2026’s best RPG was built by a Dungeon Master who barely prepares

Christoffer Bodegård's experience as a DM helped shape Esoteric Ebb into a fantastic RPG Christoffer Bodegård, the solo developer behind my pick for 2026’s RPG of the year, Esoteric Ebb, is obsessed with interactive storytelling. As I played the game, before I knew anything about its creator, I kept telling myself: “The person who made this is clearly a Dungeon Master who plays a lot of Dungeons & Dragons.” I wasn’t wrong. As I interviewed him, I feared that Bodegård might be annoyed that most of my questions were about D&D rather than the video game he developed and released in March of this year to critical acclaim. Instead, I was almost overwhelmed by his eagerness to speak about D&D. “I’ve been playing continually since 2018,” Bodegård said. “We play every other Friday consistently, and we’ve been doing this for eight years.” In a recent interview with PC Gamer, Bodegård revealed that to focus on developing Esoteric Ebb, he had to pause his video game sessions with his friends. But he did not pause D&D night. If you have already adventured into the whimsical and intricate world of Esoteric Ebb, you’ll agree that, more than its much-flaunted Disco Elysium inspiration, Bodegård’s