Mongoose doing Star Trek d20?

[Ranger REG]

I know nothing's stopping me. Decipher did a handful of books for Star Trek and I liked them. I hope I get a chance to actually use them. I'm just lamenting the fact that the licence keeps changing hands.

Blame Decipher for their mishandling their own RPG venture. Most of their ex-LUG, ex-WotC employees have left and only two are left to run their RPG studio which is probably going to be shut down if they're subcontracting to Mongoose.

AFAIC, Decipher didn't create CODA. It's the team of Kenneth Hite, Christian Moore, Ross Isaacs, and Steve Long ... names no longer associated with TCG publisher Decipher.

:\

 

[Ghostwind]

Mongoose does not have the license. Matt has publicly said this on the Mongoose boards. I can also confirm that because I've talked to Decipher myself. How do I know? Because I've been involved with Decipher on negotiations for this license with another company for months. That is all I can say because of an NDA. However, I can say that Decipher will be making an announcement this year concerning the Trek RPG and its future based upon the information I was told yesterday.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Okay if there is any truth to this whatsoever, how on earth would Hasbro let Mongoose get the rights to do a Trek D20. I mean, last I checked Hasbro owned all the rights to the Trek license.

 

[Aaron2]

Mongoose does not have the license. Matt has publicly said this on the Mongoose boards.

Matt's denial was rather vague, he dismissed the "rumor" not the license. I don't think some data entry clerk at Amazon is just going around inventing game books to trick people, the info had to come from somewhere.

I'd rather WotC had the license. That way they could make it compatable with SW so were could finally settle the SW vs. ST argument.


Aaron

 

[Dragonblade]

Hasbro? I have never heard that.

Well back when d20 was new, WotC bought LUG lock,stock, and barrel just to get their hands on the Dune and Trek licences that LUG had.

However, due to a clause in the contract with the Herbert estate, Dune reverted back. Because of the new sci-fi miniseries, the estate wanted an outrageous sum for the RPG rights so WotC gave up on it.

Then a clause in Paramount's contract let them ok any transfer of the license and they decided to pull their license. Rumor says it was because WotC already had Star Wars and some big wig at Paramount didn't like that.

So Decipher picked up the Trek license and LUG disappeared from the face of the Earth. Which is a shame because their Trek RPG looked really nice and seemed to enjoy much more success than the Decipher one.

If Mongoose does have the license, it will be interesting to see what they do with it.

 

[VorpalBunny]

Okay if there is any truth to this whatsoever, how on earth would Hasbro let Mongoose get the rights to do a Trek D20. I mean, last I checked Hasbro owned all the rights to the Trek license.

Rumor has it when WotC bought Last Unicorn Games, Paramount yanked the license from Hasbro because they specifically didn't want the Trek RPG to be using the same system as Star Wars.

Seems a little much to me - I like to believe when the sale was final the license agreement was nullified.

 

[qstor]

Rumor has it when WotC bought Last Unicorn Games, Paramount yanked the license from Hasbro because they specifically didn't want the Trek RPG to be using the same system as Star Wars.

Seems a little much to me - I like to believe when the sale was final the license agreement was nullified.

This is very interesting news this morning for me

I've head this rumor too about the ST license. The Dune RPG was killed at the same time that WotC bought LUG. The Dune book had very limited release and goes for a lot on Ebay.

Ghostwind - any new stuff on the Decipher boards about the LotR license too?

Its a shame that all of this has happened. Both licenses should be a gold mine for RPG companies. I wish that Steve Long and Christian Moore still worked on the games with Decipher. But time and time again, Decipher has screwed over the RPG department in favor of the trading cards games.

Mike

 

[VorpalBunny]

Its a shame that all of this has happened. Both licenses should be a gold mine for RPG companies. I wish that Steve Long and Christian Moore still worked on the games with Decipher. But time and time again, Decipher has screwed over the RPG department in favor of the trading cards games.

Mike

True, but Decipher *is* a TCG company. They got the RPG license in a bundle with the TCG license, and rather than sit on it, they had Steve Long and Co. produce a great RPG system. When the RPG lines didn't produce the returns they were expecting (i.e. a TCG-like profit margin) they decided to kill both RPG lines.

The thing that makes me grind my teeth though, is not that they killed both RPGs but how they did it. They seemingly jumped into RPGs with little or no knowledge as a company as to how the RPG buisness works. Then when they thought they weren't getting enough money back from their RPG lines they silently kill both lines with absolutely no explanation, leaving a metric ****-load of written but unpublished material. BAD DECIPHER! BAD!!!

 

[Psion]

Then when they thought they weren't getting enough money back from their RPG lines they silently kill both lines with absolutely no explanation, leaving a metric ****-load of written but unpublished material. BAD DECIPHER! BAD!!!

/me hands VorpalBunny a rolled up newspaper.

 

[The_Universe]

Well dangit - if the rumor had been true, that would have rocked harder than anything has rocked before.

I can think of companies that I'd rather see with a D20/OGL Star Trek than mongoose, but it'd be better than the old systems, none of which I have ever been terribly fond of.*

However, with Star Trek sinking into the crapper on a weekly basis first with Voyager, now with Enterprise, is there only a limited amount of profitability left in the franchise?

*It would have to be OGL - or, I suppose, based on the Modern SRD. You could almost do it now with the D20 Modern/Future combo....