to get a look in, with Asmodee likely to reserve the best opportunities for Lord of the Rings releases for itself.
Luke Peterschmidt, head of active category management at Asmodee
He said at the time, “Our job is to make the right number of Middle-earth games at the right pace, so that every game has space to breathe, and there is a Middle-earth game or gaming accessory for every type of game.
“That’s the mission, and no part of that mission says, ‘and Asmodee makes all the games’.”
He added, “It is absolutely fair to have that thought in your head, and it’s our job to prove that thought wrong. And, I mean, literally nothing I say, I think, could convince anybody other than action. So yeah, it’s got to be the action, we’ve got to follow it up.”
In a statement announcing the first slate of partner companies, Peterschmidt said, “There may be The One Ring to rule them all, but it takes many publishers to satisfy the gaming needs of The Lord of the Rings fans and I’m sure each of our partners are going to do their part in that quest.”
Asmodee’s own Lord of the Rings-themed releases this year are currently set to include The Lord of the Rings: The King’s Gambit, which its studio Space Cowboys is developing in partnership with Restoration Games.
That title is a reimagining of turn-of-the-millennium Avalon Hill release Star Wars: The Queen’s Gambit, which is based around four battles that take place during the events of Star Wars film The Phantom Menace.
Publishers interested in pitching a Middle-earth game to Asmodee can do so by emailing METTGlicensing@asmodee.com.
Osprey Games, the UK publisher of tabletop titles including the critically acclaimed Undaunted series, is shutting down its board and card games operation to refocus on wargames and RPGs.
A statement from the company said Osprey’s owner, the multinational book giant Bloomsbury Publishing, had made the “difficult decision” to sell the board and card game line as part of a “strategic refocusing” on book publishing, adding that the move was “not a decision taken lightly”.
The company said it would not commission any new board or card games, but would continue to release, sell and license upcoming games according to its existing schedules while Bloomsbury hunts for a new owner for its board games.
BoardGameWire understands from two sources that Bloomsbury hopes to find a buyer willing take on the existing board and card game team in addition to its catalogue of titles, but the firm is yet to publicly comment on the sale process.
Osprey Games was launched in 2015 as part of Bloomsbury arm Osprey Publishing, which had a decades-long history of creating military and historical information and reference books before beginning to publish wargaming rulebooks in 2008.
The gaming arm’s early successes included Peer Sylvester’s The King is Dead and The Lost Expedition, as well as popular titles such as Hal Duncan and Ruth Veevers’ design Cryptid and the second edition of Martin Wallace’s London.
Those releases were followed by the high-profile success of the Undaunted series of deckbuilding wargames from David Thompson and Trevor Benjamin and the Imperiumgames from Nigel Buckle and Dávid Turczi.
Osprey also gained a reputation for taking chances on a range of titles with intriguing mechanisms and designs, such as Sylvester’s area control and trick-taking hybrid Brian Boru, highly asymmetric area control title Crescent Moon, card-based strategic wargame Battalion: War of the Ancients and small-box, quick-playing conflict title General Orders: World War II.
Undaunted: Normandy, designed by David Thompson and Trevor Benjamin
Speaking to BoardGameWire, Sylvester said the sale news had come as “a bit of a bombshell”, adding that he wasn’t aware of any problems at Osprey which pointed to a possible sale.
He said, “I dont think the decision has anything to do with how the games have sold. From what I see, there are some strong titles, like The King is Dead (which is still selling well), Undaunted, and apparently also Lost Expedition. So it’s a decision made from the parent-parent-company at Bloomsbury.
“Working with Osprey was perhaps the defining moment of my ‘career’ as a game designer. First: they always had great developers there, which was fun to work with. Brian Boru wouldn’t be as good as it (hopefully) is without the team at Osprey.
“Also, Lost Expedition was turned into a hit partly because of the great idea to hire [comics creator and illustrator] Garen Ewing. So they elevated my games, but they also published them in the first place, which helped me getting a name and contact in the industry.
“I really don’t know if I would continue working on games as much as I did, if I wouldn’t have worked with them. So I owe them a lot.
“The news of the potential sale therefore makes me quite sad. I just hope the team keeps being around in some form, so I can keep working with them.”
David Thompson, the co-designer of the Undaunted series and fellow Osprey titles War Story: Occupied France, Line of Fire: Burnt Moon and the General Orders games, told BoardGameWire, “I’ve worked with Osprey for the last 14 years. Over that time, they’ve grown to be like a family to me.
“It was over a decade ago that Duncan Molloy, then the lead of the Osprey Games board game division, took a chance on a fledgling designer and signed what would eventually go on to be Undaunted: Normandy. Over the next decade I had the opportunity to collaborate with Duncan, Filip Hartelius, Anthony Howgego, Jordan Wheeler, Rhys Ap Gwyn, and Luke Evison on the editorial staff.
“Each and every one of them are incredibly talented people, and it was through their shepherding that games like the Undaunted series, General Orders, and War Stories: Occupied France came to be. And I would be remiss if I did not mention Emily Neat, Pete Ward, Benji Corless, Benjamin Thorne, and George Barker from the marketing staff and Gareth Clarke for his graphic design.
“Amazing people, each and every one. Over the years I’ve partnered with about 15 board game publishers, but the folks at Osprey will always hold a special, unique place in my heart.”
Fellow board game designer Ellie Dix, whose tapestry-themed worker placement design Threaded could prove one of the last published by Osprey Games, said she also did not know what had provoked the decision.
Ellie Dix design Threaded, published by Osprey Games
Dix told BoardGameWire, “I’ve loved working with Osprey. They’ve been absolutely brilliant. Honestly a dream to work with. They’ve taken so much care with Threaded and done such a great job to bring it to life. I’m very sad about the decision to sell.”
The news comes a month after Bloomsbury, which has a stock market valuation of almost £500m, announced it was “streamlining its structure for further growth”, which included a reorganisation of the company’s editorial divisions and the loss of about 55 jobs.
That restructuring follows Bloomsbury’s sales doubling from £185m to £361m over the last five financial years, with profits more than doubling to £48.8m in the same time.
No mention of Osprey was made in the restructuring announcement, or in Bloomsbury’s interim results announced in October last year, which revealed revenues of £160m and profits of £24m in the six months to August 2025.
Root publisher Leder Games has unveiled four new hires as it continues to rebuild from a staff exodus earlier this year that included star designer Cole Wehrle and style-defining artist Kyle Ferrin.
The Minnesota-based publisher has brought in experienced operations director Johnny Dale as executive director, who will take on responsibility for day-to-day operations, and former Trick or Treat Studios graphic and production designer Jody Henning as senior graphic designer.
Jesse Wertz, who previously worked in operations and finance in the software and banking sectors, has been brought in as director of operations, while Adam Jury has been hired as a graphic designer.
Leder agreed to sell Arcs and Oath to Buried Giant as part of the shake-up, while keeping hold of its huge-selling star title Root – a game which despite its complexity has broken out of the hobby game bubble and onto the shelves of major retailers such as Walmart and Target.
Kyle Ferrin artwork for Root
Other Leder staff who moved across to Buried Giant included Josh Yearsley, who designed the most recent Root expansion Homeland, senior graphic designer Pati Hyun, event coordinator and community manager Matt Martens and graphic designer Megan Ganey.
That left Leder with a design and development team comprising company founder Patrick Leder – the co-creator of its debut release Vast: The Crystal Caverns and co-designer of multiple Root expansions – Nick Brachmann, who has worked on expansions for Root, Ahoy and Fort, and solo game design specialist Liz Davidson.
Leder named Davidson as the company’s new creative director in February, while former customer support coordinator Andrea Francisco has become a junior game developer at the studio, and Alita Robertson has been promoted from production assistant to producer. The company also brought in Tyler Exsted as a game developer two months ago.
New Leder executive director Dale has had a long career in director roles across advertising, media and pharmaceutical companies – and has also spent many years running the popular Eize Basa social media account, in which he jokes about board gaming and other subjects.
Dale initially announced he had been hired by Leder on his Eize Basa BlueSky account on April 1, which given the nature of the account was widely laughed off as an April Fool’s Day prank.
Speaking of Dale’s hire, Patrick Leder told BoardGameWire, “Bringing Johnny on as executive director is a perfect fit. He’s spent his career building and leading teams like ours, he’s passionate about board games, and anyone who knows him knows how creative he is.
Leder Games founder Patrick Leder
“Johnny has been a friend of Leder Games for almost ten years now, so having him join the team feels completely natural for me, Liz, and the rest of the team.
“For me personally, having Johnny take over day-to-day operations will be a huge benefit: it means I get to spend more of my time doing what I love most, which is designing games.”
