Mythic Games, formerly one of the most successful crowdfunding-focused board game publishers of all time, has officially been liquidated after a financial collapse which left it unable to fulfill millions of dollars-worth of Kickstarter projects.

The company, which operated out of Luxembourg, was condemned to a compulsory liquidation at the end of October for failing to publish its annual accounts, a Mythic spokesperson confirmed to BoardGameWire.

They added that a criminal investigation against the business had also been closed after a failure to find fraudulent behaviour, misappropriation of funds or suspicious financial movements by company management.

The dramatic demise of the decade-old publisher comes after it raised more than $19m from board game crowdfunding campaigns in just five years – including in excess of $5.6m from over 28,000 backers for its most successful Kickstarter, Darkest Dungeon: The Board Game, in 2020.

More than $12m of that total came via a flurry of six Kickstarter campaigns Mythic ran between 2020 and 2022, during a tabletop crowdfunding boom fuelled by Covid-19 lockdowns – which saw people increasingly diverting their disposable income into activities they could do at home.

Alongside the relative ease of raising crowdfunding dollars, however, many of those campaigns were also launched while global economies were gripped by spiralling inflation and soaring manufacturing and shipping prices caused by the pandemic.

Having failed to anticipate that rising expenditure or cut its financial cloth accordingly, Mythic was left struggling under the weight of its expensive to produce, miniatures-heavy projects, and by the summer of 2022 had already subsidised more than $1.2m of unexpected costs.

But despite those financial danger signs it continued to launch new projects, including raising more than $1m from over 5,500 backers for its Anastyr campaign in May of 2022. At the time of that launch, Mythic already had five unfulfilled Kickstarters totalling more than $11m.

Darkest Days

Just two months after the Anastyr campaign funded, Mythic began to divulge the serious financial straits it was in – and in addition to outsourcing the entirety of its remaining workforce took the unprecedented step of telling some backers they would have to commit more money if they wanted to receive their games at all.

Some of the heaviest criticism directed at Mythic in the last few years has been over its handling of the Darkest Dungeon Kickstarter – one of the biggest board game crowdfunds ever at the time of its $5.6m campaign.

The publisher blamed chaos caused by the Ukraine war across raw materials and shipping rates for $1.75m of unanticipated costs for the first wave of the game alone – and told backers they would have to pay extra in order for their games to be sent.

Supporters were asked for between $18 and $69 each for ‘Wave 1’, comprising the English version of the core set, an expansion and several add-ons – on top of the $100 to $330 plus shipping they had already spent on the original crowdfunding campaign.

That contribution would make up about 50% of the extra costs, with Mythic saying it would provide another $775,000 and Darkest Dungeon video game developer Red Hook agreeing to commit $100,000.

More than 80% of backers duly paid up in order to get Wave 1, and were told that if they were also expecting projects in Wave 2 – several more expansions, add-ons, and the full-range localised into six other languages – they would not have to make any further payments.

But Mythic went back on that commitment in October 2023, with Wave 1 backers being asked for another $13 to receive each of the Wave 2 expansions they were expecting, with even more added on top for shipping – blaming inflated raw materials expenses and the cost of ‘last mile’ shipping, which it said had “never been higher”.

Some backers saw their total extra bill across both waves reach more than $380 – around double their original pledge. But despite telling supporters who paid the second extra charge that the process had been a success and that they would receive their Wave 2 expansions, the games were never produced.

Failure To Deliver

Mythic repeated the extra contributions manoeuvre for its 6: Siege crowdfunding in May of 2023, informing backers – some of whom had already parted with close to $500 in pledges and shipping – that they would need to pay up to $249 extra in order to receive their game.

That game did eventually make its way to supporters who paid the extra charge – but Mythic’s death leaves the publisher having failed to deliver on close to $5m of other crowdfunding projects.

They include Hel: The Last Saga, which raised over $2.2m from supporters, and Anastyr, which it gave up trying to fulfill in January last year by selling the intellectual property rights to CMON – a crowdfunding publisher facing its own financial turmoil, which has since sold the IPs off again as part of its own fightback against heavy losses.

Mythic also quit trying to complete its $1.3m Kickstarter for kaiju-battling game Monsterpocalypse in January of this year, despite hope from some backers that the Hel and Anastyr IP sales would give the ailing publisher enough capital to get its final projects out of the door.

