Tell me you want to be the premier law firm for TTRPGs without telling me you want to be the premier law firm for TTRPGs.
Azora Law is, according to a publication in the Washington State Bar News – June 2021, it is “one of Seattle’s oldest virtual law firms”.4 Brian Lewis “Three Big Developments in Soft IP Law” Washington State Bar News (Washington US, June 2021) at 30 This seems to be the singular instance of it claiming to be a virtual law firm, which is an odd claim since if they’re all in Seattle and they have a registered office address… that means they just let staff work from home if they want? Pretty sure that was the standard in mid 2021.
Unless they also had a presence in the Metaverse at some stage.
My name is Kim. I am not a lawyer, certainly not a US lawyer specializing in copyright and most importantly I am not your lawyer. I am a law graduate in New Zealand who has a passion for role-playing games, and you should not consider anything I post to be legal advice (or take legal advice from blogs or social media posts in general). Also please, understand – absolutely nothing you say to me falls under lawyer-client privilege – especially if you do it in the comments.
So, after GiantLands 1st Edition1 James M. Ward & Stephen E. Dinehart GiantLands 1st Edition (Wonderfilled Inc, Wisconsin USA, December 2021) (also known as “GiantLands, the only edition”) was released, it only had 1,000 units (again, 1,000% of the amount promised in the Kickstarter).
What next for this exclusive limited edition?
As a note, this has gotten trickier to report on as in June 2025, Dinehart had another meltdown – this time provoking the far-right audience he’d cultivated and ended up nuking most of his public facing posts and accounts. So I’ll have to be relying on screenshots, notes and memory from here on.
“A project of remarkable vision” according to the project proposer.
Wisconsin receives an average of 40+ inches of snow per year, with higher snowfalls in particular areas – not exactly a place that’d be create for pseudo-Mayan/Aztec/Inca fusion architecture that was designed for the tropics.
But, by far the weirdest thing about this is its not clear what the vision is. This doesn’t seem to be a specific location, so the overall layout etc isn’t really clear if its a proposed layout, or a sort of conceptual depiction. There’s also no way to know what the attractions are supposed to be. Is the arena for shows or do you go to fight?
To date, there has been no progress on this idea – but you know what, we’ll get to it later. The point is this is a terrible idea and despite the claim of “remarkable vision” there’s not really any vision here, or anything new. It’s “Gamma World, but make it Native American”. One the biggest problems with GiantLands is that it lacks both immersive quality, but also a unique pitch that will appeal to normies.4 Kim Wincen “GiantLands (2021)” (30 March 2024) A gentleman with opinions <https://blog.wincenworks.com/2024/03/30/giantlands-2021/>
Particularly since the connection to Native Americans is tenious at best. There’s not connection to a particular group or organization, the use of mythology is arguably appropriation and the only related cause Dinehart seems to support is Friends of Aztalan State Park (which, seems to me to mostly be white people taking care of abandoned ruins so they don’t have to deal with actual natives except as performers).5 “Friends of Aztalan State Park” <https://www.aztalanfriends.org/>
I will restate yes, that Dinehart claims to be Cherokee and given how complex and fraught the validity of that claim is, I’m not here to decide whether he is or is not. What I am happy to do is point out that Aztec, Inca and Mayans are not Cherokee.
In a publicly shared, but now deleted, video called with Dinehart, the late Jim Ward proposed that the theme park should about the gaming system and each setting have its own region -similar to how Disneyland works. But this also relies upon the idea that Dinehart will somehow secure talent who can create material that will rise to being a monolithic victor in the already hyper-saturated market of TTRPGs.
As a side note, it is genuinely sad that so many artifacts of Jim’s final work and ideas have been deleted due to Dinehart’s calousness and carelessness.
For reasons that I suspect will remain unclear to mere mortals until Judgement Day, Dinehart decided that the real thing that his sales busting limited edition TTRPG required was 3 wildly different soundtracks.
Now I need to stress, as a guy who regularly plays with a DM who plays background music to add to the atmosphere – I understand how it definitely can contribute to a session. But the thing is, that DM uses Spotify because the idea is to set the scene – not the setting – and there’s a lot of types of scenes.
You may also be wondering if these albums were a sneaky way for Dinehart to vertically integrate by say, making you buy the albums if you wanted more GiantLands lore the same way TSR Inc and Wizards of the Coast release novels, comics, video games, etc. The answer is no.
GiantLands – The Album
In true Dinehart fashion, he would release the first album right away and with the name of one of the musicians misspelled. This has since been corrected, but its absurd that it happened in the first place since all he had to do is literally copy-paste.
Of course, no apology was ever issued for this, the (apparently unique) typo was never corrected and he would go on to forget them soon as the album didn’t make him a fortune.
