Feature
Touching Base
The games people play
Toy World spoke to Michelle Chin, co-owner of d20 Board Game Café in Watford, Hertfordshire, about the visitors to the café, the most popular games with its clientele, and how crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter are influencing the games market. Do you think board game cafés help drive the sales and awareness of the games you offer? Definitely. Often we recommend games that people have never heard of before and they end up loving them, which is great. Board game cafés are really handy because you can ‘try before you buy’; some board games can be quite an investment but after having played them, our customers know whether or not they are worth purchasing.
Which of the games you offer are most popular with your visitors? Who is a typical visitor to the café? It really varies. During the day, we get families with kids playing the classics and groups of students playing party games. In the evening, we see a real mix of people; groups of young adults playing social deduction games and also more advanced gamers playing Dungeons and Dragons. We welcome people from all walks of life; we always say there’s a board game for everyone.
A wide variety of games are played at our café. The games chosen mostly depend on the size of the party and age of the group. Codenames is a popular game for all ages and group sizes. Another is Dobble, by Asmodee. More recently, Star Wars Destiny, a collectible card game, has been growing in popularity among our customers. More and more people have started playing, so much so that we have created regular events and even a Facebook group that people can join to talk about the game
Social climbers influencers, such as Dude Perfect who we recently worked with to create content for our Fantastic Gymnastics game, as well as influencers who have a smaller audience globally, such as in the UK and US markets, as well as France, Germany and Mexico, giving us the ability to reach fans around the world. Additionally, Hasbro Gaming was an exhibitor at the online video convention VidCon in Ahaheim, California, which attracts 30,000 creators, fans and consumers. Having a presence at this increasingly popular event provided a way for us to connect with game fans, creators and the overall community.
What role does social media play in driving sales and awareness of Hasbro’s games? We know that social content is a key driver for awareness of our games, with fans sharing their experiences of playing the games in a real and authentic way. We’ve seen social media become a great word-of-mouth tool for our audience to share how much fun they are having playing our games, and it has helped build great momentum.
How does Hasbro develop its social media campaigns in order to target game fans? Hasbro is focused on working with large-scale
The Monopoly Facebook page has over 10m followers and generates thousands of comments a day. Are comments made on social media, including Tweets, analysed as feedback for development purposes? We’re always keeping an eye on what is trending and popular on social media and we’re always listening to our fans to understand their interests and what they’re looking for. The Monopoly brand has a longstanding history of inviting its fans to make changes to the game. For example, in 2013, Hasbro held the Monopoly Save Your Token Vote on Facebook, where fans voted for the token they
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What kind of games are most popular and why do you think this is? Party games are definitely the most popular type of game played. While other genres are more appealing to the regular gamer, party games offer all players a chance to enjoy taking part together at the same level, irrespective of skill.
Generally speaking, how well are new games received by your visitors? Is there anything which influences this? Many new games have a lot of hype leading up to their release, so people are already looking forward to playing them before they arrive at the café. Because of this anticipation, new games get more attention initially. People are more aware of game releases because of things like Kickstarter, where you can discover new games every day and pledge towards them. This means that months before a game’s release, people know a lot about the game and what to expect with regards to game play.
Toy World spoke to Craig Wilkins, Hasbro’s marketing director, about the influence of social media on the company’s games offering. wanted to keep in the game and for a new token they would like added to the game. Fans ultimately chose the Cat token, which replaced the Iron token. And, earlier this year, we held a historic, worldwide vote asking fans to pick all eight Monopoly tokens in the game, which ultimately ended with the Boot, Thimble and Wheelbarrow leaving the game, replaced with the Rubber Ducky, T-Rex and Penguin tokens.
In terms of importance and impact, which social media platforms are most favoured by Hasbro? Social and digital media is key to reaching today’s modern audience, be that using YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or another social medium. We identify the right social media platform on a caseby-case basis, dependent on what we’re looking to achieve and how we think we can best engage our audience. It’s really important to Hasbro to keep on top of the games proving popular on social media. We’ve released hugely successful games in Speak Out and Pie Face, with two more recent hits including Egged On and Fantastic Gymnastics based on the popular viral egg roulette challenge and flip challenge, respectively.