Imagination has Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) leaping off the gaming table and into the real world for a group of artists, players and YouTubers in the Okanagan.
Their passion for the famous role-playing game is taking the team behind Fool’s Gold to places they could have never predicted, including a popular YouTube podcast, and now, a graphic novel book deal.
“In 2017, we were just playing this game in my basement with my friends and then suddenly now we are getting product out there,” said Felix Irnich, producer and game master. “People love watching (Fool’s Gold) on YouTube. We are getting invited to San Diego ComicCon.”
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The D&D-inspired role-playing show has been a smash success on YouTube. Viewers helped the team raise nearly $2.5 million on Kickstarter to launch their Fool’s Gold campaign set called ‘Into the Bellowing Wilds’ so fans can interact and play in the world themselves.
“Everything in the (campaign) book, you can expand and create your own story, and that’s really what we wanted,” said Jenna Woldenga, creator of Fool’s Gold.
Now, they’ve inked a graphic novel book deal with the publishing company Simon & Schuster to bring a whole new audience into the Bellowing Wilds world with ‘Fool’s Gold: Death by Karaoke.’
“The funny story that comes from all of this, my character sings karaoke and sings it so bad he casts a spell that releases an apocalyptic creature, the Tarrasque,” said Woldenga.
The humongous D&D monster was reimagined by team artist Avery Howett and then by Hit Point Press into a equally large miniature figure players can use in their games.
“It won the 2025 Origins Award for the Tarrasque [miniature],” Howett said. “We beat out Star Wars, Warhammer, and I think even D&D in order to take home that prize, so it was a huge honour.”
Their ingenuity is taking them on a mad dash to the top of their industry as ‘Fool’s Gold: Death by Karaoke’ hits the shelves Tuesday.
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