Harry Potter board game kickstarter canceled, US election blamed (?)

A Kickstarter campaign for a board game called Harry Potter: Catch the Snitch was canceled, with editors blaming the “current state of uncertainty in the world arising from the election campaign in the United States.”

The game, a recreation of Potter’s Quidditch only with piles of plastic figures, was fetching $ 450,000 to fund its release, but at the time of its cancellation it had raised only $ 64,000.

In a statement posted on the game’s Kickstarter page, Knight Games publishers write:

The current state of uncertainty in the world resulting from the election campaign in the United States is negatively affecting our Kickstarter. This generates many technical problems on the web and freezes our communication strategy plan.

All social networks and platforms generate much less traffic, which has a very negative impact on advertising campaigns. This implies that they do not have the range that they would have in a normal situation.

We understand the concern and anxiety this causes among the people of North America and we stand in solidarity with them.

Therefore, we believe that it is best to postpone the KS campaign until next Thursday 12 November (11-12-20) so that we can reach out to all of you and bring you the best products with smooth communication and without interference.

We are very sorry for any inconvenience this may cause, but we will compensate you all for it. For starters, we include the Harry Potter figure in the basic box. But we will still have several surprises to show you next week.

We reiterate our apologies, but the gravity of the current situation requires us to take this break so that we can come out with a stronger start and bring the universe of Harry Potter to all of you who are the meaning of our efforts.

cordially

Knight Games Team

It’s … a terribly long bow to draw. As many users point out in the comments directly below their statement, it ignores another, potentially the most important, factor of people’s limited interest. The problem may not have been the US election, but the price of the game, which was an outrageous € 100 / $ 120, and that’s for the the cheapest version; the more sophisticated edition was € 300 / $ 350. For a game of quidditch.

The publishers will try to list the game again on November 12. It remains to be seen whether they will try again at 100 € or not.