Critical Role's plans to make a videogame have become an 'active pursuit', says CEO Travis Willingham, after almost 10 years of growing a D&D campaign into a full-on franchise
Critical Role was a humble D&D livestream experiment begun on Geek and Sundry circa 2015. Since then, it's become a massive company, producing TTRPG systems and TV shows with millions in funding, and it's finally set its eyes on the world of videogames. That's according to a recent interview with Rolling Stone, wherein CEO Travis Willingham, who plays Grog Strongjaw in both the animated series and the livestreamed show, reveals that it's become "an active pursuit" for the crew.
"The last few years we have been having necessary conversations to figure out how to do that smartly. It's, you know, it's an entire enterprise that's separate from what we do on Beacon, Twitch, or YouTube, it's separate from the animated series and it comes with its understanding that has to be undertaken … We are starting to come to the end of a long road that we've been undertaking for the last couple of years.
"And hopefully, we'll have something really exciting to share, maybe around the end of the year, maybe at the beginning of 2025, just in time for our 10-year anniversary."
That's a far more confident stance than the one given by Matthew Mercer almost exactly one year ago in an interview with Dicebreaker, wherein he cautiously approached the subject as something that could only happen if "all those stars align". Granted, he wasn't wrong to express caution—while Critical Role's made mountains of merch, started its own charity foundation, has its own publishing arm, and so on, making a videogame is a monstrously hard effort even compared to all of those milestones.
The Critical Role cast is made up of prolific videogame voice actors—you might've heard Marisha Ray as Jaina Proudmoore, or Liam O'Brien as Illidan Stormrage, for example. Meanwhile, Matt Mercer has a list of credits so big it's unviable to recount here, starring in Persona 5, Overwatch, League of Legends, Baldur's Gate 3… point is, these guys have been in the industry for years. They're likely wildly aware that a Critical Role videogame could be a catastrophe if they aren't careful.
Still, as I said back then, I also think it's more likely than ol' Mercer believed, given the almost-instant funding their TV series received, going on to be repeatedly greenlit by Amazon for four seasons. Turns out I was right—the Critical Role folks are really talking like they have something concrete in the works:
"Those collaborations we've had with various partners have been little toe dips in the pool just to see how it feels," Willingham explains. "You know, there's a lot of upheaval in the interactive space right now. And we've seen studios sort of bear and weather those strains," he adds that the crew is "trying to become smarter about it, and find out how we might fit into that larger ecosystem."
As for what game we'll be seeing, it's hard to say. Critical Role could always licence another official D&D game with Hasbro (Mystra knows they're peachy keen) but my Insight check's telling me that they might try and spin up something out of Daggerheart. It's already a game that uses cards, after all, and I can very easily see its systems making for a solid turn-based tactics game. Or maybe they're not gonna start small, and just barrel full steam ahead into an ambitious CRPG—either way, it sounds like it's still a twinkle in Critical Role's eye. More news should come in 2025, but I figure we'll be waiting a while yet for our turn to roll.