New Infinities Productions was an American game company that produced

role-playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of player character, characters in a fictional Setting (narrative), setting. Players take responsibility for acting out ...

s and game supplements.

History

Immediately after leaving TSR,

Gary Gygax Ernest Gary Gygax ( ; July 27, 1938 – March 4, 2008) was an American game designer and author best known for co-creating the pioneering tabletop role-playing game ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (''D&D'') with Dave Arneson. In the 1960s, Gygax creat ...

helped form New Infinities Productions, Inc. Wargamer and accountant Forrest Baker had worked as a consultant for TSR during 1984 and 1985, and wrote up a business plan that convinced Gygax to try again with the business side of roleplaying; New Infinities was the results, with Baker as CEO and Gygax as chairman of the board. In October 1986, the company was publicly announced.

Frank Mentzer Jacob Franklin Mentzer III is an American fantasy author and game designer who worked on early materials for the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. He was an employee of TSR, Inc. from 1980 to 1986, spending part of that tim ...

and

Kim Mohan Kim Rudolph Mohan (May 4, 1949 – December 12, 2022) was an American author, editor and game designer best known for works related to the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' role-playing game. Early life and education Mohan was born in Chicago, Illinois, on ...

were design executives and with Gygax formed the creative committee. Gygax, Gary 1987. "From the Sorcerer's Scroll", ''

Dragon A dragon is a Magic (supernatural), magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore of multiple cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in Western cultures since the Hi ...

'' 122:40 (Jun 1987) Before a single product was released, Baker disappeared when his promised outside investment of one to two million dollars failed to come through. In February 1987, Don Turnbull was brought on as the new CEO of New Infinities. Gygax had retained the rights to Gord the Rogue as part of his severance agreement with TSR, so he licensed Greyhawk from TSR and started writing new novels beginning with ''Sea of Death'' (1987); Gygax's Gord novels were the main things keeping New Infinities in business. The company's line of action/adventure science fiction was distributed by

Berkley Books Berkley Books is an American imprint founded in 1955 by Charles Byrne and Frederic Klein owned by the Penguin Group unit of Penguin Random House. History Berkley Books began as an independent company in 1955. It was founded as "Chic News Compa ...

. Gygax's first role-playing game work for New Infinities (with Mohan and Mentzer) was the science fiction-themed RPG '' Cyborg Commando'', which was published in 1987. New Infinities began working on a third line of products, which began with an adventure written by Mentzer called ''The Convert'' (1987); Mentzer wrote the adventure as an

RPGA D&D Adventurers League (or simply Adventurers League for short) is the organized play association for the ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (''D&D'') roleplaying game which is officially administered by ''D&Ds publisher, Wizards of the Coast. It was rebr ...

tournament for ''D&D'', but TSR was not interested in publishing it. Mentzer got verbal permission to publish the adventure with New Infinities, but since the permission was not in writing TSR filed an injunction to prevent the adventure's sale, although the injunction was later lifted.

Jefferson P. Swycaffer Jefferson Putnam Swycaffer (born ) is an American writer best known for his "'' Traveller''-like" science fiction who lives in San Diego. Career Jefferson Swycaffer started his writing career in 1979 at the age of 23 with "At the Sign of the B ...

wrote three books based on '' Traveller'', called the "Tales of the Concordat" trilogy (1988), beginning with ''The Empire's Legacy'' and ''Voyage of the Planetsmasher''. Gygax announced in 1988 in a company newsletter that he and Kuntz were working on a new fantasy RPG, and that the company's "Fantasy Master" line would detail the Castle and City of Greyhawk as they had originally envisioned them, now called "Castle Dunfalcon". Gygax and Kuntz's new game would be called "Infinite Adventures", and was envisioned as a multigenre RPG supported by different gamebooks for different genres. However, New Infinities' investors forced the company into bankruptcy, and the company was dissolved in 1989.

References

{{reflist 1986 establishments in the United States Publishing companies established in 1986 Role-playing game publishing companies