Dale added, “I’ve been a fan of Leder Games for a long time, so stepping into this role is a huge honor. I bring nearly 20 years of experience leading creative teams, and I look forward to putting that to work alongside Patrick and this group.
“We have a great pipeline of games in development, and I think players are going to be very excited about what’s coming.”
Some of those in-development games were recently showcased by Leder on its YouTube channel, with Alita Robertson showing off backyard soapbox racing game Kart, and Nick Brachmann demonstrating a prototype of a Taylor Shuss dexterity-based mech and monster battle design with the working title Creature Control.
In the same video Patrick Leder revealed he had been working on a lightly-asymmetric economic euro game called Fish based around catching, canning and delivering fish, which he said might be renamed to Trawl – something which would break a long tradition of Leder games all having four-letter titles.
Paul Bender and Christopher Badell, who launched the business in 2011 alongside Adam Rebottaro, said they have reacquired the brand and the rights for the Sentinels of the Multiverse titles alongside their other original IP such as the Sentinel Comics RPG.
The deal comes just under a month after Flat River Group sold the Greater than Games brand name and the Sentinels range to digital developer Handelabra Games, which had spent more than a decade creating digital versions of the Sentinels of the Multiverse and its expansions – as well as for Greater than Games’ best known release, Spirit Island.
Two new titles have been announced by the company slated for a summer release, in the form of Badell-designed party game Digital Detox and social deduction title Crime Scene Tamperer, from Homestar Runner creators Mike and Matt Chapman.
Greater than Games co-founder Christopher Badell || Photo credit: Greater than Games
Badell, GtG’s chief creative officer, added on the livestream that the publisher is “in the development process on a high-single-digit number of games right now”, while creative director Matthew Kroll added that the company has two “heavy hobby games in the pipeline” – one co-operative, one competitive.
Bender added on the livestream that Bottom of the Ninth designer Darrell Louder had recovered the rights to the game, which had previously been published by Dice Hate Me and GtG, “and would like us to publish it again, so we’re excited to do that”.
The relaunched company’s five-strong team comprises Greater than Games veterans SaRae Henderson as art director and chief operating officer Katie Nale, in addition to Badell, Bender and Kroll.
GtG’s third co-founder Adam Rebottaro, the original artist and co-creator of Sentinel Comics, has also rejoined as a “creative collaborator”, the publisher added, “helping to shape the next generation of Sentinel Comics releases alongside Badell”.
That will see the pair working together on new content in the Sentinels range, beginning with reprints of all existing definitive edition products for Sentinels of the Multiverse and then moving on to a new expansion, which is expected to come to crowdfunding in 2027.
Badell said in a press release announcing the GtG revival, “A year ago, I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to come back to this. Sentinel Comics has been the defining creative work of my life – fifteen years of stories, characters, and worlds I love – and watching it become uncertain was genuinely painful.
“So when I say this feels like coming home, I mean it. I’m back in the Multiverse. We all are. And we’re just getting started.”
Greater than Games co-founder Paul Bender || Photo credit: Greater than Games
Bender added, “Greater Than Games has always been about more than just publishing games — it’s about building experiences and communities.
“Over the years, the brand has grown and evolved, but its heart has always been with the people who create and play these games. Being able to steward that again is both a responsibility and a privilege.
“We’re excited to reconnect with our community and continue building something special.”
Greater than Games is also set to return to Gen Con this year, the publisher added, underscoring its rejuvenation as a business with a booth in the Entrepreneurs Avenue segment of Hall G – an area dedicated to companies making their debut at the event.
Flat River Group, a distribution and e-commerce specialist, had bought Greater than Games in 2021 after picking up private equity investment from Guardian Capital Partners a year earlier.
It followed that expansion into board game publishing with further deals for Canadian publisher Synapses Games and hobby game distributor Luma Imports in 2022.
Co-op designs The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship and Vantage put in a powerful showing in this year’s Golden Geek Awards, winning five categories between them and scoring another five runner-up successes.
Pandemic creator Matt Leacock’s spin-off creation The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship took home the awards for medium game of the year, best thematic game and best co-op at the 20th annual Golden Geeks, which are selected and voted on by BoardGameGeek users from games released in the prior year.
Co-op open-world exploration game Vantage, designed by Scythe and Viticulture creator Jamey Stegmaier, won the innovative game prize and best solo game awards, while Jon Perry’s chaotic mascot racer Hot Streak triumphed in the best party game and light game of the year categories.
Jamey Stegmaier’s design Vantage, from Stonemaier Games
The much sought after heavy game of the year title went to Galactic Cruise, while The Old King’s Crown secured the artwork and presentation award, Toy Battle took best 2-player game and Star Wars: Battle of Hoth best wargame.
All of those Lord of the Rings titles were published by studios at board game giant Asmodee – which last October announced it had been named manager of the hugely lucrative Middle-earth licence for tabletop games and accessories.
Fate of the Fellowship winning the co-op award marked the second year running that a Lord of the Rings game has triumphed in the category, after Bryan Bornmueller’s The Fellowship of the Ring – Trick-Taking Game took home the prize in 2025.
Despite the high-profile successes of two co-operative titles in this year’s Golden Geeks, the results were less positive for co-op fantasy adventuring game Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread – which failed to convert any of its six nominations into wins or runner-up placings.
Sci-fi and space-themed games were notably everywhere again across this year’s awards, continuing a trend from 2025 which ended in multiple wins for Arcs and SETI.
Speaking about Vantage’s multiple wins and nominations, designer Jamey Stegmaier – who spent about eight years designing and playtesting the title – told BoardGameWire, “I’m just happy for the opportunity to bring a little joy to people through our games, and I’m honored that my labor of love, Vantage, was able to do that for the people who selected it for the Golden Geek Awards.”
Fate of the Fellowship creator Matt Leacock said, “Designing The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship was such a rewarding experience for me. I’m so pleased that players are continuing to enjoy it and using it to write their own stories with each other.
“So many things came together with this product: the creative direction, development, illustration, paper engineering, graphic design, sculpting, and marketing. I want to extend my congratulations to the entire team that brought it to life.”
The 20th Annual Golden Geek Awards results in full:
Entertainment website The AV Club has shuttered its board game and video games segment, bringing to an end almost 13 years of tabletop coverage for veteran writer Keith Law across the site and its predecessors, Paste Games and Endless Mode.
Law wrote more than 300 pieces across those sites following his debut article in 2013, helping bring modern board gaming to a wider audience through his reviews, opinion pieces and highly regarded ‘games of the year’ lists.
Speaking to BoardGameWire, Law said the shuttering had come as a shock, adding that he would continue to write about board games on his personal blog.
He said, “It’s been an honor and a privilege to write about board games and the tabletop space for the last 12 years for Paste, Endless Mode, and AV Club.
“I worked with some great people, notably my longtime editor Garrett Martin, and feel incredibly lucky to have had the opportunity to write so much about one of my passions.”
The loss of Law’s writing from such a well-read entertainment site was bemoaned by Votes for Women designer Tory Brown, who cited his rave review of that title as “a high water mark in the effort to bring my game to the masses.”
She told BoardGameWire, “Keith Law is a treasure, the kind of smart and thoughtful writer whose approach to criticism makes us all smarter and more thoughtful.
“That a media outlet failed to recognize the value of his contribution says more about the lack of vision in American journalism than the board game audience or industry.”
Keith Law’s glowing review of Tory Brown’s design Votes for Women
The shuttering of the AV Club tabletop section marks the latest in a string of high-profile gaming and entertainment sites closing or shrinking their tabletop coverage in recent years.
They include major video games site Kotaku, which has not published an article to its tabletop section since veteran writer and editor Luke Plunkett left in 2023, and Polygon, which lost renowned, long-serving tabletop editor Charlie Hall as part of a downsizing 12 months ago.
While Polygon’s tabletop section still exists, the segment’s focus has shifted heavily towards coverage of trading card games such as Magic: The Gathering and Pokemon.
Of the 61 articles in tabletop section last month, just three were about board games – one a story highlighting that Star Wars: Outer Rim was being discounted at Amazon, and two about the Game Changer Kickstarter from comedy team Dropout.
Kevin Bertram, the founder of Votes for Women publisher Fort Circle Games, told BoardGameWire, “While I appreciate the contributions of many YouTube reviewers, video cannot fully replace the depth and clarity of written criticism.
“The loss of voices like Charlie Hall (of Polygon) and now Keith Law marks a deeply troubling turn for our industry.
“Board game journalism faces a structural challenge: establishing a sustainable business model that supports rigorous, long-form analysis. Perhaps that future lies with independent critics like Dan Thurot or collaborative models such as Rascal.
“Whatever forms emerge, their success will depend on active support from a community that values thoughtful, written criticism.”
