D&D’s Japanese Rival Sword World Crowdfunding Raises Over $2 million in a Day
Sword World RPG, a long-running Japanese fantasy tabletop game, has raised more than $2 million in the first 24 hours of a crowdfunding campaign for its first official English localisation. The response matters because the game has been highly popular in Japan, where it helped make Dungeons & Dragons less influential, but licensing issues had kept it from reaching English-speaking players.
The campaign launched on 20 October and had raised more than $2.7 million at the time of writing. It will fund the localisation, design and printing of the Sword World 2.5 Core Rules, with Group SNE overseeing the project and anime director Shunsuke Nakashige serving as art director. The campaign is due to end on 20 November, and products are expected to ship by December 2027.
In short
- Sword World RPG raised over $2 million in its first day.
- The campaign funds the game's first official English localisation.
- Products are expected to ship by December 2027.
Explained simply
Sword World is a fantasy role-playing game played around a table, where players take on characters and a game master guides the story. It was created in Japan by Group SNE and has been published in several editions, with the current rules known as Sword World 2.5.
The game became popular in Japan alongside Dungeons & Dragons, the American role-playing game often shortened to D&D. Differences in licensing have meant Sword World was not officially available in English, limiting access for players outside Japan. An English edition would make its rules and setting available to a wider audience.