News Digest 137

This is a copy of the “script” we used to organise Brainwaves Episode 137. It is not a full transcript but should give you an overview of the news as we reported it. Quotes are in italics.

Brainwaves Episode 137

Headlines

Hasbro Financials

https://investor.hasbro.com/financial-information/quarterly-results

• It’s that time of year when big companies start talking about the state of their finances and it isn’t looking particularly good for Hasbro, the company that owns Wizards of the Coast. 
• Hasbro lost $1bn in quarter 4 of last year largely made up of charges related to its sale of eOne, its entertainment channel that was sold to Lionsgate at the end of 2023. 
• The Entertainment section of the company showed a $1.1 billion dollar loss and Consumer Products, which includes things like transformers and my little pony, lost $126 million. This was offset by a rise in in the Wizards and Digital Gaming segment of the company which showed a $103 million profit for the quarter. 
• Hasbro as a whole showed profits down 23% in the quarter with the only segment of the company showing positive growth being Wizards and Digital gaming which was up 7%.
• The whole year performance has Hasbro down 15% across the company with again the only section doing well being Wizards and Digital Gaming being up 10%. 
• That sounds like good news for the tabletop segment of the company but it doesn’t seem to be as clear cut as that. 
• Looking at the Wizards and digital gaming segment further most of the money came from the licensing of IPs in the digital gaming space. Wizards Tabletop sales was actually down 1.3% in the quarter and only up 0.1% over the course of the year. A lot of the revenue in this segment comes from Baldurs Gate III and Monopoly Go! 
• Hasbro expects wizards of the coast revenue to be down about 3-5% across 2024 but CEO Chris Cocks was upbeat about the company’s performance on the earnings call. 
• Chris said this in a statement on the Hasbro site
  • “Guided by our strategy of “Fewer, Bigger, Better,” we had important wins across both toys and games while making progress in our transformation during a challenging 2023. Despite the macroeconomic backdrop, we are entering 2024 with a healthier balance sheet, a leaner cost structure, and a diverse portfolio of industry-leading toy and game brands that support our capacity to invest in the business and maintain our commitment to returning cash to shareholders via our category-leading dividend.
  • Our refreshed leadership team is bringing innovative new products to our fans. At the same time, we are taking the necessary actions to transform Hasbro and deliver long-term profitable growth starting with driving significant profit growth across our segments in 2024 and building momentum in our innovation pipeline between now and 2025.”
• We would like to remind listeners that Hasbro fired about 2000 staff over the course of last year including 1100 in the run up to Christmas 2023. No mention of the layoffs was made in the statement or conference call other than allusions being made to actions the company had taken in the fourth quarter to balance the books. 
• Some of those people fired were behind the liaison with Larian to make Baldurs Gate 3 and others were behind some of the Magic: THe Gathering projects that made Hasbro a lot of money last year, even if the overall segment was only just slightly up. It could have been a lot worse for Hasbro had those products not existed. 
• Shares at the company fell sharply on the conference call

Embracer prioritises shareholders

https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/embracer-says-it-s-looking-out-for-shareholders-after-cutting-almost-1-400-jobs?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=bluesky#close-modal

https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/56241/board-game-sales-down-asmodee-embracer-q3

• Embracer Group is a swedish based investment company that for the last couple of years has been on a buying spree across the digital gaming industry. Of course the reason we keep an eye on them is they also bought Asmodee. 
• Recently they have been shuttering studios left, right and centre due to a deal, rumoured to be with a Saudi investment fund, fell through in 2023 to the tune of £2 billion dollars in lost investment. 
• Embracer have now laid of close to 8% of their workforce with about 1400 people at very well regarded studios losing their jobs and numerous projects getting cancelled. 
• Embracer recently reported that board game sales were slightly down across the globe with the United States lagging behind Europe. Sales at Asmodee were slightly up mostly down to trading card game sales. Embracer also noted that they had seen good revenue from their ownership of the Lord of the Rings gaming license from sales of the Lord of the Rings Magic the Gathering tie in. Just a reminder that Wizards of the Coast, who are nothing to do with Asmodee, make that product but Embracer license the IP.  
• Lars WIngefors, CEO of Embracer Group said this in a statement
  • As part of the restructuring program, Embracer still has a few larger structured divestment processes ongoing that could strengthen our balance sheet and further reduce capex. Processes are in mature stages. Certain companies might initiate restructuring before any divestment is announced. Our overruling principle is to always maximize shareholder value in any given situation.
• The tabletop games segment of the company delivered 4.4 Billion SEK, about £333 million and was up 1%. From the statement
  •  For the calendar year, the tabletop mass market saw a slight growth, confirming the industry’s resilience, with Asmodee’s strong position key to its robust growth.

