"Tabletop D&D Has Lost Its Way" Says Pathfinder Video Game Exec

Feargus Urquhart, one of the execs from Obsidian Entertainment, which is behind an upcoming Pathfinder-themed video game, told Polygon why the company chose to go with Paizo rather than WotC for tabletop fantasy inspired games. "One of the reasons we actually went with Pathfinder was ... how do you say it? I'll just say it: We were having a hard time figuring out how to move forward with Dungeons and Dragons." The issue, he says, is that "D&D is a part of Wizards of the Coast and WotC is a part of Hasbro" and that he would "love to see D&D be bought by someone and become what it was before... Become TSR again."

Of course, TSR went bankrupt, so I'm not sure wishing that on somebody is a kindness.

Urquhart is a long-time D&D video game exec, having worked on games like Neverwinter Nights 2; he points out that "I'm probably one of the people who has one of the most electronic D&D games that they've worked on". Now, of course, his company has moved on to Paizo's Pathfinder.

The upcoming Obsidian video games will be based on the Pathfinder games - specifically a tablet game based on the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game, due in the next few months. The studio is, of course, known to tabletop RPG fans for D&D games like Neverwinter Nights 2. Urquhart did hint at non-card-game based projects, saying that "We're thinking about how can we take traditional RPG stuff and put it on the tablet. No one has solved it really."

You can read the short interview here.

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[variant]

As a general rule anyone who wants TSR back can be safely ignored. As can anyone working for/with someone's competition. That's two strikes.

TSR licensed to anyone for anything at probably a very low price. That's how we ended up with the Dungeons & Dragons movies. It is only by luck that Interplay licensed the D&D games.

 

[nofax1]

To summarize: D&D is great but Hasbro is impossible to deal with.

 

[Eejit]

To summarize: D&D is great but Hasbro is impossible to deal with.

That's not a good summary.

 

[nofax1]

I beg to differ. I could go into more detail summarizing a quote a few sentences long but then it wouldn't be a summary anymore.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

He's right. I think that Monopoly has lost its' way. How many versions can you have? There's one for the Walking Dead, one for my alma mater, one for Star Wars, the list goes on and on. It gets stale and rehashed endlessly. And when will we see the character classes expanded? How many times do I have to be faced with the tired old choices of Top Hat, Scotty Dog or Race Car? I'm glad that recent versions have returned more power to the Banker but frankly I think that the rules are too tactical and less oriented to role play than they were before.

 

[nofax1]

He's right. I think that Monopoly has lost its' way. How many versions can you have? There's one for the Walking Dead, one for my alma mater, one for Star Wars, the list goes on and on. It gets stale and rehashed endlessly. And when will we see the character classes expanded? How many times do I have to be faced with the tired old choices of Top Hat, Scotty Dog or Race Car? I'm glad that recent versions have returned more power to the Banker but frankly I think that the rules are too tactical and less oriented to role play than they were before.

/like

 

[Carl H]

At this point I think most of Mearls goodwill comes from a group that hasn't bought D&D other than core rules since TSR were a thing.

Admittedly I am in this group.

 

[DM Howard]

Are we talking about WotC now, or are we talking about Games Workshop?

Jokes aside, I think that it is what it is. Someone will want to make a D&D video game at some point and it will be Obsidian's loss regardless of whether they could get the license or not.

 

[DMZ2112]

To summarize: D&D is great but Hasbro is impossible to deal with.

That's not a good summary.

No, it totally is. It's all the article deserves. Urquhart isn't saying "D&D sucks," he's saying "Hasbro sucks for D&D." The article is poorly written clickbait.

At this point I think most of Mearls goodwill comes from a group that hasn't bought D&D other than core rules since TSR were a thing.

I'm not sure what this means. His goodwill comes from customers? I think that's probably apt, yes.

He was identified with 4e, pissing off most of the Pathfinder fans. And he also made jokes about shouting hands back on and other anti-4e edition war nonsense in the runup to 5e.

In a nutshell, this is why I asked him at Gen Con to write his memoirs someday. He has had a career at Wizards spanning some wild changes and about-faces, and I would love to get an insider's take on them.

 

[Sailor Moon]

I think where Paizo's success lays is the fact that they aren't actively trying to be number 1. If their online game isn't rocking the number 1 spot then I don't think they really care. If it reaches number 1 then that's fantastic, if not then that's okay as long as we aren't losing any money.

Someone mentioned earlier about Hasbro being "all or nothing" and I think they are spot on. Paizo isn't about dominating the market, they are about giving their customers what they want.