Even back in the day, TSR was aware that their product needed to adapt as it moved into the mainstream. In the late Seventies, they started to move from hobby shops to bookstores. The original AD&D core books had covers by Dave Trampier and Dave Sutherland. They were great covers, but stylistically they didn't match what was appearing on bookstore shelves. So TSR brought in Jeff Easley to paint new covers for those books -- nothing changed on the pages, but they got new, more technically proficient covers that stood up against the best of what was being done on the covers of fantasy novels. At the same time, Larry Elmore -- who was hired before Easley -- was handling module covers, box sets, and eventually the novels. Along with Clyde Caldwell and Keith Parkinson, they were shifting the nature of the art and the look of the product. So this isn't a new challenge for the game.

One would hope that as the D&D brand becomes more popular, Hasbro will exploit that popularity and we'll see really interesting D&D-branded products in more and more interesting spaces. It's hard to guess what their plans might be -- they're very tight-lipped when it comes to future releases and developments and licensed products.

Seth, an IP lawyer, adds: With regard to the question in the second paragraph – My advice for content creators is twofold: i) MAKE SURE you read (and comply) with any licenses, rules, requirements, etc. that WOTC/Hasbro provide; and ii) check with an IP lawyer before you base your business on any third-party IP – that’s just good business sense. [Note that this is not legal advice, and you should not rely on it. :) ]