AV Club editor-in-chief Danette Chavez provided a statement to BoardGameWire which said, “The AV Club made the difficult decision to eliminate three roles, which included two full-time staff who ran our video games coverage after joining us from Endless Mode in November 2025.
“This also includes changing the direction of our television coverage. Our hope is this will allow The AV Club to focus on our core strengths: incisive coverage of film and TV through reviews, features, and news.
“We will continue to have some games coverage, but we cannot sustain a full-time staff covering it with our smaller team. All previously published games stories will remain available to read.”
Tomáš Holek’s space exploration eurogame SETI has surged past 100,000 copies sold, following a triumphant 2025 in which it cleaned up across a string of major board game awards.
SETI publisher Czech Games Edition told BoardGameWire it had ordered bigger than usual, more frequent print runs than it initially planned for the Spiel 2024 release, after the title picked up early widespread praise from reviewers and impressed visitors at gaming conventions across last year.
That swell of interest translated to a rash of awards, including heavy game of the year and best thematic game in the Golden Geeks – voted on by BoardGameGeek users – and a trio of wins at last year’s Dice Tower Awards, where it was named game of the year and best strategy game, while designer Tomáš Holek was named best new designer.
SETI designer Tomáš Holek
CGE said, “We knew the game was good. But the reality has definitely exceeded our expectations.”
It added that the speed at which SETI became popular was comparable to its 2020 release and fellow multi-award winner Lost Ruins of Arnak, with SETI’s sales numbers “much higher than for our other recent heavy game releases” such as the well-received Kutná Hora and Deal With the Devil.
Asked whether the high-profile awards success across 2025 was a big contributor to SETI’s sales performance, a CGE spokesperson said, “This is very hard to evaluate, especially with the number of awards SETI has won.
“There probably wasn’t a noticeable bump thanks to a particular award, but they definitely help bring more eyes to the game. Awards like Golden Geek or The Dice Tower Awards help guide the community to what games are worth checking out, and that leads to increased sales.
SETI’s rapid success is striking following a year which has seen many publishers pivoting to smaller box titles over more heavyweight designs, as a response to economic factors such as US tariff volatility, as well as gamers having less money to spend due to inflation and general cost of living struggles.
CGE told BoardGameWire the colossal success of its 2015 release Codenames had been critical in putting the Prague-headquartered publisher in a financial position where it can take a chance on heavy titles like SETI from previously unpublished designers.
Titles from the relaunched version of Codenames, which was unveiled in 2025
Codenames had sold more than 16 million copies as of May last year, has been translated into more than 45 languages, and has just undergone a relaunch with new art, packaging, a re-tuned word selection and simplified rulebook, with CGE looking to keep the evergreen title flying off shop shelves.
The CGE spokesperson said, “We can now experiment more than in the past. However, we’ve also made quite smart decisions overall and chose really strong titles recently (Arnak, SETI) – and we’ve built a really strong position on the market throughout the years.”
They continued, “SETI’s success is a combination of theme, art, and game design. When we showed the game at UK Games Expo, people geeked out seeing various projects.
“That’s where a good part of SETI’s success lies – the inspiration in real science and space exploration. It’s hard to find a chunky space-themed game that would be more grounded in reality, while also being visually stunning.
“The beautiful art is not only on the box, but also on the board, cards, and other components. On top of that, the innovative spinning board always manages to draw attention.”
They added that they believed the game “scratched an itch” for fans of successful games like Terraforming Mars, providing a heavy strategy title with gameplay that “can be explained in a digestible manner, making the game quite accessible”.
They added, “Players also often think about how they’ll approach it differently when they play again. Because of this, SETI gets to the table more often than some heavier titles. Players feel like there are truly more ways to explore the galaxy.
“When the game is played more often, it reaches more people, and it gets organic lift through discussions on forums, groups, etc. This also leads to more favorable reviews and posts on BGG, where SETI has quickly climbed the charts over the last year.”
CGE’s 2026 release slate revealed to date includes Drillers, from first-time designer Roman Bednář and Project L co-creator Adam Španěl, as well as a Critical Role-themed co-op reworking of Codenames and several Codenames expansion packs, focused on themes such as sci-fi, fairy tales and ‘cute critters’.
Asmodee has agreed to buy the rights to party game Time’s Up! from R&R Games, continuing an expansion push predicated on social games being the fastest growing category of the board games market.
Time’s Up!, first published by R&R in 1999, is based on classic party game Celebrities, in which players write down names on pieces of paper, which teams then take turns guessing based on a single player’s descriptions.
The game increases in difficulty over two subsequent rounds, with players having to describe the same names using just a single word alongside actions and gestures, while in round three the describer cannot speak at all.
Time’s Up! Family, published by Asmodee studio Repos Production
Celebrities has been reworked into multiple different boxed releases from various companies over the years, with Peter Sarrett’s design Time’s Up! and Monikers from CMYK among the best known versions.
Asmodee has been a publisher of Time’s Up! since its 2020 acquisition of Repos Production, which had been putting out various versions of the game in Europe since 2004 through a licensing agreement with R&R.
Last year the board game giant shifted Time’s Up! to its Zygomatic studio alongside fellow small-box social games such as its bestselling Dobble range, Werewolves of Miller’s Hollow, the Timeline series and Jungle Speed.
Asmodee said the rights purchase cemented Time’s Up!’s presence as once of Zygomatic’s flagship titles, adding that the Zygomatic team would focus on focus on “expanding the IP and further strengthening its global reach particularly in English-speaking territories, where there is a significant growth potential for the brand”.
It added that it would undertake a “rationalisation and modernisation” of the Time’s Up! range in 2027, which will see it “streamline the product line, refresh the brand positioning, and ensure stronger competitiveness and accessibility across markets”.
Asmodee said Time’s Up! Express, which was launched in January, marked the first step in its refreshed strategy for the game – with its faster gameplay and broader accessibility reaching new audiences “while remaining faithful to the core experience that made the game successful”.
Asmodee said at the time that it expects a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for social games of between 4% and 8% between 2025 and 2030, compared to about 4% for the wider board games market, citing mass market sales research for the US and ‘main European countries’ conducted by Arthur D Little.
Company CEO Thomas Koegler said in the company’s Q2 report last November that Asmodee had seen “good momentum” in its lower price-point products in the US mass market, singling out Exploding Kittens as a particularly strong performer in what he called a “challenging market”.
The ATM deal followed five other acquisitions from the past 12 months – including the buyout of Japon Brand from CMON, anchoring the board game giant’s push into a “currently untapped market” for the company.
Speaking about the Time’s Up! deal to Board Game Beat, R&R Games president Frank DiLorenzo reportedly said multiple companies had reached out over the years to inquire about buying the title or the entire business, but added that “most offers either didn’t align with our valuation or came from partners we felt would not fully honor and support what we’ve built”.
He said of the Asmodee buyout, “We’ve had a longstanding relationship with Asmodee, particularly following their acquisition of our European partner, Repos.
“They have a deep understanding of the game and a clear vision for maintaining its longevity and appeal. Their offer was both attractive and well balanced. We believe this agreement creates meaningful benefits for both companies and for the players who love the game.”
He added that R&R would transition out of publishing the game over the next few months, winding down its remaining stock through direct sales on its website.
Alliance Open House, the tabletop publisher and retailer networking event launched more than 25 years ago by Alliance Game Distributors, has rebranded to Universal Summit US in the wake of Alliance’s takeover by Canada’s Universal Distribution.
Universal said it is waiving all registration fees to celebrate the inaugural US Universal Summit, which will continue its predecessor’s slate of game demos, panels and workshops, vendor exhibit hall and networking opportunities.
This year’s event will be held at the Grand Wayne Convention Center in Fort Wayne, Indiana between August 27 and 29, with registration required by May 15.
Universal Distribution CEO Angelo Exarhakos told ICv2 last July that the company intended to invest “a fair bit” in expanding the event and “making it more welcoming to both retailers, and especially the vendors”.
He added, “We generally, at the Universal level, don’t charge vendors to attend these shows. We think this is a very good marketing expense for us and a good investment, to be able to bring our vendors close to our retail partners, so you’re going to see us invest and expand that show.”
Alliance Game Distributors was a perennial heavyweight of US board game distribution since it was created through the merger of Chessex and The Armory in 1998, with both companies already major players in the sector before the deal was signed.
The company had maintained its strong position since being bought by Diamond in 2000, despite the woes of its parent business in recent years.
Universal will also be holding its regular Canadian summit on September 13 and 14 this year, at the Sheraton Laval in Montreal, Quebec. Registration for that event is also due by May 15.
UK-based Gutter Games, which was launced in 2017, is best known for dexterity challenge party game Beat That!, and has also published adult-themed party titles including Gutterhead and Trunk of Drunk.
