DOJ Company Announcement

[Jomster]

Really pleased to see how it's working out for my favourite games company! A hearty congrats to everyone involved!

Some very informative posts above too. Thanks all.

[Lord Liaden]

The bigger problem wirth a substantial expansion to Hero publishing is that this would mean more people writing, which means more editing and less writing for Steve as the line head. I'm not sure that's Hero's desired direction.

Pursuant to that point, my favorite creative period of the DoJ era was when Allen Thomas, Scott Bennie, Dean Shomshak, Michael Surbrook, Aaron Allston, James Cambias, and others joined Steve, Darren, and Jason in the writers' stable. I've said before that I have great respect for Steven S. as a game writer and designer, but I really enjoy reading other people's takes on the system, game genres, and Hero Games's official worlds. If more money ultimately led to the company hiring more creative folks, either as freelancers or staff, I don't think I'd complain.

Not to mention that as it stands now, the outcome of Steve Long not noticing an oncoming bus could be tragic on so many levels...

[Susano]

Pursuant to that point, my favorite creative period of the DoJ era was when Allen Thomas, Scott Bennie, Dean Shomshak, Michael Surbrook, Aaron Allston, James Cambias, and others joined Steve, Darren, and Jason in the writers' stable. I've said before that I have great respect for Steven S. as a game writer and designer, but I really enjoy reading other people's takes on the system, game genres, and Hero Games's official worlds. If more money ultimately led to the company hiring more creative folks, either as freelancers or staff, I don't think I'd complain.

Not to mention that as it stands now, the outcome of Steve Long not noticing an oncoming bus could be tragic on so many levels...

Well, I for one, certainly wouldn't turn down any chances to work on projects for DOJ and would love to have them grow to the point where they can once again extend work to freelancers.

[BobGreenwade]

Well, I for one, certainly wouldn't turn down any chances to work on projects for DOJ and would love to have them grow to the point where they can once again extend work to freelancers.

Ditto that, every word.

[KawangaKid]

Wow. I'm a bit late to the party, but very very interesting.

Would love to hear more about the rationale behind this, but I think it's interesting that a company whose main product is often criticized as being a dinosaur -- a traditional mechanics-oriented system from the early days of gaming -- has come out to support a lot of innovation coming from the indie school of gaming.

Talk about bridging the gap, and really driving home the fact that we're all in the same hobby but with different preferences and tastes.

[gojira]

Woo! I'm also rather late to the party; I just saw this announced on the front page. Good news for DOJ, to be able to expand in a weak economy. And I'm sure it'll be a boon to Hero Games. Even if it just manages to pay Jason and Tina's wages, that's still more money in the till for other things (more color books?).


I wonder if there's an industry trend towards dumping the rather icky publishers/distributers that exist now and having larger game companies take over the operation. For example, Steve Jackson Games seems to have done exactly the same thing as DOJ when SJG founded Warehouse 23. So I guess there has to be real dissatisfaction with the current distributers for them and IPR to pick up business with other indies so readily. Just idle thoughts and conversation....

[Spence]

Well, I for one, certainly wouldn't turn down any chances to work on projects for DOJ and would love to have them grow to the point where they can once again extend work to freelancers.

I for one would LOVE to write something and get published by Hero.


Of course that would mean being able to write well