Fantasy Flight Games (FFG) is a
game
A game is a structured form of play (activity), play, usually undertaken for enjoyment, entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator s ...
company based in
Roseville, Minnesota
Roseville is a city in Ramsey County, Minnesota, United States. It is one of two Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Twin Cities suburbs that are adjacent to both Saint Paul and Minneapolis (the other is Lauderdale, Minnesota, Lauderdale). The land comprisin ...
, United States, that creates and publishes
role-playing
Role-playing or roleplaying is the changing of one's behaviour to assume a role, either unconsciously to fill a social role, or consciously to act out an adopted role. While the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' offers a definition of role-playing a ...
,
board,
card Card or The Card may refer to:
* Various types of plastic cards:
**By type
***Magnetic stripe card
*** Chip card
*** Digital card
**By function
***Payment card
****Credit card
**** Debit card
****EC-card
****Identity card
****European Health Insur ...
, and
dice
Dice (singular die or dice) are small, throwable objects with marked sides that can rest in multiple positions. They are used for generating random values, commonly as part of tabletop games, including dice games, board games, role-playing g ...
games. As of 2014, it is a subsidiary of
Asmodée Éditions
Asmodee is a French publisher of board games, card games and role-playing games (RPGs). Founded in 1995 to develop their own games and to publish and distribute for other smaller game developers, they have since acquired numerous other board game ...
.
History
Fantasy Flight Publishing was founded in 1995 by its CEO
Christian T. Petersen. Since the release of its first game product (''
Twilight Imperium
''Twilight Imperium'' is a strategy board game produced by Fantasy Flight Games in the genre of science fiction and space opera. It was designed by Christian T. Petersen and was first released in 1997. The game is in its fourth edition (2017), ...
'') in 1997, the company has been doing business as Fantasy Flight Games (FFG). Since that time, FFG has become one of the biggest names in the hobby games industry, being a marketplace leader in board games and maintaining strong businesses in the card game, roleplaying game, and
miniature
A miniature is a small-scale reproduction, or a small version. It may refer to:
* Portrait miniature, a miniature portrait painting
* Miniature art, miniature painting, engraving and sculpture
* Miniature (chess), a masterful chess game or probl ...
game categories.
In 2008, FFG partnered with
Games Workshop
Games Workshop Group (often abbreviated as GW) is a British manufacturer of miniature wargames, based in Nottingham, England. Its best-known products are ''Warhammer Age of Sigmar'' and ''Warhammer 40,000''.
Founded in 1975 by John Peake (gam ...
to represent ''
Warhammer
Warhammer may refer to:
* War hammer, a medieval weapon
Warhammer media franchise
*''Warhammer'', a series of games and related media:
** ''Warhammer'' (game), a table-top fantasy miniature wargame, and origin of the franchise
** ''Warhammer Fan ...
'' and ''
Warhammer 40,000
''Warhammer 40,000'' is a miniature wargame produced by Games Workshop. It is the most popular miniature wargame in the world, and is particularly popular in the United Kingdom. The first edition of the rulebook was published in September 1987, ...
'' settings in role-playing, board, and card games.
FFG announced the end of that partnership on September 9, 2016. Effective February 28, 2017, FFG no longer offers for sale any games made in conjunction with Games Workshop.
In August 2011, Fantasy Flight Games acquired the license for card, miniature and role-playing games set in the ''
Star Wars
''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
'' universe. They have also created board and card games for the well-known licenses ''
Game of Thrones
''Game of Thrones'' is an American fantasy drama television series created by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss for HBO. It is an adaptation of ''A Song of Ice and Fire'', a series of fantasy novels by George R. R. Martin, the first ...
'', ''
Battlestar Galactica
''Battlestar Galactica'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Glen A. Larson. The franchise began with the Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series), original television series in 1978, and was followed by a short-run sequel se ...
'', and ''
The Lord of the Rings
''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...