Sure, some people may think that it was probably undermined by the fact that almost nobody who bought GiantLands seems to have played it (possibly due to it being unplayable), but I have to think if this album had the unique juice the pitch claims it’d be noteworthy to someone.
What’s the perfect pairing with soothing electronica? If you answered with Stoner Doom Metal – then you may be Stephen Dinehart.
The second album was by Singaporean band Marijannah,9 “Music | Marijannah” Bandcamp <https://marijannah.bandcamp.com/> who Dinehart referred to as a Malaysian band – but its worth noting that drugs are extremely harshly policed in both areas so simply by being openly pro-stoner these guys are fucking punk.
Dinehart, cares nothing for this and just seems to think their sound belongs with/to GiantLands – having used it in the weird trailer with where the woman has a gas mask and speaker titties (2 elements not in GiantLands).10 Stephen E. Dinehart “GiantLands: Edition Zero: Kickstarter Promo Trailer” (4 December 2019) YouTube <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRyumHBMkTA> This makes it even weirder given the title of the album is Music Inspired From & Inspired By GiantLands 1E.
I am confident they didn’t play it or care about it beyond some funding during a period where it was particularly hard to get a gig. After all, there’s not really anything in GiantLands to inspire anyone.
The album is also only 15 minutes long, with the tracks being noticeably shorter and suspiciously within the time frames where one might become suspicious that it was generated procedurally, or that it was intended as one piece and then broken up into small pieces to avoid having to work out how to manage transitions.
Weird that Dinehart didn’t even credit himself. Almost like, nobody made this.
Is GiantLands: AI generated “old school”
After years of bragging he was all about old masters using old master techniques (ie buying physical paintings off Larry Elmore) he did what everyone expected from an NFT bro and pivoted hard into AI art.
How hard? Well, he replaced the kind of charming cover for The Broken Roads with an AI artwork, he keeps using AI art and AI generated videos for promotions – none of which seem to have any input from the GiantLands illustrations.
Yo umay notice that yes, Dinehart signssome of these as though they were actual artwork he created – behold is respect for old school masters.
So all that masterpiece by Larry Elmore is looking more and more like its whole purpose was just to be a brag item in Dinehart’s personal collection. He didn’t even try to sell it as an NFT (though that could just be Larry not allowing it in the license, I understand he got roped into some NFT nonsense in 2022).
Naturally he is no more concerned about the harm that AI does to the environment than he was over the harm that NFTs do. In fact, he loves it so much he’s outsourced the design of the park to Midjourney.
Is GiantLands: Getting a job?
At some point, Stephen did the inevitable – he bought a PO Box in Lake Geneva so he could continue to claim it was the official registered office of Wonderfilled and moved to Florida to get a job. A job with a steady salary, a job where he gets to shape young minds and inflate his book sales.
Stephen Erin Dinehart III is, at time of writing, an Associate Professor at University of Tampa.
It’s not going great – at the moment he has a 1.9 rating on Rate My Professor, and that’s including the 2 suspicious 5.0 reviews that appeared telling people not to hate – he’s actually a great professor.
Equally alarmingly, these ratings seem to indicate that Dinehart has made his own “textbook”13 Stephen E Dinehart IV Narrative Design: Fabulator Ludus (23 January 2023, Independently Published, USA) mandatory reading for the course.
His profile at the university also contains numerous questionable credentials, which I’ve been doing my best to try to verify – and thus far this is what I’ve got:
THEA Awards are theme park awards, these are very industry specific awards which are handed out annually – and come with specific credits.
