D&D 5E Sword Coast Legends: After the fall.
MonkeezOnFire
Adventurer
I'd actually like to see more D&D video games that don't try to just translate the table top experience into digital form. Those games always come up short because the number of experiences are limited by the content in the game. If I came up with a neat adventure set in a tundra city I can easily present such an adventure using the tabletop game, but if the video game doesn't have icy tilesets, well I'm out of luck.
But D&D has such rich history and lore and it would be great to see video games use that. Some ideas:
-a dungeon delving rogue-lite. These are a dime a dozen, but one that uses D&D IP would really stand out and give it heart. Look to games like Darkest Dungeon for inspiration
-a side scrolling beat-em-up. The old arcade games are great and helped inspire the also great Dragon's Crown. Intense action sequences followed by choose your own adventure style really worked nicely together
-an action RPG. These are expensive and risky and it would really require a good team to pull off. But I'd love to see something like Mass Effect set in a D&D world
But D&D has such rich history and lore and it would be great to see video games use that. Some ideas:
-a dungeon delving rogue-lite. These are a dime a dozen, but one that uses D&D IP would really stand out and give it heart. Look to games like Darkest Dungeon for inspiration
-a side scrolling beat-em-up. The old arcade games are great and helped inspire the also great Dragon's Crown. Intense action sequences followed by choose your own adventure style really worked nicely together
-an action RPG. These are expensive and risky and it would really require a good team to pull off. But I'd love to see something like Mass Effect set in a D&D world
The worst thing about Sword Coast Legends was that by slowly and painfully editing the .JSON (which is a horrid format to work with in a text editor) you could actually radically transform the game and move it much closer to 5e... and then they patched and broke that functionality destroying hours upon hours of work.
I'm not bitter....
I'm not bitter....
MrHotter
First Post
I'd like a D&D game that felt like D&D. I got Sword Coast Legends and at level 2 I was spending hours trying to compare my bags of magic items to figure out what ones to use.
I'd rather see a game that translated the rules and feel of the actual RPG. I'd even be happy with an 8 bit graphics game on my phone.
I'd rather see a game that translated the rules and feel of the actual RPG. I'd even be happy with an 8 bit graphics game on my phone.
Jester David
Hero
The catch is, licenced games are *always* terrible.
Think back on all licensed games you've played or review: ones based on TV shows, comic books, movies, or roleplaying games. Think hard? They're all awful.
"But Jester," you say, "I remember <game X>. And <game X> was decent. Or even good."
True. But for every example of a good (or just not godawful) game there are a dozen terrible ones. Good games are typically flukes. They're non-representative. And the bad games can sometimes be among the worst video games of the year… if not ever.
See, the thing is, video games are made by one of two types of studio: ones owned by a larger company that can pay for the development, and ones owned independently owned. Independent studios typically have to rely on investors (and now Kickstarter) to make their game, and if they're hoping to break into the big league, they need to attract attention. Which means their game either needs to be really special, or their game needs to have a familiar name.
Just like movies: either you wow everyone, or its a sequel/remake/reboot.
Licensed games are almost always done by independent studios. Because ones owned by larger companies don't need the name recognition the name brings. They have advertising and marketing budgets. (Plus, they want the ability to make their own IP that can be licensed for books, toys, movies, etc.)
The studio goes to the rights holder and asks for permission to use the rights in a video game, paying to do so. They're hoping the investment in the IP will be offset by greater sales and attention.
WotC doesn't make D&D games. They also have little say in who makes their games. They can only choose between the companies making a pitch. I no one great proposes a new D&D game, then WotC has the choice between the least bad of the studios or no game.
(There's also the option of making the game themself, either by hiring people or creating their own design studio. But given the success race of first time video game studios, it makes more sense to did a big hole in the woods, fill it with five million dollars, and set the pile on fire.)
Did all the support on SCL stop? Well, yeah, the company that made the game went under and everyone who was paid to make the game lost their jobs.
Utter failure? Yup.
What did WotC learn from this? Well… likely as much as Blizzard learned from the failure of the Warcraft movie or DC comics learned from the response to Arkham Knight. I.e. almost nothing since they weren't the ones making the game.
I *hope* they learned that people want a game that follows the D&D rules. And that just because someone has a loose tie to DragonAge doesn't mean the game will be a hit.
Think back on all licensed games you've played or review: ones based on TV shows, comic books, movies, or roleplaying games. Think hard? They're all awful.
"But Jester," you say, "I remember <game X>. And <game X> was decent. Or even good."
True. But for every example of a good (or just not godawful) game there are a dozen terrible ones. Good games are typically flukes. They're non-representative. And the bad games can sometimes be among the worst video games of the year… if not ever.
See, the thing is, video games are made by one of two types of studio: ones owned by a larger company that can pay for the development, and ones owned independently owned. Independent studios typically have to rely on investors (and now Kickstarter) to make their game, and if they're hoping to break into the big league, they need to attract attention. Which means their game either needs to be really special, or their game needs to have a familiar name.
Just like movies: either you wow everyone, or its a sequel/remake/reboot.
Licensed games are almost always done by independent studios. Because ones owned by larger companies don't need the name recognition the name brings. They have advertising and marketing budgets. (Plus, they want the ability to make their own IP that can be licensed for books, toys, movies, etc.)
The studio goes to the rights holder and asks for permission to use the rights in a video game, paying to do so. They're hoping the investment in the IP will be offset by greater sales and attention.
WotC doesn't make D&D games. They also have little say in who makes their games. They can only choose between the companies making a pitch. I no one great proposes a new D&D game, then WotC has the choice between the least bad of the studios or no game.
(There's also the option of making the game themself, either by hiring people or creating their own design studio. But given the success race of first time video game studios, it makes more sense to did a big hole in the woods, fill it with five million dollars, and set the pile on fire.)
Did all the support on SCL stop? Well, yeah, the company that made the game went under and everyone who was paid to make the game lost their jobs.
Utter failure? Yup.
What did WotC learn from this? Well… likely as much as Blizzard learned from the failure of the Warcraft movie or DC comics learned from the response to Arkham Knight. I.e. almost nothing since they weren't the ones making the game.
I *hope* they learned that people want a game that follows the D&D rules. And that just because someone has a loose tie to DragonAge doesn't mean the game will be a hit.
The Myopic Sniper
Hero
If I were WOTC I would just steer well away from licensing out the IP for video games for the foreseeable future unless it is from an AAA developer willing to throw that sort of money to do a top of the line product. I don't think that little products like this hurt the brand any, but they are just cannibalizing energy from WOTC promotional efforts and pretty much anyone who is going to check it out in the first place is already a WOTC customer.
There is a chance that a little developer with something truly groundbreaking might be able to find a niche as well, but I am guessing that anyone who is in that spot would rather own the IP aspects of it as well.
There is a chance that a little developer with something truly groundbreaking might be able to find a niche as well, but I am guessing that anyone who is in that spot would rather own the IP aspects of it as well.
flametitan
Explorer
I'm suspecting in the future wotc will look towards their already established partnerships. I remember sometime last year or earlier this year hearing about beamdog hiring more writers for some reason. Odds are for a game/expansion to an existing game. I haven't heard if this was for a D&D game or not, but I'd suspect that as wotc has had reasonable success with beamdog that their next attempt at a video game will be to license something new with Beamdog.
Well brand management is important - you don't want your brand to build a reputation of being associated with sub-par products because that can be the reverse of a halo-effect.
The Dungeonology book on Amazon is getting bad reviews because some people don't understand that it's not a normal D&D book. Yes - they look silly for thinking that, but also WotC can be faulted for perhaps not properly positioning the product within its portfolio.
This movie better at least be watchable...
The Dungeonology book on Amazon is getting bad reviews because some people don't understand that it's not a normal D&D book. Yes - they look silly for thinking that, but also WotC can be faulted for perhaps not properly positioning the product within its portfolio.
This movie better at least be watchable...
GreenTengu
Adventurer
The last actually good D&D video game was Neverwinter Nights II.
