Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz, Wizards of the Coast president John Hight has revealed that a team of developers that were formerly working on EA’s cancelled Black Panther game has joined the company to work on a new title.
The team is led by veteran creative director Michael de Plater, who was a key figure at Monolith Productions, and director of 2014’s Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor. He previously worked on games like Tom Clancy’s EndWar and Rome: Total War.
Hight says that along with de Plater, Wizards of the Coast has welcomed a number of other developers from Cliffhanger Games, the EA subsidiary that was revealed in 2023 to be working on Black Panther. But the project was cancelled and the studio shuttered in May this year.
“We were actually able to bring him and 14 key people that he’s worked with there – and many of them at Monolith – to incubate a new game for us,” says Hight.
“He’ll be starting concept development on something very cool and new – and that part I can’t tell you yet.”
The new project is still in the early design phases. “We want to give him time,” Hight says about de Plater’s work on the new title. “We’ll go through a fairly lengthy concept process where they’re going to look at a lot of different ideas.”
Hight says it will be a similar process to what Wizards of the Coast has recently been doing with Stig Asmussen, the director of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor. The company is working with Asmussen’s new studio, Giant Skull, on an unannounced title.
“We’re super excited to have him as part of the team,” says Hight about de Plater’s arrival, adding that at some point de Plater will be “rooming with all of us” in the Seattle area, home of the Wizards of the Coast headquarters.