Beat That! by Gutter Games
Gutter was bought by US Amazon aggregator Perch in 2021, which was itself acquired by private equity-backed Amazon FBA businesses operator Razor Group three years later.
Savana founder and president Romain Chemière de Carné told Mojo Nation, “Gutter Games built something genuinely special – irreverent, high-energy games that travel across cultures and languages.
“Our intention is clear: restore the brand to the prominence it deserves, develop extensions and new entries in the Gutter Games universe, and further strengthen a portfolio that is already one of the most dynamic in the global board game industry.
“This is our first M&A operation, and our first acquisition overseas – it demonstrates SAVANA’s capability to execute complex international transactions, and it opens a new chapter in how we grow the business.”
Savana also sells markers and crayons, nail stickers and temporary tattoos in addition to its line of board games.
The company’s game releases this year are set to include a One Piece version of its pirates-themed social deduction game Traitors Aboard, according to a listing on BoardGameGeek.
Arcs, the hybrid trick-taking wargame from Root and Oath designer Cole Wehrle, has won game of the year in the ioGioco Awards, which were created in 2021 to celebrate Italian-language board games and their designers.
This year’s award for best aesthetic and production quality went to Michele Morosini’s The Breach, published by Ludus Magnus Studio, while best two-player game went to Paolo Mori and Alessandro Zucchini’s design Toy Battle.
Nominees are picked by the editorial staff at Italian tabletop gaming magazine ioGioco from all of the titles published in Italy in the previous year, with the winners decided by public vote via the magazine’s website.
The Breach, from designer Michele Morosini and Ludus Magnus Studios
ioGioco said the tabletop gaming sector continues to prove “particularly vibrant”, with the market in Italy seeing a 27% rise in value last year compared to 2024 according to data from research company Circana.
Trading card games were a huge driver of that figure, the research shows, with sales of tabletop games outside of that category growing 3% year-on-year. More than new 800 titles were released in the country last year, ioGioco added.
Last year’s ioGioco game of the year award was won by fantasy deckbuilding and strategy game Black Rose Wars: Rebirth, which was designed by Andrea Colletti, Diego Fonseca and Marco Montanaro.
ioGioco Awards 2025 – full results
BOARD GAME
Winner: Arcs, designed by Cole Wehrle – published in Italy by MS Edizioni Ants, Renato Ciervo, Andrea Robbiani Bomb Busters, Hisashi Hayashi The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship, Matt Leacock Star Wars – Battle of Hoth, Richard Borg, Adrien Martinot
GAME DESIGNER
Winner: Paolo Mori Gregory Grard Hisashi Hayashi Reiner Knizia Matt Leacock
LIGHT & FAMILY GAME
Winner: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Trick-Taking Game, Bryan Bornmueller – Asmodee Italia Bomb Busters, Hisashi Hayashi Castle Combo, Grégory Grard, Mathieu Roussel Cities, Steve Finn, Phil Walker-Harding Flip 7, Eric Olsen
WARGAME
Winner: Memoir’ 44 (New Edition), Richard Borg – Asmodee Italia Battlefields of the Napoleonic Wars, Paolo Mori, Alessandro Zucchini Pocket Air War: Definitive Edition, Carlo Amaddeo An Impossible War: The First Carlist War in the North, 1834-1838, David Gómez Relloso Wunderwaffen, Walter Obert)
CHILDREN’S GAME
Winner: Splendor Kids, Marc André, Catherine André – Asmodee Italia Jurassic Valley, Davide Panizza My Puzzle Adventure: Ochre Land, Antonin Boccara, Romaric Galonnier, Fabrice Lamouille, Mathilde Malburet Redwoods, Gary Kim, Yohan Goh, Hope S Hwang Opération Noisettes, Emilie Soleil, Jérôme Soleil
AESTHETIC AND PRODUCTION QUALITY
Winner: The Breach, Michele Morosini – Ludus Magnus Studio Cyclades: Legendary Edition, Bruno Cathala, Ludovic Maublanc Galactic Cruise, TK King, Dennis Northcott, Koltin Thompson Koi, Rosaria Battiato, Massimo Borzì, Martino Chiacchiera Runar, Diego Fonseca)
AESTHETIC AND PRODUCTION QUALITY – ROLE-PLAYING GAME
Winner: Mörk Borg, Pelle Nilsson, J Yamil – Need Games Daggerheart Elder Mythos, Laura Fontanella, Marta Palvarini Magus et Oraculum – New Edition, Momatoes, Oscar Biffi Pilgrims of the Murk Dome, Pelle Nilsson, J Yamil
SOLITAIRE GAME
Winner: Gloomhaven: Buttons & Bugs, Joe Klipfel, Nikki Valens – Asmodee Italia Final Girl Season 2, Evan Derrick, AJ Porfirio Hispania, Miguel Marqués Too Many Bones, Josh J Carlson, Adam Carlson Voidfall, Nigel Buckle, Dávid Turczi
TWO-PLAYER GAME
Winner: Toy Battle, Paolo Mori, Alessandro Zucchini – Asmodee Italia Duel for Cardia, Faouzi Boughida, Mathieu Rivero Agent Avenue, Christian Kudahl, Laura Kudahl Memoir’ 44 – New Edition, Richard Borg Zenith, Grégory Grard, Mathieu Roussel
BOARD GAME EXPANSION
Winner: The White Castle – Matcha, Sheila Santos, Israel Cendrero – Devir Dune: Imperium – Bloodlines, Phil Amylon, Andy Clautice, Paul Dennen, Caleb Vance Food Chain Magnate: The Ketchup Mechanism & Other Ideas, Jeroen Doumen, Joris Wiersinga Talisman: Nemesis – Call of the Hunt, Craig Van Ness Twilight Imperium: Fourth Edition – Thunder’s Edge, Dane Beltrami, James Kniffen
ROLE-PLAYING GAME
Winner: Daggerheart – Acheron Games DIE: The Roleplaying Game, Kieron Gillen Marvel Multiverse Roleplaying Game, Matt Forbeck, Marty Forbeck Triangle Agency, Caleb Zane Huett, Sean Ireland Wilderfeast, Federico Corbetta Caci, KC Shi
ROLE-PLAYING GAME SUPPLEMENT
Winner: The One Ring: Realms of the Three Rings, Michele Garbuggio, Marco Maggi, Francesco Nepitello, Gabriele Quaglia – Need Games Dolmenwood Campaign Book Dungeons & Dragons 5.5e: Dungeon Master’s Guide Outgunned Adventure, Simone Formicola, Riccardo Sirignano Tal’Dorei Reborn, James JHaeck, Matthew Mercer, Hannah Rose
GAMEBOOK
Winner: Un altro passo nella neve, Manuele Giuliano – Ingenioso Hidalgo 15 Mondi da Cana, Stefano Tartarotti Chi è stato? 1 – La Casa degli Automi, Michele Buonanno Fiabe Oscure 2 – Aurora, Valentina Ceciliato The Freedom Finders – Beak Your Chains, Emily Conolan
The follow-up to the top ranked game on BoardGameGeek, Brass: Birmingham, was always like to attract significant attention for its crowdfunding campaign. For Roxley Games’ Brass: Pittsburgh, that interest converted into more than $9.1m, securing the biggest board game crowdfund of 2026 so far and one of the top ten tabletop gaming raises of all time. Roxley CEO Gavan Brown, who co-designed Pittsburgh alongside original Brass creator Martin Wallace, spoke to BoardGameWire about soaring past his expectations for the crowdfund, avoiding the ‘arms race’ of deluxe editions, the advantages of Gamefound over Kickstarter and overcoming the campaign’s biggest mis-step.
BoardGameWire:Congratulations on the crowdfund! It’s obviously been a massive success, in terms of raw numbers – are these the kind of levels you were anticipating prior to launch, for backer numbers and total funding, or were they above or below where you’ve ended up?
Roxley Games CEO Gavan Brown: I thought $4m was most likely. If the community and fans felt like we nailed the game, it was POSSIBLE (but highly unlikely) to hit as high as $8m. On the low end, if it funded below $2m I would have felt that we must have dropped the ball in some way, only because of how respected Birmingham is.
Roxley Games CEO and Brass: Pittsburgh co-designer Gavan Brown
I think there are plenty of people out there who would look at this campaign and say ‘well of course it performed well, it’s the sequel to the number one game on BGG’. Can you speak to the advantages you might have had going into making this game, in terms of it being a success – and also the ways in which you had to make sure you didn’t take crowdfunding success for granted?
I’ve said before that starting this project, it felt like we were making The Matrix 4. It’s going to be nearly 10 years between the two titles, so we can’t wait this long and just throw something together. Obviously, there is a cohort of fans who are going to back it regardless, because it’s Brass. On the other hand, Brass players enjoy playing a 3-4 hour economic simulation game about the industrial revolution, so needless to say, they are also some of the most savvy gamers in the hobby who would be absolutely uninterested in a cash grab. So I realized before we started that we would need to create a sequel that fires on all cylinders. Which luckily, that’s the always the objective of myself and Roxley.
