This will be a bit of a rant. Hold onto your butts…
So, I have been a long time supporter of Free League, the publishers of many fine tabletop roleplaying games, including “Vaesen”, “Mork Borg”, “Dragonbane”, and of course, “Blade Runner”. I have backed several of their projects on Kickstarter, and while there has been a minor issue here or there, it usually had to do with shipping (delays and such), but the quality of the delivered product was always top-notch. I have had mostly great things to say about the company itself, as I frankly love their games.
Well, back in June of 2024, myself and many other fans successfully backed the Free League supplement for “Blade Runner”, being “Replicant Rebellion“. The initial timeline for delivery of this product was February 2025, but those of us who are Crowdfunding Veterans know that delays happen frequently, so we usually have some grace for projects that take longer than initially expected to arrive.
Anyway, it has been over a year since the initial delivery date for RR has come and gone, which happens of course, but it is disappointing. But this is a Free League project, so we know that it is coming down to the wire, and we will likely see delivery to backers – who are supposed to get the product before it goes to retail – in the next few months.
Right, Free League? Right?
So you can imagine my shock and surprise when some backers from the United Kingdom came across several game store in the UK that are listing “Replicant Rebellion” as being for sale to the public, either very soon, or in the case of Dungeonland… right now.
Here’s the thing: I get it. Retailers somehow managed to get their hands on a product, and they want to make it available for sale to their customers. That’s how business works. But when it comes to Crowdfunding, especially this Crowdfunded campaign, Free League would be the “Retailer”, and the backers are the “Customers”.
Not other Retailers. Not random plebs at gaming conventions. The Backers are the “customers” who matter here. We threw down our hard-earned money literally a year and a half ago, and damn well should be the very first folks to receive our products. I shouldn’t be able to walk into a Dungeonland store, or order off of their website, and grab a copy of a product I – as a backer of its Kickstarter – won’t receive until after mid-April at the earliest.
This isn’t the first time something like this has happened, mind you. I recall how Limithron treated their “Pirate Borg” backers when they sold copies of the game at a convention, then showed absolute contempt for said backers when they complained about it. Or when the folks behind “Knave 2nd Edition” pulled the same thing. My point being, you can’t trust people doing Crowdfunding projects to put their backers first anymore, as they are supposed to do. If they can make a dollar or two more by selling the product early, they will do so, and the Backers can just wait, I suppose.
Nevertheless, this is wrong, and I suspect Free League at least knows it. Comments on the official Kickstarter project page regarding retailers selling RR early have been up for a day as of the publication of this article, and as of now, FL has not responded to the controversy at all.
They could be looking into it further, or it could be that they know this looks bad, and just hope the controversy dies down and ‘goes away’. Well, I don’t know about anyone else, but I certainly won’t be letting this one go. Furthermore, I won’t be backing any more Free League projects in the future, nor buying their games once they hit retail. To put it bluntly, they have lost my trust as a publisher, and they will have to address this issue properly in order to win it back.
