Mostly posting this as a reminder that I want to write up my own thoughts on this topic at some point soon.
Lots of rumblings recently — Teh Fyooture is a’ comin’. Given the things I’ve got cooking backstage, I’m finding all of this very, very interesting.
First up: Announcements made by White Wolf at the International Camarilla Conference about where their business is headed, coupled with more definitive statements from Ryan Dancey in an interview with Gamasutra. Long story short — WW is transitioning. Tabletop RPGs are a “legacy business”, they’re going to gradually move towards ePublishing, in whatever format.
Second: Very insightful thoughts from former Adamant freelancer Malcolm Sheppard about what it all means for the future of the business — the coming post-tabletop games, the idea of traditional RPGs as “IP Prototyping” (the real gem concept of the entire article). Well worth reading.
All of this dovetails really well with the data I’ve been collecting, which is bubbling in my head, making steps towards coming together in a primordial soup of a new business model for Adamant (and perhaps other traditional hobby game companies).
I have to admit some degree of hesitancy in aggregating everything and presenting it in one grand thesis statement. It almost seems like all of the various ingredients I’ve been looking at are there for all to see, but nobody has combined them specifically with the idea of applying the separate elements to the game industry IP-presentation model. The nagging worry (born of egotism, I know), is that I’ll assemble the post, present my concept, and then get beaten to market by folks who say “Hey! That’s a great idea!”, and rush to launch, either on the back of a better budget, a larger staff, or just half-assing it.
In other words, the selfish side of me wants to keep the inspiration to myself, and just LAUNCH.