Hasbro Opens New Wizards of the Coast Video Game Studio in Montreal to Support D&D Franchise

Hasbro has announced a new video game studio in Montreal, with a new focus on supporting D&D video games. The new studio, called Wizards of the Coast Studios Inc. will focus on developing new content for the Dungeons & Dragons franchise and expanding Hasbro's lineup of digital games. The studio is expected to support 200 jobs. Dan Ayoub, the head of the D&D franchise, will also run the new studio. Ayoub, you may recall, has a long pedigree in video game development.

The new studio will not replace Invoke Studios, Hasbro's other studio located in Montreal. The new office for Wizards of the Coast Studios Inc. will be located next to Invoke Studios.

Hasbro has big aspirations for expanding the D&D franchise via video games. Several D&D video games are in development at third party studios and now we're seeing an in-house expansion of the D&D digital portfolio. One obvious speculation is that the new studio will work on a Baldur's Gate 4, which Hasbro has promised will eventually be released following the mammoth success of Baldur's Gate 3.

 

[Parmandur]

more books, not more people working on the same book…

They are already producing 5E books at a breakneck pace.

And they are already paying top dollar in the industry and devoting more resources to the RPG than anyone else does. D&D the TTRPG is not under--resourced.

 

[Reynard]

2E AD&D shows that throwing more money and more product at the wal is not necessarily profitable.

Do you think the markets are the same? Do you think the number of players is the same? Do you think the way people interact with the game is the same?

On top of that, is throwing a half a billion dollars at a studio that will almost surely close before a game is released be "profitable"?

 

[Reynard]

No, Wizards does not need to produce more boiks. I suspect they are already producing all the books the market can bear.

What a weird stance given how many non-WotC books are produced -- many of which are currently available from WotC's Wannabe Steam-like storefront.

It must be very difficult for them to exist in this quantum state where there are more players than ever and D&D is the most successful it has ever been, while simultaneously at the cusp of collapse if they put out an extra book every 12 months.

 

[The Soloist]

If you were from there, you would know that they are more likely to get bogged down in ensuring the working language was French and all the signs are in the right language. Considering that they are targeting a mostly English speaking market, it actually is a negative. The weather really sucks, so at least more time inside coding, so that is a plus.

I live in Montreal. The employees of studios are bilingual but we prefer to work in French. There is no bogging down. We get the work done.

Why would a Portuguese studio in Portugal work in English instead of using their native tongue? It makes no sense.

I mean we are born, grow up, f@ck, marry, have children, become grand parents and die in French. It makes no sense to work in English when our native tongue is French.

 

[Parmandur]

Do you think the markets are the same? Do you think the number of players is the same? Do you think the way people interact with the game is the same?

On top of that, is throwing a half a billion dollars at a studio that will almost surely close before a game is released be "profitable"?

I think that WotC is already making a full compliment of yearly books. They are releasing 7 major products this year alone. And they are fully staffed for thar and pay top dollar for the TTRPG industry.

WotC hasn't closed any of the half-dozen other video game studios they have started tniabdecade: Sigil crashed and burned, but a VTT was not as good an investment idea as a video game, to be honest.

 

[mamba]

They are already producing 5E books at a breakneck pace.

I am not saying they should, I am saying having 200 people work on the same book was the wrong takeaway. All of this ignores that video game developers might not have the right skill set for creating TTRPG supplements anyway

Not sure I agree with breakneck pace though, four or five books a year is not something I consider breakneck, and given how much third party material is getting made, there seems to be room for more, albeit you probably increase overall profit while lowering the profit margin

 

[DEFCON 1]

Of those 200 video game people they would hire... only a handful of them would have the skillet and desire to work on hardcover RPG products.

Unless you think a 3D assets designer would rather be a cartographer but just hasn't gotten around to it. Or the expert at Unreal Engine would really prefer to edit.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

What a weird stance given how many non-WotC books are produced -- many of which are currently available from WotC's Wannabe Steam-like storefront.

It must be very difficult for them to exist in this quantum state where there are more players than ever and D&D is the most successful it has ever been, while simultaneously at the cusp of collapse if they put out an extra book every 12 months.

I never claimed that the market would collapse, do not put words in my mouth. What I am saying is that the more content released the less attention any given thing will get and with that lower attention comes a reduced chance any given product will get a purchase.
I find I am near that limit with WotC and pretty much pay zero attention to the third party market. Others will be different, some will have more attention to give or will prioritise other producers.
What the larger market does, is create a larger space for any given niche but I am not convinced that books axiomatically means more sales.
This belief has persisted for most of the history of the hobby and alongside the belief that book sales followed the long tail pattern.
5e sales indicate otherwise.

 

[wicked cool]

Good for them. When you have ea only closing studios and not reopening then good on wotc.

 

[Dausuul]

I don't think it makes sense to hire hundreds of new people to work on the tabletop game. Maybe a dozen or so, even twenty, but there's only so much you can profitably invest in any given product; after that you're just lighting money on fire. TSR illustrated that vividly. (Mind you, that era also generated a flood of raw material that D&D continues to draw on to this day, so it's not all down side.)

That doesn't mean all these video game studios are a smart investment either. WotC's track record with in-house development remains abysmal; M:tG Arena is literally the only good product they have ever built, and not for lack of trying. (Reminder here that WotC did not build D&D Beyond in-house. They bought it.) Maybe the new guy will change that. I'm not holding my breath.

So what should Hasbro do with their D&D profits? Well, it wouldn't hurt to put some of that dev talent on improving D&D Beyond, which has the potential to be a lot better than it is. Beyond that (heh), I would focus on outside partnerships -- both officially licensed deals like BG3, DDB, and Honor Among Thieves, and more serendipitous connections like Stranger Things and Critical Role -- and on looking to the future. Experiment with new RPG systems, board games, card games, dice games. Invest, judiciously, in D&D-adjacent startups, both digital and analog, and especially ones trying to ease the burden on DMs (the single biggest long-standing obstacle to growing the game).

The current boom won't last forever; use the time to prepare to catch the next wave.

Also, give the third-party community some love. It's a talent pipeline and free R&D program that has contributed massively to D&D's success.