Tue Aug 1, 2006 @ 7:32 am

R.I.P. Guardians of Order

From ICv2:

Author George R.R. Martin has disclosed that the Canadian role-playing game publisher Guardians of Order is now out of business. Writing on his Website, Martin, whose work provided the basis for the elaborate RPG volume, A Game of Thrones published by Guardians of Order (see "A Game of Thrones"), reports that he has contacted GOO Owner and President Mark MacKinnon, who confirmed that he is shutting down the company's operations.

Founded in 1996, Guardians of Order published a number of innovative games over its decade-long run including the first major anime RPG, Big Eyes Small Mouth; the comic book-based RPG Silver Sentinels; as well as a number of gaming/anime fan books on series such as Trigun, Fushigi Yugi, Serial Experiment Lain, and Neon Genesis Evangelion. Most GOO games featured the company's own "Tri-Stat" gaming system.

The demise of Guardians of Order can be seen as the inevitable result of the continued softening of the RPG market, but another factor played an important role. With most of its sales in the U.S., Guardians of Order was severely hurt by the recent decline of the U.S. dollar against the Canadian dollar, which devalued the majority of the company's sales.

Guardians of Order's Mark MacKinnon is currently trying to arrange the transfer of GOO's strongest properties to other publishers.

Permalink • Posted in: biz, Canada, gaming • Comments (2)

Comments:

Joshua Aug 4, 2006

Update from ICv2:

Guardians of Order president Mark MacKinnon, in a post on the company Website, has announced that upcoming GoO products will be released by another company as a result of GoO's liquidation. BESM Third Edition, according to the post, is finished and ready for press, with another company planning to publish it and provide future support. MacKinnon said of the book, "It's the most elegant version of BESM and the Tri-Stat System that I have put together...."

Advanced d20 Magic orders will be shipped this month. As far as the rest of the GoO line, "We are arranging for our products to be transferred to another company," MacKinnon said.

GoO is attempting to find a home for the Game of Thrones RPG, which George R. R. Martin would have to approve. MacKinnon said that he was sorry that Martin had broken the news of the company's liquidation in a post on his Website, calling the conversation that Martin recounted "in confidence."

Parmeter Aug 4, 2006

Huhn. How does one do a "Serial Experiment Lain" rpg? Ug. That makes my head hurt.

BESM wasn't bad, but I was pretty disapointed when they got on the d20 bandwangon. I wasn't aware that there was going to be 3rd Ed of the system. Heck, I wasn't aware that they had revised and released a 2nd Ed!

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