Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Alphastream - Why No RPG Company Truly Competes with Wizards of the Coast
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="teitan" data-source="post: 8482951" data-attributes="member: 3457"><p>The Renegade studios games are standard licensing affairs. Renegade wanted to make games based on those toy lines, Hasbro said ok, here are our lawyers, work with them. </p><p></p><p>Those video games were popular but hardly house hold names. The re-releases didn't exactly light the video game world on fire a couple years ago and they are just the names of cities. With video games, unless it was a Phenom like Mario, Tomb Raider, Sonic or the like is it really a household name like Captain America? Not really. Just having a video game that was popular, especially a PC game in the day when PCs, especially gaming PCs, were still incredibly expensive to get into, isn't enough. </p><p></p><p>You're right, being a well known property takes more than being a well known property to make a hit movie. That was exactly my whole point. The problem with the Conan movie was multitude. Let's start with the first: it wasn't Arnold. It was nothing like the Arnold movie, of which only the first was a well regarded hit. The second stunk the place up like the turd that it is. Before the movie came out there had been hints of Arnie returning to finish the story, which had been appropriated for the Kull movie with Kevin Sorbo a few years before. So it was hampered. Secondly it was after a long dormant period of Conan where the last thing we saw in pop culture was, aside from the Dark Horse comics, a poorly received John Carter mash up toyline and the weak Ralph Moeller TV series. The Dark Horse comics started off very good but were limited to comic book shops and therefore not in front of the casual readers who may pick them up off the comic rack at a pharmacy or grocery store. While Europe has a different model for comics and graphic novels, the European market at the time was different as well. Comic books, especially in America, are not a guarantee of anything, especially in the market of that time, unless the monthly is successful enough to get a trade published and on the shelf and that doesn't promise a thing. There was the D20 RPG from Mongoose and then the Conan RPG they did without D20 but all that faded. The last bit that was an issue with the movie was... Momoa. He was coming off GoT sure, he was cast off the strength of that role. People went expecting Khal Drogo. They got... Aquaman.</p><p></p><p> But it was the beginning of a marketing blitz for Conan, also a bad idea. I would say that Conan, now, is in a much healthier place for a modest movie than he was when the Momoa movie came out. </p><p></p><p>WHat the cartoon has that could be used is nostlagia. WHat's hot right now? Again? Masters of the Universe. Transformers is poised to come back again in a Bumblebee sequel that will make use of Beast Wars characters. GI Joe toys are hot, hard to find, and in demand. Reviving the animated series with a toyline and a new series or movie that ties into the toyline by LJN more strongly, especially since WOTC/Hasbro have shown interest in the IP in that way with Witchlight, would have been great business. I think this new D&D movie will be big, don't get me wrong, and it will set up for sequels, but it won't get Marvel. Marvel is lightning in a bottle that no one has managed to recreate in multiple attempts and only The Conjuring has made some sort of success, without the crossover, and Godzilla/Kong has truly pulled off, and that after all but being pronounced dead when the pay off film was released and still might be.</p><p></p><p>I think you're more fanfictioning what you would like to see than what is possible. The only thing that makes Ravenloft unique IS the lore. Strahd is 100% Dracula with D&D trappings. We have several movies and TV shows that are contemporary or within the last 20 years that are recent enough that looking at Ravenloft people would see "rip off" and see the latest actual rip off. We have Castlevania, Van Helsing, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, The Witcher, Solomon Kane, Seventh Sun, Last Witch Hunter. All but the last would look visually similar to Ravenloft and thematically similar. Strahd is the entry point so we've now entered... Castlevania and Jackman's Van Helsing. </p><p></p><p>The settings that I think would work best at movies are Forgotten Realms, Sword Coast, for the very recognition you do call out, the underdark for a sequel and then to the Planes in the third with Planescape as a bridge concept to tie the movies together, like I said, but no crossovers. The a Dark Sun film could work and Eberron. Each is different from the other with little crossing over in ideas and concepts. Visually they stand out from each other and from other properties while still saying D&D. I think concepts like Spelljammer may be too esoteric.