Lucky Duck has a big hitter of its own in the Chronicles of Crime series of games, which have sold more than one million copies worldwide.
Emma Recher, who will head up a three-person team at Don't Panic's new US office in California, told BoardGameWire, "Several recent titles have reinforced our confidence in expanding more directly into the US market. "
Print and Play had provided prototypes, promos and components for a string of big-selling titles, as well as fast turnaround print and play services for budding developers and designers.
Universal becomes an authorised US hobby distributor for Stonemaier's games, which include the massive-selling Wingspan series and other popular titles such as Scythe, and will take on sole distribution rights in August of this year.
The dice and card-focused combat game has become a crowdfunding heavyweight following its original $180,000 Kickstarter project from Mind Bottling Games in 2018, going on to raise almost $13m across a string of subsequent campaigns.
That drop saw the US fall behind both France and the UK in Q3 in terms of the company's highest-performing countries for net sales, with France surging 47% year-on-year to over €111m, and the UK growing 41% to €82.7m.
Company co-founder and CEO Jamey Stegmaier told BoardGameWire the prevalence of smaller box releases, expansions and re-releases in its 2026 plan was not a response to US tariff concerns or other economic factors.
The War of the Ring publisher has added Europe to its distribution partnerships with Poland's Galakta Games, Italy's Tabula Games, Czech Republic-based Albi, and France's Nuts! Publishing and Don't Panic Games, for which it already has distribution deals in North America.
Asmodee CEO Thomas Koegler said the company had seen "good momentum" in its lower price-point products in the US mass market, singling out Exploding Kittens as a particularly strong performer in what he called a "challenging market".
The company has let go of project director Danielle Reynolds and customer experience manager Derek Gill as part of the "heartbreaking" layoffs, which it said were necessary to ensure its long-term sustainability.
