A Very Simple Question

[Auraculum]

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[JarlFrank]

Wasn't there that Sword Coast Legends game, which is now no longer for sale?

 

[Deuce Traveler]

Just look over here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Dungeons_&_Dragons_video_games

For some reason, no one has been making a new D&D video game for some time. Except for Sword Coast Legends, the games that have been published have been modern remakes of older games. I'm not sure whether or not it is a licensing issue or whether or not Hasbro just isn't interested in allowing publishers to license their IP outside of mobile Facebook games. The lack is really quite bizarre, especially when you consider how TSR embraced the opportunities available in video games.

Or maybe you can blame the developers of Daggerdale (Bedlam games) for doing such a poor job that no one has taken a serious hack at it for the last seven years.

 

[Jokzore]

Licensing fee. Why pay Wizards to use their shit (which isn't even as recognizable anymore), when you can make up your own generic fantasy shit?

Don't you love listening about ''muh world building'' and exploring Fantasy World #5864 every time a new RPG comes out? Why let the writers write stories or characters when they can be busy creating background details for a world no one will ever care about.

EDIT: Also this is a thing
https://www.polygon.com/2015/2/9/80...video-game-devs-thinks-that-tabletop-game-has

 

[DraQ]

Licensing fee. Why pay Wizards to use their shit (which isn't even as recognizable anymore), when you can make up your own generic fantasy shit?

Well, paying for generic fantasy shit does indeed seem pointless.

 

[Mustawd]

Does anyone have any CONCRETE answers as to why they aren't made anymore?

I don't, but there is some evidence that we might get something soon(ish):

-D&D brand has seen growth the last couple of quarters when other gaming franchises have gone down

This quote from their last earnings call:

Within Hasbro Gaming, consumer demand remains strong. New launches, such as Hearing Things and Don't Step In It performed well and tapped into social gaming trends. In addition, DUNGEONS & DRAGONS and JENGA grew revenues. We continue to see immense interest in gaming from consumers of all ages, and Hasbro is investing to further leverage our advantage and reach in this area.

I think with SCL's goal and the above statement of "consumers of all ages", it seems Hasbro's wet dream would be to attract a wide spectrum of players. However, their last stint with SCL showed they were very stingy on actually paying a good studio to make a game.

 

[Jokzore]

I don't think Forgotten Realms is "generic" by any means

Forgotten Realms certainly is generic as a world/background, but when you get down to an individual story level it's whatever you make of it.

The issue is everyone wants their own IP to be the next big thing, the next Faerun/Cyrodil/Middle Earth and then milk that into oblivion. What they fail to realize is, something like that requires building from the ground up, not top down.

One Pillars game where you waste half the writing staff fleshing out lore bits that we'll never see in the actual game won't get anyone invested into the world. Writing an actually interesting story and appealing characters does that.

 

[Mustawd]

I think with SCL's goal and the above statement of "consumers of all ages", it seems Hasbro's wet dream would be to attract a wide spectrum of players. However, their last stint with SCL showed they were very stingy on actually paying a good studio to make a game.

Also, you need to consider how the closure of Toys R Us has affected Hasbro. All of a sudden, a large reseller of physical goods is gone. So naturally, you'd want to increase your digital footprint in the games industry. Some more tidbits from their earnings call:

And then if you go out around the world and look at our Entertainment and Licensing business, it continues to grow. We saw growth in digital gaming and Consumer Products in the quarter. We've seen growth in Latin America and in Asia Pacific. We continue to believe in our Wizards of the Coast team and their business, and we've seen great response to Dominaria, which comes in Q2 as well, as Magic: The Gathering Arena, which is still in closed beta, but increasingly spreading the opportunity to play the game. And the feedback has been phenomenal. We continue to enhance that. So I think we have one of the broadest portfolios with strengthened sell-through, with retail inventories down, strong retailer support and plans that the teams are developing in real time across the U.S. and around the world. So we just -- it's early days relative to the Toys"R"Us liquidation, and we'll update you as we get closer to the third and fourth quarter.

 

[Micormic]

Not sure but since I'm generally not a fan of forgotten realms I can't say that I mind.

 

[dragonul09]

Good question, I wondered that too a few times, I mean you already have an established universe, plenty of stories to tell, it may be generic, but it's generic done well. I would pay a good sum to play another game set in FR, instead I got Pillars of Unoriginality.

 

[deuxhero]

Because you'd need to use 5E mechanics and those are just trash.

 

[Jenkem]

dude they literally released a forgotten realms game last year:

 

[Luckmann]

Why, ever since Storm of Zehir, have no new RPGs set in the Forgotten Realms been made? You guys must know something on the topic, right?

Because 4e D&D completely fucked up the setting and salted the Earth. They've tried to unfuck it in 5e, but what's done is done and there's little coming back from that. They should've just retconned it, but they can't even retcon properly with their own heads so far up their own collective ass.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

As the others have said, these gaming companies thought (correctly) that Forgotten Realms is pretty old, and unoriginal at this point, and there is no reason why they can't come up with their own lore and systems.

