For those board gamers among the sea of Kicktraq data addicts, you’ve probably heard of Gen Con. You know, that little convention in Indiana with about 35,000 board gamers all crammed into the convention center for 4 days. Yeah, that one. It’s currently t-minus 7 days and counting. Can you believe it?
Unlike past years where I wanted to go but wasn’t able, this year I’ll actually be going! I’m excited to be able to touch base and chat with all the projects I’ve watched over the last year and the folks I’ve interacted with online. If you’re going to be there, hit me up on twitter or the contact form and I’ll make time! I’d be truly honored to meet you in person.
So, In honor of the Gen Con festivities and for all my loyal data addicts, I’ve put together some fun infographics about the massive growth of Board & Card games on Kickstarter in the past year and how it compares to last year.
I’m releasing these all under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC 3.0), so hack up and share away, just remember to give me a hat tip (and I’d love to see it if you’d be willing to share!). All data used was gathered from successful project data from January 1st, 2011 through August 1st, 2012 via submitted projects to Kicktraq.com. Categorization of gaming projects is completely arbitrary and my personal opinion as Kickstarter has no official category segregation of the various sub-genres of games that exist in the world (yet).
Enjoy!
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Please let me know what you think! If you’d like to use these, feel free to download directly using 201208-kicktraq-gencon-infographics.zip. We’d appreciate a link back, but enjoy regardless.
By Philip duBarry August 9, 2012 - 4:30 pm
Outstanding! FYI I’ll be around Thursday–mostly at the AEG booth and the Game Salute booth.
By Adam August 9, 2012 - 4:47 pm
Awesome! I have no doubt I’ll be hovering around that booth a bit this weekend. Can’t wait to meet you!
By Break From Reality Games August 9, 2012 - 4:36 pm
AWESOME information Adam! Great graphics.
By Adam August 9, 2012 - 4:47 pm
Thanks Eric!
By Andrew Hackard August 9, 2012 - 5:01 pm
Adam, I’m with Steve Jackson Games, and I’d love to bend your ear about Kicktraq and Kickstarter and the trends you’ve been seeing. Shoot me an email and let’s set up a time!
By Adam August 9, 2012 - 5:47 pm
Andrew, I’ll send you an email!
By Casey Clark August 10, 2012 - 11:19 am
Right now we are focused on RPGs but I have been building a library of Board Games and envisioned using Kickstarter to see them to market. This kind of information is invaluable. Trying to wrangle Kicktraq was a bit much in the midst of our last KS Campaign.
Thanks!
Casey
By Adam August 10, 2012 - 11:48 am
Casey > If you ever have any questions, don’t hesitate to hit me up via the contact form. I’m happy to help!
By Harald K August 13, 2012 - 4:09 am
35000 boardgamers? Yeah, that’s a little one. Essen’s got about 500000 last time I checked
This is a fabulous site, by the way. Figures that there’s a boardgamer behind it!
By Adam August 13, 2012 - 3:24 pm
Oh there is no doubt that the whole of backers of Board & Card Game projects on KS is but a microcosm of the board gaming community as a whole, it’s still interesting to see how KS has grown the community. I know it made a big impact with me.
Thank for the feedback, it means a lot!
By Kevin August 14, 2012 - 11:33 am
Are you include Sedition Wars and Zombiecide in the board game category, or other? I’m guessing the rules were not the primary driver in their success, especially considering how Reaper’s Bones kickstarter is going.
Speaking or Bones, any idea how common it is for your minimum projection to be higher than the trend?
By Adam August 14, 2012 - 12:00 pm
You assume correct! I lumped them both in miniatures even though they are a game. Much like you, I felt their overwhelming success was based on their incredible miniatures vs their game as a whole.
It’s not common, but not unheard of. Basically if any campaign starts out slow and has a large ramp up success towards the middle of their campaign, they’ll easily outpace the trend with the projection because the projection includes acceleration in their campaign where the trend is an average.
Hope that helps!