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="teitan, post: 8482951, member: 3457"] The Renegade studios games are standard licensing affairs. Renegade wanted to make games based on those toy lines, Hasbro said ok, here are our lawyers, work with them. Those video games were popular but hardly house hold names. The re-releases didn't exactly light the video game world on fire a couple years ago and they are just the names of cities. With video games, unless it was a Phenom like Mario, Tomb Raider, Sonic or the like is it really a household name like Captain America? Not really. Just having a video game that was popular, especially a PC game in the day when PCs, especially gaming PCs, were still incredibly expensive to get into, isn't enough. You're right, being a well known property takes more than being a well known property to make a hit movie. That was exactly my whole point. The problem with the Conan movie was multitude. Let's start with the first: it wasn't Arnold. It was nothing like the Arnold movie, of which only the first was a well regarded hit. The second stunk the place up like the turd that it is. Before the movie came out there had been hints of Arnie returning to finish the story, which had been appropriated for the Kull movie with Kevin Sorbo a few years before. So it was hampered. Secondly it was after a long dormant period of Conan where the last thing we saw in pop culture was, aside from the Dark Horse comics, a poorly received John Carter mash up toyline and the weak Ralph Moeller TV series. The Dark Horse comics started off very good but were limited to comic book shops and therefore not in front of the casual readers who may pick them up off the comic rack at a pharmacy or grocery store. While Europe has a different model for comics and graphic novels, the European market at the time was different as well. Comic books, especially in America, are not a guarantee of anything, especially in the market of that time, unless the monthly is successful enough to get a trade published and on the shelf and that doesn't promise a thing. There was the D20 RPG from Mongoose and then the Conan RPG they did without D20 but all that faded. The last bit that was an issue with the movie was... Momoa. He was coming off GoT sure, he was cast off the strength of that role. People went expecting Khal Drogo. They got... Aquaman. But it was the beginning of a marketing blitz for Conan, also a bad idea. I would say that Conan, now, is in a much healthier place for a modest movie than he was when the Momoa movie came out. WHat the cartoon has that could be used is nostlagia. WHat's hot right now? Again? Masters of the Universe. Transformers is poised to come back again in a Bumblebee sequel that will make use of Beast Wars characters. GI Joe toys are hot, hard to find, and in demand. Reviving the animated series with a toyline and a new series or movie that ties into the toyline by LJN more strongly, especially since WOTC/Hasbro have shown interest in the IP in that way with Witchlight, would have been great business. I think this new D&D movie will be big, don't get me wrong, and it will set up for sequels, but it won't get Marvel. Marvel is lightning in a bottle that no one has managed to recreate in multiple attempts and only The Conjuring has made some sort of success, without the crossover, and Godzilla/Kong has truly pulled off, and that after all but being pronounced dead when the pay off film was released and still might be. I think you're more fanfictioning what you would like to see than what is possible. The only thing that makes Ravenloft unique IS the lore. Strahd is 100% Dracula with D&D trappings. We have several movies and TV shows that are contemporary or within the last 20 years that are recent enough that looking at Ravenloft people would see "rip off" and see the latest actual rip off. We have Castlevania, Van Helsing, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, The Witcher, Solomon Kane, Seventh Sun, Last Witch Hunter. All but the last would look visually similar to Ravenloft and thematically similar. Strahd is the entry point so we've now entered... Castlevania and Jackman's Van Helsing. The settings that I think would work best at movies are Forgotten Realms, Sword Coast, for the very recognition you do call out, the underdark for a sequel and then to the Planes in the third with Planescape as a bridge concept to tie the movies together, like I said, but no crossovers. The a Dark Sun film could work and Eberron. Each is different from the other with little crossing over in ideas and concepts. Visually they stand out from each other and from other properties while still saying D&D. I think concepts like Spelljammer may be too esoteric. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Alphastream - Why No RPG Company Truly Competes with Wizards of the Coast
Top