It was only a few months ago that iwot Studios announced a new game division dedicated to developing an ambitious open-world The Wheel of Time RPG that covers content and story from every book in the series. iwot Studios (formerly known as Red Eagle Entertainment) has a long and sordid history with the IP dating back to Robert Jordan’s fraught relationship with them over two decades ago.
While the project already seemed too good to be true, the cancellation of The Wheel Of Time’s Amazon Prime television series, the studio’s lack of experience and overpromises, among other practical considerations, all have me convinced that the game is doomed to fail.
The Wheel Of Time Universe Might Be Too Massive
Even An RPG Might Not Do The Source Material Justice
The Wheel of Time universe is absolutely massive, and developers for the open-world RPG are intent on creating a massive video game franchise with the IP. To do so effectively is a huge undertaking, and I’m very skeptical about a completely newly formed AAA studio creating something that not only honors the source material, but delivers on all the promises iwot is making.
In an IGN interview with iwot studio heads Rick Selvage and Craig Alexander, they claim that “the plan is to work with the franchise for many years and develop a series of games, sequels, expansion packs, DLC, et cetera, and build out as much of the world we can.” For anyone familiar with the scale of The Wheel of Time’s overall narrative, characters, and world, it’s a mystery how even the most experienced studios could pull this off, let alone a studio like iwot.
Simply put, iwot is promising something bigger than even the most massive RPG experiences ever made, more ambitious than any Elder Scrolls entry, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and Elden Ring combined. The game will either be the biggest RPG ever released, or will have to make some compromises in terms of scale that might limit the studio’s ability to deliver something as complete as they’re promising.
The Wheel Of Time Amazon Cancellation Is A Bad Sign For The RPG
Fans Don’t Want A Lackluster Adaptation
After The Wheel of Time Amazon show’s cancellation, one thing has become blatantly clear: The Wheel of Time fans don’t want a bad adaptation of the source material, whether that’s in the form of books, movies, TV shows, and especially video games.
I worry that The Wheel of Time RPG’s ambition will be its inevitable downfall, trying to juggle too many plotlines and character arcs and epic battles and failing to do them all justice in a satisfying way. It’s unclear just how many compromises the game will need to make to be deliverable, and with each compromise there is a risk of contradicting the source material or going against canon.
Given all this, it’s really hard to get excited about The Wheel of Time RPG, made worse by the fact that it likely won’t be a reality until at least the next generation of consoles start to roll out. Even then, if developers intend to deliver on their promises (unlike they have on previous projects), I’d guess the timeline will be significantly longer than anything they’ve claimed is possible to date.
