Feature - Games & Puzzles

Good moves

The Games & Puzzles category was one that fared exceptionally well during the pandemic, and now that particular fog is lifting, it’s clear that a return to normality doesn’t mean a slump in sales. Rachael Simpson-Jones speaks to a selection of leaders in the space to find out how they’re approaching the category this year and what new opportunities lie ahead.

In the February issue of Toy World, putting paid to the notion that fatigue might be setting in amongst consumers, The NPD Group’s Melissa Symonds reported that Games & Puzzles was the second fastest growing category in the last two years, up +16% (an additional +£36m) and representing 12% of total toy market sales. The data showed the category had retained an impressive 85% of the 2020 gains in 2021, with trading card games – particularly Pokémon, which this year benefits from the launch of Pokémon Scarlet and Violet on Nintendo - and family board and action games holding their own particularly well, alongside adult puzzles.

As a category, Games & Puzzles benefitted from the impacts of Covid-19, as billions of consumers sought ways to stave off cabin fever at home during the long months of lockdown. Of course (rightly or wrongly), restrictions have now all but vanished across much of the UK & Ireland, with only mask mandates to go in some areas. There’s always been a slight concern that, once life returned to something more closely resembling normality, sales in this category could decrease – but it seems many people are planning a year of get-togethers and celebrations.

Beth Motherwell, UK marketing manager at Big Potato, says the team at the Shoreditch-based games studio has noticed that this year, retailers are placing more of an emphasis than usual on spending time together as a family. She tells Toy World: “It’s not just about who can eat the most chocolate anymore: people have spent so long apart that we all now really appreciate the special time we get to spend with friends and loved ones. This is obviously great news for the game and puzzle industry, as we all know there is nothing better to bring people together.”

Anil Boodhoo, a director at Asmodee, notes that the cost of living is on the rise and family budgets are under pressure, leading him to believe that consumers might splash out on games and puzzles for another reason: staying home voluntarily, thereby saving money on entertainment. He adds: “We’ve also seen our educational games thrive, as parents look for ways to reduce screen time – BrainBox, with its recent rebrand, is proving very popular. We’re really working with our teams to ensure that the games people invest their hard-earned cash in offer value for money and stand the test of time.”

Speaking of standing the test of time, the iconic football game Subbuteo celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. The game has come a long way since it was launched in 1947, with its wire goals and paper nets, cardboard playing figures and bases made from buttons weighed down with lead washers. Nowadays, the extensive range includes a new generation of tough, detailed and accurate figures spanning both the men’s and women’s games. Mark Jones, sales director at University Games and The Lagoon Group, says 2022 is set to welcome a commemorative 75th Anniversary Main Game, as well as a licensed Liverpool Main Game and Player Set. University Games is also hoping to work with the English Subbuteo Association, which has player events planned throughout the year.

“Subbuteo is such an inclusive game, spanning generations and enjoyed by players from age 6 to 106,” Mark explains, when asked what’s behind Subbuteo’s enduring appeal. “Subbuteo allows players to combine their love of football with strategic thinking and is a sociable and active game that gets players off the sofa and moving around. We’re living in a technology-rich time where children and young adults are glued to phones and tablets, and games that actually encourage youngsters to physically move and step away from a screen are well supported by parents. The game also has a big competitive following, with Subbuteo clubs and leagues set up all over the country. In 2024, the FISTF Subbuteo World Cup will be held in Tunbridge Wells - the home of Subbuteo.”

Uno, meanwhile, is now over 50 years old and still going strong, with one deck sold every two minutes in the UK and the game now available in over 80 countries. Kelly Philp, Mattel’s marketing director, puts Uno’s longevity – and its position at the world’s No.1 game - down to its ability to transcend language, culture and age, and says that combining the brand’s inclusive roots with delightfully simple gameplay has allowed it to evolve from family pastime to cultural phenomenon. Of course, classic games rarely stay relevant without updates and overhauls – Gibsons, for instance, has significantly improved the gameplay of Kingmaker, which relaunches this autumn 46 years after it first hit shelves – and Uno is no exception. There are myriad iterations for fans to choose from, the latest of which is Uno All Wild. New licensed additions are also in the pipeline for this year, with properties including Uno Disney Pixar Lightyear and Uno Jurassic World Dominion both tied to their exciting (and hugely anticipated) movie launches.

Kelly says: “From iconic artists to athletes to nonprofit organisations, Uno is committed to developing diverse partnerships that build inclusive and culturally relevant products. As evidenced by its latest partnerships, the brand is collaborating with a variety of iconic names across the globe in art, fashion, sports and more to create uniquely designed products.”

