Steve Jackson Games is Organizing an Organized Play Program

While the news is nearly a week old, I find it very interesting the Steve Jackson Games is joining the ranks of organized play and have even hired an Organized Play Manager.

Why is this important?

Because organized play brings people into game stores. Its as simple as that.

While many bemoan the swing to Kickstarters for even the larger players in the gaming industry to protect themselves from potential losses should a new game not sell, the fact is, Kickstarter is keeping many of these companies in the black. What Kickstarter does, however, is divert sales that may have been made at the FLGS. Which sucks for the FLGS.

Now, what will be interesting to see is if this will be a new trend amongst the publishers of RPGs and similar games to get customers into the stores they've been diverting business from.

We know Paizo and WotC have their Organized Play programs. From the original posting, I'm going to guess SJG is going to cover their core games - Munchkun, Ogre, Car Wars and possibly, dare I say it? Dungeon Fantasy?

At Steve Jackson Games, we've big plans for OP, and 2017 will see us adding programs for pretty much all of our existing lines, plus a few games we've yet to tell you about! Stay tuned!!!

I've heard rumors of another company exploring the idea of adding some sort of organized for their RPG lines.

So, what other gaming companies have or soon will be joining in on Organized Play Programs? Will it benefit the FLGS enough to keep them in the black?