D&D 5E How Important is Stranger Things to the Success of 5e

[Ralif Redhammer]

Name recognition matters. Showing countless people (since Netflix is generally chary of giving viewership numbers) games of D&D on screen matters. In the words of Mr. Clarke, "Once you open up that curiosity door, anything is possible." If Stranger Things is not in your top 5, I'm curious what would be? I wouldn't list it as number 1 (for that I'd put the designers' work itself - Stranger Things' publicity wouldn't matter for much if the game itself wasn't good), but I certainly would put it in the top 5, personally.

I just don't buy it, because knowing those names has absolutely no bearing on wanting to be involved with a fairly wild hobby. The vast majority of D&D players have never played games directly involving Demogorgon or Vecna, I daresay. Perhaps not even indirectly. I know huge numbers of Strange Fans things in my friend group and through work, and let's be real, they don't even see those as D&D names for the most part. They see them as Stranger Things names, and they're kind of right to. Cuts the other way even - one of my friends who has played D&D for 30+ years didn't know Vecna was a D&D name until the most recent season of ST came out! We've never played Greyhawk or run any of the adventures where Vecna might turn up so...

I very much doubt it's top 10, let alone top 5.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Name recognition matters. Showing countless people (since Netflix is generally chary of giving viewership numbers) games of D&D on screen matters. In the words of Mr. Clarke, "Once you open up that curiosity door, anything is possible." If Stranger Things is not in your top 5, I'm curious what would be? I wouldn't list it as number 1 (for that I'd put the designers' work itself - Stranger Things' publicity wouldn't matter for much if the game itself wasn't good), but I certainly would put it in the top 5, personally.

Top 5 things responsible for the meteoric success of 5E?

1. Increasing normalization of games and gaming generally in Millennial culture, like person-to-person culture, word-of-mouth. We're famous for our obsession with boardgames, it's like, an identifying trait of Millennials (albeit many younger Gen-Xers are equally keen, and I know from boardgame cafes in London that Gen Z are following, and maybe even more into it). Obviously it goes without saying the Millennials play far more videogames than any previous generation (maybe more than Gen Z will, it kind of seems that way). Things like World of Warcraft were primarily Millennial cultural events (even if MMORPGs generally stretched into Gen X a bit). I'm old as hell for a WoW player, at 44 - even now the average age is a lot closer to 30. Millennials in general are just vastly less put off by things being seen as "nerdy" than Gen X were - I don't blame or denigrate Gen X for this, note, it's just how the culture was.

This is absolutely the dominant factor, for my money, and it sweeps everything else off the table in terms of preparing the way for D&D to be a huge success.

2. Decades of showing D&D in increasingly mainstream media, going back a long way, to things like the IT Crowd, via Community, Big Bang Theory (I loathe the show but it's a thing), and so on, which people grew up with.

3. Accessibility of the basic design of 5E. I don't buy the idea that a less-accessible version could have succeeded as well. Something like a reorganised and updated RC D&D? Sure. Both most other editions, including both AD&Ds and 3/4E? Nah.

Now you could definitely reorganise 1-3 based on what you thought was most important, but I can't see how it's not those three.

4. The rise of podcasts and streaming services in general, and Critical Role in particular. Absolutely could not have happened as fast as it did without them. Had streaming and podcasts been a big thing before 4E (rather than largely nascent - I mean podcasts were around a ton but they weren't nearly as normalized as now), I think it could have done a lot better (or maybe PF would have done even better! But it would have had an impact).

5. Celebrities, both minor and major, coming out as D&D/RPG players or just general nerds. Again, this has been happening since the very late '90s, I remember talking to friends about such-and-such minor celeb saying they played D&D, but it's been increasing at an almost exponential rate. You've got Henry Cavill, one of the most swooned-over male actors of the generation, getting on YouTube or the like and showing himself building his gaming PC, painting his Warhammer miniatures, discussing in interviews how much he loves World of Warcraft, for example.

I mean, literally the two hottest people on True Blood came out as being DMs for god's sake! That sort of thing is a massive perspective change for people who see D&D as "too nerdy". Much more massive than say, "some fictional nerdy kids in the '80s playing D&D, an '80s thing, largely as a metaphor".

So that's my top 5. It'd be asking a lot to make me do the whole top 10, frankly, but I'm guessing I'd put Stranger Things, specifically, at maybe 10 - however I would note the future impact may well be larger.

