GYGO: D&D 6e(?), Blair Witch 2021, and the Sun Sets on Discord’s Stage Discovery

It’s been quite a while since I’ve gathered up industry news for Get Your Game On, but here I am making my triumphant return! Let’s see if the news greeting me this past week is all good!

Games Are Movies Are TV Are Games

Lionsgate has partnered with the storytelling platform Dorian to give users the chance to bring their fanfic to life. The first of Lionsgate’s IP to be turned into user-generated interactive games is the Blair Witch franchise. Between October 15 and 31, users across the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Philippines, India, Australia, and New Zealand can submit their fanfiction, based on a 2021-inspired prompt, for a chance to see their work transformed into a game on the Dorian platform.

Meanwhile, Netflix has teamed up with Night School Studio to explore narrative gameplay on the streaming service. I guess that Black Mirror experiment worked…

With 2024 Comes the Evolution of D&D

D&D executive Ray Winnginer recently announced that Dungeons & Dragons will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2024 with the biggest overhaul of the game players have seen in years. Though very little information was shared regarding the scope of the overhaul, however, it was stated that the newest edition would still be compatible with 5e. Let the speculation begin.

Discord’s Stage Discovery Is Out, YouTube Is In

Despite the success of Discord’s Stage channels, the Stage Discovery pilot has proven to not be working out as quite as intended, based on community feedback. Meant to help users discover new communities and allow communities to showcase events in order to gain new users, Discord says that there is still work to do in terms of moderation and server onboarding. As such, Discord has decided to sunset Stage Discovery as of October 4, with plans to rethink some of the aspects of Stage channels to help manage some of the onboarding issues expressed.

Discord is also working on the integration of YouTube videos just weeks after YouTube forced two popular Discord music bots offline. The Watch Together feature allows Discord users to watch YouTube videos together.

In other news…

• Restrictions on gaming imposed by the Chinese government have gotten even more strict.
• The Anti-Defamation League has released a report indicating an increase in harassment and exposure to white supremacy.
• The International Games Summit on Mental Health (TIGS) takes place virtually on October 6–7.
• Out Making Games has published an open letter to Rockstar Games calling out the transphobia apparent in GTA V.

Wendy Browne

Mother, geek, executive assistant sith, gamer, writer, lazy succubus, blogger, bibliophile. Not necessarily in that order. Publisher at WomenWriteAboutComics.com