The MMORPGs are well... MMORPGs and suffer from the setbacks from that. The pay to play becoming pay to win model once they go free-to-play, further setting all half-decent (and let us stress half-decent) content behind pay walls... and everything in the game designed to make you play the same levels over and over and over again... plus the whole "respawning mobs" thing.
There was an RTS set in Eberron that well... gave a fairly weird impression about the setting all together, I am not even sure why that game needed to be D&D.
Daggerdale was vanilla to the point of being absolutely dull. A few pregenerated characters and totally dull combat with no options.... actually, if it just put auto-death traps everywhere it would probably be the absolute perfect game for Grognards. Perfectly encapsulates their version of D&D. But for anyone who actually likes options and creative direction, it isn't very fun.
After that, other than Sword Coast Legends, the only thing they put out were the enhanced Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale games... I tried them, but I despise the 2E game system, particularly the spell system... between that and having to micromanage 6 different characters at once, I didn't get terribly far in them. Actually, I think I was getting through the first pretty well and then ran into a bug where one of the characters got stuck inside something and so I couldn't continue the game at all. Not without reloading the save and redoing the last hour of tedious play. So while people praise these games up and down like they are a gift from the gods, I can say I have had much better experiences with other games.
I can't even try Lords of Waterdeep because it never came out on Android.
I haven't tried Arena of War, maybe I should.
Anyway, I can't help but think it is a shame something akin to the Elder Scrolls games can't be made based on the D&D license.
The MMORPGs are well... MMORPGs and suffer from the setbacks from that. The pay to play becoming pay to win model once they go free-to-play, further setting all half-decent (and let us stress half-decent) content behind pay walls... and everything in the game designed to make you play the same levels over and over and over again... plus the whole "respawning mobs" thing.
There was an RTS set in Eberron that well... gave a fairly weird impression about the setting all together, I am not even sure why that game needed to be D&D.
Daggerdale was vanilla to the point of being absolutely dull. A few pregenerated characters and totally dull combat with no options.... actually, if it just put auto-death traps everywhere it would probably be the absolute perfect game for Grognards. Perfectly encapsulates their version of D&D. But for anyone who actually likes options and creative direction, it isn't very fun.
After that, other than Sword Coast Legends, the only thing they put out were the enhanced Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale games... I tried them, but I despise the 2E game system, particularly the spell system... between that and having to micromanage 6 different characters at once, I didn't get terribly far in them. Actually, I think I was getting through the first pretty well and then ran into a bug where one of the characters got stuck inside something and so I couldn't continue the game at all. Not without reloading the save and redoing the last hour of tedious play. So while people praise these games up and down like they are a gift from the gods, I can say I have had much better experiences with other games.
I can't even try Lords of Waterdeep because it never came out on Android.
I haven't tried Arena of War, maybe I should.
Anyway, I can't help but think it is a shame something akin to the Elder Scrolls games can't be made based on the D&D license.
Beleriphon
Totally Awesome Pirate Brain
I actually think an action RPG inspired by D&D, using the settings, characters and general aesthetic of D&D would work well. Despite its flaws the Neverwinter MMO is actually pretty fun as an action RPG in a D&D setting. The issue is making the game 1) similar enough to D&D to capture the right feel and 2) make what you have fun with an entertaining enough story to get people to buy it.
I think you've actually hit the nail on the head with the issue. Bioware doesn't use D&D anymore since they got big enough they could make their own fantasy setting and have 100% control over it, and Bethesda doesn't need to use D&D because Elder Scrolls.
For a company to take D&D to the same production value as a Dragon Age or Elder Scrolls game is going to require a massive investment, and probably have to sell millions of units to recover the cost. No start up can afford that, and a big enough company can just make their own IP and not have to license anything.
On the note of movies, specifically Warcraft to Blizzard-Activision: Ubisoft has outright said they don't even care if the Assassin's Creed movie makes money, its basically a 2 hour commercial for their games, and the games make so much money the movie could lose money and Ubisoft would still come out ahead.
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