Wizards of the Coast has made massive strides towards increasing its presence in the gaming industry over the past year. They’ve acquired studios like Tuque Games and announced a variety of games based on their IP like Baldur’s Gate 3, Magic: Legends and Dungeons and Dragons: Dark Alliance. Now, it is opening up a brand new studio with the help of BioWare veterans James Ohlen and Chad Robertson called Archetype Entertainment that has is doing something quite different for Wizards of the Coast – it is working on a new IP.
Instead of opting to develop games based on Magic: The Gathering or Dungeons and Dragons, Archetype Entertainment will create a brand new sci-fi IP for Wizards of the Coast. Archetype’s website also confirms that its sci-fi game will be a story-driven RPG that aims to “put the player at the center of an epic personal narrative with impactful choice.” Because of this mentality, hiring former BioWare developers that worked on classic titles like Baldur’s Gate and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic makes a lot of sense.
GamesIndustry.biz actually got the chance to speak with James Ohlsen almost a year ago, and he actually teased what working at Archetype Entertainment meant to him back then. “This is just an opportunity to work on projects as personal to me as the good ol’ days of the ’90s and early ’00s. In that time, work wasn’t work for me at all. I didn’t think of the work I was doing then to be anything but a labor of love. It was the most fun. I would prefer to be working on one of my games than going on vacation. I was a little bit of a workaholic because I loved it. And Wizards is giving me an opportunity to return to those personal projects,” he said.
As Archetype Entertainment is only just getting off the ground, it will likely be a while before we find out what their new IP is. That being said, Wizard of the Coast’s President Chris Cocks actually teased what the new IP will entail in that same interview last year. “Our first step is to build a franchise that will endure, like Magic and D&D, and we’ll figure out the right platforms for that world to express itself over the years to come. We think our strength is in creating fun, detailed worlds that players and our community want to immerse themselves in. Obviously, we have a rich lineage in tabletop and trading cards, but what our focus on is developing a world that people will care about and then figuring out which platforms let people connect with it in the best possible way for them.”
In the meantime, there are still several Wizards of the Coasts titles to look forward to this year.
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