How A Halifax Board Game Company Keeps A Legacy Alive
HALIFAX — People start a small business for a variety of reasons. Some want to be their own boss; for others, being an entrepreneur is a lifelong dream. But Rick Berger started AOE Games because he needed a way to cope with his trauma.
During Christmas of 2015, Berger lost his son Ian in a tragic traffic incident. Board games had played a big role in Berger’s life since childhood, so that is what he turned to when he needed something positive.
“Everybody has her way of dealing with things,” said Berger, who co-owns AOE Games with his wife Holly Hynes. “And I needed something, some form of therapy. Traditional methods weren’t doing anything for me. So, I just started this company.”
Ian worked in food services at Dalhousie University. Berger remembers his son as a talented artist who spent much of his time sketching. Naturally, Ian made a lot of friends at Dalhousie, many of whom were musicians.
“One of his best friends was an opera singer. Most of his friends were in bands. What he did when he had a spare second; he always had his sketching pad, and he was sketching,” Berger remembers.
Following his tragic death, Berger and his family started some bursaries in Ian’s honour. One of the bursary programs awards a guitar each year to a promising student.
Ideas Drawn From Personal Experience
Board games are best played with a large group, and throughout his life Berger has been surrounded by willing players. He grew up with five sisters and he has enough nieces and nephews to keep the tradition going.
“The family gets together on the anniversary of my father’s birthday and we play games. Most of them are ones we just make up. Whoever hosts that year is in charge of making up a game that we were playing.”
Over the years, AOE (which stands for Art Over Everything) has created unique board games like Chef, Puck (a hockey-themed game), and Ready For Christmas. They also have new games coming soon, like Property Ladder and Bras d’Orosaurus Goes Traveling.
AOE is rapidly expanding and will have 13 unique games in its catalogue in late 2023. Since AOE is just a small, independent, game maker, Berger is planning to market games to certain industries.
Earlier this month, AOE released its newest game, called It’s the LAW! It’s a game where participants must tell the difference between crazy laws that are real and ones that are made up. Berger is planning to market the game to law firms, of course.
“We’re marketing right to law firms as corporate gift ideas,” said Berger. “We would personalize the box for them, and it would be a gifting idea for the law firm.”
In March, AOE will release a game called Property Ladder. Naturally, it’s a game perfectly geared toward realtors.
When it comes to getting inspiration for board games, Berger and Hynes draw from their personal experience. The Bras d’Orosauras game comes courtesy of Cape Breton, where Berger’s wife hails from. The couple created the dinosaur character based on Bras d’Or Lake.
“We developed a character based off of the Loch Ness monster or Ogopogo,” explained Berger. “It’s a traveling dinosaur game. We thought that the character itself was going to be the charm. We’re in the process of getting all our merchandise developed and we hope to be in a lot of stores in Cape Breton and hopefully through Nova Scotia in time for tourist season next year.”
Berger and Hynes are looking to build and grow sales over the next few years. They have started doing more advertising for AOE Games to aid in their efforts. And, of course, at the center of it all is Ian’s memory and legacy through the bursaries.
“Let’s see if we can get ourselves out there for the next few years and see if we can be successful at building it,” said Berger. “At the very least, we get to go back to our roots because we’ll be able to sell enough to maintain the bursaries and our programs.”
Derek Montague is a Huddle reporter in Halifax. Send him your feedback and story ideas: [email protected].