Hidden Path say their Dungeons & Dragons game is still happening, despite cancellation report
Out of the dungeon for now
In a bizarre turn of events, it seems that Hidden Path's unannounced Dungeons & Dragons game is alive and well, after recent reports it had been cancelled. Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that D&D owner Wizards Of The Coast had cancelled five unannounced projects, naming Otherside Entertainment and Hidden Path as two of the studios affected. In a Twitter post last night, Hidden Path emphasised "Our epic D&D project with Wizards is still happening!"; Bloomberg, meanwhile, stand by their reporting.
In response to Hidden Path, Bloomberg's reporter Jason Schreier defended his original article. "This is a very unusual and very unfortunate situation, but we stand by our reporting," he said. "Both a source and a Wizards of the Coast spokesperson told Bloomberg on Tuesday that Hidden Path's D&D game is cancelled." So in simple terms, we have reports that the publisher's spokesperson says the game is canned, while the studio's social media account claims it's not.
We don't know much about Hidden Path's mystery project (we're can't even be sure if it's happening), but the studio's website shares a few more details. On their careers page, Hidden Path say, "Currently, we are working on a AAA open-world, third-person, single player RPG set in the Dungeons & Dragons universe." The devs previously worked on the Defense Grid series - a fun group of tower defence games - so their D&D project would be a foray into a new genre for them. Otherside Entertainment, the other studio named in Bloomberg's report, haven't commented on the status of their games, two of which are already announced.
I'm fairly certain this isn't the last we'll hear about this D&D drama, but it's not all bad news for D&D fans. Baldur's Gate 3 escapes the prison bars of early access this August, and those of us cursed with being D&D video game nerds can look forward to the virtual tabletop experience in Unreal Engine 5.