On a personal note: Not only is this a blow to all the fans of Cubicle 7’s highly regarded roleplaying take on Middle-earth but I guarantee my pals Dominic McDowall, TS Luikart, and the rest of the design and development team sank tons of hard work into ToS 2E and now all of that goes for naught. Plus, with The One Ring and Adventures in Middle-earth releases being C7’s best selling lines, this will surely have a massive economic impact on the company in the short run.
Dominic McDowall and Cubicle 7’s announcement:
‘I am with you at present,’ said Gandalf, ‘but soon I shall not be. I am not coming to the Shire.’
We have some very unfortunate and unexpected news to share. Contractual differences arose recently which we have been unable to resolve, and so we have decided to end our licensing agreement with Sophisticated Games. It is with regret that we have made this very tough decision to withdraw.
This means we will cease publishing The One Ring and Adventures in Middle-earth in the first half of 2020. Unfortunately, this doesn’t give us enough time to release the much-anticipated The One Ring – The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game second edition.
As many of you know, our first edition of The One Ring is eight years old, and we had high hopes of a full product line to support our second edition. Our team have worked incredibly hard on this new edition; with many of the announced titles already written and edited, so being very close to completion makes this decision even harder.
Although we were very close to the finish line when these issues arose, as gamers ourselves we did not feel it was right to release a new edition which we would be unable to support.
We appreciate how passionate so many of you are, especially those who have followed our journey from first edition and eagerly awaited the second edition. Thank you for your support over the years.
Pre-orders and refunds
Our immediate priority is to make the refunding process as easy as possible for those who pre-ordered from us. Anyone who pre-ordered The One Ring – The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game (standard or collector’s edition) or Rohan Region Guide directly from our webstore should have already received an email from us detailing their options and outlining any action required. We are offering full refunds or Cubicle 7 store credit. More information on this can be found in our detailed blog post here.
We are commencing our Black Friday offers today which include 50% off current The One Ring first edition stock and 30% off Adventures in Middle-earth stock, see our webstore for more information.
Thanks to our team
We would like to thank our talented team for their amazing work on The One Ring – The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying Game, including our producer, editor, artists, graphic designers, sales and marketing team, and all the freelancers involved.
Thanks for your support
We have enjoyed sharing glimpses of our vision for The One Ring second edition over the last number of months, and we are disappointed that we cannot bring our extensive plans to fruition. We’d like to take the opportunity to thank you all once again for your incredible support, patience and understanding in this matter.
What’s next?
This year has been Cubicle 7’s most successful year to date. We have been awarded funding from the Irish Government to support our continued development, and have recruited new staff to our passionate and dedicated team.
Work continues on Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, led by our new WFRP Producer Pádraig Murphy. The PDF of Enemy in Shadows Companion will be released imminently. We are excited to continue working on Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound, Warhammer 40,000: Wrath & Glory, Lone Wolf and Doctor Who. We are looking forward to 2020, which is shaping up to be our busiest year yet with many exciting releases planned.
