Biggest Franchises Without an RPG

[Dannyalcatraz]

I would totally buy a Car Wars: Top Gear RPG.

 

[darjr]

wool by Hugh Howey would be a neat rpg. about the pcs living in a silo post apoc. like that other silo game without the high tech scifi war gear and gonzo mutants. he has a liberal fan fic policy as well, there are a few good ones for sale with Hugh's blessing, I guess he's fine with anyone giving it a shot. I'll bet an rpg could count, though an rpg might want to include actual primary content.

 

[Henry]

Pokemon, though ... there's one I thought we would see a game for back in the 90's and it never happened.

The was a Pokemon RPG:
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1625/pokemon-jr-adventure-game-pokemon-emergency

It just never got fully developed, only a starter game.

 

[Andor]

The was a Pokemon RPG:
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1625/pokemon-jr-adventure-game-pokemon-emergency

It just never got fully developed, only a starter game.

There was also Cute and Fuzzy Cockfighting Seizure Monsters which was Pokemon in all but name.

For a lot of these any modern day RPG will do. For the Bond/Bourne stuff Spycraft was tailored for exactly that genre.

Honestly IMHO liscensed RPGs never really pan out. The biggest reason for that is that the Protagonists most important power, I.E. The Plot, is never actually available to the PCs who expect to have free will and are probably going to snipe your big bad in the middle of his introductory monologue anyway.

 

[Lord_Blacksteel]

The was a Pokemon RPG:
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1625/pokemon-jr-adventure-game-pokemon-emergency

It just never got fully developed, only a starter game.

Yeah I was under the impression that wasn't very complete, more of an intro set than anything else. I have a City of Heroes tabletop starter RPG sitting on my shelf too and it's not enough to run a campaign. Given the success of the cards and the video games back then (and still, to a degree) it seems like one of the bigger misses of the 90's.

There was also Cute and Fuzzy Cockfighting Seizure Monsters which was Pokemon in all but name.

There are a lot of serial-numbers-filed-off games out there, from Mekton to Starships and Spacemen. We have those types of games at least when the license option never materializes.

 

[Lord_Blacksteel]

I bet they won't make anything like as much money with Firefly than they would have with Marvel Heroic though.

The so-called 'Big Six' licenses, according to RPG historian Shannon Appelcline, are:

Lord of the Rings
Harry Potter
Star Wars
Star Trek
Marvel
DC Comics

Harry Potter won't be happening any time soon due to JK Rowling's aversion to the rpg hobby (she famously tried to deny that she was a fantasy writer, as she thought it was embarrassing to her social circles, so she must view RPGs as the Antichrist of good taste...).

The rest have been taken up by various companies over the years. Personally I would add Doctor Who to that list these days, and maybe Game of Thrones as both are phenomenally successful TV franchises currently.

I really don't know what else to add to the list that truly qualifies as being as big. Avatar could be, I suppose, if it grinds out a few sequels. Top Gear (wherein you play reactionary, politically incorrect, middle aged men who have a puerile fascination for fast cars and hate the environment).

I'm not sure how Harry Potter could be a "Big Six" RPG license when it's never been a game? I agree on Doctor Who though, and it seems as though Warhammer 40,000 does pretty well as a licensed RPG.

Skylanders might make for an interesting license if someone could get it. It's approaching Pokemon levels of want/need amongst the tween set.

 

[TrippyHippy]

I'm not sure how Harry Potter could be a "Big Six" RPG license when it's never been a game? I agree on Doctor Who though, and it seems as though Warhammer 40,000 does pretty well as a licensed RPG.

In terms of marketing potential it's a top license. Indeed, one prominent game company owner pointed out that they could 'make a fortune' if they could obtain the Harry Potter license and start producing 'Choose Your Own Adventure' style books out of them....but they failed to get a license. I can't stand it, personally, but Harry Potter is the biggest selling book series of all time - a huge potential market.

 

[Lord_Blacksteel]

In terms of marketing potential it's a top license. Indeed, one prominent game company owner pointed out that they could 'make a fortune' if they could obtain the Harry Potter license and start producing 'Choose Your Own Adventure' style books out of them....but they failed to get a license. I can't stand it, personally, but Harry Potter is the biggest selling book series of all time - a huge potential market.

I'm pretty sure MWP thought Marvel was going to be a huge seller too - how did that work out for them? The Star Trek RPG's haven't set the world on fire since the 80's. LOTR hasn't been a barn-burner of a game either. I get that they're all big media properties, I'm just not sure that automatically translates to being big RPG's in sales or general popularity.

 

[dm4hire]

I think it worked out for MWP pretty well from the popularity of the Cortex system it used, as well as the the price point to get into the game. Marvel's problem is Marvel. They have never kept a license for an extreme long term with anyone in the past with maybe the exception of one company. If anything I think the pulling of the license was probably a regroup tactic by Disney, meaning I think Disney had Marvel pull the renewal of the license in order to do a re-evaluation of the value of the IP and then most likely shift it to a company under the Disney family umbrela.

 

[FlareStorm]

Seems like almost any license could make at least a little money if you started out with just pdfs, or had a core system to build from, or let hardcore fans/rpgers write them. The licenses just expire so quickly, and people switch fandoms so quickly. They are competing with Netflix and Wikipedia.

It would be interesting if they could license out to two different companies at the same time. Let them compete. Survival of the fittest.