The year in review

Well....another one almost done. When I first started making games I never thought I'd be posting this 5th year wrap up, but Pocket Sports is still growing and reaching new fans. I still think appreciating the folks that have followed us from day one is the most important part of the business and drives me to create new games and freshen up current titles any way I can improve on.

2015 was the biggest year we've had so far in production and new games adding to the range. January seems so long ago but 7 new games were released as well as upgrades to 5 previous titles.

As an independent designer and publisher, most would see 1 or 2 new game releases in a year. You could say we have carved a niche in the board games industry, but I'd say we've only just scratched the surface.

Another milestone was reached this month with officially reaching the 30,000 total units sold mark to date (over 220K dice). A number I never imagined reaching when starting 5 years ago but a number I view as needing to ramp up over the next 5 years :)

So with most of the popular sports already covered, what's on the drawing board for 2016? I'm glad you asked...........

3 tentative new titles will include:

Surfing Tour - this has been ready to go for some time. A little more work on design and further play testing should have it in production early next year.

Rugby v.3 - there's no doubt this game hits the mark in the UK. Taking the model from Gridiron with team specific cards will be a new feature. 4 teams may include NZ / Australia / England and Sth Africa for classic match ups. Diff positions with updated plays and values.

Formula 1 - I had this alongside Cycling when working on the design which will work in a similar vein. Team cards, pit stops, fuel, engine levels and special skills will give allow some strategy to offset dice rolls.

Keeping the new batch to 3 games should be a nice size for fans to update their collections. I may look to Kickstarter to reach a wider audience but past fans will always have the pre-order prices we do during the production phase.

On another note - I've adding to the main page links to other independent Australian designers to share their games & wonderful ideas, so please check them out to see if they may tickle your fancy! Just the one so far but I'll be adding more in the new year.

So have a Merry Christmas and enjoy some Pocket Sports in between meals and drinks! Thank you for being with me on this journey.

Regards

Hamish Sterling