From the old (no offence, Subbuteo and Uno) to the new: 2022 has seen Moose Toys – a company arguably best known for its collectibles and pre-school toys – make some major steps in cementing its position as a serious contender in the games space. January saw the company announce Clipology, an all-new interactive streaming experience featuring the world’s most iconic TV and movie content. This screen-time meets gametime, trivia-based title features a physical board game, video content and over 12 unique video challenges. Spontuneous, meanwhile, which Rob Wolf, head of Marketing for Boys + Games at Moose, describes as a hilarious game for groups of family and friends who love to sing (and don’t take themselves too seriously) has been quietly bubbling away in the background for a couple years, where it’s proven itself a hit among consumers and garnered positive global reviews.

“We have been building towards this moment,” Mark says, when asked why Moose has decided the time is now right to ramp up its presence in games. “Over the past couple of years, we’ve been developing a games-centric infrastructure supported by top-tier talent that know the business intimately. We’ve prioritised Games as a key strategic growth platform for Moose and believe we’ve identified white space in the market where we can thrive. We are ready to make an immediate impact and drive our vision for games success globally.”

He continues: “We saw how perfectly the Moose ‘wow’, which we are so famous for within our toy brands, would translate to the games category and quickly identified an opportunity to develop engaging, fun games that make people happy. We’re offering a variety of games that appeal to consumers across all ages and occasions, from kids to adults to the whole family, so there really is something for everyone.”

Elsewhere, others in the Games & Puzzles space are using their latest launches for a very special purpose – raising money for charity. The sale of every new Great Ormond Street puzzle, from Gibsons Games, will see 25p donated to the world-famous 170-year-old children’s hospital, which helps treat some of the most poorly kids in the UK. As GOSH depends on charity to help it continue its work, Rebecca Hersee, marketing executive at Gibsons Games, says consumers really will be making a difference when they purchase this puzzle.

It's not the first time Gibsons has supported a charity in this way, as Rebecca details: “Previously we’ve supported Variety with our Sunshine Coach jigsaw puzzle and in 2020 we created our Rainbow Heroes puzzle to remember and celebrate the heroes who kept us safe, cared for us, and delivered the things we needed during the challenging lockdowns. To say thank you, Gibsons donated £2 from every Rainbow Heroes puzzle sold to the Samaritans. The demand for our products increased sharply during the lockdowns and it was really important to us to give something back.”

Asmodee is planning on giving back in a different way, by reintroducing its games demonstrators to the retail space, hopefully in Q2. In doing so, the company will not only be helping consumers decide what games are right for them, it’ll also be helping retailers sell more. The company will be attending the UK Games Expo (UKGE) in Birmingham for the first time in a couple of years too, something Anil Boodhoo is clearly excited about.

He enthuses: “We can’t wait to be back out there. We’re looking carefully at getting our incredible demonstrators back into retail spaces and we’re hopeful we can make this a reality soon. This should be music to our retailers’ ears: we all know how successful they are. Asmodee is known for its desire to help consumers interact in person with our games, and we know from experience that seeing a game played first hand is the easiest way to fall in love with it – and to pick up tips and tricks. We’re not ashamed to say that our team of demonstrators is second to none. Nobody can create in-store theatre quite like they can. There are more plans afoot for other events too, but we’re keeping those under our hat for now.”

At Exploding Kittens, consumer interaction is nurtured for different reasons. The company, which this year is building out its direct relationships with UK retailers instead of going via a distributor (previously Asmodee), leans into its Kickstarter community on many of its new launches. This way of doing things has been at the core of the company for some years and has, according to general manager Joeri Hoste, helped Exploding Kittens get to where it is today. Initially, the company was hoping to raise a modest $10,000 through Kickstarter for its original Exploding Kittens game. The Kickstarter community had other plans, however, and the campaign ending up raising $8.7m in 30 days from 219,000 backers. To date, after four successful crowdfunding campaigns, Exploding Kittens is the No.1 most-backed project in Kickstarter history, has developed 16 additional games and expansions, and has sold over 18m games.

This game of social deduction and sabotage pits the ‘good’ wombats against the undercover ‘bad’ wombats, as the former try to build neatly stacked towers, and the latter try to mess things up. Oh, and everyone plays with their eyes closed. At the time of writing in mid- March, the campaign was just shy of $1m, indicating the level of demand out there for the new game.

“The biggest benefit to crowdfunding is not the funds, but the crowd,” says Joeri. “Getting feedback from those invested in the game and inviting them into our Exploding Kittens community has helped us to create more and better games by listening to feedback. We’ve learned that the best games aren’t inherently entertaining, but they should make the people you’re playing with entertaining. No one will remember the game tokens the next day, but they will remember beaning their grandmother with a burrito, while playing our dodgeball card game Throw Throw Burrito, for all eternity.”

