Hasbro and Zynga announced today that they have entered into a global partnership. With this license, Hasbro will be making a variety of toys and board games using Zynga’s brands, with the first products expected to be released in the coming Fall. There will also be co-branded merchandise.

“It’s exciting to partner with Hasbro as we share a common vision for play and a mission to connect the world through games,” said Zynga CEO Mark Pincus in a statement–funny, since much of Zynga’s success has come from Words With Friends, a game that incorporated changes to scoring, a heavy social aspect and other differences in part to avoid similarities to Hasbro’s venerable game Scrabble. Brian Goldner, CEO of Hasbro, said in today’s press release: “Hasbro is thrilled to have the opportunity to bring Zynga’s immensely popular social games to life.”

Zynga’s social games have 227 million monthly active users, with 14.9 million monthly active users on Words With Friends alone. Hasbro is counting on that sizeable group to make these new products successful. And the possibilities inherent in this partnership are almost staggering: Words With Friends the board game, Lego-esque FarmVille playsets, Zynga Poker card game sets, CastleVille the RPG from the Dungeons and Dragons creators, and even MafiaWars action figures.

[Image: Flickr user Warren]

Originally published by Fast Company.