Sword Coast Legends Developer n-Space Closes Down After 21 Years

Thanks for the update. I really had hopes for this game but the more I found out about it the less I was interested. I loved the idea of a live DM running a digital game. I hope this doesn't damper future work on that kind of idea.

 

[ZeshinX]

I avoided SCL precisely because it was, for all intents and purposes, not D&D. It had the names, the places....but not the underlying rules (it was more Dragon Age than D&D....not surprising considering Dan Tudge was the lead on it).

 

[Jabborwacky]

Plus, DMing is a higher pressure activity than being a player. This is why AL incentivizes playing as a DM. I think it is a positive and wonderful idea to try making DMing as attractive an activity as being a player, yet it is also highly experimental. They probably should have tacked that on as a later expansion and focused on the core experience first.

And yes, its sad to see another mid-range studio go during a time when they are an endangered species. I hope they can find new work at other studios. They certainly have the talent.

 

[Jester David]

I avoided SCL precisely because it was, for all intents and purposes, not D&D. It had the names, the places....but not the underlying rules (it was more Dragon Age than D&D....not surprising considering Dan Tudge was the lead on it).

How much Dan Tudge was involved with DragonAge is questionable.

As for the D&D rules, I always ask myself how well a football or baseball game that was *inspired* by those rules would do. That took the names and loose concepts but tweaked them to be faster and more action packed. How fans of baseball and football would react...

 

[RedSiegfried]

I just wanted a toolset and persistent world mod support like NWN (1) had. Heck, if NWN 1 still had persistent world server services around and mods which made it use 5E rules, I'd happily still use it.

For myself, being 5e wasn't as important to me as the robust multiplayer and customizability. But OTOH, I always go on and on about how much I dislike 3e, and somehow NWN is my favorite CRPG despite that. Maybe having the fiddly math done behind the scenes made it more appealing to me. At any rate, I'll go on playing NWN1 on the existing PWs out there, and locally with friends and family. I'm actually looking forward to doing some 3 player + DM action next weekend in the NWN version of Eye of The Beholder on my LAN.

SCL had the potential but I'm kind of glad I haven't taken the leap yet. And if some magic happens and some real upgrades and improvements are released, hey, it's never to late to buy it one way or the other. So the story isn't over yet.

 

[indemnity]

Hasbro's agenda with D&D is very clear: The core RPG is not their business model...they plan to make all their profit by licensing the IP...This business model is not great for companies that want to use the IP to develop new innovative ways to actually play D&D.

That is actually a very good business model for both D&D players and 3rd party developers. What does Wizards know about programming a character builder?

Hasbro does make D&D profit from selling the fanbase. The RPG delivers the audience they on-sell. Good RPG=more fans=more licensing. The CEO of Hasbro has directly espoused that model at annual reports time.

Wizards can focus on creating and supporting content to grow the player base. Regular publications, coherent rules, high quality books, social media.

3rd parties assume the risk of failure when they (try to) negotiate a license and buy into the existing fanbase (e.g. FantasyGrounds, HeroLab, minis/figs, movie studios, publishing companies/authors). Wizards gets cash up front or royalties and avoids lay offs.

SCL is the perfect example of innovation in D&D. Outsider with a novel idea paid the IP license (or took rates) and sadly could not make as much profit as predicted. And business as usual continues at Wizards...

 

[Barantor]

For myself, being 5e wasn't as important to me as the robust multiplayer and customizability. But OTOH, I always go on and on about how much I dislike 3e, and somehow NWN is my favorite CRPG despite that. Maybe having the fiddly math done behind the scenes made it more appealing to me. At any rate, I'll go on playing NWN1 on the existing PWs out there, and locally with friends and family. I'm actually looking forward to doing some 3 player + DM action next weekend in the NWN version of Eye of The Beholder on my LAN.

SCL had the potential but I'm kind of glad I haven't taken the leap yet. And if some magic happens and some real upgrades and improvements are released, hey, it's never to late to buy it one way or the other. So the story isn't over yet.

There is hope that NWN could be redone. The company that has been redoing Baldur's Gate just came out with an expansion today Siege of Dragonspear Castle for Baldur's Gate 2, but also updates to Baldur's Gate 1 enhanced edition which Beamdog also did.