Gamefound soars

https://www.polygon.com/24063935/gamefound-top-10-biggest-board-game-campaigns-2023-kickstarter

https://www.polygon.com/24074262/cmon-gamefound-exclusivity-agreement?fbclid=IwAR1AZzaeLEktg_rP7UkMKBcaqITXPO7nbiFlLx9BI7At7ZI_vH9bxF0DA60

https://www.polygon.com/24054381/kickstarter-top-10-biggest-most-backed-board-games-campaigns-2023

https://gamefound.com/en/blog/post/cmon-and-gamefound-announce-exclusive-pact

• It’s all change in the world of crowdfunding!
• Kickstarter, what was the only crowdfunding platform for many years, saw Tabletop revenue fall to $226.2 million dollars in 2023 from $236.4 million dollars in 2022. 
• There are many possible reasons for this but one of those might be the increasing competition in the crowdfunding marketplace. 
• One of those competitors, Gamefound, has had a great 2023 with revenue from crowdfunding rising to $56 million dollars, up 98% on the previous year. 
• 4 of Gamefound’s campaigns were among 2023s most funded campaigns. 
• While Gamefound is smaller, with 142 campaigns against Kickstarters 4920, its per project average is massively higher. Gamefound take in $394,366 per-project on average, whereas Kickstarter sits at $45,982.
• Gamefound founder Marcin Swierkot said
  • “I would say 2023 was a breakthrough year for us, still A LOT to do and we are nowhere near our final vision, but 2023 was kind to us and we are very hopeful for 2024!”
• Gamefound has scored another coup early in 2024. Announced just a few hours ago, we are recording on the 16th of February, on site Polygon, publisher Cool Mini or Not has signed an exclusive deal with the platform to host CMONs future crowdfunding campaigns. 
• David Preti, Cool Mini or Not’s Chief Operating Officer said
  • “At CMON we always look to innovate and provide the best products and experiences for our customers. Gamefound has a number of excellent features that our fans have been asking for, and we feel their platform is a great fit for us as we move into the future. We want the consumer experience to be as smooth as possible, and Gamefound gives us the tools we need so we can focus on creating great games.”
• To give an idea of the scale of Cool Mini or Not on the platform we can tell you it has raised over $100 million for the platform since 2012 with an average of just under $2 million per project. 

