Hidden Door brings generative AI to the Land of Oz

If you have ever finished a fantasy novel and immediately wished you could wander around in that universe on your own terms, you are not alone.

Gaming startup Hidden Door is turning that fantasy into an interactive reality. Following its debut at the PC Gaming Show, the New York-based studio launched limited playtests on its Discord for an AI-powered tabletop role-playing game platform set in the Land of Oz. The full browser-based game is slated for a Winter 2023 release.

An interactive Oz where rules are made to be broken

Hidden Door positions the experience as a hybrid between a traditional tabletop RPG and an interactive graphic novel, playable entirely inside a web browser.

Players kick off their run with a process called conjuring, picking characters, plot beats, and overarching vibes to establish the tone of their run. Once inside, an AI narrator generates custom encounters, items, locations, and narrative branches tailored to player input, accompanied by visuals rendered in Hidden Door's distinct in-house art style.

You can select narrative prompts suggested by the AI narrator or type in custom actions. Want to team up with the Wicked Witch of the West instead of fighting her? Go ahead. Prefer to ignore the Yellow Brick Road entirely and hang out in Kansas playing fetch with Toto? The AI adapts in real time while keeping the lore grounded in the source material.

Starting in the public domain

Hidden Door was founded in 2020 by a team spanning game developers, artists, and computer scientists. To prove out the platform after three years of development, CEO Hilary Mason chose L. Frank Baum's 14 original Oz novels.

The rationale came down to three factors: the books are in the public domain, the universe is universally recognized, and Oz provides a massive sandbox for emergent storytelling.

However, Oz is merely the proof of concept. Hidden Door's broader business model centers on partnering directly with intellectual property holders, offering them a secure, customizable framework to spin active book and film franchises into ongoing social RPG experiences.

Why it matters

For tabletop enthusiasts and casual roleplayers, the hardest part of tabletop gaming has always been finding an experienced, tireless Dungeon Master. An adaptive AI narrator removes that scheduling bottleneck, allowing anyone who can type to build custom group campaigns on the fly.

For the media industry, Hidden Door presents an intriguing template for monetizing back-catalog IPs. Instead of spending tens of millions on static licensed games, studios could theoretically license universes to AI engines that generate infinite canonical fan adventures.

We think Hidden Door's go-to-market strategy is especially smart because it sidesteps the copyright gray zones currently plaguing generative AI. By anchoring their launch to public domain texts and bespoke in-house visual styles, they avoid legal friction while showcasing platform stability. The true test will be whether their containment guardrails are sturdy enough to convince cautious IP owners that user freedom won't compromise brand integrity.