What does this have to do with NWN? Well one of the Execs at Beamdog was a team member at Bioware during the creation of NWN and they have said that he is "very interested" in it during one of their twitch streams showing off Dragonspear. Hopefully Beamdog can get the rights to update NWN 1&2 and we could possibly have a very good set of 3E game tools at our disposal. With as easy as the NWN game was to mod I don't doubt that someone could possibly make a mod to support 5E style as well.

 

[Barachiel]

Is it me, or is almost every computer project that takes up something with the D&D brand (or something similar, like Pathfinder recently) have a curse on them to either bumble up or outright fail hard?

 

[Uder]

This is sort of good news, IMO. Looking at their history of crap games I can't bring myself to believe that SCL was going to be the one exception (eventually! We promise!)

 

[ZeshinX]

There is hope that NWN could be redone. The company that has been redoing Baldur's Gate just came out with an expansion today Siege of Dragonspear Castle for Baldur's Gate 2, but also updates to Baldur's Gate 1 enhanced edition which Beamdog also did.

What does this have to do with NWN? Well one of the Execs at Beamdog was a team member at Bioware during the creation of NWN and they have said that he is "very interested" in it during one of their twitch streams showing off Dragonspear. Hopefully Beamdog can get the rights to update NWN 1&2 and we could possibly have a very good set of 3E game tools at our disposal. With as easy as the NWN game was to mod I don't doubt that someone could possibly make a mod to support 5E style as well.

Siege of Dragonspear is an expansion to BG: EE, not BG2: EE (just in case any might run out to snag a copy lol).

 

[MadmanMike83]

How much Dan Tudge was involved with DragonAge is questionable.

As for the D&D rules, I always ask myself how well a football or baseball game that was *inspired* by those rules would do. That took the names and loose concepts but tweaked them to be faster and more action packed. How fans of baseball and football would react...

Exaggerated sports games was Midway's wheelhouse for a long time. NBA Jam, NFL Blitz, NHL Hitz, and MLB Slugfest (and even Wayne Gretzky's 3D Hockey) were all fun in their own way.

Exaggerated D&D games can also work well. I have fond memories of the Dark Alliance games and Demon Stone, while not amazing, was still a fun experience. I enjoyed Turbine's DDO for a long time as well. Hell, even the old D&D arcade games were great in their own way.

The problem with WotC in recent years seems to be their willingness to throw the license to unknown or untested developers.

 

[darjr]

To be fair the game was getting rave reviews from insiders and the 'industry'. Which probably helped convince WotC. What I can't seem to square is all that hype and reality.

 

[flametitan]

I can't say I'm surprised. It was fairly obvious that SCL just couldn't bring in enough customers despite how low they cut retail price. A Lunar New Year Sale price of $10 from a $40 retail in October is a really fast drop for a project of what I assume to be a fairly high budget project.

I just hope that whatever parts of the code can be opened up to the public will be, so that those with the know how can made more extensive mods for it.

 

[JoeyQueerAF]

I did not buy into SCL because of the very poor reviews it got.

 

[Jester David]

The problem with WotC in recent years seems to be their willingness to throw the license to unknown or untested developers.

Tested developers make games from their own Intellectual Property. Untested developers licence IP selling that name since their own is unknown.
It's always a gamble. Sometimes it pays off (BioWare) other times not.

 

[TheSwartz]

I did buy into it. I bought the Limited Edition Collector's version. I very much wanted these guys to succeed.

However, I hate to say it, but this is what happens to a game studio that releases a complete crap product and does everything possible to let down an entire generation of D&D fans.

One good thing: The Belaphoss statue is badass... It's center piece in my collection of CE gaming figures. I don't mind buying what I did cause of this. But, in the end, I'd rather it came with a classic game like they promised.

 

[EthanSental]

I don't think I ever saw the Belaphoss statue, just the mock up. How tall is it?

just looked it - pretty nice statue!

 

[Curmudjinn]

On a brighter note, Siege of Dragonspear comes out tomorrow for Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition. Me=Pumped.

 

[Jhaelen]

It was doomed, imo, when it was clear it was not using D&D rules.

Unfortunately, yes.

 

[TheSwartz]

I don't think I ever saw the Belaphoss statue, just the mock up. How tall is it?

just looked it - pretty nice statue!

I'm not at home to measure it, but it's definitely as tall as my Colossal Red Dragon. It's heavy too..

 

[EthanSental]

What version or DLC has been put out for SCL? I have the one that added the drow as a playable race....is there any other DLC besides that one?

I'll have to see if I can grab a Belaphoss statue on the aftermarket, really nice looking statue.