Updates

So you want to be a games master update

• Over the last couple of casts we had reported on the death of Jennell Jaquays, their legacy amongst the tabletop RPG community and a controversy that had arisen in the wake of their death. 
• Site the Alexandrian had originally attributed a particular dungeon design style to Jennell, calling it Jaquaying the dungeon. As their surname was Jaquays many thought it should be Jaquaysing the dungeon. Some back and forth on the matter and a forthcoming book led it to being renamed Xandering the dungeon after Justin Alexander the person who wrote the original article on his site The Alexandrian and author of the forthcoming book. Justin had also refused to remove Jennell’s deadname from the original article on the subject. 
• Justin has put up a new post about the incident, laying out the timeline of events, and offering an apology for what happened. In addition he shares an email from Ava Islam, author of the Errant RPG, who explains in detail why Justin’s reaction to what had happened had hurt so many in the trans community. Justin shares this email with the permission of Ava. It’s pretty extensive so we aren’t going to read it all out here. We did want to pick out this
  • You have seen, even in the wake of Anne writing her post and your response, how much information degrades on the internet. We live in a world where signal definitively lost the war to noise. By changing the name of the term itself, you are ensuring vast swathes of people you reach will never know about Jennell’s contributions and influences, will never discover her work the way so many people did prior when the term was Jaquaying/Jaquaysing. It took on a life outside of your post; even absent any mention of the article, just using the term would ensure that some people who didn’t otherwise know about Jennell would find out about her.
• Anne is the author of the original piece that brought the controversy to light. You can find links to that in our show notes. Anne has since updated the piece accepting that Justin made some honest mistakes and reflecting on the piece she wrote. 
• Justin rounds out the piece by saying this.
  • o Ava, Anne, and the wider trans community: I hear you and I understand.
  • What has resonated with me through my conversations is that there is a mismatch between my perception of events and the wider community’s perception of events because I have thought of these things primarily in the context of Jennell, and I have ignored the effect on the wider trans community.
  • So when I privately apologized to Jennell years ago and we mended our fences and then spent years in a distant, but friendly professional relationship — recommending each other for work and that sort of thing — I thought I had reached an understanding and healed any harms.
  • But I was ignorant of and ignoring the harm to a wider community.
  • A private communication cannot heal a public harm.
  • Therefore, to the trans community, let me say clearly and publicly:
  • I am very sorry for the harm that I’ve caused you.

Evil Genius games may just be evil

https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-rise-and-fall-of-evil-genius-games.702617

• In episodes 131 and 136 we brought you news of RPG company Evil Genius Games and their battles with Netflix over the rights to the Rebel Moon RPG.
• EN world, a site dedicated to RPG news has just released an investigation into Evil Genius Games and revealed several troubling facts about the company. 
• The article covers allegations of staff not getting paid, a drive to incorporate AI and NFT technology into the games they were producing, and a general culture of mistreating staff. 
• The investigation is good so we didn’t want to repeat it verbatim here. We wanted to make you aware of the troubles with the company and point you at the article in question which you can find in our show notes. 

News

Sexism in Chess

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-68201529

• We have reported many times on the controversy that the ancient game of chess finds itself in on a regular basis. From cheating allegations to the women’s year in chess being sponsored by a breast enlargement company, the organisational body FIDE can’t seem to keep the sport out of the spotlight for all the wrong reasons
• Now chess finds itself once more under scrutiny. 
• Reported on the BBC News site, Divya Deshmukh, an 18 year old international master, went online recently to complain about the way women were treated when playing chess. 
• Divya shared this post at the end of a recent Tata Steel Chess tournament in the Netherlands. From that post
  • “It’s a sad truth that when women play chess, [people] often overlook how good they actually are… and every irrelevant thing is focused on,”
• She said that she had wanted to address the issue for a while and had been receiving derogatory comments about her appearance and the way she speaks since she was 14. 
• Thousands of people have liked the post including Grandmaster Susan Polgar. Sharing her own experiences on Twitter she said
  • “When I was a young chess player, I consciously tried to look as plain and unattractive as possible. I never did not even touch makeup until I was in my 20’s. Most people never knew why. I never really talked about it. There were 2 main reasons: 
  • 1 – It is because I was tired of being sexually harassed/assaulted and hit on constantly by male chess players….
  • 2 – We were so poor that I had no money for fancy clothes. Most male chess players cannot understand what many girls/women have to endure in chess, especially back then. Sexism and discrimination in chess still exist today, just not as much. 
• Susan says more in that post including that she was at times fearful for her life and that many male players thought she was there to ‘pick up’ men and wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Non-Binary Tabletop Awards

https://www.dicebreaker.com/categories/roleplaying-game/news/nonbinary-tabletop-awards-2024-winners-announced

