Following several delays in the manufacturing and shipping of the highly anticipated Shin Megami Tensei The Board Game, ICREA has announced that shipments will begin in August 2026. The company apologized for previous delays and assured backers that the release date has been confirmed with all relevant parties, with no other major changes in schedule expected.
ICREA’s plans for a Shin Megami Tensei Board Game go back as far as 2021. After teasing the project through prototype displays at GenCon and Tokyo Game Show in 2024, the company finally launched a Kickstarter campaign that ran from November 12 to December 13 of the same year. The campaign was a resounding success, reaching its goal of 30 million JPY (around $19,300 USD) in three hours and amassing 98.96 million JPY (roughly $626,726 USD) in finding in total.
ICREA would run into its first setback during the board game’s campaign period. The company drew criticism after directly mentioning competitor CMON in a response to a question from one of the project’s backers. While this may seem harmless, it is considered a poor business practice in Japan to name-drop another company that is not involved in the project without permission. ICREA’s statement, coupled with poor communication with backers and its then-relatively short manufacturing and distribution timeline, led many people (particularly Japanese SMT fans) to express distrust in the company to the point that some cancelled their Kickstarter pledges.
The timeline was updated for the first time on December 8, 2024. Following a review of the initial schedule, the project’s manufacturing and shipping dates were moved from December 2024 and April 2025, respectively, to 2025. Another delay would be announced in November 2025, moving the manufacturing and shipping dates to 2026. In both instances, ICREA noted “additional time required for rule adjustments and component refinements” as the primary causes for the delays.
According to the latest update, the game’s markers, tokens, and 72 demon figures have already been finalized and are currently in the manufacturing stage. Production of the cards, which consist of Demon Cards, Grimoire Cards, Lunar Phase Cards, Demon Conversation Cards, and Event Cards, is currently being supervised, their text translated to Japanese and English, and given their final designs. Lastly, the rulebook structure is being finalized alongside the card changes.
