Framingham, Mass. – August 21, 2007 – Vivox, the leading provider of integrated voice services for online games and virtual worlds, today announced that it will be the voice chat provider for Wizards of the Coast’s new digital Dungeons & Dragons® experience – Dungeons & Dragons Insider™ (D&D Insider™). Vivox will provide Wizards of the Coast with hosted and managed voice communication services that are customized for and integrated into D&D Insider.
With Vivox voice, Dungeon Masters (DMs) and D&D Insider players will be able to speak with each other around the Dungeons & Dragons Gaming Table, create one-to-one channels for private conversations, and start, leave or rejoin voice conversations during game play without impacting game performance. The DM will have full moderator controls to mute, kick and ban players during the game for enhanced security and control. On-screen indicators will show players what voice channels are active and which players within a channel are speaking.
“Voice is an essential component of the D&D Insider player experience,” said Bill Slavicsek, R&D Director of Dungeons & Dragons at Wizards of the Coast. “The roots of classic Dungeons & Dragons lie in the ability to play interactively with your friends, communicating openly around a table, developing characters, building the scene, laying out the adventure and communicating actions and dialog. To recreate this experience online, we needed a voice partner with the ability to deliver a consistently high quality and reliable voice experience for our players. We also needed a company with the resources to support us during and after the integration, with a proven ability to scale to a very large online community. Vivox is well positioned to deliver on these elements and we look forward to a successful relationship.”
“D&D is the original tabletop roleplaying game, and we are thrilled to be a part of bringing it online,” said Vivox CEO, Rob Seaver. “Adding real-time voice to D&D Insider will make for an unprecedented online experience that only Wizards of the Coast can create. High quality voice will grab users and immerse them in game play that is challenging and entertaining, as well as create a sense of community and camaraderie. It’s this kind of technology and game innovation that is going to keep new and old gamers alike heavily-invested and excited about the future of online games and communities.”
