On June 20, Antoine Bauza and Thomas Provoost shared they were launching a new board games publishing company, PlayPunk. A press release shared on Twitter reveals the publisher will offer “a limited catalog” of games, but PlayPunk’s debut titles are already in development.
Antoine Bauza is known for designing some of the best board games of the last decade. As well as games like Hanabi and Ghost Stories, Bauza also created the popular drafting game 7 Wonders. This, and its spin-offs, were published with the help of Thomas Provoost, co-founder of the Repos Production publishing company.
“On the strength of their long collaboration, [Bauza and Provoost] decided to set up a new publishing company together”, PlayPunk says in Tuesday’s press release. “For them, authors are the key creative players, and will be supported – and challenged! – so that each game reaches its full potential.”
This support, combined with a promise that all games will be “polished down to the smallest detail”, is why PlayPunk says it’s offering a more limited roster of games. “To achieve this goal, PlayPunk will take the time to mature its games”, it says.
The first game announced by PlayPunk is Captain Flip. This is a family board game designed by Paolo Mori (Libertalia) and Remo Conzadori (Fairy Tale Inn). PlayPunk has also announced an untitled “expert game” from Gregory Grard (Cross Clues) and Mathieu Roussel (Kameloot). Captain Flip is set to release in the first quarter of 2024, and the untitled game will be released at Essen 2024.
Looking for new board games to try? The 2022 Golden Geek Award winners are come highly recommended. Or, try something we can recommend personally – here’s our recent Darkest Dungeon board game review.