In a new interview, WotC President John Hight talks about MMORPG ambitions, what’s next for D&D, and blurring the digital/physical divide.
Wizards of the Coast’s new president, John Hight, is always “dropping hints” to the WotC development team about a new D&D MMORPG in the wake of “forever games” like Fortnite and Minecraft, according to a new interview with Gamesindustry.biz.
Of course it wasn’t just flights of MMO fancy on the table. Hight also discussed the future of D&D, the critical success of Magic’s Universe Beyond project—including and especially the Final Fantasy set. He also expressed that he hopes D&D can help players “seamlessly transition” from playing digitally to playing in-person and back again.
We’ve Had One D&D MMORPG, But What About Second D&D MMORPG?
First of all, the whole interview is a faascinating look at where WotC in general is heading. Especially since Hight took over—this includes where Dan Ayoub, the new president of D&D, specifically, hopes to take D&D with the franchise model. But there’s a few things that are worth chewing on a little further, starting with the whole D&D MMORPG idea. Because, as you may well know, there already is a D&D MMORPG, fittingly titled D&D Online. And this is on top of the many, many virtual ways to play D&D.
However, Hight still thinks there could be room for a second D&D, albeit one that involves a reimagining of what an MMO even looks like. After all, the game has changed considerably over the last twenty years—and Hight would know, given his extensive background at Blizzard. He was General Manager during Dragonflight, Executive Producer during Shadowlands, Production Director during Legion and Battle for Azeroth.
“I’d love to have [a new D&D MMORPG]. I think that we’ll want to rethink what an MMO is in this day and age. I think the traditional model that Blizzard—well, even before that, Ultima Online, Everquest—pursued could use updating.
I think in our case, it’s probably a crawl, walk, run [situation]. We want to make sure that we’ve assembled the talent, we have the backend technology, we have the plans to pursue.”
Although Hight is quick to point out that a new D&D MMO is just “a glimmer in the eye” at this point. But the idea is something he wants to see happen—and is even possible because of the flexibility of D&D. And that’s something you see reflected across the various games that WotC is developing. And using D&D as a sort of creative palette. It’s something that Hight says is the “foundation for great storytelling, great worldbuilding”. This can adapt to both different styles of play and distribution methods.
Here Hight is referring to the video game projects that WotC has in the works. Specifically the difference between something like Baldur’s Gate 3, a cRPG masterpiece, and the upcoming game in development from Giant Skull studio and former Jedi Fallen Order/Survivor director Stig Amussen, which is going to look wildly different. The still-in-baby-stages game will be a 3rd person action game with Amussen’s signature focus on “traversal and exploration” for instance.
Video Game Teams and WotC Schemes
To that end, one of the big things that Hight speaks about is the creation of a centralized “specialist team” at WotC. It would have a background in/focus on Dungeons & Dragons. Presumably, if this works out, WotC will build such a team for Magic as well. But D&D is at the fore for video game development at WotC these days, it seems.
Hight spoke about having a team that can keep working on things like concept art and storytelling and worldbuilding. But he’d like to eliminate the need for the increased team size that usually comes at the end of a game’s development cycle. That way WotC has a hand in all the story-driven D&D games in the works. This would make it easy to flow from project to project. In Hight’s words, the team will be a “set of artists and designers that are trained up on the IP, that have a love and affection for the IP and an understanding of it, and can effectively move from one game to the next.”
But video games are only a fraction of Wizards’ digital dreams. The other big thing that Hight spoke about for the future of D&D was a trend back towards in-person play:
“Unfortunately, because of COVID, there’s a whole generation of gamers that has spent a good deal of their time playing only online. And they’re rediscovering the joy of being able to play together. What I want us to be able to do is have players move fairly seamlessly between in person play and online play.”
And we can kind of see that in the upcoming new D&D starter set: Heroes of the Borderland. It has an extensive use of “class boards” and other physical components. They track things like hit points and adjust your AC the same way something like D&D Beyond does. This could make it easier to keep players “fully linked up” between digital and physical D&D.
You can read the full article here. And in the meantime, keep an eye out for more D&D video game news—that door is only barely open. More games look to follow in the wake (but not necessarily footsteps) of Baldur’s Gate 3.
What would your dream D&D video game look like?
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