Wizards Digital Game Studio Is Probably Not What You Think

So an announcement from Chris Cocks (Wizards of the Coast President) has created a fair amount of speculation about what's in store for digital D&D products in the future. Here's the quick summary of the press release.

Magic the Gathering Tactics

• Wizards of the Coast is forming a digital studio.
• The Magic Online team has been folded into this studio.
• Wizards has been farming talent from other game studios.
• They wish to "bring Magic and D&D to unexpected settings, genres, and platforms."

So what does this mean for D&D table top? Probably not much (if anything) and not for a long while despite what all the blogs are speculating online.

D&D Neverwinter PS4

So, this is a fun thing that happened.

A couple weeks back, I entered a little contest by sharing a Tweet and FB message from the Neverwinter MMO team. The prize was a PS4 with a really sweet Tiamat skin.

Oddly enough, I actually won one of the PS4's they were giving away. This was really cool, but what made it even more fun was a small token on the part of the Neverwinter team.

Inside the box, was the PS4, a D&D sticker, and a hand-written, hand-aged note. Basically, they wrote a nice letter and used what I assume to be the "tea bag aging" process to stain the note and make it look like old parchment. While this was just a small gesture, it really added something extra special to the whole prize package.

Table top gamers have been known to scoff at MMO players from time to time, but this was a small reminder to me that no matter the media format in which one enjoys the Dungeons & Dragons game, we all love the fantasy genre and have a deep-rooted passion for D&D.

Before our kids, my wife and I played Neverwinter on the PC when we had time to spare. After kids, that time is even more sparse, but I look forward to returning to the game with the new PS4.

Thanks to the Neverwinter team for pouring their passion into the D&D genre. The note was an awesome touch.