One thing I think a lot of people forget is how small Netflix reach actually has been. In 2016, Netflix only had 79m subscribers, split across dozens of countries. It's now up to 220m, which is impressive as an increase, hugely so, but obviously is still an absolutely tiny number in a larger context, especially as a huge proportion of those gains were not in English-speaking countries.

Here's the 2021 Netflix-by-country sub breakdown if you're interested: Netflix Subscribers and Revenue by Country [2022 version]

For reference, Netflix in the UK has 12.72m subscribers, but that's far less than the 23m Sky TV has here for example. And we're third in the world. And Sky's reach is much smaller than the BBC or the like.

 

[Mannahnin]

Top 5 things responsible for the meteoric success of 5E?

I think your top 5 is solid, but I would account for Stranger Things as a substantial part of your 2, rather than dumping it down at 10 all by its lonesome. It's probably the single largest pop culture element in that category over the last six years.

I think you're also substantially underestimating the impact of Netflix by only conceptualizing its viewership in terms of subscriber numbers. While we don't have reliable numbers for shared accounts, we know that a very large number of subscribers do share accounts with family, partners, and occasionally friends.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

I think that depends entirely on how you define "interest" and whether you think it matters if that interest translates to actually buying/playing D&D. I very much doubt there are more people playing D&D because of Stranger Things than Critical Role, especially given how fast 5E's audience grew.

You need, generally, to have interest first. So yes and the ST produce vastly more interest, but mostly likely a lower success rate of turning that into actual players. However, I think the numbers are probably so much larger for ST be CR that even with lower rate of return it ultimately produced more sales for D&D

 

[grimslade]

I voted (2) important role in the popularity of 5E. It is not the most important but it is a constant reminder of D&Ds existence and nearly 50 years of play. It is the best and biggest advertising WotC has received for the game and they get it for free. Critical Role and Dimension20 have helped show the actual game to the public, but you have to search them out first. The continued growth of the game so long after the edition launched, is a testament to the growing reach to wider pools of players. Stranger Things gets into the wider world even to people who don't watch the series, they have heard of it, D&D, Demogorgon, Mind Flayers, and, now, Vecna.

 

[Burnside]

I will say this: for those outside of gaming stranger things has been much more impact than critical role. I know no one who watches Critical Role, or anyone who knows anyone to watches it. But I know a lot of people who watch Stranger Things.

There's no doubt that Stranger Things has a MUCH bigger audience overall than Critical Role.

But Critical Role creates a lot more D&D players than Stranger Things does.

By which I mean the viewer-to-player conversion rate for CR is much higher than for Stranger Things, resulting in more people getting into actually playing or DMing the game "because of" Critical Role.

Stranger Things, Critical Role, The Adventure Zone, and to a lesser degree Community all have an important distinction from The Big Bang Theory in creating players: the latter group of shows portray playing D&D as a cool thing to do, and buck traditional stereotypes as to who is playing. Big Bang Theory largely just confirms/exploits the nerd stereotypes and does little or nothing to make the viewer feel that they themselves would actually enjoy playing.

 

[Reynard]

There's no doubt that Stranger Things has a MUCH bigger audience overall than Critical Role.

But Critical Role creates a lot more D&D players than Stranger Things does.

My guess is they work in concert. If ST gets people to start looking into to how this D&D thing works, CR will be one of the first things they find online that explains it.

 

[Burnside]

My guess is they work in concert. If ST gets people to start looking into to how this D&D thing works, CR will be one of the first things they find online that explains it.

Yes, absolutely, as do many other pop culture "hits" where D&D is referenced. The movie will be get another point of contact that will blend with these.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

For my part:

1. Quality of D&D 5e design and presentation. Without accessible rules, inspiring art, representation, involving adventures and lore, you wouldn't get far.

2. Critical Role. I go back and forth on whether it's big enough to break out of the rise of D&D-related streaming category or not. Considering you've even got an animated series and multiple official D&D books for it now, I lean towards keeping it separate.

3. Stranger Things. Like I said, not only does it provide name recognition, but it depicts D&D with genuine love.

4. D&D-related streaming (encompassing podcasts, YouTube, Twitch, the Tik-Tok (I am an old, therefore I must refer to it with a "the"), etc.).

5. Open celebrity endorsement of gaming (if you had told me in the 90s that one day I'd watch The Big Show play D&D on a major streaming event, I would've laughed. After you explained to me what streaming was, that is).

