Wizards’ Bold AAA Video Game, Exodus, Ventures into the Tabletop RPG World

Archetype Entertainment, which is part of Wizards of the Coast (famous for publishing Dungeons & Dragons), recently made an exciting announcement about their new tabletop role-playing game for the original AAA sci-fi RPG, Exodus. This announcement came out on Wednesday, aligning with Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks’ promise to release one or two games annually in the coming years. As such, the spotlight on Exodus is intensifying.

At the helm of this game is a team of former BioWare developers, known for their work on classics like Baldur’s Gate, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, and the Mass Effect trilogy. Exodus was first introduced in a grand manner at The Game Awards 2023, complete with a cinematic trailer featuring Matthew McConaughey. The trailer hinted at a fresh take on the sci-fi RPG genre, particularly focusing on the intriguing concept of time dilation during cosmic travel, drawing inspiration from the decade-long fascination with Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar (which explains McConaughey’s appearance). Since then, fans have been a bit starved for more game details. Instead, they’ve been treated to world-building articles on the game’s website and an in-universe novel by Peter F. Hamilton that came out earlier this year.

The launch of the tabletop RPG is presented as a “special limited time offer” for those who join Archetype’s “founders” email list. Subscribers who join by December 10th get a “chance to purchase” an early edition of the rulebook. James Ohlen, known for his brilliant work on games like Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2, Neverwinter Nights, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, is designing this tabletop experience. Although there is a cover image and some general ideas about the game, like exploring the Exodus universe and tackling the challenges of time dilation as “the Traveler,” there’s not much else revealed about the game’s look and feel.

Creating a companion tabletop RPG is a pretty popular strategy these days for big, intellectual property-driven games. It helps create buzz around their crowdfunding or pre-order campaigns, a tactic seen with the Neopets RPG, which secured hundreds of thousands of dollars before revealing any game mechanics on Kickstarter.

Whether this ambitious AAA project will be a hit is still uncertain. As Wizards of the Coast’s first foray into non-Dungeons & Dragons tabletop RPGs since Gamma World, the universe of the Exodus TTRPG remains largely unexplored. As for the video game itself, Exodus is set to be released on PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X, but as of now, there’s no specific release date.