New Infinities Productions

Last updated

New Infinities Productions was an American game company that produced role-playing games and game supplements.

History

Immediately after leaving TSR, Gary Gygax helped form New Infinities Productions, Inc. [1] Wargamer and accountant Forrest Baker had worked as a consultant for TSR during 1984 and 1985, and wrote up a business plan that convinced Gygax to try again with the business side of roleplaying; New Infinities was the results, with Baker as CEO and Gygax as chairman of the board. [2] : 237  In October 1986, the company was publicly announced. [2] : 237  Frank Mentzer and Kim Mohan were design executives and with Gygax formed the creative committee. [3] Before a single product was released, Baker disappeared when his promised outside investment of one to two million dollars failed to come through. [2] : 237  In February 1987, Don Turnbull was brought on as the new CEO of New Infinities. [2] : 237  Gygax had retained the rights to Gord the Rogue as part of his severance agreement with TSR, so he licensed Greyhawk from TSR and started writing new novels beginning with Sea of Death (1987); Gygax's Gord novels were the main things keeping New Infinities in business. [2] : 237  The company's line of action/adventure science fiction was distributed by Berkley Books. [4]

Gygax's first role-playing game work for New Infinities (with Mohan and Mentzer) was the science fiction-themed RPG Cyborg Commando , which was published in 1987. [2] : 237  New Infinities began working on a third line of products, which began with an adventure written by Mentzer called The Convert (1987); Mentzer wrote the adventure as an RPGA tournament for D&D, but TSR was not interested in publishing it. Mentzer got verbal permission to publish the adventure with New Infinities, but since the permission was not in writing TSR filed an injunction to prevent the adventure's sale, although the injunction was later lifted. [2] : 238  Jefferson P. Swycaffer wrote three books based on Traveller , called the "Tales of the Concordat" trilogy (1988), [2] : 237  beginning with The Empire's Legacy and Voyage of the Planetsmasher. [2] : 238  Gygax announced in 1988 in a company newsletter that he and Kuntz were working on a new fantasy RPG, and that the company's "Fantasy Master" line would detail the Castle and City of Greyhawk as they had originally envisioned them, now called "Castle Dunfalcon". [2] : 239  Gygax and Kuntz's new game would be called "Infinite Adventures", and was envisioned as a multigenre RPG supported by different gamebooks for different genres. [2] : 61  However, New Infinities' investors forced the company into bankruptcy, and the company was dissolved in 1989. [2] : 239 

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gary Gygax</span> American game designer (1938–2008)

Ernest Gary Gygax was an American game designer and author best known for co-creating the pioneering role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) with Dave Arneson.

Greyhawk, also known as the World of Greyhawk, is a fictional world designed as a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game. Although not the first campaign world developed for Dungeons & Dragons—Dave Arneson's Blackmoor campaign predated it by over a year—the world of Greyhawk closely identified with early development of the game beginning in 1972, and after being published it remained associated with Dungeons & Dragons publications until 2008. The world itself started as a simple dungeon under a castle designed by Gary Gygax for the amusement of his children and friends, but it was rapidly expanded to include not only a complex multi-layered dungeon environment, but also the nearby city of Greyhawk, and eventually an entire world. In addition to the campaign world, which was published in several editions over twenty years, Greyhawk was also used as the setting for many adventures published in support of the game, as well as for RPGA's massively shared Living Greyhawk campaign from 2000–2008.

Gord the Rogue is the protagonist in a series of fantasy novels and short stories written by Gary Gygax. Gygax originally wrote the novels and short stories to promote his World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. After he left TSR, Gygax continued to write Gord the Rogue novels for several years. In all of these works, the plot revolves around the adventures of a young man named Gord who rises from humble origins in the slums of a large city on the planet Oerth to become a powerful force trying to stave off the takeover of Oerth by demons.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mordenkainen</span> Fictional character in Dungeons & Dragons

Mordenkainen is a fictional wizard from the World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game. He was created by Gary Gygax as a player character, only months after the start of Gygax's Greyhawk campaign, and is therefore one of the oldest characters continuously associated with Dungeons & Dragons.

