Well, They Blinked.

Wizards of the Coasts Releases a Statement on New OGL

So Wizards of the Coast released an official statement regarding the community’s reaction to the leaked OGL. While it’s couched in humility and affection for the game and the community, trust remains broken and the bell cannot be unrung. It is my belief that going forward it will all but impossible for Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast to regain the trust of the community and certainly not the trust of third party publishers like myself.

What Does That Mean For Barrel Rider Games?

The most important sentence in this document for me as an independent publisher is “Content already released under 1.0a will also remain unaffected. “ That means that White Star, The Hero’s Journey (Second Edition) and the rest of the Barrel Rider Games library will continue to remain available for the time being. Now, they say that these products will remain unaffected, but that doesn’t mean that it will always be so. We’ve seen Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro go back on their word once, and I can’t say I’d be surprised if after things have calmed down they won’t try this kind of thing again.

What this does mean is that the publishing of products at Barrel Rider Games will continue as scheduled. Four different books were completely drafted for The Hero’s Journey (Second Edition) product line at the time of the OGL 1.1 leak and at the time of writing this it is my full intent and the intent of my publishing partner Gallant Knight Games to ensure those products see the light of day to the best of our ability. They will not be OGL 1.0a products, however.

In fact, going forward, Barrel Rider Games will publish products that are either wholly or partially utilize the Creative Commons License. The OGL is no longer trustworthy in any incarnation, and while ORC may serve as a vehicle for many independent publishers, the freedom offered by Creative Commons and the ability to make my material as freely available to those who want to utilize it is of paramount importance.

Fighter, Thief, Wizard: Basic Rules, Fighter Thief, Wizard: Advanced Rules and Disturbers of the Peace will still be published in the future with Fighter, Thief, Wizard: Basic Rules still planned to be part of the upcoming ZineQuest.

Now, if you’ll pardon me, I need to get back to writing games. It’s been a helluva week.

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