How long has the development process been for this one, and what would you say were the major changes that you made as playtesting and development went on?
The research went on for years prior to me even beginning. I also kept a document where I would jot down ideas of new mechanisms and dynamics that I wanted the game to feature when they popped into my head. Heavy development for Pittsburgh started in November of 2024. I began working on it every single day of the week.
I am the type of designer who will gut an entire system if it’s not working how I want to. There is basically no level of redesign that I will refuse to undertake if I believe that the change will make the game better. There were many massive, large-scale redesigns of the system in Pittsburgh, but the largest one was fundamentally redesigning how oil was consumed.
Initially, oil was only consumed by the kerosene industry. But as time went by, we realized that this resource not being consumed by manufactured goods reduced the competition and interdependence between players, which I feel is a core defining principle of Brass. As I researched oil and its relationship with manufactured goods, I discovered that a massive amount of crude oil was also processed into lubricants used in the making of manufactured goods.
What was your professional take on the board game crowdfunding environment prior to launching – both for crowdfunding in general, and for higher-priced, deluxe games. Did you make any specific changes / have any particular strategies for the crowdfund based on your knowledge of the current environment?
The strategy of many publishers is to create deluxe editions of their games to increase average order value. They need to increase average order value because they need the product to cost enough to fuel the advertising needed to fuel the campaign. Roxley was one of the first companies to start leaning into deluxe editions of board games, simply because I (and our team) love the experience of playing games made from high-quality materials.
So to us, the Collector’s Edition represents the most pure vision of the game. While we do put immense care into the retail ‘Essentials’ version of our products, this is always done after we realize the pure vision of our Collectors Editions. To us, the Collectors Edition is the painting, and the retail is a print. Both can be beautiful, but the painting is made from different stuff.
So we win because we get to make our ideal version of the game, and it’s a win for the consumer because if we sold the Collectors Edition through retail distribution, it would need to cost over $200. Deluxe Editions across the hobby have become sort of an arms race, with endlessly scaling scope, physical size, number of boxes, vac trays, and plastic in the boxes.
Our strategy: we do not pay attention to any of this. In fact, we often do the opposite. We focus on making our games as physically small as possible to respect your shelf space. We also choose materials that feel innovative and fit the aesthetics of the game, rather than just adding more plastic miniatures (unless the creative direction or game design calls for them).
My motto regarding innovation in product and game design is: we aren’t trying to make the ‘next thing’, because someone is making that as we speak. Instead we are trying to make the ‘next next thing’. We spend a great deal of time studying manufacturing methods used outside of boardgaming. For example, yesterday I recorded a video of a nice velvet texture on the inside of a friend’s new Volvo, wondering how we could apply same texture on a vac tray.
This was your first campaign on Gamefound, after ten on Kickstarter across more than a decade. Why did you decide to switch for this campaign, and has it persuaded you to stick with Gamefound for your next one?
We do not have any allegiance to any crowdfunding platform. We see them a tool used to realize creative expression, and Roxley will always use the best tool for the job. But in recent years, Kickstarter has mostly remained the same while Gamefound has been silently innovating and refining its service.
So our decision to use Gamefound was based on them currently being the best tool for the job.
What did you find where the biggest advantages to using Gamefound as the campaign went on – and were there any aspects which you’d expected to be more beneficial than they were?
Here’s a few ways we Gamefound is currently leading over Kickstarter:
They have a built in pledgemanager
They invented pre-campaign updates, which was pivotal in precampaign hype
They allow a youtube link for the campaign video
Greater level of comment moderation
They allow mp4 videos embedded in the campaign page, which also support transparency (making them work better for dark mode), which are vastly more function
Responsive design is vastly superior to Kickstarter. When you have a Kickstarter page open on a full screen browser window, the imagery is a little 580px strip in the middle of the page. 2015 called and wants their boilerplate back.
Tools to help charge and remit sales taxes on behalf of the creators. Kickstarter simply washes their hands of this and says “It’s the creator’s problem”
Greater localization support: we can display every part of the campaign in multiple languages
They are highly responsive to the needs of their clients
What do you think was the most important thing you learned from running this campaign generally, in terms of preparing for future crowdfunds – and maybe for providing others with advice on running theirs?
Our biggest misstep was not communicating the total value of the Collector’s Edition on day one of the campaign. Every single component of the Collector’s Edition was intended to be upgraded by the end of the campaign. We wanted to ‘surprise’ everyone with these upgrades as the campaign progressed. But Brass already had a deluxe edition released previously, so while the final form of the Collectors Edition does represent immense value, the way it was initially presented did not adequately communicate this.
We corrected this by discarding the concept of stretch goals (Funding Quests), for this campaign, unveiling all of them in text form on day four, and then doing a spotlight on each one of these upgrades for each day of the campaign. This change immediately got us back on track.
My advice to other creators:
Do not be afraid of changing or redesigning your campaign.
Consider not using stretchgoals on a crowdfunding campaign for a sequel to a previous title, which likely carries preconceived consumer expectations with it.
I think one of the notable aspects of this campaign was the weekly drip-feeding of content updates and reveals from August through December last year, prior to the campaign launch. Is that a strategy you’ve employed before, what was the impact of doing things that way (in terms of e.g. backer numbers, online conversation etc), and would you make any changes to the way you approached it, in hindsight?
This is probably the best thing we did for the campaign. I don’t think any campaign had utilized prelaunch updates to the level that we had during this campaign. Usually, creators do updates talking about all the new cool components, materials, mechanics, and effort put into the game during and after the campaign. But during the campaign, you need to focus on very short concise messaging to try to get a conversion. After the campaign the customer is already getting the game, and it doesn’t help you sell more.
But talking about this before the campaign launches allows the players to form a bond with your game and your team before the campaign even launches. If they like what they hear and what they see, they will follow your campaign, which greatly increases hype, followers, and if your updates are interesting and from the heart, it will also increase sales.
There’s been discussion online from people upset at what they see as a high price level for this campaign – but then more than 37,000 people have backed it to the tune of over $9.1m. Can you speak a little to why you went the direction you did with this campaign – deluxe components, for example, rather than a more basic, more affordable production?
The Essentials Edition is priced at the exact same MSRP as we sell Brass Birmingham for in Target. It was also pointed out on BGG that after adjusting for inflation, Brass Pittsburgh: Essentials Edition is cheaper than the 2007 Treefrog Games Edition.
The Collectors Edition provides immense value, and as discussed would need to be priced at upwards of $200 if sold through retail distribution.
I hear retailers talk about margins all the time, and their need for reaching levels of about 50% for individual titles. Is the pricing of Pittsburgh going to provide any challenges on the retail side, do you think, or are you confident the numbers will work out for both Roxley and retailers of the game?
Target is regarded as having the most price-conscious demographic in the market. Brass Birmingham currently sells well in Target at $80. We don’t forsee this being any different for Pittsburgh.
How concerned are you about the impact of further US tariffs changes on producing and delivering Pittsburgh – and what kind of tariff hike could Roxley reasonably absorb before additional fees would have to be charged to backers?
The tariff situation has been evolving rapidly, and we’re keeping a close eye on it. For US backers, applicable tariffs are effectively a VAT. This is something international customers have always navigated, and now the US is in the same boat.
What were your expectations around endgame, and what impact has it ultimately had on the game and on the crowdfund for Roxley overall?
We have never done end game before, and I had never even heard of it until [Roxley director of operations Kira Peavley] said it was running for our campaign. The Gamefound folks reached out to us a few days prior to the campaign ending and suggested we create a little trinket that backers could add to their pledge in order to keep the timer going.
Because the campaign had done so well, we also decided to come up with an exclusive gift for everyone who backs copy Brass: Pittsburgh collectors edition on Gamefound. Because this gift was to be exclusive to Gamefound, it could not be gameplay related, as Roxley does not offer gameplay-related crowdfunding exclusives (we want people to be able to buy all game content after the campaign). So, we came up with the idea of doing an artfolio that would feature Brass’ artwork from Mr. Cuddington that they’ve created over the years. It will even feature a fabric cover, as you would see in a high-quality hardcover book.
When the campaign shifted to Endgame, the funding amount was $7,869,841, so it has generated over $1m in extra funding. As for how much impact it has had, that is up for debate: Some of our previous campaigns that have generated an additional 75% of additional funding while the pledge manager was open. But honestly, that doesn’t matter to us… we are very happy with the funding level we have reached, and it makes us happy to reward each of our backers with this extra item as a thank you to them.
