Heard of Project Sigil? Wondering what it is? We have you covered.
Dungeons & Dragons is booming. The runaway success of Baldur’s Gate 3 has brought a titanic influx of new players to the iconic tabletop RPG, all looking to continue the adventures they began in Larian Studio’s masterpiece. There’s no getting around it though, Dungeons & Dragons is not as accessible to play as Baldur’s Gate 3. Playing DnD itself requires set-up – hefty rulebooks, map-making and a table big enough to accommodate all that – plus snacks.
Yes, there are online solutions – platforms like Roll20 are incredibly versatile ways of hosting Dungeons & Dragons online, but they don’t deliver that totally immersive visual experience people might have come to expect from their time on the Sword Coast.
What is Dungeons & Dragons: Project Sigil?
Project Sigil is the ‘official’ answer to the virtual tabletop. A fully 3D game, in effect, complete with a variety of assets available to make the dungeons of your dreams, and customisable hero miniatures that capture a hand-painted model effect. It delivers the traditional DnD experience in full 3D graphics, with things like rules and character sheets just baked into the user interface.
It’s an attempt to streamline what can be a very dense experience for newcomers, and make the game more accessible to everybody. Not just for players, either – DMs will have their modules built directly into the game itself, meaning there’s no more awkward looking back and forth to figure out what happens next.
Project Sigil essentially wants to be the perfect fusion between tabletop and graphics-driven gaming – and the time has never seemed better to achieve such a thing. Will it succeed? Only time will tell.
How can I sign up for Project Sigil?
Project Sigil is currently in closed beta, and you can sign up to test run it by heading over to Beyond and signing up for a free account. Once you’ve done that, just head to the sign-up page here and you’ll be added to the list.
If your sign-up is successful you’ll receive six codes – enough for you and five friends to get involved. If you’re lucky enough to have five friends, that is. The closed beta hasn’t launched just yet, but you’ll receive a notification from DnD Beyond when it goes live.
Will Project Sigil be free-to-play?
Yes – it’s not yet clear just how many assets will be available for free, but it seems as though an ‘essential’ suite of features will be free for anyone with a Beyond account to use. This will include pre-made environments and adventures to find your way through and customisable hero miniatures.
By creating this deluxe 3D sandbox to play in, Wizards of the Coast are clearly hoping to keep their players firmly within their ecosystem – why go further afield to Roll20 when you have a fully integrated, visually spectacular experience right on DnD Beyond? Though the game is still firmly in an experimental, test-heavy phase, it’s safe to assume that it will sync up automatically with whatever content you own on Beyond. It’s equally safe to assume that we can expect a degree of microtransactions to be involved – character customisation options, monster minis, asset packs etc.
There’s still so much about the future of Project Sigil that remains vague and unconfirmed. It’s not quite a video game, not quite a virtual tabletop, but something in between – and as a regular DnD player who takes up both sides of the table, virtual or otherwise, I do find myself wondering exactly what niche it’s looking to fill.
It’s considerably more resource-hungry than your average VTT, which immediately presents a barrier to entry. Will DnD players who don’t already have decent gaming computers want to purchase one just to experience Project Sigil. Probably not. And more importantly, will the extra time that inevitably goes into building 3D dungeons and towns be worth it in the first place? Only time will tell how widely adopted Project Sigil may become.
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