But apparently, what they didn't realize is that their own efforts would be much worse, despite the low bar. I mean Forgotten Realms might be meh, but Cat n' Imp Realms (D:OS) and SJW Realms (PoE) managed to be significantly worse.

 

[Luckmann]

Why, ever since Storm of Zehir, have no new RPGs set in the Forgotten Realms been made? You guys must know something on the topic, right?

Because 4e D&D completely fucked up the setting and salted the Earth. They've tried to unfuck it in 5e, but what's done is done and there's little coming back from that. They should've just retconned it, but they can't even retcon properly with their own heads so far up their own collective ass.

Could you give me the short and sweet on what they did in 5th Edition? I stopped having anything to do with the setting once they announced the Spellplague. Mother*******.

Check out the Forgotten Realms wiki for the cliff notes, but really, they just undid some of the bigger fuckups, brought back a bunch of the gods that died, and generally restored a lot of stuff. Dragonborn are still around, though, and Tieflings still look like full-on fucking demons, and like I said, they didn't really retcon anything, they just hurried things along and tried to restore stuff - all the shit that fucked everything up in 4e still happened, ultimately, with all that entails and does to the universe.

So it's arguably worse, because not only were they too afraid to do a proper retcon and actually solve the shit they creamed out, but they also showed that they have no faith themselves in that it was actually a good idea to begin with.

Edit: Oh, and elves are genderfluid now because reasons.

 

[FreeKaner]

Fuck Forgotten Realms. Why isn't there any Warhammer RPGs?

 

[Jenkem]

Fuck Warhammer Fantasy. Why isn't there any Warhammer 40k RPGs?

 

[Luckmann]

Fuck Forgotten Realms. Why isn't there any Warhammer RPGs?

Because what happened to Forgotten Realms happened to Warhammer Fantasy, too, except, like, 800 times worse.

Not even joking. They literally killed the setting and did everything in their power to utterly destroy it through "End Times" so that it could not be redeemed in the future in an effort to force people into moving on from Warhammer Fantasy to Age of Sigmar.

Fuck Warhammer Fantasy. Why isn't there any Warhammer 40k RPGs?

Because.. dammit, you guys, could you just.. not make me live through these things again?

 

[Micormic]

Not sure but since I'm generally not a fan of forgotten realms I can't say that I mind.

Wow, this really added to the conversation.

Such a shitty thread doesn't warrant much conversation aside from pointing out the OP is a moron.

 

[FreeKaner]

Fuck Warhammer Fantasy. Why isn't there any Warhammer 40k RPGs?

Warhammer 40K is the reason why Warhammer Fantasy died. A better setting.

It can burn in hell.

 

[Jenkem]

Fuck Warhammer Fantasy. Why isn't there any Warhammer 40k RPGs?

Warhammer 40K is the reason why Warhammer Fantasy died. A better setting.

It can burn in hell.

 

[Mustawd]

Fuck Warhammer Fantasy. Why isn't there any Warhammer 40k RPGs?

Warhammer 40K is the reason why Warhammer Fantasy died. A better setting.

It can burn in hell.

Yes.

 

[FreeKaner]

Actually, as I've mentioned somewhere else, they seem to be very, very slowly reinstating Warhammer Fantasy. Apparently, Games Workshop saw the success of both Total War: Warhammer and Vermintide. Now WFRP is getting a new edition, and Black Library is re-releasing old titles with new covers, in new collections etc. So it would appear that SOMETHING is going on there. Maybe they will eventually simply split Warhammer Fantasy and Age of Sigmar into separate continuities? After all, that's what they did with 40K and Fantasy many years ago.

Don't tease me like that, source?

I wonder how will they retcon end times. The ideal would be to just claiming it was prequel to Age of Sigmar and anything related to end times is separate timeline canon.

 

[FreeKaner]

Actually, as I've mentioned somewhere else, they seem to be very, very slowly reinstating Warhammer Fantasy. Apparently, Games Workshop saw the success of both Total War: Warhammer and Vermintide. Now WFRP is getting a new edition, and Black Library is re-releasing old titles with new covers, in new collections etc. So it would appear that SOMETHING is going on there. Maybe they will eventually simply split Warhammer Fantasy and Age of Sigmar into separate continuities? After all, that's what they did with 40K and Fantasy many years ago.

Don't tease me like that, source?

I wonder how will they retcon end times. The ideal would be to just claiming it was prequel to Age of Sigmar and anything related to end times is separate timeline canon.

1. http://cubicle7.co.uk/?s=warhammer - Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th
2. Total War: Warhammer and Vermintide - well...Steam
3. https://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-chronicles - the various new collections of old books

Maybe it's just milking the cow to the last drop. Or maybe they actually realised that, just maybe, Warhammer Fantasy was dead as a tabletop game, but sold really well as novels, and even better (as they are discovering during the last two years) as video games.

And yes, I'd imagine they would simply split Age of Sigmar and Warhammer Fantasy into completely separate timelines/universes/realities...whatever.

If they just discontinued the tabletop but still kept producing books, artwork and stories while licensing the genre for video games it would be the dream. Age of Sigmar is better for tabletop anyhow.

 

[Jokzore]

If they just discontinued the tabletop

And give up the damn goldmine that are those figurines ?