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Renegade Game Studios Takes Over World of Darkness
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<blockquote data-quote="zhivik" data-source="post: 8125901" data-attributes="member: 6966637"><p>A few more notes on events and timeline. The CCP-White Wolf merger (effectively a buyout by CCP) took place in late 2006. At that time, White Wolf had completed their classic World of Darkness lines, with the final books released in 2003, and had launched New World of Darkness in 2004. While CCP claimed the deal wouldn’t affect White Wolf’s tabletop products, what happened is that they were increasingly pulling White Wolf staff into development of a World of Darkness MMO, thus bleeding tabletop products dry. It reflected into fewer tabletop releases. In the meantime, there were growing rumours that White Wolf writers were used to write for Eve Online and adjacent products, rather than the new MMO.</p><p></p><p>After a few years, CCP had increasing trouble, as it tried to launch a first-person shooter in the Eve Online universe that didn’t work out, it had controversy with micro transactions and developers favouring certain players, which led to big financial loss. There was no news about the World of Darkness MMO, either, so many suspected something bad was going on. In the end, CCP announced massive layoffs in late 2011, a lot of them from White Wolf.</p><p></p><p>It is when Richard Thomas, creative director for White Wolf, founded Onyx Path Publishing. You should have in mind that it was a weird time, as tabletop books were still printed mostly in North America at the time (mainly in Canada), as Chinese printers were not that good yet. All this made print publishing a very expensive business, which forced Onyx Path embrace digital publishing. Also, in February 2012, Double Fine Productions, a video game studio headed by Tim Schafer, did its now historic Kickstarter campaign, which showed everyone crowdfunding was a viable way to secure funding for a game - any kind of game, as it turned out.</p><p></p><p>So that’s how it started. It was rough at first, though Onyx Path did the right thing and decided to start with 20th anniversary editions of classic World of Darkness lines. By the way, if you are looking to play these classic games, don’t look further. The 20th anniversary editions are a consolidated and cleaned-up version of the books released for Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, Changeling and Wraith, with rules revision and clarification, where necessary - I very strongly recommend these versions.</p><p></p><p>Anyway, Onyx Path became the only source of new World of Darkness products, whether classic or New World of Darkness. Things at CCP kept going poorly for White Wolf, or what was left of it, until the World of Darkness MMO was axed in 2014 and White Wolf became effectively defunct.</p><p></p><p>Then, Paradox stepped in, taking over White Wolf in 2015, which was only the IP at the time, as all staff was let go. It was Paradox that decided to rename “new World of Darkness” to “Chronicles of Darkness”, leaving it entirely to Onyx Path to develop those lines, of which they have done an admirable job, in my opinion. I still wish they weren’t making the CoD game world so crowded, though.</p><p></p><p>Meanwhile, Paradox started development of their own, fifth edition of Vampire: the Masquerade - it’s fifth because you have first, second, revised and 20th anniversary editions before. Back then, they said they would make all the major game lines compatible for cross-play, as the Chronicle of Darkness books allow, though nothing other than Masquerade books have been released since.</p><p></p><p>The big controversies came mostly from adjacent products, like adventures, rather than the core book, which is mostly lucklustre, though it does have some good ideas (I like hunger dice a lot, for instance). The biggest issue with the core book is that there is simply not a lot there regarding lore and available clans, and many argued, deservedly, in my opinion, that they could have cut on art in favour of more actual content.</p><p></p><p>Paradox decided to end in-house development after the controversies and contracted other developers like Modiphius in late 2018 or Hunters Entertainment in 2019 to produce Vampire and Werewolf books, respectively, but nothing seems to have come out of that, either. I am kind of sceptical that a new Werewolf book will arrive soon, after Ivan van Norman from Hunters Entertainment went to run Critical Role’s Darrington Press. For Paradox, getting someone like Justin Achilli is a good thing, but who knows what will happen. Hopefully, the upcoming video games in that universe will do well, which will likely boost tabletop products. I myself went into World of Darkness after playing the original Vampire: the Masquerade - Bloodlines game back in 2003 or 2004, so it makes a difference.