Isaac Childres, the founder of Cephalofair Games and designer of its runaway successes Gloomhaven and Frosthaven, is stepping down from his role as CEO to focus exclusively on game design at the company.
Cephalofair’s long-time chief operating officer Price Johnson has been promoted to CEO at the publisher, while industry veteran Julie Ahern has been hired from Van Ryder Games as its new COO.
Childres founded Cephalofair in 2014 to self-publish his first game, Forge War, and struck huge success with his follow-up design, fantasy co-op campaign design Gloomhaven, which raised about $4m for its second printing on Kickstarter in 2017.
Three years later the company broke the Kickstarter funding record for a tabletop game with Childres’ successor design Frosthaven, which pulled in almost $13m from more than 83,000 backers.
Standees from Frosthaven
Childres has led the company since inception, seeing it growing from a one-person operation to overseeing a team handling design, development, writing, art direction, promotion, publishing and fulfillment.
New CEO Johnson, who joined Cephalofair in a business development role in 2017, oversaw strategic initiatives such as mass market placement of Jaws of the Lion, as well as managing marketing and production of Frosthaven as the heavily-delayed project navigated the huge disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
He has also been a high-profile voice in campaigning against US tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump over the last year, and aiming to highlight the heavy financial burden it has placed on tabletop game publishers – many of which rely on Chinese manufacturing for their titles.
Johnson will continuing to oversee strategic initiatives, business development, sales and marketing, and catalogue growth at the company following his promotion to CEO.
He said, “Working with Isaac since the early release days of Gloomhaven to grow both Cephalofair and our community has been an absolute privilege and highlight of my career.
“We have come a long way since the early days of indie game design and crowdfunding, while learning a lot about ourselves and this industry in the process.
“I can’t wait to share the exciting plans we have creatively and organizationally in this next chapter with our fans, but that starts by putting in the hard work alongside our amazing team, whom I thank for their trust and support.
“With confidence, there is no place I’d rather be… epic strategy awaits!”
A statement from Cephalofair said Childres would now focus solely on his role as lead game designer at the publisher, overseeing design and development on its entire line of games.
Julie Ahern, who replaces Johnson as COO, most recently spent almost four years as senior director of operations at Van Ryder Games, which is best known for solo horror game series Final Girl and murder mystery title Detective: City of Angels.
Titles from the Final Girl range, from Van Ryder Games
She previously spent almost 12 years at Greenbriar Games as COO and vice president, overseeing day-to-day of business operations and game development while contributing to the Folklore: The Afflication and Zpocalypse product lines.
Childres said, “Julie is my absolute favorite person in the board game industry (sorry Price!), and I could not be happier to welcome her to the team.
“I think she is the perfect fit for a needed role in this transition that allows me to focus on my core passion: designing epic, strategic games. Thanks Julie!”
Johnson added, “Growing as an organization means surrounding ourselves with professionals who not only compliment our core strengths, but exceed many of our own.
“Julie Ahern is one of those professionals I’ve long admired as a leader, innovator, and tabletop enthusiast. From coffees at conventions to shared manufacturing trips in China, I’m thrilled to finally have the opportunity to work directly alongside her as Cephalofair enters its next chapter.”
Ahern said, ““I have known and respected Isaac and Price for many years. While I loved my time at Van Ryder Games, it is a genuine pleasure to start this new adventure.
“I am thrilled to delve into the Gloomhaven universe with all its deep lore and challenging campaigns.”
Cephalofair’s most recent crowdfund saw it raise more than $5m on BackerKit for Gloomhaven Grand Festival – one of the highest-profile campaigns on the crowdfunding site to date – which included a second printing of Frosthaven, second edition of Gloomhaven and several other designs such as small-box release Gloomhaven: Buttons and Bugs.
That campaign has suffered heavy delays compared to its original timeline, however, due to both production delays and the volatility caused by US tariff policy.
The new edition of Gloomhaven, for example, only began fulfilling in May last year, despite initial estimates that it would begin fulfillment in March of 2024.
Cephalofair is currently on Wave 4 of production for the project, working on the Gloomhaven RPG, which it originally estimated would be fulfilled in July 2024.
Financially-troubled board game publisher CMON is pinning its future on a push into video game development and blockchain-based projects, beginning with a $2.1m investment in NFT game maker Blissful Link.
CMON’s board said it planned to transition its titles such as Massive Darkness and Super Fantasy Brawl Reborn into “high-quality digital assets”, adding that it believed integrating its board games with digital and Web3 technologies “would enhance the long-term commercial value of the group’s portfolio”.
The company has kicked off that shift by agreeing to acquire a 2.2% stake in Blissful Link, which operates Capverse, a play-to-earn video game built on blockchain technology in which players buy NFT ‘Sumer’ characters to battle with online.
CMON’s investment values British Virgin Islands-incorporated Blissful Link at more than $95m. Blissful Link made a loss of about $197,000 in 2024, on revenues of just over $408,000, and had net liabilities of about $889,000, according to unaudited figures provided by CMON. It did not include finances for 2025.
A statement from CMON’s board supplied to the Hong Kong stock exchange, where the board game publisher is listed, said, “Over the years, traditional board and other table top games have merged with digital ones providing digital convenience, offering online multiplayers, automated rules and apps that enhance physical play.
“The company believes that in order to continue to be relevant in the games industry and to expand the group’s revenue stream, the group would need to conduct digital transitioning and venture into video game development and Web3 projects.
“Digital transitioning would have the benefits of enhanced visual effects, have apps that handle scoring, timing etc, would enable a diversified number of players and are more accommodating to players not within the same vicinity.
“Added to this, entering into Web3 projects often emphasise social responsibility and ethical practices such as transparency and fairness on decision marking. By participating in Web3 projects, the company can demonstrate its commitment to social responsibility and sustainability.
“However, the group would continue to supplement this digital transformation as physical games would still offer a ‘screen break’ for individuals as well as foster direct face to face interaction.”
Non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, are digital assets which represent specific items – such as an illustration, trading card or piece of music – each with an individual signature stored via blockchain technology, which includes information such as who created it, who owns it, who sold it and for how much.
Two years ago CCG project Wonders of the First had to pull a $1.4m campaign from Kickstarter after falling foul of the crowdfunding platform’s ban on NFTs. The game went on to raise about $1.2m after relaunching without NFT content.
CMON, a long-time heavyweight in board game crowdfunding thanks to games such as Zombicide, Blood Rage and Cthulhu: Death May Die, slumped to a loss of more than $3m in 2024 due to falling sales for its crowdfunding campaigns.
CMON’s $23m losses across 2024 and 2025 are now almost 5.5-times larger than its profits from the preceding nine years combined, and have pressed the company into a string of asset sales as it attempts to fulfill more than $14.3m of as-yet-undelivered crowdfunding campaigns.
Those IP sales included parting with its most famous and profitable title Zombicide – which has raised more than $40m on Kickstarter since its 2012 launch – to Asmodee, as well as Blood Rage, Rising Sun and Ankh to Tycoon Games.
Last month an independent auditor hired by the company questioned whether it CMON had the resources to stay in business for the foreseeable future, saying the publisher’s $19.9m annual loss, its net liabilities of more than $3.5m and contract liabilities of over $7.5m “indicate a material uncertainty which may cast significant doubt about the group’s ability to continue as a going concern.”
CMON’s directors had a different view, however, saying in the company’s 2025 financial report that it “should be able to continue as a going concern” thanks to a trio of factors.
They include financial support from some of the directors “sufficient to finance CMON’s working capital requirements”, the roughly $2.4m proceeds from selling its Singapore office that it received in January, and about $1.25m of gross proceeds from a successful share sale in February.
CMON’s hefty liabilities are largely due to its eight undelivered crowdfunding campaigns, which are not recognised as revenue on the company’s books until they are fulfilled to backers.
Toy and game maker Hasbro has delayed its quarterly results by almost a month after suffering a cyber attack, but said it expects to post Q1 revenues of up to $985m thanks to continued strong performance of Magic: The Gathering.
Hasbro said it identified “unauthorized access” to the company’s network on March 28, but believes that access has been “contained” – adding that Magic’s shipments and release cadence had continued unaffected.
The company expects Q1 revenue to be between $970m and $985m, a rise of between 9% and 11% compared to the same period last year – while operating profit is expected to reach $235m to $245m, a 38% to 44% jump.
Those preliminary results are expected to be solidified when Hasbro eventually releases its full Q1 financial report, which is now scheduled for May 20.
Hasbro saw its wider 2025 revenue rise almost 14% to $4.7bn, driven by a record 45% growth in its Magic, D&D and digital gaming division Wizards of the Coast, the company revealed in February.
