Freddie Prinze Jrs DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

Freddie Prinze Jr’s DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

With tabletop RPG streaming on the rise, Freddie Prinze Jr. brings his own spin to DC Universe All Star Games – and he isn’t doing it alone.

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Freddie Prinze Jrs DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

The world of tabletop role-playing campaigns is coming to the DC Universe streaming service, in the platform’s first original unscripted gaming mini-series, DC Universe All Star Games. And for executive producer Freddie Prinze Jr., it’s the definition of a ‘passion project.’

The new series is planned as an anthology bringing famous DC fans together to take part in the quickly-expanding genre of tabletop game streaming. While Prinze’s co-executive producer and Game Master Sam Witwer may be an expert in Dungeons & Dragons, it’s the heroes of the DC Comics Universe taking the spotlight in the five-part series. The Star Wars Rebels stars previously united for a campaign on Prinze’s own YouTube gaming channel, Gegghead, which the actor credits for his renewed enthusiasm in tabletop RPGs. Energy he will be sharing with fellow All Star players Vanessa Marshall, Clare Grant, and Xavier Woods, as the group travels back in time to 1985 to start their own campaign in the classic RPG DC HEROES. And after speaking with Prinze ourselves, it’s clear he has big plans for what comes next.

Before we dive into the new series, I know a lot of people who are aware of your “nerd cred” will see this series and assume you are a tabletop role playing fan, and always have been. But this is a relatively new passion for you, right?

Well I’ve played board games my whole life, so technically that’s tabletop. And I played a little bit of RPGs when I was younger. But then there was like a twenty-five year gap where I didn’t play any of that, I was just playing video games. We had our weekly Monopoly, and there was a game called Balderdash, which is basically who lies best. Then games like Mafia and Werewolf, which are just a deck of cards and everyone was role-playing a character and lying, right? More like social games that you play with your friends. But when Gegg Wars came about I hadn’t played an RPG since… 1990 probably [laughs]. So it had been a long time, and the only one I had really played was DC HEROES. And with D&D, I had never even used the Fantasy Flight system, so it was all a brand new experience for me. Then once we did that, I was all in again. I went online and found local D&D groups here in LA and started linking those circles together. I built like four, five, six groups now? And we’re getting ready to do a ton more stuff, man.

Freddie Prinze Jrs DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

It would be hard for me to think of another type of gaming or hobby that has a higher presumed barrier to entry than the tabletop RPGs we’re talking about. You went back into playing it and got those hooks sunk into you right away. What was it about the game, and that social experience that did it?

Yeah, and that’s a great question. So here’s what I love and hate about video games: I love them because it’s a great escape, the same way tabletop was. I hate them because there is zero accountability. We live in a world now where multiple generations have been born into social media, born into the Internet, whereas people my age existed before that. And with social media you can literally mute and block any conflict, any disagreement, any criticism you want. And you never have to hear anything except love. What I found so amazing–which I didn’t get when I was younger, but as an adult now in my forties, what I found so amazing with D&D, and with DC HEROES, and Gegg Wars, is the level of accountability and responsibility you have at a table to keep the whole group alive. When you’re face to face with someone and you do something stupid, they’re going to tell you, ‘Hey man, that’s stupid. Don’t do that.’ And there’s no mute! There’s no block! There’s no, ‘Get all my followers to tell them to shut up!’ It’s just you and that person, and you have to figure out what kind of a human being, what kind of a teammate you’re going to be in that moment. And if you’re a garbage one you don’t get invited back. That’s how real life works.

So I clicked so hard with this, and I’ve done so many different RPGs now. I did Hyper RPG’s D&D Wrestling a few weeks ago–I’m their new arcade champion, that’s how hardcore I went! I played in full character, I know a ton about wrestling because I used to work for Vince McMahon, and they gave me a high level character. They didn’t know the disadvantage they were at. I had an absolute blast, so I’m already working with that group again and trying to find something else we can do. I’m trying to get another RPG show going. Hopefully this goes well and DC wants to do my next DC idea, because we already came up with it. So it’s something I have a ton of passion for, and I was fortunate enough to have social media help find me these circles of RPG players, and have been able to build all these new games that happen weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly.

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Freddie Prinze Jrs DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

So you have that passion, and you have your past work with Mr. Jon Lee Brody, and Gegghead, like you said. How did that shift into what became DC Universe All Star Games? How did that passion for the DC characters and RPG collide into this series?

So Jon was in Vancouver, Canada working. He FaceTimed me from a comics shop out there, and said ‘Hey man, isn’t this the game that you were telling me about last year?’ And he turned his phone around and it was DC HEROES, the 1985 one. This was like the debut of the Teen Titans. So I was like, ‘Oh my god!’ Because we’re big nerds on the Teen Titans cartoon, I think it’s genius writing. So I was like, ‘That’s the one!’ He goes, ‘I’m getting it for you.’ I tell him I’ll pay him for it, he says he’s going to get it for me. So he’s getting ready to get on a plane, and I call a friend of mine at Warner Bros., because they own DC, obviously. It just popped in my head, I said, ‘Hey man, I do an RPG on my channel, I want to do one on your channel. It’s the old school DC 1985 RPG game. You got to let me come in and shoot this for you guys. We can make it super cheap and it will be awesome.’ He goes, ‘Dude, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m going to introduce you to Paul Malmont over at DC Universe. Talk to him.’

