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Chaosium announces end of Magic World product line


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Chaosium announces end of Magic World product line

Chaosium has no plans to do anything further with the "Magic World" product line, it was announced today. Magic World, published in 2012, was a reworking of earlier Chaosium RPG rules based on the Basic Roleplaying engine including Elric!, The Bronze Grimoire, RuneQuest Third Edition, and Sailing on the Seas of Fate.

Statement by Jeff Richard, Chaosium Creative Director:

"Chaosium is a small company with two main product lines: Call of Cthulhu and the Glorantha setting (HeroQuest, RuneQuest, 13G, etc). Anything else needs to be carefully chosen - it either needs to be something we think can financially support itself or be something we internally have a great artistic desire to produce. Unfortunately, Magic World does not fit into either category. We are far more interested in projects that push the artistic and creative envelopes than generic fantasy projects.

That being said, we know that Magic World has a small but devoted following, and we have no issue with Magic World continuing on as licensed/fan-produced product. And we will continue to sell existing Magic World releases at chaosium.com and DriveThruRPG.

We have written to authors working on speculative Magic World projects advising them of this decision."

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4 hours ago, MOB said:

Chaosium announces end of Magic World product line

That being said, we know that Magic World has a small but devoted following, and we have no issue with Magic World continuing on as licensed/fan-produced product. And we will continue to sell existing Magic World releases at chaosium.com and DriveThruRPG.

We have written to authors working on speculative Magic World projects advising them of this decision."

Totally understandable decision. And not surprising. It is very interesting that Chaosium is open to "licensed" Magic World products. That's the real news in my view.

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24 minutes ago, smiorgan said:

Totally understandable decision. And not surprising. It is very interesting that Chaosium is open to "licensed" Magic World products. That's the real news in my view.

Agreed. The follow-up question, of course, would be: can we on this board collaborate to produce "licensed" Magic World products? This is not a idle question. I'd be keen on getting involved on such projects but have no idea where to start.

Colin

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2 hours ago, ColinBrett said:

Agreed. The follow-up question, of course, would be: can we on this board collaborate to produce "licensed" Magic World products? This is not a idle question. I'd be keen on getting involved on such projects but have no idea where to start.

Colin

My guess would be to start with a polite note to the good folks who own the copyrights. The folks in charge at Chaosium are the ones who were always open to and happy to work with fans and freelancers 30+ years ago. 

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I'm not totally surprised by this. It's disappointing, but is what it is. Maybe someone can pick up the rights and continue on with it. Thankfully I work with a system I feel is better and more diverse, but many (I mean a lot) of people on this forum prefer MW so hopefully it won't totally die off.

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While news like this is always disappointing, it is good to hear that Chaosium are open to licensing etc. I agree with their philosophy - to focus on their 'knitting' and produce top notch works (both in the writing and design) for both Call of Cthulhu (which I for one love) and Runequest etc. (which isn't so appealing to me).

Marcus

 

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5 hours ago, Mysterioso said:

This seems like it would be the ideal situation. 

Pretty much. However, someone would need to invest a lot into marketing since Chaosium honestly didn't seem to market it as much as other lines when it first came out. I never knew it existed until I went on their website and was like "what is this?" And I've been perusing RPG forums (not this one sadly) and the like for a long time.

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3 hours ago, Marcus Bone said:

While news like this is always disappointing, it is good to hear that Chaosium are open to licensing etc. I agree with their philosophy - to focus on their 'knitting' and produce top notch works (both in the writing and design) for both Call of Cthulhu (which I for one love) and Runequest etc. (which isn't so appealing to me).

Marcus

 

I'm more about Runequest personally. There are things about it I don't care for but if I had to choose, Runequest will get my vote every time. Which bodes well to me investing in a third party version of MW if it ever comes out.

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I am more RQ and CoC, so I'm happy that these two lines are the priority.

However MW does have its merits, and there are those who greatly prefer it.

I wonder if Ben Monroe is in a position to be involved with a licencee.. ?

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Guest Vile Traveller

I would have to wonder about the value of the MW trademark, and whether it would be a worthwhile investment for a licensee. It seems like fan publications might be more viable.

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8 hours ago, daddystabz said:

This is very disappointing to me.  The first thing this new Chaosium team has done that I disagree with.  I really, really enjoy Magic World.

Unfortunately, a MW-led recovery was not going to save Chaosium, and we had to divert our attention and resources to our core lines (Call of Cthulhu, Glorantha) to get the company back on its feet. But, as noted in the announcement, we'll keeping selling the existing MW stuff on chaosium.com and are happy to see licensed or fan MW material coming out.

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As (many) have said, this is not surprising. However, there is room for those working on fan works and those with more aspirations than that too. 

The key is to get people to play, find a new audience and get interest up.

I would definitely be interested in finding out how the licensing works.

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6 hours ago, Vile said:

What is the Chaosium fan policy these days? There doesn't seem to be one on the website.

We are still working on a new fan policy for Chaosium, along with submissions and licensing guidelines. They will be similar to the policies Moon Design had on glorantha.com, which seemed to work well for everyone.

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