Troubled board game maker CMON has sold the rights to its most successful board game IP, Zombicide, to international publisher and distributor Asmodee. Asmodee announced the deal on the morning of June 10, the first acquisition the firm has made since it became an independent company this April - but not the last it plans to make.
According to a press release by Asmodee, Zombicide will now operate under its Guillotine Games board game label. Asmodee's global corporate communication manager Xavier Audoin tells Wargamer "we have acquired the IP, which gives us full rights to the existing range of games as well as the opportunity to develop new titles". The firm has no comment on the amount that it paid in the deal.
Although Asmodee is getting the whole Zombicide IP, the two comic book tie-in games 'Marvel Zombies: a Zombicide game' and 'DCEASED: a Zombicide Game' "will continue to be managed by CMON", and the specific board game licenses for those tie-in games haven't moved from CMON to Asmodee.
"There are no employee transfers included in the deal, and no additional hires are needed to support the existing game portfolio" within Asmodee, Audoin adds. He suggests that there may not be much disruption for customers since "we already handle the distribution of [CMON's] games in many geographies".
The first edition of Zombicide was crowdfunded via Kickstarter in 2012, raising $781,597 for a miniature-packed, lightweight dungeon crawler board game. It was the breakout hit that established CMON as a company, one of the games that sparked the tabletop takeover of crowdfunding, and it has since had many expansions, sequels, and spin-offs.
Zombicide's formula of good graphic design, approachable rules, and scores of plastic minis was incredibly influential, convincing many publishers that the best board games should all come with a stack of plastic components whether or not the rules really called for them.
CMON has already let go three prominent board game lines - Blood Rage, Rising Sun, and ANKH: Gods of Egypt - in a sale to competitor Tabletop Tycoon at the end of May. At the end of April it laid off development staff and froze all future crowdfunding campaigns, citing the extraordinary tariffs then in place for Chinese imports to America.
The firm was in visible difficulty even before then. Its stocks were delisted from the Hong Kong stock exchange early in April after it failed to publish finalised accounts in good time. Its provisional accounts for the year showed a substantial loss, massively draining the firm's cash reserves.
Asmodee has recently become an independent company after several years within Embracer Group, a large multinational investment vehicle, which dissolved into three successor companies in April this year. In the run-up to Asmodee becoming independent, CEO Thomas Koegler announced the firm's intention to grow by acquiring promising board game brands and companies, with at least twenty already in its sights.
Are you a big Zombicide fan? Do you have fond memories of that original, landmark Kickstarter? Are you just concerned about whether or not one of CMON's outstanding Kickstarters will ever arrive in your mail? We're always keen to chat in the official Wargamer Discord community.
Want something a bit meatier than Zombicide? If you want an actually spooky game, check out our guide to the best horror board games - or for more of a tactical challenge, we've got a great guide to the best strategy board games.