Worldcraft

We're working on our next game! It's about dwarves that are also samurai-- it's SAMURAI DWARVES!

Concept art by Luke Beatrice. When Luke told me that he studied Kurosawa in school, I knew we were in good hands.

I'm stoked about these concepts, and with spring starting to hit me, I'm just going to let that enthusiasm flow, no filter. Grab onto something!

Dwarves would be the best fantasy race to hang out with. They aren't aloof like elves. A dwarf would come to your cookout. They work hard but still take time to enjoy the finer things, unlike obsessed wizards or sleepy dragons. Yeah, they probably care too much about money, which seems practical to me. They do NOT tolerate bullshit, which is important if you want to maintain a moral society. They revere rocks and mountains which is where they get their resilience. And you gotta be resilient given the difficulty setting we are all grinding through right now. They understand that the things we make are reflections of ourselves, and will outlive us, so give it all you got!

Samurai are perfect followers. Like dwarves, they also understand that life is fleeting and how you live is what really matters. If I had to trust someone with my life, I would entrust it to a samurai. As soldiers, they must also be resilient. They stand their ground even if it would mean certain death. There's no room for half-assed work among samurai. They'll even tear into calligraphy or a cup of tea with the same intensity that they take in to battle. Hell yeah!

I've gotten obsessed with all sorts of stuff along the way, but some of my first big obsessions are captured in these two groups of romanticized people. My life would be very different and probably not as enjoyable if it weren't for Tolkein, or for Gary Gygax, or for Mark Ricci, the sensei at my home town's Karate dojo, and for Akira Kurosawa, who made many of the movies that sensei loaned out to his students. To me these themes and messages aren't just fertile ground for game design, they are templates for how to live a good life. That's why I want to make a game about them.

But it's not enough to just sit here and vibe about braided beards and sharp swords. We are making a game, so here's another influence whose name I want to drop: Ray Winninger. Long before he was head of R&D at Wizards, he wrote a column for dragon magazine called "Dungeoncraft" and it's pretty much world building 101. my teenage self took it all to heart. As he walks you through his process, you go from simple ingredients (example: "D&D with Dinosaurs") to a living world that feels real and fantastic. And that's what I think we should be doing as a small studio. While big publishers are recycling IPs (and training their LLMs or whatever) we need to be driving on another axis. It's HARD to pull a brand-new IP out your ass, but kitchen table DMs are doing it every day. And their players are coming back year after year. I think we can pull that off.