It’s that time of year again where Breakout try to pay back to the community. The two charity days we hold each year are really important to Breakout and who we are, because we’re aware we wouldn’t be here without the people of the cities we’re based in.

We held our first charity day in April 2015 at our flagship Manchester branch and each time we’ve done one since it’s got bigger and bigger, and now involves the sales of all of our rooms becoming charitable donations and a way of getting local charities actively involved in what we do. And by all our rooms we mean at all four cities, so that’s Manchester, Liverpool, Cardiff and Chester all trying to help in the small way we can. In 2016 we raised over £6000 with our charity days and we strive to smash that target this year as well.

We dedicate certain rooms to the different charities, and then any sales during the day time from that game become donations for them. In the evenings we tend to give these games to the charities themselves to do with as they will. Some sell them on to members and patrons, others get sponsorship for their service users to play and some even raffle their games off. It is completely free for them to do as they will.

Selecting our charities is a careful process, there are some that are just close to our hearts and others that we find from the local area (as much as possible).

This time around the charities we’re working with are:

Barnardo’s, Zoe’s Place and Clatterbridge Cancer Trust

Barnardo's is a charity working to improve the lives of vulnerable children and young people. They provide services to aid these children, but also work hard to campaign for positive change and conduct research in the area. They work to help every child achieve their full potential despite whatever has lead to Barnardo’s intervention with them, be that poverty, disability, domestic abuse or sexual exploitation.

Clatterbridge Cancer Centre is a Liverpool based hospital providing specialist cancer treatments to people from the Merseyside and Cheshire areas. They deal with over 30,000 patients a year across their ten sites, which provide pioneering chemotherapy, radiotherapy and proton therapy treatments. As well as providing specialist treatments the Clatterbridge also fund vital research in the area.

Zoe's Place provide palliative, respite and end-of-life care to infants from birth to 5 years who are suffering from a life-limiting disease or something that they may not recover from. Zoe's Place strive to provide a safe home-from-home environment for their patients and their families.

Between now and the date we’ll release on twitter which games support which charities, but all of them are fantastic causes so there really is no better time to play than our charity day!