Magic’s record-breaking year was capped off by a storming fourth quarter, which saw revenues from the game up 141% compared to Q4 2024 on the strength of the Avatar: The Last Airbender and Final Fantasy releases.
That stellar performance of Wizards, and Magic in particular, was in stark contrast to Hasbro’s consumer products segment – which includes Nerf guns, Transformers and Peppa Pig toys.
That segment saw revenues drop 4% last year “amongst macro and retailer volatility brought on by tariff announcements in Q2″ – and unlike for Magic, Hasbro said that the cyber incident would likely impact second quarter revenues and operating profit in consumer products due to expected order processing, shipping and invoicing delays.
Hasbro added that it still expects full-year revenues to rise between 3% and 5% in 2026. Hasbro CFO and COO Gina Goetter said in February that the company expects Wizards of the Coast to deliver mid-single-digit revenue growth in 2026, “supported by a healthy release cadence and continued engagement across the Magic ecosystem”.
The American arm of high IQ society Mensa has unveiled the latest crop of board games winning its Mensa Select seal, which are voted on by hundreds of organisation members during an annual four-day gaming marathon.
Alex Cutler and Peter C Hayward both saw two of their creations win the seal this year, including their co-design Critter Kitchen, Hayward’s Things in Rings and Cutler’s A Place for All My Books – which he co-created with Michael Mihealsick.
Things in Rings publisher Allplay also saw its title Twinkle Twinkle, designed by Ammon Anderson, pick up a Select seal, while other winners this year included Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset’s Fromage, Yoann Levet’s Got Five and Tomáš Holek design Galileo Galilei.
Entries to the annual Mensa Mind Games are judged on aesthetics, instructions, originality, play appeal and play value, Mensa says, with the award aiming to highlight games that are original in concept, challenging and well-designed.
Not all games released during the past year are eligible for the award, however – entries carry a fee of several hundred dollars each, and games up for consideration need to have an average play time of 90 minutes or less.
Barnes & Noble and other major retailers have previously given special consideration to games bearing the Mensa Select seal, while winning games are also featured by American Mensa’s official online retailers and on its website.
Fromage is the most decorated of this year’s seal winners, having previously won the Origins Award for best light strategy game, as well as picking up nominations for medium game of the year, most innovative game and best artwork in the 2024 Golden Geek Awards.
Fromage, designed by Matthew O’Malley and Ben Rosset
Things in Rings was previously nominated in both the Golden Geeks and Origins Awards in the best party game category.
Co-op fantasy adventuring game Arydia: The Paths We Dare Tread has scored six nominations in the 20th annual Golden Geek Awards, which are selected and voted on by BoardGameGeek users.
Cody Miller’s “green legacy” design, which can be fully reset after each dozens-of-hours-long campaign, is up for heavy game of the year, most innovative game and best thematic game, as well as for the best artwork, solo game and co-op game categories.
Fellow open-world exploration game Vantage, designed by Scythe and Viticulture creator Jamey Stegmaier, is challenging across five categories this year, as is Pandemic creator Matt Leacock’s spin-off design The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship.
Both those titles will battle it out for the Medium Game of the Year prize, which is also being contested by popular releases including Galactic Cruise, Eternal Decks and fellow Stonemaier Games title Finspan.
Eternal Decks, a limited communication co-op game designed by Hiroken, has picked up four nominations
The Golden Geeks is one of board gaming’s highest profile awards, as well as being among the earliest of the major competitions to unveil its winners each year – with the Dice Tower Awards falling in May, the Spiel des Jahres in July and Deutscher Spiel Priese in October.
Notable awards which have already named their winners this year include France’s highest-profile board game prize, the As d’Or, which picked Paolo Mori and Alessandro Zucchini’s Toy Battle in its main prize for 2026.
Toy Battle is nominated in two categories in the Golden Geeks: best two-player game and best wargame. The latter category will see the title go up against a huge variety of different designs, including Memoir ’44-inspired Star Wars: Battle of Hoth, whist-themed English civil war strategy title A Very Civil Whist, and heavyweight GMT Games releases such as Congress of Vienna and Seljuk: Byzantium Besieged, 1068-1071.
As well as published board games, the Golden Geeks also features categories for best print and play design, best board game app and best podcast.
Voting will be undertaken by BoardGameGeek users who have paid an annual support fee in any year, who pay a one-time 20 GeekGold fee, or who have purchased an avatar on the site. They will rank nominees in individual categories, with voting set to end on April 30.
Last year’s Golden Geeks saw Arcs, the hybrid trick-taking wargame from Root and Oath designer Cole Wehrle, win a trio of awards, while fellow space-themed game SETI notched up a pair of wins.
This year’s Golden Geek Awards nominations in full:
Lucky Duck Games, the board game publisher behind European localisations of major hits such as Dune Imperium and Cascadia, is scaling back that side of its operations to prioritise development of its own designs.
Scott Morris, the company’s global brand director, told BoardGameWire that while localisation had been an important part of the business over the years it was “resource intensive” and dependent on external factors – adding that developing in-house titles provided “more opportunity for long-term value”.
Lucky Duck has become a varied operator in the modern hobby games industry since it was founded in 2016, growing from a small design studio running Kickstarter campaigns into a global publisher, localiser and distributor with offices across Poland, the US, France, Italy and the UK.
That localisation activity has been centred most heavily around Lucky Duck’s home of Poland and early expansion country France, with the company becoming known for local language version of strategy titles and big-selling games such as Too Many Bones, Flamecraft and The Isle of Cats.
But Lucky Duck has a big hitter of its own in the Chronicles of Crime series of games, which have sold more than one million copies worldwide, and Morris told BoardGameWire the company was also “very confident” in its other recent releases Borealis: Arctic Expeditions, Purrramid and Oakspire.
He said, “We also have several games in development we have not announced yet, but we are very excited about. The team knows how to make fun and engaging games, which, at the end of the day, focus on our goal: bringing smiles to gamers everywhere.”
The French edition of Too Many Bones from Chip Theory Games, localised by Lucky Duck Games
Lucky Duck was bought by Rummikub manufacturer Goliath two years ago – and Morris said the global distribution opportunity offered by such a high-profile mass market player was part of the reason behind the strategy shift.
He said, “Since the acquisition, there has been a focus on leveraging Goliath’s global distribution network and operational scale. This includes expanding access to new retail channels and improving production and logistics capabilities.
“These changes are ongoing, but they are already opening new opportunities for our titles to reach wider audiences. We have seen significant growth in these new channels and are excited to continue to introduce our games to new retailers and customers.”
He said, “I can understand how the announcement was received that way and we will work to make our announcements clearer in the future.
“We have decided to not localize some items we originally planned to, and we’re working with those partners to find the best solutions for everyone, in those situations. The decision is part of a broader strategic evolution, rather, and is not a France-specific decision.
“We are refining how we approach the different markets, with a greater emphasis on publishing and developing our own titles globally, while continuing to work with partners where the right opportunities exist.”
Some of those planned localisations which will now not go ahead include the French localisation of Cascadia Alpine Lakes, published by Flatout Games, which was only announced by Lucky Duck a few weeks ago.
Cascadia: Alpine lakes || Kickstarter image
Morris said the strategic shift did not affect the company’s Global Publishing Network operation, which is a separate business unit that acts as a localisation agency, connecting publishers and distribution buyers who localize in their regions.
It might appear that developing and publishing home-grown designs is a much riskier proposition than localising already popular titles which gamers are keen to get hold of in their language – but Morris said both approaches carry different types of risk.
He told BoardGameWire, “With the support of Goliath’s global infrastructure, we are in a stronger position to manage risks effectively. While localization benefits from existing demand, original publishing allows us to build long-term value, strengthen our own brand identity, and deeper our engagement with the players.
“We have a very talented design and development team in Poland, led by Michal Szewczyk, that has produced award winning games.
He added, “By prioritizing internally developed titles, we have greater control over product development, timelines, and long-term brand building.”
Goliath CEO Jochanan Golad said at the time of the Lucky Duck takeover that it saw two major growth areas in games: adult party games and strategy games – but some publishers have begun to move away from larger box, complex titles and towards lighter, smaller games recently amid the fallout from last year’s US tariffs chaos.
Morris confirmed to BoardGameWire that strategy games “remain a key area of growth”, saying, “Our strategy reflects confidence in that segment, alongside opportunities in other categories.
“The Lucky Duck brand is focused primarily on strategy games… we’re both very happy with our recent releases, the reception they have seen, and our upcoming titles to announce soon!”
He added, “Tariffs have added significant pressure across the entire industry, affecting production costs and pricing strategies. It has been extremely hard to see our industry hit so negatively, and see so many people’s livelihoods, and in some cases, life’s work, stretched to, and beyond their breaking points.
“Like many publishers, we’ve had to adapt by optimizing supply chains and planning more carefully around manufacturing and distribution decisions.