It was one of those pitches that was going to go really well, or really bad. Because it’s just a crazy idea, right? So I pitch the idea and he and Veronica Baker were super quiet, which is either a good thing or a bad thing. They’re either about to say, ‘Well thank you’ and you leave, or you continue to talk. They had this sort of nod that they knew what it meant. I kind of know what it means, because I’ve been in this business over twenty years. They said, ‘We want to try to make this happen.’ And I knew we were in right there, because I knew what number I could turn this show in at, which is at a low low budget. I’ve got a lot of people who love this kind of stuff who would do favors, right? So we turned in a really good number, they loved our idea. Then they met Sam and they heard his story and what he wanted to do with this, and they went absolutely bananas.

Freddie Prinze Jrs DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

And I loved it! I’ll be honest with you man, we had to earn it. On the day of the shoot my boss Paul looks at me like, ‘Hey man. You better know what you’re doing.’ It got me hyped! Like a coach talking to a quarterback. We went in there and we knocked it out. Now I hear from them and they’re like, ‘Every time I watch an episode I love it more, this is so great.’ I’ve seen the first episode, I’ve already forgotten some of the choices that happened. I was so excited and had such a blast watching it as a fan, not even knowing if the roll I was about to do was successful or not. I was rooting for myself! It was so much fun. You know, people like Critical Role have paved the way and opened this door, and it’s just us walking through that door and trying to mainstream it even more. And give the DC Universe a custom version of these kind of games.

If you’re talking about getting hyped up to nail this, I can’t imagine a Game Master I would want in my corner more than Sam Witwer. He seems like the kind of person to take that the exact same way. What made him no-brainer for this project?

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Sam is–and I don’t mean any disrespect to any other DMs or GMs I work with–Sam is my favorite. I won’t say best, because that will hurt feelings. Sam is my favorite Dungeon Master that I’ve ever played any game with, ever. He is an incredibly talented storyteller. He is an incredibly talented actor. He has amazing control and range over his voice, so he’s voicing characters and bringing them to life for you. And he has so much experience–the guy has written books for Dungeons & Dragons that are on Amazon, you can buy them right now! There is no part of an RPG engine that he can’t figure out. Then he comes up with custom stories, which is what I like to do. He allows the stories that people have worked so hard on to inspire other stories in his mind, and he shares those with us. And every game I’ve ever played with him, whether he was a teammate or a Dungeon Master, we always have a blast. His level of commitment is top shelf, he plays in character, he just did an episode of our new Gegg Wars series Galaxy of Crime, another Star Wars one. He legit took the Actor class and played an actor who used to be popular but not so much anymore, but still had the ego… it was great. We had so much fun doing that.

Freddie Prinze Jrs DC UNIVERSE ALL STAR GAMES is a Tabletop Labor of Love

He’s the one who gave me the courage–I’m getting ready, and can’t announce with who yet, but I’m getting ready to DM my first game for one of these big game channels. The whole story I came up with I was like, ‘Be hard on me, be tough on it, just show me where I made my mistakes.’ And he was like, ‘Bro I want to play! I love this!’ He gave me a few notes here and there, and reminded me that he’s never run a game that didn’t go off the rails at some point, so to be ready for that. I’m excited, man. I’m shooting in a week and a half, I’m going down to Florida and we’re shooting.

The rest of the cast you’ve assembled also seems like a perfect mix. Even if I can’t imagine being a teammate with Xavier Woods.

Okay, so Xavier is a very close friend of mine. He created UpUpDownDown, he’s also a professional wrestler if you guys don’t know. He is a huge nerd. His passion and my passion are at an equal level, so we just click and connected. I asked him in a text, ‘Do you want to come play this DC game with me for DC Universe?’ He just sent back ‘Yep. Just say when.’ And I knew that’s what he would write! I loved bringing him in. Then my partner in crime Clare Grant, who is the most competitive person on Earth. She co-founded Gegghead with me and Jon, and is just hardcore. She will always commit, she will go with the flow. If it’s a group of players that play out of character, fine. If they want to go in character, she is all in. Something in between? Right on. There’s no curveball you can throw her.

Then Vanessa is the newest to RPGs, she started with us on our game channel with Gegg Wars. And she does every single voice in the DC Universe that Tara Strong doesn’t [laughs]. So I thought she would be a perfect fit for it, especially because she’s on the Harley Quinn cartoon right now. So I pitched her and they said yes to everyone I pitched. Like I said, once they met Sam it was game on. And he has a big voice and presence in the DC Universe as well. It was very organic, and Jon Lee Brody knows everything about DC, so it just worked out. He’s my encyclopedia. People ask me what the Force means, I ask him about DC stuff.

I know you’re in good hands after Sam turned a standoff at a security checkpoint with a Trunk Droid into one of the most riveting Star Wars scenes I’ve ever witnessed–

I mean, off the rails, off the rails RPG nonsense! And he somehow pulled it together… and almost killed me with a giant man-squid [Laughs].

—

Directed by Jon Lee Brody and produced by Telepictures, the first episode of DC Universe All Star Games is available on the streaming service now. New episodes will go live exclusively on DC Universe every Friday. For more information on DC Universe or DC Universe All Star Games, readers can head directly to dcuniverse.com.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/freddie-prinze-jr-dc-universe-all-star-games-rpg/

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