THEA – Outstanding Achievement in a Theme Park Land (2022) This appears to refer to the award during the 28th round, for Super Nintendo World in Japan – which seem to recall he listed himself working on in 2017 – 2018 on Linked In. Certainly he didn’t work on it during that year. Dinehart’s name does not appear in the credits.14 “The 28th Annual TEA Thea Awards Program” (23 April 2022) Themed Entertainment Association <https://issuu.com/themedentertainmentassociation/docs/28th_thea_program_issuu>, at 67
THEA – Outstanding Achievement in a Technical Innovation (2022) This is from the same round, and specifically for Mario Kart: Koopa’s Challenge. Again, Dinehart seems to have only worked on it 2017 – 2018 and does not appear in the credits and there is no reason for him to for an award issued 4 years later.15 Above, at 51
THEA – Outstanding Achievement – Water Theme Park (2019) Again, I can’t find any mention of him in the credits of this but it seems to be taking credit for Universal Volcano Bay Water Theme. Now, all evidence suggests Stephen did work at Universal Orlando in 2017 & 2018. The award was specifically for the Tapu Tapu bracelets, which were first released when the park opened in 2017, and credit seems to that pre-release group (“Team 533”). So… I dunno… maybe he got screwed on credits or maybe this is stolen valor. 🤷🏻16 “25th Annual TEA Thea Awards Program – April 2019” (13 April 2019) Themed Entertainment Association <https://issuu.com/themedentertainmentassociation/docs/thea_program_2019_for_issuu_high_re>, at 98
I also feel the need to point out that since this all seems to relate to 2017 – 2018, according to his LinkedIn – during this time Dinehart was:
Manager of Software Development at NBC Universal (which was the Super Nintendo World work)
Game Attraction Designer at Universal Orland Resort
Executive Producer for Boomtown Festival (aka “Boomtown Fair” in the UK)
Exectutive Producer for PsychFi
Independent Game Devleoper with Nintendo
Operating “Narrative Designer” which Dinehart had converted into a click through link that described him as an “Writer, Director, Artist & Serial Entreprenuer”.17 Stephen E. Dinehart “Narrative Designer” (4 March 2016) Archive: <http://narrativedesigner.com/>
Honestly I genuinely feel sorry for his students since I can only imagine that any discussion of his experience and insights simply leads to extremely awkward rambles and misdirections.
Is GiantLands… anything?
Dinehart’s personal portfolio claims that GiantLands is a Park & Roleplaying game, that is “many years off” but he is never the less proud to say he registered trademarks for.18 Professor Stephen Erin Dinehart IV “Portfolio of Recent Works” (2024) <https://narrativedesigner.com/Stephen%20E.%20Dinehart%20Portfolio%202024.pdf> Trademarks are not supposed to be registered until you can demonstrate use in commerce.
It’s definitely dying.
One thing that has become clear is that GiantLands has entirely run out of momentum. In late June 2025, Dinehart admitted that he hadn’t made a sale in 2 years19 Tenkar’s Tavern “Wonderfilled Admits To NO SALES IN LAST TWO YEARS!” (26 June 2025) YouTube <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uV2DXhKKqbI> – but even before then it was pretty clear nothing was coming out.
Andrew Spohn, host of Amusement Sparks (a podcast which I think is about ideating on ideas for amusement parks) sub-hosts the GiantLands podcast. Since the release he has talked to Larry Elmore and Penny Williams, and neither of them has had anything to say about GiantLands. Also the hosting service seems to be going under as it keeps reporting bad security certificates.
Penny has hosted games of GiantLands at Gary Con.20 Stephen E. Dineart “GiantLands at EGG Con I – A Celebration of Gary Gygax with Penny Williams” (11 July 2024) Press Release <https://www.pr.com/press-release/915466> Dinehart was going to run a game at Arne-Con 2, and now promises to run a couple at GenCon 2025 – no evidence anyone bought a ticket for either though.
The only demonstrations of play available to the wider public are the videos where the late Jim Ward tells people things won’t work until he gets bored and kills everyone’s characters… at the time of watching those have 307 views total.
In June 2025, Dinehart, during another public meltdown, burned his bridges with the last YouTuber who was vaguely supportive of him (but had also been telling him to just finish the module he’d presold).
It’s gotten so bad that, while he’s apparently still trying to run tests of the game at conventions… including Gen Con, he’s going to actually run it himself.
I can’t find any evidence anyone bought a ticket.
It’s also horrifyingly pushy.
Of the 2,000 total units which seem to have been made, it looks like Dinehart still has a few hundred units left over – and he was forcibly giving them away.
I do meant forcibly, when he had a falling out with YoDanno (over him explicitly saying he threw out GiantLands when it arrived due to a hard stance against transphobia): Dinehart used the shipping data to first try to call YoDanno and then to mail 2 more copies that YoDanno explicitly did not want. This resulted in YoDanno getting a text message that he was being sent a package, followed by an abusive email.21 YoDanno (19 September 2022) X née Twitter <https://x.com/YoDanno/status/1571668081570729984>
As you can imagine, YoDanno was upset and frankly concerned about what else Dinehart might be doing or planning to do—Dinehart just whined about how he thought he was doing something nice for a friend.
So apparently, he knows better than you whether you want his game or not.
And as for The Broken Road, the “quick intro” adventure that was supposed to come out shortly afterwards… has been still under revision since Jim’s passing () and continues to miss deadlines even when invoking that event.
Note: 120 pages. That’s nearly twice the page count Light of Xarysis, the module you get to introduce you to 5E Spelljammer – aka Dungeons & Dragons IN SPACE! There is no justifiable reason to keep expanding it, reworking it and diluting the James Ward appeal of the time.