“I strongly believe that our acquisition by Goliath could not have been timed better with regards to the tariff situation. Their global supply chain and logistics management helped us navigate the waters better than we could have prior to the acquisition.”
Chronicles of Crime: Beyond Doubt || Kickstarter image
Lucky Duck continues to run Kickstarter campaigns for its own designs – most recently with Oakspire, which has raised just over €133,000 with about seven days of the campaign left to run, and Chronicles of Crime: Beyond Doubt, which pulled in about €373,500 last November.
The company has hit choppy water with some of its unfulfilled Kickstarter campaigns, however, with heavy delays for €1m-raising The Dark Quarter – which was initially expected to deliver to backers in October 2023 – and Into the Godsgrave, which was slated for fulfillment in December 2024.
Morris said of Into The Godsgrave, “As with many large-scale projects, with unique designs, timelines can shift due to the complexity of production, logistics, and ensuring the final product meets expectations.
“The team has prioritized quality and delivery experience, which has contributed to the revised timeline. Our team, specifically Ben Poole our community manager, has worked hard to keep everyone updated through our project updates as to the status and milestones.
“We’re excited to get that game into players hands and on their tables. It’s a very fun and unique experience that I believe will impress.”
Regarding The Dark Quarter, he added, “Similar factors applied here, particularly around production and app development, plus global logistics challenges. Goliath’s strengths here will help us mitigate those risks in the future.
“We’ve worked hard to ensure the final product met the standard expected by backers, even if that required additional time and we have seen many positive responses as fulfillment progressed.
“I’m paraphrasing a famous quote, but as a wise man once said, a delayed game can be eventually good but a rushed game can be forever bad.”
The president of hobby games trade organisation GAMA, Nicole Brady, has failed in her bid to be re-elected to the role, with vice president Meredith Placko instead being voted in by the board of directors.
Brady, who spent two years as president of GAMA, had been a key driver of a plan for the organisation to become the “epicentre” of global tabletop gaming, underpinned by the unveiling of its first-ever 10-year plan last October.
New president Placko is the co-founder of hobby paint company Turbo Dork, and spent two years as CEO of Munchkin publisher Steve Jackson Games before resigning in April last year.
She began a two-year term representing publishers on the non-profit organisation’s board in March 2025, and was elected as GAMA vice president by the board of directors a month later.
New GAMA vice president Ross Thompson
Critical Role marketing manager Ross Thompson was elected as the new vice president at yesterday’s board of directors meeting, while Southern Hobby Distribution‘s Tiffany Reid and Red Racoon Games‘ Jamie Mathy were both re-elected as secretary and treasurer respectively.
Speaking to BoardGameWire about her win, Placko said, “I want to thank Nicole Brady for her work as president over the last few years, especially for establishing the strategic vision.
“I applaud the work that has been done on that 10-year vision. The next step is to turn it into a strategic plan. I do believe it will need evaluation and tweaking, as it very much is a living vision. As GAMA’s needs change, we must be prepared to adapt.
She added “As a trade organization, we should focus on strengthening and expanding the core elements that benefit our industry.
“GAMA is at a critical juncture: we’ve seen turnover in the last year, we’re about to start the executive director search, and our industry has endured more than its share of crises, including tariffs and economic uncertainty.
“When I pitched myself to my fellow board members, and now to the membership at large, my experiences as an executive and leader in business and the news industry have prepared me to help turn our goals into a solid foundation for which the organization can continue to grow.”
She added, “Another important issue for me is that as a trade organization, we must lead the way on critical industry matters. Everything from timely updates and actionable measures regarding tariffs and related issues.
“To keep our members informed about domestic and international regulatory changes. And educating and organizing membership on how to advocate for the issues we face at local and federal levels.
“But, none of this can be done by one person alone. It’s imperative that the board works together on all of this. And we work with our committees and leadership at GAMA to turn these ideas and needs into actionable items.
“While I may have a strong vision for what GAMA should be as a trade organization, the decision is not mine alone. The board, the staff, and most importantly the membership drive this organization and make it great.
“Ultimately, one of my most important jobs is ensuring the board is part of the process every step of the way.”
Former GAMA president Nicole Brady
Brady told BoardGameWire she was proud to have created “a strong foundation that future leadership will be able to build on”, despite “people throwing tack strips on the road in front of me”.
She said, “I am proud of the many things I have done to help advance the organization, including making history as GAMA’s first female president.
“My greatest accomplishment as president was spearheading GAMA Vision 2035 at the fall 2024 strategic planning session. We put together a big picture of what we wanted for the future and that focused on becoming the epicenter for tabletop gaming.
“It included expanding internationally and domestically in a meaningful way, creating large scale marketing initiatives (think ‘Got Milk?’), building partnerships, launching a speaker’s bureau, establishing a 501(c)(3) for charitable work, providing educational certification and so much more.”
Brady told BoardGameWire last year that the Vision 2035 ten-year plan was an attempt to get the organisation away from “playing whack-a-mole” on important issues rather than managing them in a long-term strategy.
The array of plans spread across the next decade include boosting its membership within both hobby games and the mass market, expanding itself into a global organisation, shifting its finances away from the current heavy reliance on the annual GAMA Expo and Origins shows, and leading the conversation on sustainability within the industry.
Brady also highlighted her work push GAMA towards global lobbying, legislation and advocacy, over and above initiatives such as the organisation’s trip to DC last year to lobby against the US tariffs situation.
She added, “As treasurer, I called for an audit to address concerns I witnessed. That audit has finally wrapped up thanks to our current Treasurer taking over the project when it stalled and will result in changes that improve the record keeping and financial practices.
“Even with people throwing tack strips on the road in front of me, I was able to create a strong foundation that future leadership will be able to build on.
“I know I have made a lasting positive difference. Many people have shared publicly that my leadership is the reason they joined GAMA, renewed their memberships or have renewed faith in the future of GAMA.
“I did a lot of relationship repair behind the scenes. Seeing positive news instead of constant negativity is a testament to that hard work.”
That board in turn elects GAMA’s four officers – president, vice-president, treasurer and secretary – from among themselves each year, with the winner requiring a majority of the 12 votes available.
The current board of directors also includes John Stephens from Total Escape Games, Drew Wehrle from Wehrlegig Games, Heather O’Neill from 9th Level Games, former president Eric Price from Meijia Board Game Factory, Michael Maggiotto Jr from BEST Human Capital & Advisory Group, LegalWATCH’s Eartha Johnson, and Danny O’Neill from Mood Publishing.
Placko told BoardGameWire, “I want to give credit and thanks to Melinda Prickett, GAMA’s COO, who has stepped up in so many ways since John Stacy’s departure. She and the GAMA staff are doing an incredible job.
“Many changes have occurred at the operational level and much work is happening behind the scenes. Melinda and the staff have taken to it all with such earnestness and gusto.
“While the board may have seen a change in leadership, we are a small piece of the GAMA puzzle. I want to make sure Melinda, and the staff who are doing the heavy lifting of this organization, get the recognition they deserve.”
More than 3,820 attendees showed up to this year’s event in Louisville, Kentucky, up almost 12% on last year’s previous record of 3,425 – which had already left the show pressed for space across the exhibition hall and its extensive programme of seminars.
French board game designer association SAJ has renamed itself to make its title more inclusive to women and non-binary people, as well as to better underscore its status as a union.
The Société des Auteurs de Jeux – which translates as society of game designers – was formed in 2017 through the merger of three separate groups, and currently represents more than 800 individual designers.
The organisation has now been rebranded as the Syndicat des Auteurices de Jeux – the Union of Game Designers – following a vote at its annual general meeting at the Festival International des Jeux in Cannes.
SAJ president Audrey Bondurand told BoardGameWire, “We wanted to change this name for two reasons: first, we have officially been a union for several years now, and we wanted our name to reflect that.
“Second, in French, ‘auteur’ is not a gender-neutral word, but a masculine one. ‘Auteurice’ is a contraction of ‘auteur’ and ‘autrice’ (the feminine form). We chose this neologism to include women and non-binary people.”
Bondurand, who worked in a board game cafe and in distribution before publishing her first game, Draky, said part of SAJ’s remit was advocating for the recognition of board games as cultural works, something which is “unfortunately still not the case today in France or in Europe”.
The organisation also offers contract reviews, mediation, accounting advice sessions and general support for designers in the industry, much like its US-based peer the Tabletop Game Designers Association and Germany’s SAZ.
Bondurand added, “Regarding the use of AI, we openly support the position of the CIL (our illustrator colleagues) in opposing generative AI in our published games.”
SAJ said a new website featuring its rebranded title is currently under construction, with the organisation’s existing email addresses currently operating as normal.
Anmelden
