Studio Agate Takes Over 7th Sea From Chaosium

French publisher Studio Agate is taking over the development and creation of 7th Sea from Chaosium. The news was announced today by Chaosium, alongside a survey to help shape the future of the swashbuckling game. Per the press release, Studio Agate will launch a Patreon page that will give free access to developer insights and progress on future progress. A Kickstarter is also in the works to launch the "next chapter" of the game line.

7th Sea is a swashbuckling-themed game with a core mechanic involving a dice pool of d10s. Players determine the number of d10s they roll based on their trait and skill scores and then add the results together to create scores of 10 or more to make successes that can be spent over a round to influence the narrative or succeed in certain actions.

Studio Agate is best known for developing French language translations of RPGs, including 7th Sea. Last year, Agate successfully launched an English language 7th Sea product - The Price of Arrogance - via a Kickstarter that raised over $190,000.

Ownership of 7th Sea passed from AEG to Chaosium back in 2019. The ownership status of 7th Sea was not addressed in the press release, so it appears that deal involves publication rights and not outright ownership of the IP.

 

[Aldarc]

And the fans of 7th Sea have remained loyal for more than a decade, almost like the fans of Legend of the Five Rings, another game whose first edition was written by John Wick.

My old gaming group in Vienna were fans of 7th Sea but abandoned 7th Sea after 2nd Edition came out. It was too radical of a departure for their tastes. They backed the 7th Sea Kickstarter for all the 7th Sea 1st Edition materials but then gave me the core book for 2E, which has been collecting dust on my shelf.

 

[GrimCo]

There is more mechanical differences between 1st and 2nd ed 7th sea than 3.x and 4th edition D&D. They share setting and name, but game engine is so different that they might as well be two different games. That's one of the reasons lot's of people who loved 1ed as a system didn't really like 2ed.