It has been reported over the last few days that FFG are killing off their RPG department completely, and that they will no longer be producing RPGs.
The slight silver lining to the cloud is that already announced RPG products like the Keyforge campaign book will be published. But after the current commitments have been met, nada.
That means the Star Wars, L5R and Genesys RPGs will join the ranks of defunct RPGs.
It’s a shame that this is happening.
It kills off any hopes fans of the games had that FFG would be using outside contractors to produce new content for their favourite game.
There are other rumours or conspiracy theories floating around along with this news. These range from FFG are being sold off to Asmodee being sold off. But that’s just internet chatter trying to make 2 + 2 = 5.
I haven’t played the Genesys system but I do like it. Especially that it had the Android source book. The one drawback for me that applies to the whole group of FFG RPGs is the use of custom dice. Naturally these dice had the infamous FFG premium added on. They did produce a mobile app for the dice. Which was considerably cheaper than a physical set.
But we are about to get into the scenario I have for all modern board games that rely on an app for play. Support after the product is no longer published. It gets worse in this situation because the FFG software department went in the cleansing just after Christmas. So unless the Asmodee software team pick up the support and maintenance of the app. As soon as a future release of Android or iOS breaks it, that’s it. It’s a dead app. That’s assuming that FFG don’t pull the app.
The app was the only realistic option for players that want to use any of the RPGs going forward. The dice sets will get rarer and rarer, and more expensive because of this.
I suppose the only option left would be for players in the future to map the relevant custom dice to their regular versions. Not ideal, produces an overhead during play that could slow things down when doing checks. But still a work around.
The future of the licences that FFG have is an interesting one. I think some like the Star Wars one will be picked up. What the actual practicalities of that is I have no idea. Can a third party pick the RPG licence up? Can FFG sub licence those rights to a third party? I’ve no idea. But whatever the specifics we could be a few years off seeing a new Star Wars RPG.
As for seeing a L5R RPG. That’s a harder one to guess. I know it has it’s fans. But enough to warrant a third party approaching FFG about licensing it? I’m not sure.
I love the Android universe. An IP that it seems FFG are mothballing completely, joining Tannhauser.
I know Genesys is a generic system that players are meant to use to create their own worlds and adventures. However I felt it was under supported, especially the two source books they produced. Apart from the sample adventures they produced for conventions there was no other material produced for them. The Android source book was lucky that FFG had produced the Worlds of Android book for Netrunner.
I think Android and Terrinoth would both have benefitted from FFG producing adventures on a regular basis for them. As would the Star Wars and L5R games. They needn’t have been the multi adventure campaigns that WotC put out for D&D. But more single adventures along the likes that the Adventurers League gets, that form part of a season.
Yes FFG introduced the Forge for fan created content. But I’m not sure how popular that was or is. I do feel that was a little too late.
Regular official content helps sell a system. Not all GMs want to home brew. Some want to pick up an adventure and run with it. Being able to cater for both is important. Although you could argue that if that was the case then the Genesys RPG isn’t for them. But it should be.
I still hold onto the hope I can get an Android based campaign up and running. But the likely hood of it being Genesys based has taken a hit.
