Ares Games has expanded its international distribution business again through a partnership with Spain’s Draco Ideas, bringing the English editions of its games to retailers.

The deal covers games from the company’s two publishing arms, Draco Ideas and Eclipse Editorial, which merged into a single business in 2023.

Ares said distribution of Draco games would begin in December with Viking and Anglo-Saxon territory-building title Dark Kingdoms, the first English-language edition of 2018 release Reconquista, and a second edition of family game RatLand alongside two expansions and a miniatures pack.

The agreement is the latest in a series of distribution partnerships signed by Ares over the past two years, including deals with Armenian publisher Red Cat Games, Italy’s Tabula Games and Czech publisher Albi.

Ares also signed a deal with Dark Horizon Games in July this year to bring its co-operative sci-fi dungeon crawler Earth Under Siege: Flashpoint and three expansions to US retail, with the titles beginning to reach stores last month.

The company has also been extending the geographical reach of its existing distribution business, announcing last December that it would begin supplying titles from five publishers – Galakta Games, Tabula Games, Albi, Nuts! Publishing and Don’t Panic Games – to European retailers and distributors through its Italian warehouse.

That expansion has continued despite the trade disruption caused by US tariffs which prompted Ares to rethink parts of its business model last year, including reducing inventory, becoming more selective about products and increasing direct sales.

Di Meglio told BoardGameWire last December, “We are growing in small steps, but considered how complex is the situation in the US in these days, we are quite happy of this slow but steady progress.”

He added, “The current level of tariffs is not something to be happy about, but manageable. However, we have seen through 2025 that the rates can change abruptly and unexpectedly – this means we must be very careful about which products we pick, more than ever.”

Ares’ distribution partnerships have offered a route into conventional retail for games which previously relied heavily on crowdfunding.

Speaking to BoardGameWire about its Tabula Games partnership in May last year, Di Meglio said the Italian publisher had run successful crowdfunding campaigns, but its games had barely reached retail distribution.

The new Draco deal includes crowdfunded title Dark Kingdoms, a strategy and conquest game set in fifth-century Britain, which will begin being distributed to stores once its Gamefound fulfilment is complete.

That game, which was designed by Marco Antonio del Campo, sees players lead Saxon, Angle, Jute and Briton factions competing for control of territory through resource management, construction and military conquest.

Del Campo also designed Reconquista, originally published in Spanish in 2018, which pits four rival kingdoms against one another for control of the Iberian Peninsula in the 11th century.

The third title, Eduardo Garcia’s RatLand, is a family game in which players compete to grow rival rat colonies while gathering and stealing food. Its second edition will be accompanied by The Conquest of the Port and Automa expansions, alongside a pack of plastic rat miniatures.

Draco Ideas was founded in Spain in 2014 by Luis Álvaro Hernández, initially to publish his own historical battle game ONUS! Rome vs Carthage.

It has since developed into a specialist publisher of historical wargames and strategy games, with Eclipse Editorial covering narrative, adventure and family games.

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French board game distributor and publisher Atalia has entered compulsory liquidation, saying an increasingly saturated market, the limited capacity of retailers and the loss of distribution rights to bestselling titles left the business unable to remain viable.

A statement posted to Atalia’s Facebook page said the rapid expansion of the tabletop market since the company was founded in 2015 had created a tougher commercial environment for smaller distributors, despite the industry’s continued growth.

Atalia said that despite soaring numbers of players in that time, “so many new games are being released today that the market has become saturated. Shops no longer have the space, the time or the cash flow to stock all the games arriving each week”.

It added, “They therefore naturally turn to distributors with the biggest marketing budgets, some of whom invest sums each year that exceed Atalia’s annual turnover.

“This year, Atalia has lost the distribution rights for its latest bestsellers, as their publisher has chosen to entrust them to a distributor offering greater financial and marketing resources.

“We naturally respect these decisions, but we cannot hide our regret. Without these bestsellers, it has become increasingly difficult to finance new releases and ensure the company’s long-term viability.

French board game distribution is dominated by industry heavyweights Asmodee and Hachette, the latter via its Gigamic and Blackrock subsidiaries.

Atalia was founded in 2015 as a French board game distributor, before expanding into localisation and then publishing in 2021. It distributed games to hundreds of specialist retailers across France and neighbouring francophone territories.

The company says on its website that it deliberately maintained a relatively small catalogue, so individual games entrusted to it would not be “lost amongst an overwhelming number of titles”.

Earlier this year Atalia revealed it was halting its own distribution operations to focus on publishing and localisation, with its distribution being handled by MAD from May.

Atalia’s previously published releases include French localisations of games including Underwater Cities and Lorenzo il Magnifico, while recent titles published by the company include The Royal Society of Archeology and Hands Off!.

The company had also faced financial difficulties in 2019, despite a prior year in which it had generated revenues of more than €1.8m and continued profitability.

Atalia’s decision to double its headcount to six amid that success backfired when the publisher of Limite Limite, a French adaptation of Cards Against Humanity which accounted for about half Atalia’s revenue, switched to a new distributor in 2019 with no prior warning.

The company placed itself into receivership the same year, but emerged intact from that process in early 2020, citing strong sales of its bestsellers including Punto and Dreamscape, and receiving court-ordered compensation from the publisher of Limite Limite for the abrupt termination of its distribution deal.

The company’s liquidation announcement today came a month after Atalia founder and managing director Cesare Mainardi revealed it was “facing an extremely difficult period”, and cancelled its planned attendance at the Paris est Ludique festival, citing financial difficulties and organisational constraints.

Atalia officially entered compulsory liquidation on July 8 via Nanterre Commercial Court.

The company’s assets, including stock, brand and customer database, will now be offered for sale by the liquidator. Mainardi said interested parties should contact him via private message on Facebook.

He said in the Facebook post, “Today, we turn the page with our heads held high, feeling immense pride in everything we have built together.

“The people we’ve met, the games we’ve played and the memories created during this adventure will remain with us forever.”

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