Tracing the World of Darkness

Hi everyone! Anne here. I know its been a while since I’ve touched the blog, but I’ve been busy working on getting new items on the Ebay store at http://stores.ebay.com/StannexMart. And for those who don’t like eBay, I’ve started up a Amazon store for StannexMart: http://www.amazon.com/shops/StannexMart. This week I’ve put up a quite a nice selection of D&D books in various editions. Please stop on by and visit! You may find something you like!

Now, on to the meat of this post.

This month I was able to dive into my good friend’s, Jeff Grubb’s, gaming boxes. Jeff kindly blogged about our little eBay store on his own site at GRUBB STREET. Thanks Jeff!

In this first set of Jeff’s boxes, we’ve got a lot of World of Darkness role-playing books. I first encountered the World of Darkness in the 1990s, back when White Wolf was the publisher for Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse, aka the “Storyteller System” or now known as “Classic” World of Darkness. I even got excited about Kindred of the East. I also did a brief dive into Vampire LARP (published by Mind’s Eye Theatre). After that I simply decided that World of Darkness wasn’t for me because I wanted more “game” in my role-playing games, and sold all my White Wolf materials to Half-Price books.

As I pour through Jeff’s stock of used books for inventorying purposes, I realized that Vampire: The Masquerade first edition was published in 1991! That’s 22 years ago folks…and now I’ve completely dated myself. *Face Palm*

I can’t resist the urge to plunge deeper into the history of these books.

After doing a quick Google-Fu maneuver, I learned in 2003 White Wolf discontinued the “Storyteller System” and created the “Storytelling System” in its place, a more streamlined rule set which premiered in The World of Darkness Core Rules in 2004. I can understand why they were motivated in upgrading mechanics: the line had been floundering for years prior. They were also too ambitious in trying to release one game per year, and after Mage they just started going downhill. Coupled with the increasing player controversy over all the metaplots, it was just a matter of time before the World of Darkness line would decline into nothing if they didn’t try something to breathe new life into the game.

I was aware that White Wolf Publishing no longer exists because they were merged into CCP Games, the Icelandic owners of the spreadsheet MMORPG, Eve Online. I heard about this very briefly in 2006 on MMO news sites. I even saw the CCP Games booth a few times at PAX Prime the following years, where their floor reps made hoopla of a World of Darkness MMORPG – which will be “ready when it’s done,” as claimed by executive producer Chris McDonough. More than likely the WoD MMO is delayed because of losses in October 2011, following a large controversy over its introduction of micro-transactions to EVE Online. CCP laid off about 20% of its world-wide employee base. The Atlanta, GA office was hit the hardest, losing a large number of staff dedicated to the development of the World of Darkness MMO.

I didn’t pay much attention to GenCon 2012, but it was when CCP Games announced that it wouldn’t be producing table-top games and RPGs. Instead, a spin-off company called Onyx Path Publishing, created by White Wolf Creative Director Richard Thomas, purchased the Trinity games and Scion from CCP and became the licensee for producing World of Darkness titles (both classic and new), as well as Exalted.

It’s obvious to why CCP Games merged with White Wolf: to produce the World of Darkness MMORPG. I also imagine that CCP will produce other games having to do with the IP they gained in the deal. But why make a new publishing company, Onyx Path? I suspect that they really wanted to keep producing table-top games and RPGs, but didn’t want the RPG to fail because of stakeholders comparing its low-profit margins to its high-profit video game lines.

Ever since Onxy Path Publishing opened its doors at GenCon last year, they’ve been using the crowdfunding wave to re-publish their games, including Kickstarters for The Hunters Hunted II, Mummy: The Curse, and Werewolf: the Apocalypse. You can view their publishing schedule at their site, TheOnyxPath.com (http://theonyxpath.com/schedule/). Though many of the old books are now available as PDFs and print-on-demand via DriveThruRPG.com, StannexMart.com still has many of them for a lower price or you can “Make an Offer” to see if you can get a better deal.

I’m glad to see Onyx Path bring back some great World of Darkness titles and I hope to see new content as well. But I also hope you’ll help Jeff and I, by purchasing one of our used World of Darkness books too!

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