WotC Brand New D&D Video Game from WotC's New Acquisition Tuque Games

Tuque Games has announced it's working on a brand new D&/D video game. "We're developing a brand-new game based in the widely celebrated, enduring, and immensely popular Dungeons & Dragons universe. This yet to be announced title is steepled in classic D&D lore. We aspire to push this game to new heights for the genre. It’s an honour and a privilege to begin a new chapter for Dungeons & Dragons video games."

Not only that, but the company has been purchased by WotC! The press release went out earlier today:

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RENTON, Wash., Oct. 29, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Wizards of the Coast, a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. (NASDAQ: HAS), today announced that it has acquired Tuque Games, a digital game development studio based in Montreal. Tuque is led by veterans of the game industry with experience working for leading publishers. Tuque will continue the development of games for Wizards of the Coast's best-known brands, beginning with Dungeons & Dragons.

"At Wizards, we're continuing our commitment to creating new ways to bring our fan favorite brands to life," said Chris Cocks, President, Wizards of the Coast. "Our unique approach of connecting fans around the tabletop as well as through our expanding portfolio of digital games is redefining what it means to be a games company."

Founded in 2012 by Jeff Hattem, Tuque Games released their first title, Livelock, to critical acclaim in 2016. Now with over 55 full-time employees, Tuque will focus on the development of digital games based on the popular Dungeons & Dragons franchise.

"Tuque is thrilled to have the opportunity to be part of the Wizards of the Coast team," said Jeff Hattem, Founder, Tuque Games. "By working more closely together, we can accelerate our joint vision and bring to life new games, characters and worlds in Wizards of the Coast's roster of franchises."

"In Tuque, we believe we have found a unique partner that pairs the nimbleness of an indie studio with the veteran leadership and scale required to deliver complex AAA games for our largest franchises," said David Schwartz, VP of Digital Publishing, Wizards of the Coast. "We are excited to bring Jeff and the Tuque team to the Wizards of the Coast family, which we believe will allow us to continue to meet the needs of our fans while enabling us to scale our digital games development capabilities even faster."

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It seems there's a bit of a D&D video game renaissance going on. Baldur's Gate 3 is coming, as is Solasta: Crown of the Magister.

 

[Myzzrym]

Eeeeeh I'd say give them the benefit of the doubt folks! As part of the Solasta team we're always happy to see more D&D games popping up, it's great to hear that D&D is getting back on the video game scene

 

[Dausuul]

Quite recently they rejected Obsidian and Beamdog who wanted to make D&D games (particularly BG3). Bioware also rejected WotC long ago, because they felt WotC were unreasonable, and they could make their own IP more successfully (which proved to be correct - Dragon Age has been very successful whilst D&D games have been very unsuccessful, in the last decade or so).

Every word of this makes me sad. (Well, except the part where Dragon Age was successful. Those were some awesome games.)

 

[Dausuul]

Eeeeeh I'd say give them the benefit of the doubt folks! As part of the Solasta team we're always happy to see more D&D games popping up, it's great to hear that D&D is getting back on the video game scene

No one is saying it's guaranteed to fail. Maybe this will turn out great! Maybe Tuque is going to become WotC's in-house Bioware. I'll certainly keep an eye on them.

But I'm also not going to get my hopes up. That's just a recipe for disappointment. I've seen this play a few too many times to ignore how it usually ends.

 

[Parmandur]

This. It's the equivalent of "Blockbuster" in cinema. "AAA" means big budget targeting a LCD market. It does not mean "good".

Now, if a small inexperienced developer where throwing around "quality" or "innovative" rather than "AAA" I might feel more optimistic about this project.

I have more faith they can achieve a AAA game than a good game: baby steps.

 

[Myzzrym]

No one is saying it's guaranteed to fail. Maybe this will turn out great! Maybe Tuque is going to become WotC's in-house Bioware. I'll certainly keep an eye on them.

But I'm also not going to get my hopes up. That's just a recipe for disappointment. I've seen this play a few too many times to ignore how it usually ends.

Fair point, until we get more information it's hard to judge anyway.

 

[Parmandur]

Definitely. But historically these sort of acquisitions have frequently gone south. Far south. Because whilst they do "know things we do not", that doesn't mean they have a clear vision of the issues.

History might be deceiving: "past performance is not necessarily indicative of future performance" has a positive edge. WotC is three plus years into new leadership, who has gaming and digital business experience:

"Leeds will be replaced by Chris Cocks, who most recently served as Vice President, OEM Technical Sales at Microsoft Corporation, where he led a global sales and technical engagement team. Prior to his eight-year tenure with Microsoft, Chris served as Vice President of Educational Games at LeapFrog, where he led a cross-discipline team to drive hardware planning, software design and development, marketing and channel management. He began his career in brand management at Procter & Gamble and served in product management and marketing leadership positions in Xbox and MSN, including work on hit franchises like Halo and Fable, prior to joining Leapfrog. Cocks is an avid player and fan of Wizards of the Coast brands, including MAGIC: THE GATHERING and DUNGEONS & DRAGONS."

 

[LordEntrails]

To make good AAA games, you need experience making AAA games.

But you do not need to make a good AAA game in order to claim you are making a AAA game...

 

[Paul Farquhar]

But if you make a AAA that isn't good you don't get to make another.

 

[Curmudjinn]

With them creating an FPS previously, maybe they are going in an Elder Scrolls type direction.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

With them creating an FPS previously, maybe they are going in an Elder Scrolls type direction.

That seems quite likely. With development tools being what they are now, it is actually relatively easy to create a first person game with realistic graphics, and slap a D&D label on it.

What I don't expect to see in this game are any rpg-elements. That is much harder to pull off.