'', as well as board games based upon popular computer games: ''
Doom: The Boardgame'', ''
StarCraft: The Board Game'', and ''
World of Warcraft: The Board Game''. They are also known for revising and reprinting popular or cult classic games, including ''
Cosmic Encounter
''Cosmic Encounter'' is a science fiction–themed strategy board game designed by "Future Pastimes" (collectively, Peter Olotka, Jack Kittredge and Bill Eberle, with Bill Norton) and originally published by Eon Games in 1977. In it, each playe ...
'', ''
Arkham Horror
''Arkham Horror'' is a cooperative adventure board game designed by Richard Launius, originally published in 1987 by Chaosium. The game is based on Chaosium's roleplaying game ''Call of Cthulhu'', which is set in the Cthulhu mythos of H.P. ...
'', ''
Talisman
A talisman is any object ascribed with religious or magical powers intended to protect, heal, or harm individuals for whom they are made. Talismans are often portable objects carried on someone in a variety of ways, but can also be installed perm ...
'', and
Netrunner
''Netrunner'' is an out-of-print collectible card game (CCG) designed by Richard Garfield, the creator of ''Magic: The Gathering''. It was published by Wizards of the Coast and introduced in April 1996. The game took place in the setting for the ...
''.
From 2010 to 2013 FFG was Dust Studio's partner in publishing and distributing Paulo Parente's
miniature wargame
Miniature wargaming is a form of wargaming in which military units are represented by miniature physical models on a model battlefield. The use of physical models to represent military units is in contrast to other tabletop wargames that use ...
''Dust Tactics''. Commenting on the shift in 2013 Petersen stated “it became clear that Paolo and the Dust games would be better served by a partner who specializes in the unique business of miniature games.”
Fantasy Flight Games was known for their game franchise ''
Midnight
Midnight is the transition time from one day to the next – the moment when the date changes, on the local official clock time for any particular jurisdiction. By clock time, midnight is the opposite of noon, differing from it by 12 hours. ...
'', which was also made into a
movie
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
called ''Midnight Chronicles'' by the company's short-lived Landroval Studios. As of 2012, it appears that ''Midnight'' is no longer produced or supported by Fantasy Flight.
On November 17, 2014 it was announced that Fantasy Flight Games had agreed on a
merger
Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations, or their operating units are transferred to or consolidated with another company or business organization. As an aspect ...
with
French board game publisher
Asmodée Éditions
Asmodee is a French publisher of board games, card games and role-playing games (RPGs). Founded in 1995 to develop their own games and to publish and distribute for other smaller game developers, they have since acquired numerous other board game ...
.
Asmodee has helped to bring some of Fantasy Flight's board games to digital form, and in October 2017, Asmodée and Fantasy Flight announced the formation of Fantasy Flight Interactive, a division of the merged companies to bring more of Fantasy Flight's physical board games to digital implementations. However, as part of a company-wide layoff, Fantasy Flight opted to close Fantasy Flight Interactive in January 2020.
In December of 2019 through January of 2020 Asmodee announced they were moving towards focusing on Fantasy Flight Games' core boardgame-, dice- and card- games. Their tabletop role-playing games like ''Star Wars'' and ''Genesys'' will move to
Edge Entertainment and Miniatures games like ''X-wing'' and ''Armada'' to Atomic Mass.
Games
Living Card Games
Fantasy Flight Games defines a "Living Card Game" as a variant of
collectible card games
A collectible card game (CCG), also called a trading card game (TCG) among other names, is a type of card game that mixes strategic deck building elements with features of trading cards, introduced with ''Magic: The Gathering'' in 1993.
Genera ...
. LCGs have regular expansions and deck construction like CCGs, but do not have the "blind buy purchase model" of CCGs. Instead of randomized starter decks and
booster packs, LCGs have starter sets and expansion packs with fixed non-randomized distribution of cards. Their starter sets come with pre-constructed starter decks, and are designed to be self-contained; they can be played by themselves or expanded for constructed play with expansions. Expansion packs are released on a monthly or near-monthly basis, each containing 60 cards, with a number of copies of each unique card equal to the limit of the number of copies a player is allowed in his or her deck (e.g. three copies of each card in an ''Android: Netrunner'' pack). Larger "deluxe" expansions are released less frequently, and typically contain many more cards and sometimes introduce new game mechanisms.