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="zhivik, post: 8125901, member: 6966637"] A few more notes on events and timeline. The CCP-White Wolf merger (effectively a buyout by CCP) took place in late 2006. At that time, White Wolf had completed their classic World of Darkness lines, with the final books released in 2003, and had launched New World of Darkness in 2004. While CCP claimed the deal wouldn’t affect White Wolf’s tabletop products, what happened is that they were increasingly pulling White Wolf staff into development of a World of Darkness MMO, thus bleeding tabletop products dry. It reflected into fewer tabletop releases. In the meantime, there were growing rumours that White Wolf writers were used to write for Eve Online and adjacent products, rather than the new MMO. After a few years, CCP had increasing trouble, as it tried to launch a first-person shooter in the Eve Online universe that didn’t work out, it had controversy with micro transactions and developers favouring certain players, which led to big financial loss. There was no news about the World of Darkness MMO, either, so many suspected something bad was going on. In the end, CCP announced massive layoffs in late 2011, a lot of them from White Wolf. It is when Richard Thomas, creative director for White Wolf, founded Onyx Path Publishing. You should have in mind that it was a weird time, as tabletop books were still printed mostly in North America at the time (mainly in Canada), as Chinese printers were not that good yet. All this made print publishing a very expensive business, which forced Onyx Path embrace digital publishing. Also, in February 2012, Double Fine Productions, a video game studio headed by Tim Schafer, did its now historic Kickstarter campaign, which showed everyone crowdfunding was a viable way to secure funding for a game - any kind of game, as it turned out. So that’s how it started. It was rough at first, though Onyx Path did the right thing and decided to start with 20th anniversary editions of classic World of Darkness lines. By the way, if you are looking to play these classic games, don’t look further. The 20th anniversary editions are a consolidated and cleaned-up version of the books released for Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, Changeling and Wraith, with rules revision and clarification, where necessary - I very strongly recommend these versions. Anyway, Onyx Path became the only source of new World of Darkness products, whether classic or New World of Darkness. Things at CCP kept going poorly for White Wolf, or what was left of it, until the World of Darkness MMO was axed in 2014 and White Wolf became effectively defunct. Then, Paradox stepped in, taking over White Wolf in 2015, which was only the IP at the time, as all staff was let go. It was Paradox that decided to rename “new World of Darkness” to “Chronicles of Darkness”, leaving it entirely to Onyx Path to develop those lines, of which they have done an admirable job, in my opinion. I still wish they weren’t making the CoD game world so crowded, though. Meanwhile, Paradox started development of their own, fifth edition of Vampire: the Masquerade - it’s fifth because you have first, second, revised and 20th anniversary editions before. Back then, they said they would make all the major game lines compatible for cross-play, as the Chronicle of Darkness books allow, though nothing other than Masquerade books have been released since. The big controversies came mostly from adjacent products, like adventures, rather than the core book, which is mostly lucklustre, though it does have some good ideas (I like hunger dice a lot, for instance). The biggest issue with the core book is that there is simply not a lot there regarding lore and available clans, and many argued, deservedly, in my opinion, that they could have cut on art in favour of more actual content. Paradox decided to end in-house development after the controversies and contracted other developers like Modiphius in late 2018 or Hunters Entertainment in 2019 to produce Vampire and Werewolf books, respectively, but nothing seems to have come out of that, either. I am kind of sceptical that a new Werewolf book will arrive soon, after Ivan van Norman from Hunters Entertainment went to run Critical Role’s Darrington Press. For Paradox, getting someone like Justin Achilli is a good thing, but who knows what will happen. Hopefully, the upcoming video games in that universe will do well, which will likely boost tabletop products. I myself went into World of Darkness after playing the original Vampire: the Masquerade - Bloodlines game back in 2003 or 2004, so it makes a difference. [/QUOTE]
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