Most Of The WotC Team That Greenlit ‘Baldur’s Gate 3’ Are Gone Now, Larian Studio Head Reveals
It seems even the team at WotC working to get Baldur’s Gate 3 greenlit with Larian has been hit by the Hasbro layoffs.
There’s killing the goose that laid the golden egg, and then there’s ripping out its entrails and throwing them everywhere so people can finally see what a cool goose you had. This is exactly the sort of thing Hasbro has chosen, it seems.
In a post thanking everyone for Baldur’s Gate 3’s Game of the Year win, Larian CEO Swen Vincke revealed that most of the people who were “in the original meeting room” at WotC are gone in the wake of Hasbro’s company health holiday hoedown.
If helping to make sure the golden egg gets laid in the first place, what is even the point?
Larian’s Swen Vincke On WotC BG3 Team – “There’s Almost Nobody Left”
All Larian CEO and creative director Swen Vincke wanted to do was go to the game awards in armor, and get to give a speech thanking folks. He got to do one of those things, because, this was the year when Geoff Keighley decided that there weren’t enough ads, and played everyone off the stage almost immediately. Except, of course, Hideo Kojima, because Keighley really wants to be invited to Kojima’s next birthday party. But that’s besides the point.
Despite Baldur’s Gate 3 winning Game of the Year, Vincke had very little time to thank anyone. So he did what most people would do, he shared what he would have said anyway on social media.
Winning Game of the year is a great honor and I want to first thank everyone that voted for us and I want to congratulate all the other nominees. This has been an incredibly competitive year and you each would have deserved to win this award @CapcomUSA_ @remedygames…
Advertisement— Swen Vincke @where? (@LarAtLarian) December 14, 2023
Only, in the middle of the Twitter thread, which thanks everyone who worked hard on the game, saying that “making a game like [Baldur’s Gate 3] only works if you have an incredible passionate and talented team and in that regard I am incredibly lucky” and that “BG3 is a game that couldn’t exist without our player community”.
Acknowledging that other people are responsible for making the thing everyone loves and that the community plays a huge role in their product’s success are two things that Hasbro’s executive team seems dead set against, because despite boasting that Wizards of the Coast “delivered a standout performance” with the “blockbuster August release of Baldur’s Gate III“, in Vincke’s Twitter thread, he reveals that most of the WotC-side team that was in the original meeting room are gone.
I also want to thank @Wizards_DnD and specifically the DnD team for giving us carte blanche. I’m really sorry to hear so many of you were let go. It’s a sad thing to realize that of the people who were in the original meeting room, there’s almost nobody left. I hope you all end…
— Swen Vincke @where? (@LarAtLarian) December 14, 2023
“I want to thank [WotC] and specifically the DnD team for giving us carte blanche. I’m really sorry to hear so many of you were let go. It’s a sad thing to realize that of the people who were in the original meeting room there’s almost nobody left. I hope you all end up well.”
This has to be a shocking blow to morale. But Hasbro’s next year will surely be just as successful now that they’ve cut the people who were doing the good things out of their various companies. How long before we hear that the people who worked on the D&D movie have been let go as well?
In the face of all of this, it’s important to keep in mind the sentiment that ends Vincke’s would-be acceptance speech:
“Many developers, myself included, make games because they love seeing others engage with their creations in a way only games can offer. They don’t care that much about the money made beyond it being the fuel they need to create new and better games. It’s worth reminding everyone that fuel is but a means, not a goal. Whereto and how we journey are what matter and what we remember.”
2024 is going to be an interesting year at Hasbro/WotC.
