‘Everything Is a Story’ Inside Wyrmwood Gaming’s Narcissistic Funhouse
By Linda Codega
“Can’t I just say what happened?” A tall man in a flat cap asks, looking around the sparse meeting room. “Isn’t truth an absolute defense?” This is Doug Costello, the CEO of Wyrmwood Gaming. “It is,” says head of HR Bas Antoine, “if you have the whole story.” The two go back and forth, brainstorming a response, Costello repeatedly looking into a camera as he dramatically recounts allegations of sexual assault. “The person who was allegedly raped never worked at the company,” he says, eyebrows raised. “I don’t know her name.”
The scene is from a fourteen-minute video titled “Wyrmwood Responds to SA Allegations,” a record of a group of men discussing what to do about recently-surfaced allegations of sexual assault at their company. Throughout the video, Costello makes statements like: “You have to get police involved.” He mentions alcohol as a factor in the allegation. In part of the video, Wyrmwood’s lawyer, Frank E. Biedak, gives the go ahead to share the video on their YouTube channel, alongside a written statement.
Wyrmwood Gaming is an unusually transparent company; while its core business is making luxury wood products for tabletop gamers, including dice trays, deck boxes and gaming tables, its executives seem equally concerned with the production of Wyrm Lyfe, a YouTube-based reality show focused on their daily activities at the company, filmed with handheld cameras and uploaded two to three times a week.
The program has over 100,000 subscribers, and fans usually reply to new videos with praise or earnest questions. But the sexual assault discussion was not Wyrmwood’s usual content. Comments on YouTube, Reddit, and Twitter decried the video as a “tone-deaf” and “harmful” way to handle serious allegations. Several corporate partners, including Dispel Dice and the mental health organization Take This, announced they would end their relationships with Wyrmwood. The company took the video down from YouTube in less than two days.
In a statement addressing the allegations, Wyrmwood said: “We take any allegation of inappropriate conduct, including, but not limited to, sexual assault, sexual misconduct and safety issues, very seriously. We consider the safety and well-being of our employees a top priority. To that end, we’ve made very significant investments in HR and Safety and will continue to do so.”