Many games from other companies use a similar distribution model, but because "Living Card Game" and its initials "LCG" are registered trademarks of Fantasy Flight Games, other publishers do not use this term. For example,
Upper Deck Entertainment
The Upper Deck Company, LLC (colloquially as Upper Deck and Upper Deck Authenticated, Ltd. in the UK), founded in 1988, is a private company primarily known for producing trading cards. Its headquarters are in Carlsbad, California, United State ...
relaunched
VS System
Vs. System (short for Versus System), also written as VS System and abbreviated as VS, is a collectible card game designed by Upper Deck Entertainment (UDE). In the game, players build and play a deck of Vs. System cards in an attempt to win a ga ...
in 2015 as an LCG-style game but markets it as a "Two-Player Card Game" or "2PCG."
Fantasy Flight Games currently prints the following LCGs:
*''
The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game'' (2011)
*''
A Game of Thrones: The Card Game Second Edition'' (2015)
*''
Arkham Horror: The Card Game'' (2016)
*''
Marvel Champions: The Card Game'' (2019)
Fantasy Flight Games has previously printed the following LCGs:
*''
Call of Cthulhu: The Card Game'' (2008–2015)
*''
A Game of Thrones: The Card Game'' (first edition) (2008–2015)
*''
Warhammer: Invasion'' (2009–2013)
*''
Android: Netrunner'' (2012–2018)
*''
Star Wars: The Card Game'' (2012–2018)
*''
Warhammer 40,000: Conquest'' (2014–2017)
*''
Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game'' (2017–2021)
Fantasy Flight has also printed ''Blue Moon Legends'', which is a comprehensive collection of ''
Blue Moon'' and its expansions. Although it has similar gameplay and a fixed card set like a Living Card Game, it was not released in the Living Card Game line.
KeyForge
Fantasy Flight Games published the card game KeyForge in 2018. Created by
Magic:The Gathering designer
Richard Garfield
Richard Channing Garfield (born June 26, 1963) is an American mathematician, inventor and game designer. Garfield created '' Magic: The Gathering'', which is considered to be the first collectible card game (CCG). ''Magic'' debuted in 1993 and it ...
, KeyForge differs from other
collectible card games
A collectible card game (CCG), also called a trading card game (TCG) among other names, is a type of card game that mixes strategic deck building elements with features of trading cards, introduced with ''Magic: The Gathering'' in 1993.
Genera ...
(CCGs) in that the game uses
procedural generation
In computing, procedural generation is a method of creating data algorithmically as opposed to manually, typically through a combination of human-generated assets and algorithms coupled with computer-generated randomness and processing power. In ...
to create unique decks. Commonly, CCGs are sold in pre-built decks or boosters packs. Fantasy Flight Games calls KeyForge a "unique deck game" because each deck contains a procedurally designed character unique to that deck called an Archon.
IGN described the game as "a bold new idea and a vastly different kind of game format", but questioned the randomization model, speculating that "people won’t be spending tons of money on single rare cards, but that may have been replaced with spending tons of money on random deck boxes in the hopes of getting lucky with a great card combination.
Awards
2016 Origins Awards
* Board Game - Star Wars: Imperial Assault, designed by
Justin Kemppainen,
Corey Konieczka, and
Jonathan Ying
* Miniatures Game - Star Wars Armada, designed by James Kniffen, Christian T. Petersen
* Role-Playing Game - Star Wars: Force and Destiny, designed by Jay Little
References
External links
*
Fantasy Flight Gamesat
BoardGameGeek
BoardGameGeek (BGG) is an online forum for board gaming hobbyists and a game database that holds reviews, images and videos for over 125,600 different tabletop games, including European-style board games, wargames, and card games. In addition to ...
{{Authority control
Board game publishing companies
Card game publishing companies
Companies based in Minnesota
Role-playing game publishing companies
Roseville, Minnesota
Publishing companies established in 1995
Video game companies of the United States
American companies established in 1995