Who's going to clean up all that worthless paper?

Panic on the Street

I used to work for Wall Street.

I say "for" instead of "on" because technically the office was on Broadway and I wasn't trading securities for a living.

I still saw the way things work in that part of the world.

Markets get made and broken on the whisper of a word. Analysts sweat every technical chart move. Whale investors throw their weight around with impunity.

What does any of this mean for analog games?

Little, if anything.

Lots of people like to get worked up over the perception that the big fish in the pond, Wizards of the Coast, is the absolute bellwether for the industry.

This is partially true: the success of DnD relies on its exposure as a brand. The more people who know about DnD, the more they play it, and the more likely they are to hear about other games adjacent to DnD.

The part that people don't realize is that if Wizards of the Coast tanks, Hasbro (their parent outfit) sells them off, and liquidates the DnD IP...

Nothing happens.

The games industry chugs on with a new owner of the Wizards IP and DnD brand.

All those other games that people already know about?

Still fun.

Still here.

Still kicking.

Still worth playing.

Nobody owns your books but you. Nobody can delete your bookshelf. You don't rent, license, or otherwise "temporarily own" the PDFs on your hard drive.

That's your stuff. That's all you need to play. That, and some friends who want to play with you.

That's it.

You don't need a corporate brand-holder to authorize your fun.

If the market says Hasbro is on the ropes, you can safely ignore that.

And go back to rolling dice with your loved ones.

Uncertainty is the name of the game, but if we zoom out a little, the eternal nature of our beloved hobby comes into the picture.

PS - For the finance geeks, Hasbro's (HAS) recent earnings report indicates that DnD and Wizards is alive and quite well, having exceeded expectations with 46% growth due to Magic sales and DnD consumer products. They're doing just fine.