How to learn the rules of baseball by playing outside of a field: you can watch tutorials online, but you can also practice through a board game. Raphael MOREAU, a baseball enthusiast, created Pitch’n Run from scratch. Baseball TV France met up with him to discover the adventure of creating a game and its future distribution journey within the French baseball community.
BTVF: Who are you, Raphael MOREAU, and how did baseball enter your life?
I’m 44 years old and passionate about baseball. I started with the Ocean Cubs in La Rochelle in 1994. What incredible luck to have a baseball club near home in the 1990s. I played a few seasons before taking a long break when I entered the professional hotel industry. Throughout those years, I continued to follow baseball passionately. I returned to the field in 2015 with the Templiers de Senart, first as a player and then as a coach for a senior team.
BTVF: How did you become the creator of the Pitch’n Run game?
I got closer to the world of board games during the lockdown thanks to friends who introduced me to original games with different mechanics than what I was used to. In 2023, I discovered a flicking game, and from there, the idea of using the flicking mechanism for baseball started to take shape. I made sketches, tried to develop a mechanism based on the pitcher/batter confrontation. I got a full-sized board and started drawing on it. I did a first test with my sons, and it worked quite well.
I perfected it and then wanted to have other people test it—my colleagues at work during my breaks and my teammates at my baseball club after practice. The enthusiasm was immediate. The game was an instant hit. Over the weeks, thanks to feedback from those who tested the game early, I made modifications and added new mechanics. Then, meeting Clément, a designer friend, at the end of 2023, significantly accelerated the project! He put his expertise at the service of my ideas. The game had truly taken shape. This project has progressed so well, with so many people contributing and sharing my enthusiasm, that I decided to make it concrete and contact a board game manufacturer to get a quote for full production. I hope to raise the necessary funds through the Ulule platform to start production and market the game.
BTVF: Can you explain the principle of the game and its features?
The main feature of the game lies in the pitcher/batter confrontation. Part of the game mat is dedicated to this showdown, with a real face-off between the pitcher and batter in the strike zone. The principle is that the pitcher sends their ball token into their strike zone, and the batter must return the ball token into the same zone in front of them. If they succeed, they can move onto the field and send their ball token, as if hitting a real ball. Depending on where it lands, the pitcher becomes a defender and can try to eliminate the batter by sending their ball token into the glove. That’s really the basics. Later, you can apply different rules from the expert mode if you’re more experienced, like the double play or stolen base. The game can be played 1 vs. 1, 2 vs. 2, or in teams, or even as a tournament, or while waiting out a rain delay during a match!
BTVF: You’ve just launched a crowdfunding campaign for the production and marketing of the game. Can you explain the process?
The campaign will allow me to launch the production of the first 500 copies of the game and thus realize this project. Every contribution counts: you can make a donation without any reward or pre-order the game with preferential offers (-10% off the public price or a pack with a branded ball). The Ulule fundraiser will be unlocked if the minimum amount of €6,000 is reached within a maximum of 45 days (campaign ends on June 10). I therefore need the full support of the French baseball community to carry out this project. If the goal is met, production will begin in the coming months, and pre-orders will be fulfilled by the end of the year. Otherwise, donors will be refunded.
BTVF: Do you need to know the rules of baseball before playing, or is this a good way to learn them?
PITCH N’ RUN allows people who don’t know the rules of baseball to understand them very quickly. It can serve as a teaching tool for beginners, either in schools by sports teachers or in clubs to introduce newcomers. Baseball fans and players will find the basic rules of the sport and can even go further by switching to expert mode, adding more advanced rules that require some dexterity. The idea of the project was precisely to make baseball accessible to everyone, promoting it further in France.
BTVF: If everything goes well and we reserve a game, when will we be delivered?
The campaign will end on June 10. If everything goes well and we reach €6,000 by that date, production can begin, and everyone who pre-ordered will be delivered in November 2025, just before Christmas!
BTVF: What can we wish you?
First, that the campaign succeeds and then, once the game is marketed, that it meets with success and helps promote baseball in France. And then, that it can be exported beyond France! It’s quite a bold bet, but you have to dream big.
Thank you, Baseball TV France, for contacting me to talk about PITCH N’ RUN. I am very proud to present this project that has been close to my heart for nearly two years. I am very supported by my loved ones and friends on this project. Their support is relentless. If the game can be published, it’s also thanks to these people. Thank you again to all of you.
Instagram @pitchnrun_unde