https://www.snowbrightstudio.com/press/first-annual-nonbinary-tabletop-award

• Back in episode 132 we covered the news that Snowbright studio was working on the Nonbinary Tabletop award. The studio is exclusively staffed by LGBTQ+ people. The award was being designed to highlight the work of nonbinary creators in the tabletop industry.  
• The first winner of the award is the team behind Women are Werewolves C.A.S. Taylor and Yeonsoo Julian Kim. The roleplaying game won dicebreaker’s best roleplaying game in 2023. The game uses tarot cards to give players prompts that allows them to explore relationships to gendered spaces and family customs. 
• Taylor and Julian Kim said
  • “No queer art is one-size-fits-all. We hope to see games that reflect those differences even as we celebrate each one together.”
• The second accolade goes to Cloud Empress by creator watt. This is a Mothership RPG campaign that is very Ghibli inspired. 
• In watt’s own words
  • “Cloud Empress started with a bit of wish fulfilment—namely, the desire to cast magic in the Mothership rules system. Like my favourite (and probably all of) Hayao Miyazaki’s works, I tried to create a setting where tenderness and intimate communities existed without turning away from the horrors human beings face every day to survive, live, and love.”
• The final award went to Matthew Makak who runs a youtube channel called Room 51 with his brother Justin. Matthew said this about his hopes for the community
  • “My hopes for 2024 is to see more nonbinary board game content creators, designers, and industry workers. I often feel lonely as a nonbinary content creator and I don’t want to be the only one nor speak for the entire community. We belong here, we play here, this is our sandbox too; I hope folx can see there is enough sand for all of us.”

Jobs, Opportunities, and Events

https://www.facebook.com/groups/TabletopJobs

MTG grant

https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/56215/wizards-coast-offers-magic-the-gathering-new-perspectives-grant

• If you have ever dreamed of heading to some of the big Magic: The Gathering events and proving just how wizard you are then you might want to check out the New Perspectives Grant being offered by Wizards of the coast
• They are giving out 10 grants worth $2000 towards travel, accommodation, and expenses to attend a MagicCon. These events have panels, the opportunity to meet folk involved in creating Magic The Gathering and of course big tournaments. You will also get a Black Lotus VIP package for the con you attend. Couldn’t find out exactly what that meant, seems to be access to exclusive events and the like,  but some reports have it being worth in the region of $700.
• Application is due by this Wednesday, the 21st of February at 8pm Pacific Standard Time. 

Patreon Shoutouts

Kevin Bertram

James Naylor

https://naylorgames.com

Shaun Newan
game-a-lot.fun/en
facebook.com/gamealotboardgames

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Sir Meeple

Outro

https://airtable.com/appy2fJyip4rWguap/shrj7ohgj6JOmQZcu?fbclid=IwAR0JLuPSkaTHo9bfrGkeR-r4py4h1PHyz3XF6nabdM67mGusxee1Hv3am2E

• There is no doubt that Dungeons and Dragons has had a stellar run over the last few years. It has featured in film, cartoons, computer games, streaming, and countless pieces of merchandise are made displaying the famous logo. 
• Not content with filling arenas in London the RPG is now coming to the stage in a production called The Twenty-Sided Tavern.
  • At Dungeons & Dragons The Twenty-Sided Tavern, the audience is not just a viewer but the “fourth player,” influencing key decisions via Gamiotics, a browser-based software that allows you to vote on where the story will go — what characters appear, what experiences they explore, and more. With a cast of five actors and over 30 playable characters, audiences will experience an expansive fantasy world set in the Forgotten Realms, and face riddles, puzzles, combat, and more, to help shape the story. Laughter will flow like ale and with the audience in full control and exciting reveals around every corner, no two shows are alike! For those seeking a more daring experience, there are opportunities to join the action onstage and test your strength (or dexterity, or wisdom, or charisma) through a variety of rollicking games, including trivia, charades, and the ever-popular Fantasy Beer Pong. 
  • Featuring behind-the-scenes talent from popular theatrical shows such as Dimension 20, Marvel’s Rogers: The Musical, Beavis and Butthead and more, Dungeons & Dragons The Twenty-Sided Tavern is the game you know and the experience you’ll love but bigger and better than ever.
• The show is going to be happening at Stage 42 in New York and you can get tickets now at the link in our show notes. 
• If you want to work for them, they are looking for stage crew and actors! 

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