Backers of Rise of the Necromancers, which raised about $317,000 on Gamefound in January 2022, have also been left with nothing to show for their investment in the campaign.

Those failed projects came despite a string of other crowdfunding-focused board game publishers managing to get their own large-scale, big-money projects into the hands of backers – even with the upheaval from the pandemic and other global macroeconomic volatility, although often with delays.

They include Cephalofair’s then record-breaking $12.9m Frosthaven Kickstarter, the $6.9m Nemesis Lockdown campaign by Awaken Realms, Restoration Games’ $4m Return to Dark Tower revival and Go On Board’s €6.8m The Witcher: Old World campaign.

A spokesperson for Mythic Games told BoardGameWire, “For nearly two years, the board game industry has been facing a difficult economic climate. The stock sales we were relying on were not only far below expectations, but eventually became completely non-existent.

“At the same time, we were confronted with several unforeseen financial issues that severely impacted our cash flow: the increase in refund requests, including unexpected direct withdrawals initiated by Stripe, banks or PayPal (withdrawals that came in addition to the monthly refunds we were already issuing); and a VAT adjustment following a tax audit.

“The Luxembourg tax authorities believed that VAT had not been collected in certain countries, even though the payments had in fact been made. However, the external accounting firm we used had apparently failed to file the required documentation.

“We were ordered to pay a very large amount immediately, which we contested, and despite our proposal for a payment plan – while we proved our good faith – the authorities refused any compromise and seized and emptied the company’s accounts.

“We would also like to clarify that we had already paid a significant and non-refundable advance to our printer for the production of Darkest Dungeon Wave 2.

“Unfortunately, due to the issues mentioned above, we were unable to pay the remaining balance, which made production and delivery impossible – and we were not able to recover any of the funds already paid. The additional contribution we asked from backers did not take these unforeseen factors into account; we had requested the bare minimum necessary.

“We are sincerely sorry for the fans and for everyone who has lost money because of this situation, which we tried to handle as best as we could.

“Thanks to the difficult decisions we made when the problems first emerged, we were able to deliver Darkest Dungeon Wave 1 and Six Siege. We are happy for those who were able to receive their games.

“Sadly, it became clear that we are not – and will no longer be – able to deliver the remaining projects (Monsterpocalypse and Rise of the Necromancers), nor Darkest Dungeon Wave 2. We extend our deepest apologies to all backers and to our partners.

“This catastrophic situation has affected not only Mythic Games and its backers, but also several of our partners, to whom we express our sincerest apologies – in particular Red Hook, Privateer Press, and Sore Loser Games.

“Even though we were able to pay their royalties, we placed them in an extremely difficult position regarding their IPs.

“We take full responsibility for these failures; these publishers are in no way responsible – quite the opposite. We hope that fans of their games will be able to distinguish the situation clearly and will not assign blame to them. They are collateral victims, just as backers who did not receive their games are.”

Final Act

Mythic told BoardGameWire that as a final act it would provide Darkest Dungeon backers with the print-ready 3D printing files, known as STLs, for Darkest Dungeon Wave 1 and 2, to give them the option of printing out their own components for the unfulfilled games they funded.

Those operations will be carried out voluntarily by an unnamed former Mythic Games employee, the company added.

That employee, who wishes to remain anonymous, has since contacted BoardGameWire to clarify that Mythic did not actually own the Darkest Dungeon STL files in question, and “never had the intention of releasing them”.

They said, “All usage rights related to Darkest Dungeon belong exclusively to Red Hook, who remains the only legitimate party able to authorize such a distribution.”

The ex-employee added, “I am in legal possession of the STL files, following an official transfer from Mythic Games, with proper documentation to support this.

“After receiving them, I personally contacted Red Hook, who formally granted me the right to make those files available to backers free of charge.

The publisher added that it had transferred all rights to Rise of the Necromancers to the game’s designers and co-publisher Sore Loser Games, and said all the STL files for the miniatures and stretch goals would be sent to backers.

Mythic said, “We fully understand that this announcement will disappoint many, and that these gestures cannot compensate for the expectations and investment made by backers.

“For us, Mythic Games was far more than a company. It was a human adventure driven by a love of games shared by the entire team, and by the desire to create memorable experiences. Knowing that we were not able to deliver to all our backers is a failure that will weigh heavily on us for a long time.

“We are deeply sorry for not having been able to honor all our commitments, and we sincerely thank all those who supported us throughout this journey.”

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