[News] Decipher RPG Product Lines Transferred

[D.S.McBride]

Originally posted by Fesarius
I am proceeding under the assumption that Decipher has ceased publication of RPG material and will return to a card game shop.

This pretty much sums up my feelings on the subject as well. If Decipher does, in fact, manage to get something else out the door, well and good. But their performance over the last twenty-plus months has been so lacklustre and substandard that I think about the best we can anticipate is that the licences will be farmed out to a third party and - eventually - new material may end up hitting the market. But I wouldn't count on that happening for a good, long time.

[Greg Smith]

I sent Decipher an e-mail asking about the fate of the RPGs, and I got a response:

Greg -

You have not seen the last of the RPGs - we are moving the office back to Norfolk and expect to update our release dates some time next month.

Robin

So don't abandon all hope.

[Balok]

Greg, thanks for posting that news, but I must be honest, here: Decipher has trained me not to trust them, by the simple expedient of never meeting their release dates.

If they release something, and I can find space in the budget for it, then I'll get it. That's the key difference for me: when they first announced the license, I *made* space in the budget, bumping other things if necessary. I no longer feel they deserve that kind of support.

YMMV.

[Mac417]

This is just me playing Devil's Advocate here, but maybe in Decipher's collective mind, they might think moving RPG development to the home office would ensure such things as timely production and increase of output frequency. In short, more books and getting them on time?

Just thinking aloud.

--Mac

[Jason Durall]

Originally posted by Mac417
This is just me playing Devil's Advocate here, but maybe in Decipher's collective mind, they might think moving RPG development to the home office would ensure such things as timely production and increase of output frequency. In short, more books and getting them on time?

There was no delay with the L.A.'s office getting things done on schedule and on time. They had at least 8 sourcebooks finished and in various stages of production when the office was shut down.

Everything I have heard as a playtester, officially and unofficially, was that the delays in product release dates were from the Norfolk office.

[D.S.McBride]

Jason's statement dovetails nicely with a number of the postings that Matt Colville - ex-LUG, ex-Decipher - and others had made regarding Decipher's internal politics at RPG.net. I specifically recall one comment that the writers and designers had experienced exactly the same WTF reaction as the RPG-buying public when a completed, polished-off, stick-a-fork-in-it-it's-done book was pushed off to the side for an ungodly period, for reasons as yet unknown and unexplained.

If this Robin individual's prediction of an updating in March is correct, then the Decipher Trek page will have been updated three-quarters of year after the Worlds book was originally scheduled for release. I've got to say at this point that I'm really curious as to what kind of schedule they're planning on implementing, how many books they're looking at releasing during this calendar year, and, of course, whether or not they fall into the same trap that seems to have bedevilled us and them since the Narrator's Screen was originally promised.

[Space_Cadet]

Originally posted by Jason Durall
There was no delay with the L.A.'s office getting things done on schedule and on time. They had at least 8 sourcebooks finished and in various stages of production when the office was shut down.

Everything I have heard as a playtester, officially and unofficially, was that the delays in product release dates were from the Norfolk office.

What were the eight sourcebooks? (hoping one of them is ENT sourcebook)

[Jason Durall]

Originally posted by Space_Cadet
What were the eight sourcebooks? (hoping one of them is ENT sourcebook)

I don't know - the ones I referred to were for the LotR RPG.

[First of Two]

Originally posted by Jason Durall
I don't know - the ones I referred to were for the LotR RPG.

Well, of course. That's where their priorities lay.

[Doug Burke]

Originally posted by Space_Cadet
What were the eight sourcebooks? (hoping one of them is ENT sourcebook)

In no particular order (and with no indication of their current stage of development), the sourcebooks being worked on as I understand it were...

Trek: Worlds, Klingons, Mirror Universe, Peacekeepers, Seekers, TNG Sourcebook

LOTR: Fields of Battle, Paths of the Wise, Rohan, Isengard, Helm's Deep, Rogues & Minstrels, ROTK Sourcebook, ROTK Adventure Game

I know I'm probably missing one or two for each line, but that gives you an idea of the things they've been working on.

Unfortunately, the Enterprise sourcebook wnet the way of the Limited Edition set, although parts of it were planned to be inlcuded in other sourcebooks (like the NX-01 in Starships or the Suliban from Aliens). Also keep in mind that the Enterprise book was ritten right after the first season of the show and would be somewhat out of date...

[Karg]

Originally posted by Greg Smith
I sent Decipher an e-mail asking about the fate of the RPGs, and I got a response:



So don't abandon all hope.

I Did too & got this response

[QUOTE]

We will be moving the RPG Studio to our Virginia offices this month and expect to post release dates on all RPG items next month.

Thanks,

Robin

[QUOTE]

Not much more info but what the hey

[jeffearley]

for those of us who have not abandoned all hope of every seeing another star trek rpg book, this definitely gives us a small ray of hope. long live st rpg. Bring on the books baby

[REG]

I think most of us here did not abandon all hope of a future ST RPG book. Some here just think that another company will be the future ST publisher. Of course, that is up to Paramount.

* whistling dixie while reminiscing GenCon 2000 *

[Space_Cadet]

what is the duration of Decipher's liscence for LOTR and ST?

[D.S.McBride]

There's never been any definitive number/time-line given, but in his editorial of 9/00, wherein he alerted us to the fact that Decipher had acquired the license, Don stated that the Trek duration was "purported" to be five years; starting on Jan. 1, '01, of course. Information on the LotR license is, as far as I know, unavailable.

If true, this means that Decipher is a little over sixty percent the way through their tenure.