Let’s hope the new game is better than Dark Alliance (pic: Wizards of the Coast)
The developer of one of the worst games of last year is making a second Dungeons & Dragons game, helped by the producer of Watch Dogs.
Dungeons & Dragons is one of many indoor activities, along with video games, that benefited from the lockdown, with interest in the grandaddy of role-playing games also ballooning thanks to Stranger Things.
That’s led to the strongest sales in the game’s near 50 year history but owners Wizard of the Coast haven’t yet been able to replicate that success with licensed video games. Last year’s Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance was absolutely dire, but developer Tuque Games is being given another chance.
Although they’ve since been renamed to Invoke Studios, Tuque is owned by Wizards of the Coast, so they’re not keen to give up on them too early. They have, however, brought in Ubisoft veteran Dominic Guay, who has worked extensively on the Splinter Cell franchise and the first two Watch Dogs games.
Despite the official announcement, Wizards of the Coast has offered almost no details on the game, merely saying that it will have a ‘triple-A scope’ and will use Unreal Engine 5 for its visuals.
Guay will lead a team of 80 people at first, which isn’t very much for a supposed AAA game, but that will increase to 200 by 2025, which is still a little on the low side.
That implies the game itself won’t be out until at least then, so it may be a good year or two before we do find out what it is and what it looks like.
‘We have the largest and most popular brand of fantasy role-playing games in Dungeons & Dragons,’ says Guay. ‘Such a brand, with 50 years of history behind it, inspires developers and gives us enormous creative freedom. Our focus is on high-quality AAA games and we will have the means to achieve our ends.’
Although it lacks even a codename at the moment, the new project is not the only Dungeons & Dragons game currently in development, as Wizards of the Coast made the very wise decision to bring in Divinity: Original Sin 2 developer Larian Studios to make Baldur’s Gate 3.
The game’s been in early access since 2020 but is expected to launch officially next year, when hopefully there’ll be an announcement about a console release as well.
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The developer of one of the worst games of last year is making a second Dungeons & Dragons game, helped by the producer of Watch Dogs.