Last week it was announced that CCP Games sold the rights and all assets of White Wolf Publishing (the folks behind the World of Darkness and Vampire: The Masquerade IPs) to none other than Paradox Interactive. In light of this, we called up the brand new CEO of White Wolf, Tobias Sjögren about the purchase and what it might mean for RPGs and MMOs with the White Wolf branding in the future.
Obviously, it’s still far too soon to talk specifics as the newly minted White Wolf under Paradox Interactive will be rebuilding a new staff and establishing offices. As a sort of sister company to Paradox, the games and other media productions that come from White Wolf moving forward can come from all angles, Tobias said. That is to say, it’s highly possible we could see an Obsidian RPG based on the White Wolf IP and published by Paradox Interactive.
Tobias’ job is going to be to oversee the unification of the White Wolf IPs and games into one main narrative and “one World of Darkness”. When we asked if Wizards of the Coasts’ vision for a unified story across all media for Dungeons & Dragons was inspiration for this goal, Tobias said, “Of course. It’s a great way to keep fans engaged across Pen and Paper, Books, Comics, Movies, TV Shows, and of course PC and console games.” Anything and everything the new White Wolf does will work towards a unified goal and narrative for the whole universe of characters.
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Overseeing the creative process of bringing all these things together will be none other than Martin Ericsson, formerly the Senior Content Designer for CCP’s World of Darkness MMO. Martin, as it’s listed on his LinkedIn profile is now the lead world designer for a “secret project” at Paradox Interactive. We think it’s safe to say, though it’s soon for details, there are some might cool things already in the works with White Wolf. Paradox has never rested on its laurels, and it’s great to see Martin, Tobias, and the White Wolf/Paradox team hit the ground running with the IP.
And yes, for those hoping a World of Darkness MMO is in the works, Tobias couldn’t confirm anything except that they did indeed buy all of the assets to World of Darkness and the code that was being worked on for the MMO before CCP pulled the plug. Does it mean we’ll get the MMORPG one day? Who knows, but the simple fact that Tobias didn’t flat out deny it means we’re hopeful.
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Tobias ended our chat by admitting that bringing this unified one World of Darkness into reality is going to be tough, but that he and the rest of the team are all really excited to bring the universe out of the “shadows” (so to speak) to make it a more known IP across all media platforms. Don’t be surprised if movies, books, and comics or TV shows all start to sprout up in the coming years. But for us? Well, we’ll just be happy if some epic RPGs or MMOs get made. Stay tuned to the DICE Summit and GDC in 2016 as Tobias says they’ll very likely have cool stuff to talk about at those conventions.
