‘Dark Alliance’ Devs Divulge D&D AAA Game in the Works
Wizards of the Coast launched a new studio and announced development on a new AAA Dungeons & Dragons game with the Dark Alliance team.
Love it or hate it, Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance has the distinction of being the first in WotC’s new push for digital development for D&D. Though the initial launch was buggy, and network lag times and matchmaking meant that many players couldn’t play the co-op slash-em-up together, the game nevertheless proved a concept for WotC.
Yesterday, Wizards of the Coast announced Invoke Studios, a new, Montreal-based game developer studio. Alongside the new studio, WotC announced that the company was working on an as-yet-unnamed Dungeons & Dragons AAA game. Triple A games are blockbusters, with massive budgets and development teams behind them. And at Invoke Studios, the developers from Tuque Games, who published Dark Alliance, will be incorporated into the studio.
WotC’s Invoke Studios – A New AAA Dungeons & Dragons Game in the Works
Located in the Saint-Henri district, Invoke enjoys the autonomy of an independent studio, but with access to the vast resources that are the result of belonging to a great global family.
In other words, Invoke Studios will get that sweet sweet Magic the Gathering money. All those Peppa Pig sales will help power a new generation of AAA games thanks to Hasbro’s digital initiative. But Vice President and General Manager Dominic Guay remains optimistic that Invoke Studios will maintain their autonomy:
“We value the autonomy of each team member so that each person can express his or her talents in order to have the maximum productive impact on our games. In that way, we are not just the Montreal division of an international group. We will also continue to put forth the ideas and the direction of the game universes we expand and create.”
Wizards of the Coast has historically had problems with autonomy and employees. But the world does change. Sometimes. And creatives are at their best when they’re allowed to create and given guidance instead of working to specifications that have been lawyered to death. Perhaps the Magic and RPG developer will take a lighter touch with their digital initiatives and new President and Senior VP of D&D in the works.
As for the game itself, aside from being set in the D&D multiverse, precious little is known, other than it will be running on the Unreal 5 Engine. But the team is expanding. At 80 members now, by 2025, the Invoke team is aiming to total of 200 members.
For those playing along at home, this is the second major WotC-owned Dev studio. The other is Skeleton Key, based in Austin, TX. And this is also the 2nd major, untitled AAA Dungeons & Dragons games in the work. The other one is an ambitious open-world game from Hidden Path Entertainment.
And all that as Baldur’s Gate 3 continues its own development
