Summary
- Wizards of the Coast laid off 90% of the team behind the Dungeons and Dragons virtual tabletop, Sigil, due to a reduction in the project’s scope.
- Sigil will transition from a standalone release to a D&D Beyond feature, preventing it from reaching its full potential.
- Disappointing flaws in Sigil include missing features, buggy combat, and limited customization.
Wizards of the Coast has laid off 90% of the team responsible for releasing Sigil, the official new Dungeons and Dragons virtual tabletop. After a flawed release, the scope of the Dungeons and Dragons project has been drastically reduced, leading to the loss of approximately 30 of the developers on the small team.
In 2023, Dungeons and Dragons revealed Sigil, an official virtual tabletop with D&D Beyond integration, customizable characters and maps, and graphics rendered using the Unreal Engine 5 to bring campaigns to life. Unfortunately, the visually-stunning-yet-incomplete product that quietly launched on February 27 was a far cry from the “Minecraft of D&D, or the Roblox for tabletop gaming” that was advertised, leading many to puzzle over the project’s future.
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Now, some substantial layoffs have confirmed that Sigil will never reach its full potential. According to a LinkedIn post by Sigil senior writer, game designer, and team leader Andy Collins, around 30 developers – or 90% of his team – were laid off by Wizards of the Coast, including himself. This leaves only a handful of developers maintaining the project, which has drastically reduced its scope.
Dungeons and Dragons Loses 90% of the Sigil Team
Polygon also shared an email from Dungeons and Dragons senior vice president Dan Rawson, which was sent to all employees regarding the layoffs. “After several months of alpha testing, we’ve concluded that our aspirations for Sigil as a large, standalone game with a distinct monetization path will not be realized.” He went on to announce the layoffs, confirming that Sigil itself will transition into an integrated D&D Beyond feature, maintained by “a small team to sustain Sigil and release products already developed at no additional cost to users.” While it sounds like Sigil will continue to be available to Dungeons and Dragons players, the project itself is essentially on life support.
After several months of alpha testing, we’ve concluded that our aspirations for Sigil as a large, standalone game with a distinct monetization path will not be realized.
Luckily, those who were let go from the project are receiving severance packages and bonuses from 2024. Rawson also confirmed it was offering career placement services, and in some cases, opportunities elsewhere within Wizards of the Coast to developers impacted by these layoffs.
Many fans are disappointed to see bad news for Sigil. The program itself is gorgeous, with dynamic lighting and textures on par with Dungeons and Dragons video games like Baldur’s Gate 3. However, missing races and class features, buggy combat, incomplete D&D Beyond integration, and limited customization options for both characters and maps make Sigil clunky to use at best, or downright impossible at worst. It is a shame to learn that Sigil will never live up to the lofty expectations it set, but hopefully, the remaining development team can salvage it into something useful for players who enjoy it.
- Franchise
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Dungeons & Dragons
- Original Release Date
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1974
- Designer
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E. Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson