The hire puts a familiar face from board game media in charge of planning and delivering one of the tabletop industry's largest event programmes.
The Tabletop Game Designers Association has begun scoring and comparing the standard contracts board game publishers offer to designers, with the aim of improving how game creators are treated and paid.
Pax Aus has featured tabletop games since the Melbourne-based con was launched in 2013, with the segment having grown over the years to take up a significant share of the show's floor space.
Galactic Cruise also picked up gongs for best strategy game and best game from a new designer, while Luthier from Paverson Games won best theme, best production and best game from a small publisher.
Hues and Cues designer Scott Brady, Sagrada co-creator Daryl Andrews and Friendly Skeleton CEO Jacob Way said Best in Play will offer everything from interim executive leadership and designer representation to publisher submission management and crowdfunding strategy.
Few people in the hobby game industry have have seen as many sides of the business as Scott Morris - from leading global strategy at Lucky Duck Games, building publishing partnerships at GTS Distribution and running sales, marketing and social media at Arcane Wonders. Now Morris is applying that experience to his own venture as founder of Steelwing Games, whose debut title Rainbow Blvd. has been nearly a decade in the making.
The convention, which has sold out before opening for three consecutive years, is currently operating at a hard capacity ceiling at the Indiana Convention Centre.
TCG distribution remains the engine behind Asmodee's ongoing growth, with trading card games responsible for more than two-thirds of that quarterly revenue, according to the company's latest financial report.
Rozum has been devastated by the strike, with parent business Factor Group estimating the losses at up to $670,000 - a situation which has prompted Rozum to launch a fundraising appeal to help it reprint its lost inventory.
"So many new games are being released today that the market has become saturated", Atalia said. "Shops no longer have the space, the time or the cash flow to stock all the games arriving each week."
CMON’s board had planned to transition the company's titles such as Massive Darkness and Super Fantasy Brawl Reborn into “high-quality digital assets” through the investment, saying the move was necessary for it to "continue to be relevant in the games industry and to expand the group’s revenue stream".
Scott Brady believes many outstanding games never reach players not because they lack quality, but because publishers must plan their release schedules years in advance - and with only so many publishing slots available each year, excellent games are often left waiting for an opportunity that may never come.
The veteran card game has been on a tear over the past four years, evolving from parent company Hasbro's first $1bn-brand into the toy and entertainment giant's primary source of growth.
Solo play ranked as the third most prevalent component in games released between 2020 and 2025, behind only dice rolling and hand management.
After years spent engaging with publishers and designers - both at Capstone Games and through his Board Again Gaming podcast - Christopher High believes the several thousand new board games and expansions released each year are pushing publishers towards commercially safer bets. Now he's wagering his company Valor Mountain Games can succeed by taking chances on the kinds of titles other publishers are passing over.
As trading card games continue to fuel growth across the tabletop industry, hobby retailers are placing greater emphasis on the accessories that support organised play. In this sponsored article, TCG and board game accessories maker Sanseking explains how changing player behaviour is reshaping retail strategy and why competitive accessories are becoming a more important part of the European hobby market.
The annual awards, which have now been running for 17 years, aim to act as a showcase and celebration of business practices, community-building and operational innovations that other hobby retailers can learn from.
While many of Generation Analog 2026's presentations explore environmental issues, the conference's broad 'Green' theme also encompasses topics including newcomer experiences, representation, identity, game history and design philosophy.
JinxO designer Martin Ang's victory underscores the growing internationality of the venerable German board games award, which until last year's success for Hishashi Hayashi's Bomb Busters had never been won by an Asian designer.
Marino joins Devir in the newly-created role after nine years at The Op, including the last four as director of hobby games, where he helped oversee releases such as runaway hit Flip 7, Gnome Hollow and Tacta.
The publisher will debut 'Season One' of Shelfy at Gen Con later this month, featuring 28 miniature recreations of board game boxes for titles including Gloomhaven, Dune Imperium and Boop.
