Board Game Arena

Dear Takenoko players,

Takenoko will be Premium on Board Game Arena starting April 1st 2021.

To explain the why / how / when, here's a little FAQ:

Why Takenoko (or any other game) is Premium?

BGA offers to every publisher the possibility to be free or Premium, so this is a publisher's choice, and as a rule of thumb (and this case too) BGA supports this choice

It works exactly like the Android or iOS store: there are both free app and paid app, and this is each publisher to decide. This is the best way for us to make sure every publisher is comfortable with BGA.

Why now?

Takenoko has been free from many years on BGA. Last year, the decision has been made to move Takenoko from free to premium along with the arrival of the new edition of Takenoko.

Takenoko is a "best selling game" so it does not need anymore the additional visibility offered by the "free" status. This decision is thus logical and BGA is supporting it.

April's fool?

Sorry, no: we are very serious when doing jokes, so we're having only one April's fool joke on BGA each year

Is it linked to the Asmodee deal?

No. We explained it in details in the BGA+Asmodee FAQ ("Will there be more games Premium? Will the free games remain free?").

Concerning Takenoko specifically, the decision has been taken on Summer 2020, so a long time before joining Asmodee.

In the link above, we explained that 2 popular games will become Premium on BGA, so now you know which one: Can't Stop and Takenoko.

Is it linked with the new edition?

Yes and no. As explained above, the new edition is an important step in the history of the game, so it's a good time to also change the way the game is proposed on BGA, but the game would have moved to Premium with or without this new edition.

By the way, I take advantage of this to recall that BOTH editions of Takenoko are available on BGA: if you don't like the new edition, you just have to switch the corresponding option when creating a table.

Hi, don't understand why you need to explain your choices. It's not a charity business, and you've the right to do so. Thank you for the creation of this site and to offer so many games in free access.

BeCool wrote: ↑02 April 2021, 21:40 Hi, don't understand why you need to explain your choices. It's not a charity business, and you've the right to do so. Thank you for the creation of this site and to offer so many games in free access.

Mostly because peoples complain. Except for the April Fool part, it's essentially them copying the different answers they previously gave to peoples complaining. It doesn't cost them a lot to copy those answer each time a game becomes premium.

will the chibis expansion be added?

BeCool wrote: ↑02 April 2021, 21:40 Hi, don't understand why you need to explain your choices. It's not a charity business, and you've the right to do so. Thank you for the creation of this site and to offer so many games in free access.

Any entity or organization, even charities, that depend on patrons to function are in effect obligated to announce major changes. Lest they lose said patrons.

That means that the publisher will get a mini portion of the Premium fee I pay (which by the way I pay gladly for your great site), and I think that's only fair. If I understand correctly, your Premium model for publishers is based on time spent with games, so the games that are played a lot of times and by a lot of players tend to get more kick-back... that's also fair!

This is terrible. Bye-bye Takenoko. It was good while it lasted.