MMORPG.com has the word that Keith Baker will be writing for Dungeons and Dragons Online.

I don’t really understand this move. I mean, I certainly think that DDO needs more content. That’s not a question. The confusion I have is centered around the big name. What does that say to the folks in the trenches? I’m not that big a fan of the quests in DDO, but a lot of people obviously put a lot of work into the thing.

What does it say to the designers when the company very visibly hires a ‘big name’ to come in and flavour up the world?

What it says to me is that Turbine has no faith in the people working on the project. The game hasn’t recieved the response the company wants, and so they’re pulling PR stunts in order to get pen and paper gamers more interested in the product. Which is a losing proposition. Keith Baker is a good writer, but the reality of the situation is that gamers (especially the finicky pen and paper variety) go where the good games are. How many gamers love the X-Files? The card game made about the show in the late 90s should have been a hit, right?

It bombed miserably because the game just wasn’t any fun. While DDO isn’t devoid of fun, the amount of fun squirreled away in the streets of in the Stormreach isn’t going to increase because of a high profile writer.

A for effort, though, and I’m sure the resulting quests are going to have great flavour text.