Despite a few canceled games (such as the titles in development at Hidden Path and Otherside Entertainment), Wizards of the Coast is still betting heavily on the D&D brand for its video gaming division.
Speaking with Gamespot at GDC 2024, Head of Digital Product Development Dan Ayoub (formerly at Microsoft) talked about the breadth of Dungeons and Dragons experiences coming to gamers:
When we make a D&D game, we work with the D&D team. We also want to tie into what they’re planning for future releases and things like that. So the different types of games and the roadmaps we have are tied in with a larger D&D strategy. So you may see some overlap, but if you do, it’s intentional. And that’s kind of where I go back to the studios having their creative freedom, but there’s still that larger plan. So you’re going to be seeing a number of different kinds of D&D experiences coming.
Interestingly, Ayoub also confirmed that Faerûn and its Forgotten Realms will not be the only setting of these games. While the Forgotten Realms are by far the most popular Dungeons and Dragons setting, there are many others, such as Greyhawk, Mystara, Eberron, Ravenloft, and Spelljammer, just to name a few.
So far, we know that the co-op game announced by Starbreeze in December for a 2026 release will be set in Waterdeep, one of the biggest cities of Faerûn. We do not know the setting of the D&D VR game announced this January by Resolution Games, nor do we know the setting of the new Dungeons and Dragons Unreal Engine 5 game in development at Invoke (formerly Tuque, the studio that made Dark Alliance). On the subject of the latter project, a job ad posted last month for a Principal Gameplay Programmer suggests there may be PvP modes:
Passion for Multiplayer and PVP live Game is a plus.
PvP is generally not a great fit for D&D, but maybe they’re attempting some sort of asymmetrical 1v4 multiplayer where one player is the Dungeon Master and effectively tries to stop the group of heroes.
Overall, Wizards of the Coast is investing over a billion dollars across its gaming studios in North America. Beyond the aforementioned D&D games, there’s the ambitious sci-fi RPG Exodus by Archetype Entertainment, a G.I. Joe Snake Eyes game in development at Atomic Arcade, and a horror game in development at Skeleton Key.
