Is this the start of a beautiful friendship with Italy’s premier pop culture celebration?
We’ve got our plane ticket, we’ve packed our bags and we’re scanning the highly anticipated lineup for Lucca Comics & Games 2025 as our excitement builds! The headline debut of Critical Role’s Matthew Mercer and Marisha Ray has us the giddiest. The duo, making their first appearance as guests of Acheron Games, will headline presentations and signings. They’ll also be part of a massive multi-table session of Daggerheart, the roleplaying game from Critical Role’s creative hub, which will receive its official – and much-anticipated – Italian release during the festival.
According to Festival Director Emanuele Vietina, Critical Role has been on his team’s hitlist for quite some time.
“My team wants to create the festival they would like to attend. So we try to follow the things that we love and Matthew Mercer and Critical Role, we have tried to bring them to Lucca in the last few years, and it’s the same with Hideo Kojima,” says Emanuele, Director of Lucca Comics & Games.
“We try to be value driven. We want to introduce the old players to the new tendencies, and also to celebrate the innovator, because one of the most important reasons for Matthew Mercer and Marisha to be in Lucca is to tell a unique story. From passionate roleplay gamers to someone who completely changed the perspective of video games, we always want to improve our offering.”
But what of the future? If the festival’s director has his way, might we see the whole Critical Role crew turn up and perform?
“Matthew Mercer is a true professional. We started dealing with each other one year ago,” says Emanuele. “If I can say something about the future, of course, this is the first year for Matthew and Marisha here with Darrington Press in Lucca. But who knows, Netflix came in 2017 and they brought the teenagers of Stranger Things. And after eight years, the Duffer brothers have come to Lucca with the kids. So when we meet a fellow, we try to do a full journey with the fellow. Our hope is to make them enthusiasts of Lucca and maybe have Darrington Press in the [coming] years. Who knows? This is a first step. We hope to, in some way, make them feel part of the community and let Critical Role belong to the local community.”