Joyride Entertainment, a divisionof the RC2 Corporation (see 'RC2 Forms TCG Division'), has announced a licensing agreement with FUNimation Productions for the Fullmetal Alchemist Trading Card Game. 

Created by award-winning game designer Ian Ryan, the Fullmetal Alchemist TCG, which is scheduled for release in August, will focus on teams of heroes looking for the fabled Philosopher's Stone, which can boost alchemist's powers to unheard of levels. 

The game's quest parallels that of the popular Fullmetal Alchemist anime series, which is airing on the Cartoon Network's Toonami block at 11:30 pm (ET, PT) on Saturday nights (with an encore showing on Thursday nights).  Joyride plans to conduct a comprehensive marketing campaign to get the FMATCG established in what has become a crowded marketplace for anime-based card games.  Joyride will also sponsor dedicated tournaments and leagues for the Fullmetal Alchemist game.

Fullmetal Alchemist is one of the most popular properties in Japan, where over 13 million FMA manga volumes have been sold and characters from the FMA anime are near the top in popularity in poll after poll of dedicated fans. In the U.S. the property, which is already big with hardcore anime fans, is starting to find a wider audience thanks to its Cartoon Network exposure and more and more FMA merchandise will hit the market during 2005.  Viz plans to publish English language Fullmetal Alchemist manga (and a FMA art book) later this year (see 'Viz Plans Full Metal Alchemist Manga'), FUNimation has already begun releasing FMA DVDs, Artbox has trading cards and figures (see 'Artbox Gets Fullmetal Alchemist'), and Diamond is importing figures (see 'Diamond Imports Fullmetal Alchemist Action Figures').