Crowdfunding Spotlight: Heroquest Returns!

The Witch Lord from the HeroQuest expansion "Return of the Witch Lord" stands guard over the countdown clock on the Avalon Hill web site
The Witch Lord from the HeroQuest expansion “Return of the Witch Lord” stands guard over the countdown clock on the Avalon Hill web site

Hasbro has just launched a bid to resurrect HeroQuest, the popular dungeon-crawling game first published in 1990 that is gaining traction fast among its many fans, even though, sadly, this game first created in the UK is not immediately available to fans here.

Launched with a call to arms against the dark lord Zargon, Heroquest fans can support a new-look version of the Heroquest Game System through hasbropulse.com, which has already gained $10,000 in backing just minutes after launch.

Heroquest Gaming System 2020

“Deep inside another dimension, face battling barbarians and evil magic on a quest for adventure in a maze of monsters,” the site enthuses. “This is HeroQuest, the fantasy adventure game, where winning means mastering the art of combat and magic. Once you get into it, you’ll never be the same…”

Offered are two tiers of support for the new look HeroQuest. The “Heroic Tier” includes the core HeroQuest game system (featuring 71 highly detailed character and furniture miniatures) as well as four bonus hero miniatures and one exclusive miniature only available during the HasLab campaign.

The “Mythic Tier” includes the Heroic Tier offer, as well as two game expansions, two more exclusive figures, and all available unlocks.

The new game includes materials from its original designer Stephen Baker, in the form of a quest book to accompany the game, which he reveals more of here.

“It is always humbling to think how many people have found joy playing the HeroQuest game over the years,” he says.

The management of Avalon Hill was moved from Wizards of the Coast back onto its parent company Hasbro, as reported over on ICV2.

Grab a copy of the new Heroquest Game System – sadly only if you’re a US or Canadian fan at this point (and shipping costs to Canada are very high as of 23rd September 2020) – through hasbropulse.com

Follow HeroQuest on Twitter @heroquest | Heroquest Facebook Group |

LOOKING BACK – HEROQUEST IN THE 1990s

Originally published by Milton Bradley, in collaboration with Games Workshop, HeroQuest was initially designed by Stephen Baker, who now lives in the United States, and was one of the first dungeon crawl board games to hit the market – and hugely successful, sold not only in and English language edition, but across Europe, too.

Original copies, featuring art by Gary Chalk and Les Edwards, sell for a significant premium to collectors. Stephen would go on to design another game, Space Crusade and Battle Masters, which are perhaps less well known.

“My intention was to create a game that for an adult was a true role-playing game,” Baker revealed in an interview conducted in 1998 by Italian author and game expert Andrea Angiolino, re-published here. “It is a game with the mechanisms of a board game but that presents itself as a RPG. And this, for me, was an idea that many people would like. 

“In the field of fantasy, existing games were seen as something that led you into darkness. On the contrary, I liked the idea of ​​creating a game in the “Talisman style” [classic game by Robert Harris] designed for people between nine and eleven years old. And I wanted to make a game that had an RPG flavour, where there must be collaboration even if collaboration between players is not regulated.”

Stephen Baker continued to work in the world of game design for many years, including his great modern creation Heroscape, designed as a team by Stephen, Rob Daviau and Craig Van Ness, first published in 2004, first in the USA and later in other countries, but sadly brought to an end by Wizards of the Coast in 2010.

Marvel UK's Heroquest - Cover

The game not only still has thousands of fans who remember it with great fondness, but spawned a one-shot Marvel UK licensed magazine in 1991. The now much sought after magazine, we previously featured here included features by RPG game creator Ken Walton and then partner Jo Walton (now an award-winning SF and fantasy author), including a short story, and a comic strip by Alan Cowsill, just before his days as a Marvel UK editor and Ian Abinett, drawn by Gary Frank (before Marvel Genesis 1992 and his work on Motormouth and Killpower), inked by Cam Smith, lettered by Helen Stone and coloured by Peri Godbold; and new Heroquest “hazards”, illustrated by Adrian Salmon.

Check out the new Heroquest here – heroquest.avalonhill.com

Grab a copy of the new Heroquest Game System – sadly only if you’re a US or Canadian fan at this point (and shipping costs to Canada are very high as of 23rd September 2020) – through hasbropulse.com

Follow HeroQuest on Twitter @heroquest | Heroquest Facebook Group |

FURTHER READING…

Why Heroquest is so Great…

Heroquest creator and designer Stephen Baker
Heroquest creator and designer Stephen Baker

Read Andrea Angiolino’s interview with Heroquest designer Stephen Baker

Stephen Baker Games on LinkedIn

Gary Chalk is online at garychalkillustration.com

Les Edwards is online at lesedwards.com

Missing in Action: Heroquest at Marvel UK, and the RPG magazine that never happened

• Check out Richard Sheaf’s article on Marvel UK”s Heroquest magazine here

• There’s more information about Marvel UK’ s Heroquest here on nederlands.yeoldeinn.com

• HeroQuest and the Heroquest series at BoardGameGeek

• Heroquest on Wikipedia

With thank to Tony Cheetham for directing me toward “Bardic Broadcasts



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