D&D (2024) PC Gamer: It's clear Hasbro, the custodians of D&D, have no idea what to do with Baldur's Gate 3's success

[Henadic Theologian]

It's clear Hasbro, the custodians of D&D, have no idea what to do with Baldur's Gate 3's success—but that's nothing new, it's spent the past 10 years fumbling the bag

The instant collapse of Sigil is just the latest in a long line of missed opportunities and self-inflicted wounds.

www.pcgamer.com

Shots Fired!!!

Thoughts?

 

[payn]

Yeap, not exactly breaking news. Well, besides my heart anyways.

 

[Stormonu]

You never quite know what is going to succeed or fail ahead of time. I seem to remember when Baldur Gate 3 was in beta or pre-release there were a lot of folks unhappy with the state of it. Way back ago, they did release Descent In Avernus to be put out around the time the game was being developed, but that's about it - and it didn't have a great impact as less than 1% of DIA has anything to do with BG3.

Besides, the design team usually already has their line planned out for a year or more in advance. Doing a quick heel-turn to pounce on something that does become a success like BG3 isn't something they'd be able to do without it seeming half-arsed. And by the time they do get to it, the fire's already died down.

D&D releases tied to video games and like has always been pretty bare/awful. If the game gets delayed or is awful, tying in D&D game products to come out at the same time isn't easy. Pool of Radiance and Azure Bonds got one book apiece, some time after the games had been out. Same for the Myth Drannor Pool of Radiance Game. As I recall Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 got one book named after both games. Icewind Dale - got nothing. Neither did Neverwinter, as I recall.

 

[Scribe]

Thoughts?

I think the article says it pretty much perfectly.

I don't mean to paint a picture of complete failure here—D&D is by far still the most popular tabletop game, and I don't see that changing any time soon—but the truth is, Hasbro's comical fumbling with Baldur's Gate 3 isn't some new, weird behaviour. It's the norm. This is a company that, from an outsider's perspective, barely understands its own product, doesn't really care to, and is growing increasingly impatient with its inability to turn it into a Magic: The Gathering.

 

[wicked cool]

It’s funny how we criticize Wotc and yet Bg3 is kind of the anomaly. I did a search early today on the best RPGs similar to Bg3 and similar to dragon age.
Multiple articles and Reddit posts all came up with a list over the years and some of the titles are 10+ years old like Planescape and Skyrim
BioWare had multiple titles on the list and BioWare blew it with basically 3 failures in a row

Larian was on the verge of going under prior to Bg3

I’m not seeing these huge successes from most company’s out there?

I’m also not seeing anyone tell the full story on the Larian wotc split

 

[Umbran]

It’s funny how we criticize Wotc and yet Bg3 is kind of the anomaly.

Yes. The element missing from the analysis is that videogame development is notorious for being a huge crapshoot, and that success is not generally repeatable.

 

[MothMayI]

PC Gamer is a trash rag that panders to the kind of people who approve of a game that released in the same sort of state that Sigil did—just because that game actively catered to angry straight white men who want anyone not like them to be written as monsters or subhuman.

Ironically, pandering to the same people is what killed 2024 5e, because TTRPGs became a place more welcoming to diverse players at the same time GamerGate was turning video games into an alt-right cult. The people who stan Larian do so because they want non-white races to exist as innately evil, and the 2024 approach of "pretend we're moving away from that (and then give them non-white elves to slaughter in the first major release)" peeved such people off.

 

[sevenbastard]

I think part of project Sigil was an attempt to capitalize on BG3 by building a 3D online way to play D&D. Obviously they wasted a bunch of money but I think they were trying.

 

[MarkB]

I don't think there's anything particularly wrong with WotC / Hasbro not having done more to tie into BG3 in the time leading up to its release. Its success was far greater than anticipated, with many thinking it'd be buried under Starfield's much-hyped release, so going all-in on it would have been foolish.

And while they could certainly have done more to capitalise on that success in its wake, they were very much tied in to some important projects of their own at that point, what with that whole updated ruleset thing coming out the next year. That didn't leave much space for other projects.

 

[SteveC]

I think this piece is pretty much spot on. WotC appeared to have a plan for the continued development of 5.5E after the books launched, but with Sigil sunsetting, that "walled garden" approach to monetizing the game for online play and drawing the big third-party publishers in ... leaves out the fact that they don't have the platform for people to play in.

I was loudly told that the 5.5E PHB was the best-selling book at launch ever, but I noticed it was not mentioned by Hasbro in their next report, so that likely means it's cooled. I think it will be really interesting to see what, if anything, they do from here. There may be a big tie-in with Stranger Things in November (I think that's when it's due...) and that would nicely combine with the Christmas season, so we'll see.

My group is likely to finish up the game we're playing now, but no one seems excited about picking up the new Edition, so I'm floating a ton of other games to see if one will interest people. It's a really exciting "best of times, worst of times," environment where I don't think anyone knows what's happening to the industry next. I just hope for some fun and new gaming experiences.