I find this quote interesting for a couple of reasons:
1) When the interviewer says "You are the man who single-handedly saved Dungeons & Dragons from bankruptcy", Mr. Adkison doesn't offer any correction, denial, or response of any sort. He may not be the one (in this interview at least) saying that he "saved" D&D, but he doesn't seem to mind that statement being made or that impression being created.
Yes, but let us note a couple things:
That interview seems to be from this year (posted March 9, 2011), roughly a decade after he sold WotC. His statements at this time cannot reasonably be taken as "WotC marketing", or any other statement by WotC. What he may feel in his heart as a third party now does not bear on what WotC claims.
Now, I am not personally familiar with the internal business structure of WotC at the time. He was CEO, and I presume he had some Board of Directors to work with. If it was his idea, if he did the financial workups, it he did all the gladhanding and he pushed through the BoD to make it happen, then it is not all that unreasonable for him to take credit.
2) When the interviewer asks him whether he bought TSR because he was a fan or for financial reasons, he responds only from a financial perspective, particularly one about making the company a more attractive takeover target.
I think you mis-characterize what was asked. He wasn't asked "whether he bought it for love or financial reasons". He was asked "...how much of your decision to bring TSR into the WotC family came from just being a fan of the game...?" and he doesn't really answer that question. He instead answers the second part of the question, "...what did you see in the brand from a purely financial standpoint?"
To answer the first part, I give to you an excerpt from an
interview with the man from 2002, just after it was announced that he was buying Gen Con (which he'd been attending since 1992):
GamingReport: Do you still game? If so, what games do you regularly play?
Peter Adkison: "Absolutely. I play Magic: The Gathering occasionally. Not enough to be good at building decks, but I make it a point to get the PCDs for each new release and play a few games, especially with my dad who’s a Magic fanatic. But my first and last love is D&D, which is why I bought it back in ’97 and personally led the 3rd Edition design team for 6 months until I felt it was on the right track with Jonathan Tweet at the helm. Currently I’m running two regular games and playing in three. The games I’m running are on a plane that’s quite barbaric but with powerful magic. The "fair races" (humans, dwarves, elves, etc) occupy only about 10-20% of the land, the rest is ruled by equally advanced cultures of other races, like ogres, giants, drow, etc. One of the two groups I’m running is a group of fair race adventures that are so far from civilization that not only have none of them ever been to even a village (much less a city) of their own race, they haven’t even heard of one! The only city they know of is ruled by ogre slavers.
Of the games I’m playing, in one I’m a female human cleric at about 9th level, in another I’m a 3rd level half-orc barbarian sorcerer (he has just one level of sorc so he can use all arcane wands, shield, and expeditious retreat). In the other I’m playing a dwarven rogue-druid; the first command he teaches his animal companions is "flank!" hee hee."
Let me repeat the relevant bit:
"
But my first and last love is D&D, which is why I bought it back in ’97..."
So, we can put the interviews together, and get that he bought it because he loved it, but he would not have done so if it were a bad financial move. That sounds less "opportunistic" and more "not stupid" to me.
I think you're misinterpreting positive feelings as "white knight". I don't think anyone here has suggested that he made some horrible personal sacrifice to do it, like a knight would to save a maiden fair. He did, however, take considerable financial and professional risk. At the time, TSR had some pretty ugly financial troubles (and while we the public weren't fully aware of them, Adkison would have known all about them before the purchase). That the purchase would be a financial gain was *not* a given, that 3rd edition would be a winner was by no means assured.
He was in a position most gamers dream of being in, and it led to a resurgence in the hobby - he took a risk, did a lot of work, made something good, and we benefited. Again, I ask, why we should want to think this is other than positive?
My preference does not mean that it would be a commercial success in today's market.
