Hellboy board game coming to Kickstarter

[grogtheslayer]

This project might actually happen:

https://www.cbr.com/hellboy-board-game-2018/

[timbolton]

DHC official announcement here: https://www.darkhorse.com/Blog/2631/...nch-hellboy-bo
and Mantic's is here: https://manticblog.com/2018/01/05/ma...oy-board-game/
At the bottom of Mantic's page is a signup section for a newsletter, note this will be for all their stuff, not just Hellboy.

I have mixed feelings about this - Woohoo! A Hellboy game! (then what happened to Steve Jackson Games developing one?) I loved SJG's Hellboy RPG, was hoping we'd see more of that.
On Facebook pages, the company making this (Mantic) is getting a bit of a mauling, I don't have any prior history with them but have seen their Walking Dead game - looked ok.
But the one thing that makes me less happy - Kickstarter???? For Hellboy? I dislike this a lot. However, I did find out Mantic is UK so at least it won't be near on impossible hopefully for me to get hold of, unlike the Marvel Munchkin that you can't officially buy in the UK at all.

Edit:
Just seen, Mantic are behind the "Dungeon Saga: Dwarf Kings" game (http://www.manticgames.com/games/dun...ngs-quest.html) and that DOES look well made. So fingers crossed this should be ok. I may even back the KS!

[The Lobster]

Yeah why does this need a kickstarter if it's officially backed by Dark Horse? Why does a corporation need crowdsourcing, that's ridiculous.

[JKdoc]

Would be cool.

[zerodemon]

Yeah why does this need a kickstarter if it's officially backed by Dark Horse? Why does a corporation need crowdsourcing, that's ridiculous.

It’s much more likely that the funding to produce the game is coming from Mantic via Kickstarter, with a licensing fee being kicked back to Dark Horse once the game is produced. Mantic fund all their games through Kickstarter.

[jeremypowell]

The fact is that many board game companies, including some of the most acclaimed and most profitable, now use Kickstarter basically as a preorder system. It's a highly effective way of drumming up hype for a game, and the lure of Kickstarter-exclusive content (bonus promo cards, figures, upgraded components etc.) and "add-ons" is a way of making sure to extract as much profit as possible from buyers who suffer from excess disposable income.

Often it's even the only way to acquire a game (apart from secondary market resellers e.g. ebay). And this is the case even for games based on surefire, popular IPs. For instance, next month a company called Monolith will launch a Kickstarter campaign that's expected to raise much more than 1 million USD, for a Batman board game. They've said the game will never be available in regular retail channels. If they ever decide to reprint it, the reprint will only be available via . . . a later Kickstarter campaign.

[zerodemon]

The fact is that many board game companies, including some of the most acclaimed and most profitable, now use Kickstarter basically as a preorder system. It's a highly effective way of drumming up hype for a game, and the lure of Kickstarter-exclusive content (bonus promo cards, figures, upgraded components etc.) and "add-ons" is a way of making sure to extract as much profit as possible from buyers who suffer from excess disposable income.

Often it's even the only way to acquire a game (apart from secondary market resellers e.g. ebay). And this is the case even for games based on surefire, popular IPs. For instance, next month a company called Monolith will launch a Kickstarter campaign that's expected to raise much more than 1 million USD, for a Batman board game. They've said the game will never be available in regular retail channels. If they ever decide to reprint it, the reprint will only be available via . . . a later Kickstarter campaign.

In Mantic’s case, they do stock the game for purchase on their website. Their campaigns are very generous with extras and the sculpts are pretty good. They’ve got a history of delivering too. They do use Kickstarter for marketing purposes but I also think they aren’t really that big and need to kickstart to absorb the associated risk of bringing miniatures games that could go unnoticed in a saturated market.

They did a simple but fun Mars Attacks game a few years ago, and a Walking Dead game that still receives support.