AdHoc Studio to Produce Critical Role Game

I’m a pretty casual fan of Critical Role. I quite enjoyed their animated series, The Legend of Vox Machina, and for a time, tuned into the tabletop show. From my experience, it’s clear that the creatives and cast members know what makes a good story and are quite adept at crafting compelling high fantasy worlds. That’s why I was quite excited about the prospect of a game set within their Exandria universe. This week, Indie studio AdHoc has shared a little more about this very concept, which has entered active development.

AdHoc partnered with Critical Role after working with many of the cast members, securing voiceover for their upcoming narrative game, Dispatch, set to release later this year. The game will be the studio’s first major release since forming in 2018 in the aftermath of Telltale Games’ shutdown. Much of the team originated from Telltale and are still hard at work on The Wolf Among Us 2, a game which I’m very excited for.

This new Exandria project is still a way off, though the team is aiming for it to launch within the next five years. The game likely will not be a AAA title in terms of scale and budget. Narrative will instead be the focus, with a variety of colorful characters to interact with and decision making impacting every aspect of the world. Characters from the Critical Role campaigns will certainly make their way into the story, but Travis Willingham CEO of Critical Role stated that it will be, “something unique in the world of Exandria” and “brand new in terms of storyline.” The game will also most likely retain the cartoonish art style found in the Legend of Vox Machina.

I’m hoping this game will still offer something in terms of combat depth and RPG mechanics to retain the D&D inspiration. Telltale has never been particularly good at combat, but considering the studio is not made up of only ex-Telltale developers, there is hope. I’m not expecting this to be the next Baldur’s Gate, but simply something more than a visual novel that only has appeal to hardcore fans of the tabletop games.