Hues and Cues designer launches platform to help outstanding board games stuck in publisher release bottleneck

The designer of hit mass-market board game Hues and Cues has launched a new publishing initiative to tackle one of the tabletop industry’s growing challenges: promising games sitting unpublished because publisher release schedules are already full.

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.

Brady told BoardGameWire his Proof-of-Play model will make ‘limited edition’ runs of between 1,500 and 3,000 copies for previously unpublished games, in the hope a quick burst of sales will persuade larger publishers to take a chance on them and accelerate a wider retail release.

He said the editions sold through his company A Game Studio would be offered direct to consumers and specialty retailers through channels such as B2B wholesale marketplace Faire, allowing each title to generate real-world sales, player feedback, and retail validation before presentation to larger publishing partners.

Brady added that the full license for the games – which will mostly be mass-market-friendly family titles – would remain with A Game Studio, which will sub-license the titles to other publishers.

He said, “Our goal isn’t to compete with traditional publishers, but to support them. Publishers make difficult decisions years in advance, and that is simply the reality of today’s market.

“Proof-of-Play gives great games the opportunity to prove themselves through actual customer demand, giving publishers more confidence and less risk when considering a wider release.”

The initiative launches with two games from external designers – area control card game Lock & Chain, and number combination card game Perfect 10 – with Brady telling BoardGameWire they helped inspire the concept after struggling to find homes with publishers despite being “amazing products”. “The timing wasn’t right”, he added.

Although Brady said he had not discussed the concept with publishers before launching the initiative, he believes it reflects a process that already happens informally across the tabletop industry, in which publishers hunt for successful games with tiny distribution and then take it larger – citing Qork as one example of that approach.

That game, which was initially self-published by designer Birger Norup as PlayProp back in 2015, was released as a Walmart exclusive by The Op in May this year – and has become something of a viral hit on social media sites such as Instragram and TikTok.

Asked how he plans to help Proof-of-Play titles with the problem faced by publishers across the hobby – how to stand out among a vast number of releases – Brady told BoardGameWire, “I am personally staking my reputation on the games I choose to help.

“I do not need to invest in full marketing etc as the goal is to simply get the games out there and let their quality do the selling.

“By bypassing traditional distribution and relying on organic social media, my personal network and word-of-mouth, I hope this becomes a platform for many budding designers who would like to see their game on retail shelves.”

While some publishers make use of crowdfunding sites to validate demand before going into production, Brady said his model would be a better fit for the style of mass-market games he is targeting.

He said, “Crowdfunding is great for a $50-plus game looking to reach a hobby audience. This is for games with wider appeal. The games I choose will sell on their own merit and not because of crowdfunding hype.”

Brady launched his development studio A Game Studio at the start of 2024, following the 2020 release of the big-selling Hues and Cues and the success of his cat-themed abstract strategy Boop in 2022.

He is also the co-founder of Play to Z, the publishing house led by former Z-Man Games founder Zev Shlasinger launched by a host of board game industry veterans in 2023.

Brady’s own board game releases this year are set to include If Then, Wee Folk – which is co-designed by Stefano Di Maria and Rosa Linda Romano – Size Wise, Boop Shuffle and an expansion for Caution Signs, the fast-paced sketching game he co-designed with Danielle Reynolds.