It's been a year and a half since the release of *Baldur's Gate 3*, and fans are still deeply immersed in their second, third, seventh, or even tenth playthroughs. However, with developer Larian Studios stepping away from the series, the future of *Baldur's Gate* now rests in the hands of Hasbro. Fortunately, it seems that we won't have to wait too long to hear about what's next for the beloved franchise.

In a recent interview with IGN at the Game Developers Conference, Dan Ayoub, the Senior Vice President of Digital Games at Hasbro, revealed that there is significant interest in *Baldur's Gate* following Larian's departure. "We're kind of working out our plans for the future and what we're going to be doing with that," Ayoub stated. "And actually, in pretty short order, we're going to have some stuff to talk about around that."

While Ayoub didn't provide specifics on whether the upcoming announcements would involve a new *Baldur's Gate* game or perhaps a crossover similar to the previous collaboration with *Magic: The Gathering*, he did express his desire for a *Baldur's Gate 4*. He acknowledged, however, that creating such a game would require time. "It's somewhat of an unenviable position," he remarked. "I mean, we're not in a hurry. Right? That's the thing, we're going to take a very measured approach... We've got a lot of plans, a lot of different ways to go about it. We're starting to think about, okay, yeah, we're ready to start dipping toes a little bit and talking about a few things. And I think, in really short order, like I said, again, not to over-tease that point, we're going to have some other things to talk about around that."

Ayoub also highlighted the immense pressure to ensure the next *Baldur's Gate* meets high expectations, which also influences other Dungeons & Dragons projects, including a game announced last year. "I'm never one to shy down from a challenge," he said. "And I think anything that forces us to raise our creative bar, and developers love to have a high bar to go after, and I think we've actually seen the team push some really interesting ideas that they're like, 'Okay, we need to raise our bar. We need to go bigger on this.' And things like that. So, I think that's our hope, right? We would keep raising the bar and everyone just tries to go a little higher."

In addition to discussing *Baldur's Gate*, Ayoub touched on various other topics during the interview, including *Magic: The Gathering*, the partnership with Saber Interactive, and Hasbro's broader game strategy. Keep an eye out for the full interview, which will be available next week.

Every IGN 10 of 2023

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