Also, oddly, not long after Jim passed away, Dinehart referred to his last work as an 8.5 that he, Stephen Erin Dinehart IV was going to take to an 11.
Now, you may be thinking – what about the people who pre-ordered the module? Did they ever get their product they’ve been waiting >2 years for and that is becoming less and less what they ordered at every turn?
Well according to Dinehart they’re all very understanding a supportive.
This may or may not be due to him blocking anyone did order the module and does not support him unconditionally. He also hates when people focus on that he hasn’t delivered the product that he promised, rather than just supporting him unconditionally.
Now I want to be clear, small team projects running well past deadline or even never appearing isn’t uncommon and often there are good reasons for it. But this was meant to be a quick introductory module, that keeps balooning out and is never ready for release.
Also, despite the fact it has completely derailed, he still kept asking people to buy more:
At time of writing, the site is still taking pre-orders.
When Ernie got married, he wanted you to promote his game in order to try to win a free album of his game’s music – including doing a cosplay.
Indeed, Dinehart demands you give him something at every turn.
That’s insisting if you want to beta test a module that only 25 people wanted to buy, you need to pay him the cost if you had wanted to buy it for yourself.
Low priority
The first GiantLands module, The Broken Road, has had countless release dates over the past 2 years and double in page count since it’s primary author passed away. Recently, another release date was announced with much fanfare for items that are pretty standard in every module.
Yes, it will have drawings (including drawings of maps), text to tell you how to play the module, random encounters via tables, and the lore that you were promised in the core materials. The equivalent of promising you that a new car will come with windows, tyres, headlights, upholstery and be painted.
During the same time that he’s been creating this, he’s released 2 albums that have.. nothing to do with GiantLands.
The first was an album which appears to be generated entirely using AI and pretends to be inspired by ancient Mesopotanian mythology. Being the genius he is, Dinehart announced this one while he was also melting down over Elon Musk for being… the sort of person Dinehart was doing business and seeking clout with.
He later doubled down on the absurdity of that he doubled down by timing the release of his next album where he had a meltdown on ended up with him changing the Wonderfilled name and referring to the people on X as Nazis.24 Stephen E. Dinehart as “EATME” @derloserbrigade (10 July 2025) X née Twitter <https://x.com/derloserbrigade/status/1943265662362616129> The people marketed to.
Overall, it seems now that he’s personally being impacted by the radical right – he’s trying to reinvent himself as progressive by… appropriating blackness.
Yes he does consistently mispell “professor”, which is also supposed to be his day job, consistently through all the marketing, amazingly even when abreviating too.
Honestly not familiar enough with the genre of music to be able to judge it, nor do I want to listen to it. I wondeer though: given his history of making comically bad knockoffs and his marketing, including terms like “ghettotech” and AI video to create black performers—I have to wonder if there is a meaningful difference between this and a minstrel show.26 Temple of Booty (22 June 2025) X née Twitter <https://x.com/templeofbooty/status/1936638956877095057/video/1>
Maybe it’s half-way between minstrel show and Vanilla Ice.
Either way, it’s a glaring insight into the values and principles of the guy who has been taking Jim Ward’s last work from an 8.5 to an 11 by doubling the length of it. A man who rants about how race doesn’t exist, while he prepares to release an album that is a (poor) attempt to appropriate Black American music and imagery.
I guess when you make big deal of not seeing race, it makes it easy for you to exploit and commodify black americans for your AI slop projects.
Conclusion
GiantLands is entirely unremarkable, for their will never be a shortage of dream projects that people profess to be determined to bring to reality but are unwilling to do the real effort. The Internet is littered without countless half-baked ideas for games that amount to little more than brain farts.
This one just has a claim to crediting James M. Ward and Penny Williams as involved, but no clarity to how much influence they really had.
Even Dinehart seems to realize that, so instead of releasing the module (and the other one that apparently exists in some capacity), and expanding on the project, he’s spent years working on anything but it – then come back and (despite having more commitments) diluted all the work of Jim with his own.
Given Dinehart’s refusal to allow the sale of electronic copies, and that his fan base is 25 people, I doubt that I’ll get the chance to assess The Broken Road. Nor do I think it will warrant close scrutiny for all the impact it will have on the work. Even Dinehart knows that, he’s just dragging out getting pretend credibility as long as he can.
Fortunately for the rest of the world, it hasn’t been working.
1
James M. Ward & Stephen E. Dinehart GiantLands 1st Edition (Wonderfilled Inc, Wisconsin USA, December 2021)
Stephen E. Dineart “GiantLands at EGG Con I – A Celebration of Gary Gygax with Penny Williams” (11 July 2024) Press Release <https://www.pr.com/press-release/915466>
