Import Export: Abalone Games

Tuesday, 22 January 2013

Abalone Games

In 1988 Michel Lalet and Lauren Levi created Abalone. The idea for the game came when the two animation coordinators ran into the son of a French ambassador who was tired of following his father around on business trips. Lalet and Levi decided to help the bored youth, and so the idea of Abalone was conceived. Levi and Lalet tried to get publishers back their game. However, they remained unsuccessful until a special "encounter" with Andre Jarno, the founder of Financial French Union Bank. Jarno, who happened to be the neighbor of Levi's family, decided to invest in and market Abalone. The Abalone Company was formed on January 29, 1988 with the goal of marketing Abalone, which had just won the Boulogne-Bllancourt game creator contest. In September of the same year Abalone was officially launched. In 1998, Abalone took home the prestigious honor of "Game of the Decade" at the "Festival international des jeux."