Other new Exploding Kittens releases for 2022 include Exploding Kittens: Cat Burglar Edition, a UK exclusive which comes complete with a cute Cat Burglar figure, and Mantis, a vibrant family game of rainbows and revenge with only two rules: steal or score. Joeri tells me the company is also working on other franchise release such as Zombie Kittens, which introduces ‘player resurrection’ for extended gameplay, and Poetry for Neanderthals NSFW edition, the adult version of Exploding Kittens’ hit singlesyllable-speaking game.

“We make games for game players like ourselves,” adds Joeri. “Innovation means paying attention to the fact that tomorrow we don’t want to play the same game we played yesterday. Exploding Kittens is dedicated to bringing friends and families of all ages together by creating world-class games infused with humour, action, strategy and fun.”

Fun also lies at the heart of the Big Potato portfolio, which largely comprises games that are quick to learn and easy to play – the two tenets of all the company’s development. These principles are reflected in titles such as Scrawl, Don’t Get Got, Obama Llama and more, but that’s not to say the company is averse to designing games that are a little more complex than its usual fare. An example of this is last year’s What Next?, Beth Motherwell notes, which she says is the world’s first choose your own adventure board game. She says: “What’s Next? has been received enthusiastically. Our heart and soul will always be quick and easy games, but we know that lockdown has really opened up the wonderful world of board games to lots of people, and we are always looking for ways to grow and expand our range.”

Over the past couple of years, Big Potato has also embarked on something of a sustainability push. Under the new label MOOP, which stands for Made of Ocean Plastic, the game publisher has collaborated with Waste2Wear to produce playing cards made of ocean waste, and 65% of Big Potato’s wider portfolio of games is now plastic-free. Beth says the company is also working on fitting its games into smaller boxes to cut down on transport-related pollution and carbon impacts by being able to fit more product inside ships and lorries. The best-selling Herd Mentality has just been released in a new mini version for just this reason. It’s likely we’ll see a lot more of this sort of thing in 2022, not just from Big Potato but from others in the Games & Puzzles space too, as well as the wider toy industry. I may bang this drum a lot, but it’s brilliant to see how many companies are embracing sustainability and environmental considerations. It feels like change really is in the air. And let’s face it – as far as the fate of our planet is concerned, there’s all to play for.

In terms of retail support, Big Potato’s partners all benefit from dedicated account managers and substantial asset packs for each game to use as they see fit across their website, social media channels and more. The company also takes a personal, tailored approach to catering to its retailers’ needs, preferring to look at the needs of each store rather than stick to a one-size-fits-all mentality. In previous years, Big Potato has produced themed store posters, sent out its popular Potato Plushies for giveaways, and made demonstrators available for in-store events.

University Games (and The Lagoon Group) now offers more than 700 games, puzzles and gifts, yet despite the breadth of its range still takes care to produce images and videos for use by its stockists. The company also adopts the personal approach, with a nationwide sales team it says is always on hand to support retailers and offer advice on in-store merchandising and promotions. Mark Jones adds: “In Q4 we also run dedicated marketing campaigns including social media and online advertising for a number of our key lines, such as Subbuteo, to the benefit of all retailers that stock them.”

Readers will be aware of the recent acquisition of Asmodee by Embracer Group in a deal reportedly worth €2.75b. Calling it ‘the next natural chapter in our company’s history’, Anil is keen to highlight two things: firstly, his excitement for what’s come, and secondly, Asmodee’s commitment to maintaining the strong relationships it enjoys with its suppliers and our customers. He also says that the company’s marketing efforts are ramping up significantly, explaining: “We’ve done a lot of work internally to increase our marketing capabilities and have developed our own marketing training programme. Coupled with our largest marketing budget to date, alongside support from our group and studios, you’ll continue to see our marketing efforts really increase. For example, we plan to continue driving awareness on both TV (CITV) and radio (Absolute), as we did last year, and we’re working with selected retailers to invest into expanded joint activities. We’re also boosting our PR programme, and as mentioned earlier we also want to get back to a class-leading demo programme, Covid permitting.”

He adds: “We’re a great team here at Asmodee, all working towards the same goal – getting more people playing more games, more often. We all feel tremendously lucky that we get to wake up and play games each day. I don’t think that any of us will ever forget what a privileged position that is.”

Over the following pages, Toy World brings readers all the latest games and puzzles retailers can roll the dice on this year.