D&D News - Virtual Good / Video Games Bad
It shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who follows Wizards of the Coast that there is a big push towards making the game more online-friendly. The pandemic forced us online if we wanted to keep a campaign going, and we started using resources that many of us had heard of but had yet to use. The popularity of Roll 20 and Fantasy Grounds as VTT exploded, and each has its staunch supporters and detractors. D&D Beyond was already quite popular amongst many of the people I knew, and being stuck at home playing over Discord only broadened its reach.
Seeing this trend, WotC made several moves in 2022 to strengthen its position in this arena. Hasbro and Wizards have made several excellent moves to grow the Dungeons and Dragons brand online. Here are some of the more significant moves that were made last year.
Cynthia Williams named CEO
In February, Cynthia W. Williams was named the new president of Wizards of the Coast and Digital Gaming division. This is one very smart woman, graduating from Western Carolina University with a B.S. in Business Administration Summa Cum Laude and then a Master of Business Administration in Strategy and Finance from Wake Forest University in 1995. While working at Amazon, she developed a system for identifying missing items in a fulfillment network and how to compensate for them, and she holds a patent for the system.
Her experience includes 10+ years in Amazon's finance and fulfillment departments and 12+ years at Altria (a tobacco company) in their finance department. Ms. Williams came over from Microsoft, where she has been a GM and vice president in its Xbox division since 2018. Her last position was General Manager and Vice President of the Gaming Ecosystem Commercial Team. Fancy title, but what does it mean? In a nutshell, she puts all the pieces together. There are the game developers, suppliers, consumers, and all the other technical people I know nothing about involved in the creation, execution, and delivery process. Ms. Williams was responsible for ensuring the system worked, and she did it well. Don't doubt her skills or credibility.
Her arrival couldn't come at a better time for Wizards. Between their existing systems and products, recent purchases, and the explosive growth of Dungeons & Dragons, Ms. Williams has the perfect skill set to grow and expand WotC's footprint in the digital world.
Tim Fields also hired
Hiring Tim Fields as the Senior Vice President and General Manager of Digital Gaming didn't get nearly as much press but is almost as important (and impressive) as hiring Ms. Williams. Mr. Fields will be responsible for everything within the digital gaming realm. This includes all projects being developed in-house and by outside developers, including internal and external development of Wizards' portfolio of story-led projects.
Mr. Fields came over from Kabam Games, where he was the CEO. During his tenure, Kabam saw explosive growth in quality games and revenue. For those who don't know the name Kabam Games, you've probably played or at least heard of one of their games. Kabam's library includes Marvel Contest of Champions & Realm of Champions, Disney Mirrorverse, and Fast and Furious. He's also worked for other big-name developers, including Capcom, Microsoft, and Electronic Arts.
Does this mean D&D is coming to the mobile gaming world? I see Magic the Gathering expanding in this area more than Dungeons & Dragons. Mr. Fields does know how to grow video game brands, so it will be interesting to see how this plays out. We'll also see how Mr. Fields has already had a significant impact in his role later in the article.
WotC acquires D&D Beyond.
Just because Wizards is making a big push into the digital world doesn't mean they have the infrastructure to make an immediate dramatic impact. So what could they do to make a quick splash? They went out and purchased D&D Beyond from Fandom for $146M. (I had predicted this on our podcast…just saying.) This move made sense since they had been partnering with Fandom for many years, and the platform is incredibly popular, with over 10 million users.
Adding game developers
Wizards of the Coast added to their game studio portfolio in 2022, opening Skeleton Key Studios. It is run by Christian Dailey, who joined the company as Vice President and Head of Studio. He came over from BioWare and was the executive producer for the Dragon Age franchise. He's also worked on projects at Electronic Arts and Blizzard Entertainment, so he's definitely got the background and experience to lead the new studio.
Skeleton Key Studios was just the latest in a stable of game developers under the Wizards umbrella. They join Archetype Entertainment, Atomic Arcade, Tuque Games (creators of Dark Alliance), and two studios in Washington State. They all boast impressive talent, with developers coming over from BioWare, EA, Naughty Dog, and 343 Industries. The studios were working on a variety of gaming projects until…
WotC cancels 5 video games in development.
Wait, what? We've talked about how Wizards is making this massive push in the digital realm, and now you tell us they are canceling 5 big projects? It sure doesn't sound like they are. Well, let's take a second and look at these moves objectively. First, this had no effect on Baldur's Gate 3, arguably the biggest D&D video game release in years. Second, any time there is a change in leadership, priorities change. The internal studios won't close up the shop because they are no longer working on the now-canceled projects. (It could, however, spell disaster for those external studios whose projects were canceled). They will start to work on new projects, more in line with the new management's vision. Given the lukewarm success of most of the previous D&D video games, trying to flood the market with such products was risky at best.
Wizard's digital future
So what can we expect moving forward? I don't have a crystal ball, but there are some clues as to what may be on the horizon. Last week, Ms. Williams reportedly focused on growing Dungeons & Dragons through "the recurrent spending you see in digital games." She says Dungeons & Dragons is currently "under-monetized," mainly because players do not have to invest the same amount in resources as a DM.* The question then becomes how to make money in the digital world.
We all saw the flashy new One D&D VTT when it was announced. I'm willing to bet Wizards will create a vast marketplace to purchase tokens, maps, and official adventures. I can also see them making a market for various equipment and skins, similar to what currently exists in DotA, Fortnite, and other similar games. These free-to-download games thrive because of the money they generate through such sales. You can be sure Wizards will make some attempt to capitalize on your burning desire to have your character strut around in a suit of shiny plate mail.
Finally, it could be possible that the canceled video game projects are being replaced with studios transforming existing adventures, such as Curse of Strahd, into a new playable format for their new VTT. Imagine an online campaign with top-notch graphics instead of maps that don't line up and blurry tokens (looking at you, Roll20). What if there was lighting that worked and was user-friendly or spooky sound effects when heading into a dungeon? How about cutscenes? Instead of the DM reading the descriptive text or trying to use a scary voice when Strahd appears, the adventure provides it for us via a 30-second scene. None of these are out of the realm of possibilities.
There's a growing chorus of people who hate anything and everything that Wizards of the Coast does these days. I say ignore that noise. Creation takes time, and change comes slowly, so have patience and let's see what happens.
*As I was writing this, the new OGL 1.1 was leaked. This quote sounds so much worse now than it did last week.
*Updated - corrected educational background
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