Honorable mention would go to the number of pro-gaming articles that have come out on Forbes, Wired, and other high-profile sites and general television media presence. And I agree with you that seeing D&D on shows like Community, Freaks & Geeks, and others matters, not to mention decades of LOTR, MCU, and Star Wars movies moving geek culture into pop culture. But I still think that Stranger Things, like Critical Role, has had a big enough of an impact to warrant its inclusion separately.

Top 5 things responsible for the meteoric success of 5E?

1. Increasing normalization of games and gaming generally in Millennial culture, like person-to-person culture, word-of-mouth. We're famous for our obsession with boardgames, it's like, an identifying trait of Millennials (albeit many younger Gen-Xers are equally keen, and I know from boardgame cafes in London that Gen Z are following, and maybe even more into it). Obviously it goes without saying the Millennials play far more videogames than any previous generation (maybe more than Gen Z will, it kind of seems that way). Things like World of Warcraft were primarily Millennial cultural events (even if MMORPGs generally stretched into Gen X a bit). I'm old as hell for a WoW player, at 44 - even now the average age is a lot closer to 30. Millennials in general are just vastly less put off by things being seen as "nerdy" than Gen X were - I don't blame or denigrate Gen X for this, note, it's just how the culture was.

This is absolutely the dominant factor, for my money, and it sweeps everything else off the table in terms of preparing the way for D&D to be a huge success.

2. Decades of showing D&D in increasingly mainstream media, going back a long way, to things like the IT Crowd, via Community, Big Bang Theory (I loathe the show but it's a thing), and so on, which people grew up with.

3. Accessibility of the basic design of 5E. I don't buy the idea that a less-accessible version could have succeeded as well. Something like a reorganised and updated RC D&D? Sure. Both most other editions, including both AD&Ds and 3/4E? Nah.

Now you could definitely reorganise 1-3 based on what you thought was most important, but I can't see how it's not those three.

4. The rise of podcasts and streaming services in general, and Critical Role in particular. Absolutely could not have happened as fast as it did without them. Had streaming and podcasts been a big thing before 4E (rather than largely nascent - I mean podcasts were around a ton but they weren't nearly as normalized as now), I think it could have done a lot better (or maybe PF would have done even better! But it would have had an impact).

5. Celebrities, both minor and major, coming out as D&D/RPG players or just general nerds. Again, this has been happening since the very late '90s, I remember talking to friends about such-and-such minor celeb saying they played D&D, but it's been increasing at an almost exponential rate. You've got Henry Cavill, one of the most swooned-over male actors of the generation, getting on YouTube or the like and showing himself building his gaming PC, painting his Warhammer miniatures, discussing in interviews how much he loves World of Warcraft, for example.

I mean, literally the two hottest people on True Blood came out as being DMs for god's sake! That sort of thing is a massive perspective change for people who see D&D as "too nerdy". Much more massive than say, "some fictional nerdy kids in the '80s playing D&D, an '80s thing, largely as a metaphor".

So that's my top 5. It'd be asking a lot to make me do the whole top 10, frankly, but I'm guessing I'd put Stranger Things, specifically, at maybe 10 - however I would note the future impact may well be larger.

One thing I think a lot of people forget is how small Netflix reach actually has been. In 2016, Netflix only had 79m subscribers, split across dozens of countries. It's now up to 220m, which is impressive as an increase, hugely so, but obviously is still an absolutely tiny number in a larger context, especially as a huge proportion of those gains were not in English-speaking countries.

Here's the 2021 Netflix-by-country sub breakdown if you're interested: Netflix Subscribers and Revenue by Country [2022 version]

For reference, Netflix in the UK has 12.72m subscribers, but that's far less than the 23m Sky TV has here for example. And we're third in the world. And Sky's reach is much smaller than the BBC or the like.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

There's no doubt that Stranger Things has a MUCH bigger audience overall than Critical Role.

We know this to be true (or at least we assume we do).

But Critical Role creates a lot more D&D players than Stranger Things does.

We don't know this to be true. I know very few gamers you know of CR, not to mention you have even watched.

By which I mean the viewer-to-player conversion rate for CR is much higher than for Stranger Things, resulting in more people getting into actually playing or DMing the game "because of" Critical Role.

I agree the rate of conversion for CR is probably higher than ST, but I think that larger audience of ST over compensates for that lower rate. Therefore creating more D&D players. Of course this is, like your opinion, just a guess based on almost no facts.