In the World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game, Tenser is an archmage who strives to rid the Flanaess of evil. Tenser is a former member of both the Citadel of Eight and the Circle of Eight.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Castle Greyhawk</span>

Castle Greyhawk is one of the central dungeon settings in the fictional World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game. The Castle was originally developed by Gary Gygax, for his own campaign and later detailed for publication. Castle Greyhawk is also the name of a 1988 Dungeons & Dragons adventure module that created a treatment of the Castle for the public to use. In 2005, Gygax announced the release of "Castle Zagyg," his new treatment of the dungeon.

In the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game, Tharizdun is the god of Eternal Darkness, Decay, Entropy, Malign Knowledge, Insanity, and Cold. He originated in the World of Greyhawk campaign setting but has since also appeared in other settings.

<i>Mordenkainens Fantastic Adventure</i>

Mordenkainen's Fantastic Adventure by Robert J. Kuntz and Gary Gygax is an adventure module for the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game, published by TSR, Inc. in 1984. It originally bore the code "WG5" and was intended for use with the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons first edition rules. Because it is one of the WG modules, it is a module intended for the World of Greyhawk campaign setting. It was later updated in 2004 to the Third Edition Revised rules in Dungeon magazine, issue #112, as Maure Castle. There were subsequently two additional installments in issues #124 and #139.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Iggwilv</span> Fictional wizard in Dungeons & Dragons

Iggwilv is a fictional wizard from the Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game. She was created by Gary Gygax.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Mentzer</span> American writer and game designer

Jacob Franklin Mentzer III is an American fantasy author and game designer who worked on early materials for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. He was an employee of TSR, Inc. from 1980 to 1986, spending part of that time as creative advisor to the chairman of the board, Gary Gygax. He also founded the Role-Playing Games Association (RPGA) during his time with TSR.

James M. Ward is an American game designer and fantasy author who worked for TSR, Inc. for more than 20 years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert J. Kuntz</span> Game designer

Robert J. Kuntz is a game designer and author of role-playing game publications. He is best known for his contributions to various Dungeons & Dragons-related materials.

Lenard Lakofka was an American writer of material for the fantasy role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons. Although never a formal employee of TSR, the company that published Dungeons & Dragons, Lakofka was an influential voice in the development of the game. He was one of the playtesters of the game as it was being developed, an editor of early manuscripts, wrote a widely-read monthly D&D magazine column and two official D&D adventures, and had his home campaign setting of the Lendore Isles incorporated into Gary Gygax's World of Greyhawk Fantasy Game Setting.

The World of Greyhawk Fantasy Game Setting and the World of Greyhawk Fantasy World Setting are two closely related publications from TSR, Inc. that detail the fictional World of Greyhawk campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy roleplaying game. Both publications were authored by Gary Gygax, and they were the first stand-alone offerings to provide detailed, comprehensive information regarding a D&D campaign setting.

Kim Rudolph Mohan was an American author, editor and game designer best known for works related to the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.

<i>Greyhawk</i> (supplement) Tabletop role-playing game supplement for Dungeons & Dragons

Greyhawk is a supplementary rulebook written by Gary Gygax and Robert J. Kuntz for the original edition of the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. It has been called "the first and most important supplement" to the original D&D rules. Although the name of the book was taken from the home campaign supervised by Gygax and Kuntz based on Gygax's imagined Castle Greyhawk and the lands surrounding it, Greyhawk did not give any details of the castle or the campaign world; instead, it explained the rules that Gygax and Kuntz used in their home campaign, and introduced a number of character classes, spells, concepts and monsters used in all subsequent editions of D&D.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Troll Lord Games</span> Game publisher

Troll Lord Games is an American publisher of role-playing games, The Crusader magazine and other board/dice/card games.

<i>Saga of Old City</i>

Saga of Old City is a 1985 fantasy novel by Gary Gygax, set in the world of Greyhawk, which is based on the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.

This is a bibliography of American game designer and author Gary Gygax.

References

  1. ↑ Cobb, Nathan (April 19, 1987). "It's Only a Fad". The Boston Globe . p. 77. ISSN   0743-1791. ProQuest   294411624. (Registration required)
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN   978-1-907702-58-7.
  3. ↑ Gygax, Gary 1987. "From the Sorcerer's Scroll", Dragon 122:40 (Jun 1987)
  4. ↑ https://archive.org/details/sim_chronicle_1987-07_8_10/page/8/mode/2up
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.