March 12th marked the 10-year anniversary of actual play podcast slash Dungeons & Dragons media empire Critical Role. To mark the occasion, the cofounders spoke with Business Insider about their master plan for the franchise moving forward. One key detail has caught the attention of D&D fans who love games like Baldur’s Gate 3 – the Critical Role team is reportedly working on a video game. This info comes from CEO Travis Willingham, who shared that an official announcement about the new Critical Role video game would be coming soon. In fact, we may well hear more today, during the planned live stream with the case from campaign three.
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The planned celebratory live stream for Critical Role‘s 10th anniversary and the end of campaign three will take place on Thursday, March 13th at 7 PM PDT / 10 PM EDT. While Willingham did not specifically say that the video game reveal would take place during the stream, the timing feels right, so we may well find out more about the Critical Role video game sooner than anyone expected. We don’t yet know the title of the upcoming D&D video game, but there are a few details that have many fans of the Critical Role universe excited to learn more.
Most importantly, the Critical Role video game will in fact take place in the original universe of Exandria, created by Matt Mercer himself way back in the early days. From the basic overview, it sounds like the game will take some pages from Baldur’s Gate 3‘s book in terms of gameplay. Willingham has noted that players will control “the outcome of the story” and that the game will feature some of their favorite characters from Critical Role alongside new expansions upon the world of Exandria. Beyond that, gamers will have to wait for the big reveal to learn what the game will be called, when it’s coming out, and what developer is involved.
Fans Speculate About Who’s Developing the Critical Role Video Game
Many gamers know that the developer can make or break even the most exciting of projects, which has many Critical Role fans speculating about who will take the helm here. Many developers have previously worked on TTRPG titles, and gamers have their hopes about who would do justice to the world of Exandria. Many suspect that Obsidian Entertainment, who just wrapped the launch of Avowed, may be a likely choice to spearhead the project. Critical Role has previously worked with this developer to do voice acting for Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire, so it would make sense to see the creative teams join forces again.
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That said, without an official announcement, anything is possible. Others suspect that Owlcat Games, the developer behind Pathfinder games like Wrath of the Righteous, might be the ones to take on the Critical Role video game. They certainly have the background working on cRPGs to fit the bill, and recently wrapped the final major update to Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous. So, again, the timing looks good – especially given rumors that Owlcat is about to announce its next project.
At any rate, it’s quite likely that we won’t see Larian Studios involved in the project. For all they did with Baldur’s Gate 3, the team has previously made statements about moving on from Dungeons & Dragons for its next projects.
Gamers and Critical Role fans are clearly excited about the new video game, but cautiously so until more details are revealed. Hopefully, we’ll learn more about the game’s plot, development timeline, and more with the official announcement that will reportedly arrive very soon.
Are you excited for a Critical Role video game? Let us know in the comments below!
