D&D 5E The RPG or the Brand?

[Mirtek]

Just the opposite. One book and out for each IP is what I'd suggest, maybe three a year on various franchises

Why should the franchise holders agree on such a sparse support? If they want to have an RPG created for their valuable franchise they'll expect a business plan spanning years with constant support

 

[Mishihari Lord]

Agreed. Big action movies move between cultures with relative ease. We all understand "Monster smash!"

Humor, on the other hand, is so specific to culture that comedies rarely find success when seeking an international audience. Even slapstick, the most basic and broad-based form of humor, can experience difficulty being accepted by a culture outside of the one that produced it.

I'll quibble with this point. Aristophanes, who wrote his plays ~2400 years ago in Greece, is still hilarious to me today, and I'm hardly alone in this. There is some humor that seems to be universal.

 

[Mark CMG]

Why should the franchise holders agree on such a sparse support? If they want to have an RPG created for their valuable franchise they'll expect a business plan spanning years with constant support

I don't know that that is true anymore. If the expert in the field says the law of diminishing returns means you only want a core book and support isn't a viable revenue stream (and they are in a position to know and show the numbers), then that's why the IP holder hires the experts.

 

[Staffan]

I don't know that that is true anymore. If the expert in the field says the law of diminishing returns means you only want a core book and support isn't a viable revenue stream (and they are in a position to know and show the numbers), then that's why the IP holder hires the experts.

I can't think of a single case where an IP holder has hired a game company to produce an RPG based on their IP. In every single case I can think of, it's the other way around.

 

[Mark CMG]

I can't think of a single case where an IP holder has hired a game company to produce an RPG based on their IP. In every single case I can think of, it's the other way around.

Factions in WotC have been saying for years that there's no real money in the support products. And with this latest info coming from Mearls who said TSR's problem wasn't just setting bloat but, and I paraphrase, anything-beyond-core bloat, it sure seems like the current wisdom is only the core books really make any money worth noting. If the licensee is the top dog in the field, by orders of magnitude, and they tell the IP holder they only need one core book (or just a couple/few) and that anything more by way of support is just going to dilute the profit margin, I see no reason why the IP holder wouldn't want a single big payoff up front. The one or couple/few books can include all the support that seems necessary to play the whole game. The advertising becomes infinitely easier and more focused ("Here's everything you need!"). No worrying that one not-so-well received supplement alng the way is going to tank the RPG's viability or cut severely into profit margins on the whole line. The waiting for the inevitable tail end of when supplements fall away cutting into those margins and leaving someone holding the bag on two in the pipeline and man hours already allocated and used on two others. We're definitely looking at whole new ways to plan such things but the evidence I see suggests it's the safest and best approach I can fathom for outside IP (just considering RPGs here, not other game formats).

 

[Greatwyrm]

I can't think of a single case where an IP holder has hired a game company to produce an RPG based on their IP. In every single case I can think of, it's the other way around.

You should take a look at the Dresden Files RPG. That's pretty much how Evil Hat LLC got involved.

http://www.rantingdragon.com/interview-with-fred-hicks-co-president-of-evil-hat-productions-llc/

"One of those game ideas, called Fate, got some awards, and those awards somehow got the attention of Jim’s agent, who suggested to Jim that if he wanted his Dresden Files “baby” to get treated right by folks he trusted, he could do worse than have his award-winning friends create an RPG based on the books. Jim liked the sound of that, and when he contacted us about that, so did we—which kicked off the whole formation of Evil Hat as a commercial game publisher."

 

[Hussar]

Marvel did not lead with Spider-Man. They don't have the rights to make Spider-Man movies. Sony did Spider-Man, which showed that you can make good super-hero movies.

Marvel themselves led with Iron Man in 2008. At the time, many people questioned the wisdom in this, but it seems to have worked out pretty well for them.

I'd point out that X-Men started the ball rolling, not Spider Man. X-men came out two years before Spider Man and did fantastically well with a product that, outside of comic book fans, no-one had really heard of. And, let's not forget a host of really bad comic book movies in the 90's that largely primed the pump.

Thing is, we don't actually need a good movie. When you can pump out Battleship and make enough money to keep the ball rolling (with a Monopoly movie and Candyland?!?!) the idea that an IP with a built in audience measured in the millions can't be that much of a stretch.

 

[Redthistle]

I'll quibble with this point. Aristophanes, who wrote his plays ~2400 years ago in Greece, is still hilarious to me today, and I'm hardly alone in this. There is some humor that seems to be universal.

I grant your point, but you gotta admit that you had to go back centuries to find an exception.

 

[Mirtek]

Factions in WotC have been saying for years that there's no real money in the support products. And with this latest info coming from Mearls who said TSR's problem wasn't just setting bloat but, and I paraphrase, anything-beyond-core bloat, it sure seems like the current wisdom is only the core books really make any money worth noting.

As a IP holder I don't have to care that they are less profitable, as I have no cost and just take my share of the profit. It's all the same to me whether it's 10% or 2% profitability, that's the problem of the licensee.

If the licensee is the top dog in the field, by orders of magnitude

Wait, are we talking about licensing to Paizo now?

and they tell the IP holder they only need one core book (or just a couple/few) and that anything more by way of support is just going to dilute the profit margin, I see no reason why the IP holder wouldn't want a single big payoff up front.

But the IP holder doesn't have to care about the margin, since he's not tying up his captial. Also why should Paizo tell them that anyway? They're fully into a busy release schedule

The one or couple/few books can include all the support that seems necessary to play the whole game. The advertising becomes infinitely easier and more focused ("Here's everything you need!"). No worrying that one not-so-well received supplement alng the way is going to tank the RPG's viability or cut severely into profit margins on the whole line. The waiting for the inevitable tail end of when supplements fall away cutting into those margins and leaving someone holding the bag on two in the pipeline and man hours already allocated and used on two others. We're definitely looking at whole new ways to plan such things but the evidence I see suggests it's the safest and best approach I can fathom for outside IP (just considering RPGs here, not other game formats).

Only if you are concerned with profitability rather than total profit. As an IP holder who just takes his cut of the later I don't have to be too concerned about the former

And, let's not forget a host of really bad comic book movies in the 90's that largely primed the pump.

But also not forget that these came out after hugely successfull comic book movies when suddenly everybod wanted a slice of the cake

 

[transtemporal]

How does D&D develop these stories that drive movies and sell toys?

Hasbro could put their not-inconsiderable resources behind the property and Transformerize it.

But I'm not surprised they haven't. DnD is fantasy and any fantasy is up against LotR/Hobbit and GoT and given the DnD fair that has come out in the past (Uwe Boll you talentless hack), its not hard to see why they wouldn't take the risk when they have other successful properties.