At the Gama Trade Show in Las Vegas, ICv2 caught up with representatives from Cryptozoic Entertainment, to discuss the immediate sell-out of their new Adventure Time Card Wars, the new For the Glory! Booster (see "'Adventure Time Card Wars' Booster"), and upcoming organized play support.
According to Cryptozoic Marketing Director Kat Metzen, the For the Glory! booster product was not initially planned. "(P)reorders on the game were only 2,000 copies," she said of the initial release. "But we overprinted. We printed 20,000 copies, which is a huge overprint, because we believed in the game. We believed in it, but apparently we didn’t believe in it enough, because we sold out within a week."
"That was entirely in the hobby market," added Matt Hyra, Cryptozoic’s Lead Board Game Designer.
"We immediately went into reprint. We’re going to be air-shipping those preorders from China here, to try get it back into the channel as quick as possible," Metzen said. "But in the meantime, we’re trying to come up with a way to get more content out there for fans of the game."
"At that point, in literally two days, we came up with plans for For the Glory!, and executed it," Metzen said. "We executed it, and solicited it within the same week. So it was us hustling to try to fill in the gap."
"We had a ton of extra card ideas from our previous development," Hyra clarified. "We thought, 'Hey we can finally do something with these, because we weren’t going to do something with these for years down the line with making decks, but you know what? Let’s get something out to the fans faster than we can do decks, let’s put out some boosters.'"
Katzen said that Cartoon Network was extremely helpful in approving the booster quickly, as were the game partners D3 Entertainment, who handles the mobile app version of the game, and Kung-Fu Factory, who did the art for the set.
Hrya explained that while the booster is collectible, Cryptozoic is not treating this like traditional CCGs, but more like their trading card sets. "The set is just over 100 cards, so it’s not a giant set," he said. "We have a rarity set up, where you have a box of packs (24 boosters in a box) and there are 24 rares, so if everything goes according to plan, you’re going to get a whole set in a box. It’s not a guarantee, there could be a hiccup, but you should. You’re not chasing cards. A set in a box, is the whole plan."
"Right. This booster is a content build," Metzen said. "Everyone kept asking, 'Is this a CCG?' And we’re not treating it like that. You’re not going to see a lot of booster pack releases coming out, and everyone trying to chase the cards. This is a content build--think like a Munchkin expansion pack, where it adds to the game that already exists, where this is the core of the game. We’re not trying to have an ongoing foil pack support program."
One of the exciting things about this booster is the premiere of a new fifth land type, the "Nice Lands," which Cryptozoic had not planned to add to the game until the next collector pack starters release in the fall. Several of those cards are available in ICv2’s booster preview here (see "Preview: 'Adventure Time Card Wars: For the Glory! Booster Set'").
Sara Erickson, Cryptozoic’s National Hobby Channel Manager, also shared that the company has plans for organized play support for the game, but current plans are awaiting approval. "We are definitely supporting Adventure Time Card Wars, and with the great feedback that we’ve already gotten, we already know people are playing it in their stores already."
"We want to put something out there for the players that they can have in-store, so that it makes it easier to find a community, and I think having the stores get some support always makes that a little bit easier," she said.
Sell-Out, New Booster and OP Plans
Posted by ICv2 on March 24, 2014 @ 4:57 pm CT
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