# Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan) - House: RPG publisher - Date: Founded 2011 - Canonical: https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/free-league/ > The Stockholm studio that grew from rescuing two Swedish RPGs in 2011 into a crowdfunding powerhouse behind Tales from the Loop, Forbidden Lands, Mörk Borg, Dragonbane and the second edition of The One Ring. **Why it matters:** Free League carried the Swedish roleplaying tradition to the world, pairing its Year Zero Engine with striking art-led books, and made crowdfunding and licensed worlds, from Middle-earth to Alien, central to the new golden age of tabletop RPGs. ## Quick answers **What is Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan)?** The Stockholm studio that grew from rescuing two Swedish RPGs in 2011 into a crowdfunding powerhouse behind Tales from the Loop, Forbidden Lands, Mörk Borg, Dragonbane and the second edition of The One Ring. **When was Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan) founded?** Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan) was founded in 2011 and is based in Stockholm, Sweden. **Who founded Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan)?** Tomas Härenstam, Nils Karlén, Christian Granath and Kosta Kostulas. **What is Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan) known for?** The One Ring Roleplaying Game and Mörk Borg. **What happened to Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan)?** Independent and active; ENnie Publisher of the Year in 2020, 2021, 2023 and 2024. ## History Free League, in Swedish Fria Ligan, was born from a closure. In 2011 the Stockholm publisher Järnringen wound down, and a group of roleplaying enthusiasts, Tomas Härenstam, Nils Karlén, Christian Granath and Kosta Kostulas, formed a new company in April to take over the science fiction game *Coriolis* and the development of *Svavelvinter*, a fantasy RPG based on Erik Granström's novels. *Svavelvinter* (2012) and the beginners' game *Spelet om Morwhayle* won Swedish game-of-the-year honors, and the small company began publishing books in 2015. Its turning point was a revival. In 2014, under license from Paradox Entertainment, Free League published *Mutant: År Noll* (*Mutant: Year Zero*), a new take on the post-apocalyptic Swedish classic *Mutant* (1984). Its rules, a pool of six-sided dice where sixes succeed and players may "push" a roll at a cost, became the Year Zero Engine that runs most of the company's later games. An English edition, made with Modiphius, won a silver ENnie in 2015. In 2015 Free League took artist Simon Stålenhag's eerie paintings of 1980s Swedish suburbs haunted by giant machines to Kickstarter, as an art book and as the RPG *Tales from the Loop*. The game won five gold ENnies in 2017, including Product of the Year, and Free League went on to publish Stålenhag's books *Things from the Flood* and *The Electric State* as well. A string of crowdfunded hits followed: *Forbidden Lands* (2018), a survival [Sandbox](https://www.lanternhall.org/lexicon/sandbox/) fantasy of hexcrawling and stronghold building; *Coriolis* in English; the *Alien* RPG, Gold ENnie for Best Game in 2020; and *Vaesen* (2020), Nordic folk horror based on Johan Egerkrans's art. In 2018 the new Järnringen merged its dark-fantasy *Symbaroum* into Free League. Its fantasy list grew in 2020. Free League became the worldwide publisher of [Mörk Borg](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/mork-borg/), Pelle Nilsson and Johan Nohr's doom-metal [OSR](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/old-school-renaissance/) game, released on February 25, 2020, which won three gold ENnies that year. On March 9 it announced a new edition of [The One Ring](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/the-one-ring-rpg/), the [Tolkien](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/j-r-r-tolkien/) roleplaying game formerly published by Cubicle 7; designed again by Francesco Nepitello, the second edition appeared in 2022, with *The Lord of the Rings Roleplaying* for D&D fifth-edition rules alongside it. In August 2021 Free League bought *Drakar och Demoner*, Sweden's first roleplaying game (1982), and released a new edition that reached English-language players as *Dragonbane*. *Blade Runner* (2022), *Twilight: 2000*, *The Walking Dead Universe* RPG, *Coriolis: The Great Dark* (2025) and a 2025 Kickstarter for an *Invincible* superhero RPG followed. Between 2015 and 2022 its Kickstarter campaigns raised around 100 million kronor, about $10 million. It won the ENnie for Publisher of the Year in 2020, 2021, 2023 and 2024. ## Notable work *Mutant: Year Zero*, *Tales from the Loop*, *Forbidden Lands*, *Alien*, *Vaesen*, *Mörk Borg*, *The One Ring* second edition, *Dragonbane* and *Blade Runner*. ## Legacy Free League is the defining publisher of the Kickstarter era, showing that a small Scandinavian studio could reach a global audience with art-first books and a flexible house system. It brought Swedish RPG history, from *Mutant* to *Drakar och Demoner*, to English-speaking players, and it gave Middle-earth a home again, more than eighty years after [Allen & Unwin](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/george-allen-and-unwin/) first asked Tolkien for more hobbits. ## Facts - Fria Ligan AB was founded in April 2011 when the Swedish publisher Järnringen wound down, taking over the RPGs Coriolis and Svavelvinter. - Its 2014 Mutant: Year Zero revived the classic 1984 Swedish game Mutant under license from Paradox Entertainment and introduced the Year Zero Engine. - Tales from the Loop, based on Simon Stålenhag's paintings, won five gold ENnies in 2017, including Product of the Year. - Free League published Stålenhag's art books, including The Electric State, as well as its games. - In August 2021 it bought the Drakar och Demoner brand, Sweden's first RPG, and released it in English as Dragonbane. - Its Kickstarter campaigns raised about 100 million Swedish kronor (roughly $10 million) between 2015 and 2022. - It took over The One Ring from Cubicle 7, announcing a new edition in March 2020 and publishing it in 2022. ## Sources and further reading - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_League_Publishing) - [Free League Publishing (official site)](https://freeleaguepublishing.com/) - [Swedish Wikipedia: Fria Ligan](https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fria_Ligan) --- From The Lantern Hall (https://www.lanternhall.org/), a museum of fantasy literature and roleplaying games.