Neverwinter Nights Forum News (Nov. 13, 04)

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Here are today's Neverwinter Nights forum highlights, collected by NWVault. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

Derek French, Live Team Producer

08 Nov 2004 - BioWare Online Store Interview

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Hi: This is a corporate wide request as I own multiple copies of many games and their expansion sets. My boys have accounts listed with the other games (most recently KOTOR) I'm one of your long time gamer types and when I buy a product I normally wind up buying 3 or 4 copies so we(the whole family) can play on our lan. Would it be possible in development to create a Key series that you could sell without the cd/box/manual for a nominal fee?

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Hi there, and I would just like to first thank you for your support over the years. This is probably one of the most often heard requests that we have heard, starting when we released NWN. While I cannot commit to a solution at this time, it is something that we are looking into for future PC games. Since there are many stakeholders in something like this (developer, publisher, retailer) we need to come up with a solution that satisfies everyone.

Rob Bartel, Senior Designer Live Team

ShadowGuard
I'm glad everyone's enjoying ShadowGuard and that there seems to be a market for shorter modules. It's something that goes against the survey data we'd gathered but I think there's a natural disconnect between what we say when faced with a questionnaire and what we do when presented with a well-executed gameplay experience. As for the future of the ShadowGuard series, it's too early to tell at this point but it is something we'd like to continue, given the opportunity.

Witch's Wake **Spoiler** Help
******SPOILER*********

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I think I reached the end of the module, or at least what was downloaded so far--I was tossed into the mine and found my way to Caldrian Ayre. The game ended very abruptly when a ghost appeared and a note that the game was saving to database and then led into the credits. Was that it...for the time being?

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Yes. For this first installment of the Witch's Wake series, we remastered the original module but we did not expand on it. It is the same length as the original version that's still available for download from the Vault.

Whats the next one to hit the store?

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I think maybe a MP one, a real dungeon crawler, just to see how BioWare would approach such a beast. It has to take you up to level 20 or 25.

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We do have a really great idea for something along these lines but first we'd like to do something a little more content driven. We'll see,

Gift Codes and Downloads
Yes, feel free to distribute the premium module installers on CD to save your friend the download. Until he's redeemed his gift codes, however, he'll be unable to authenticate with our master server and play them (instead, he'll see a brief demo movie). Glad to see people putting the gift codes to use,

Witch's Wake-- If you've only played it this way, you haven't played it at all!
Head... expanding...Hehe. Honestly, I'm glad you enjoyed the module and I agree with you about the VO. April Banigan, the voice actress, simply nailed it (we didn't even hold auditions, actually. I'd worked with her before and knew she'd pull it off). David John, as well, has been a joy to work with and his compositions have been excellent for all three modules. As for the sequels, I still have a few tricks still up my sleeves so we'll see what I come up with. Thanks for playing and for the excellent review

Georg Zoeller, Designer

Turning away customers is bad business.

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Jacen, you are absolutely right. If the experiement is a success I am sure Bioware will expand and get the bugs in the system squashed. A lil' patience and understanding will go a long way.

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That's the plan. For starters we are taking a smaller approach to test the waters, when we feel that the whole thing is worth the time put into it, we will expand on it, which may include investigation of different forms of payment, copy protection, etc.

Visceral Review of Shadowguard *NO SPOILERS*

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I have DSL. The authentication dialog is up for several seconds whenever I load a game. It's probably not as long as I think, but it's mostly the waiting for no reason (I've already authenticated, after all), not the waiting itself that I find annoying. Plus, if I'm loading a save, I'm not generally in my most patient mood. Anyway, I really don't think it's a big deal.

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The authentification itself takes usually less than 2 secs, but the dialog is covering a part of the module load, so it appears that it's taking longer. The module load itself for the DD modules takes a few seconds longer due to the encrypted nature of the module. Since decryption is a cpu intensive process, people with minspec machines will probably experience longer loadtimes than people with faster machines, but in all cases we didn't find the load times too intrusive (a lot of modern games ask you for way more patience).

Stanley Woo, Quality Assurance

payment methods for NWN modules
Please read the FAQ. The store currently accepts only Visa and Mastercard, or Visa- or Mastercard-supported debit cards. Other payment options may be considered for the future.

James Henley, Technical Designer

Backing up your where you are in the game?
You're going to want to keep anything that's in the following directories (where applicable):

Saves - all your saved games are here, of course
LocalVault - all of your generated characters are in here
DMVault - if you have generated any dungeon master avatars, they are here
Modules - any custom mods you've made are here
Portraits - you'll want to keep this if you've added any community portrait packs or the like to the game
Hak - any haks you've downloaded for community mods are in here
Music - any music you've downloaded for community mods will be here
TLK - any tlk files for community mods you've downloaded
Override - though I personally dislike the use of the override directory, some community mods make use of it, so you may need what's in it

Dan Whiteside - Designer

Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker
There are multiple ways through pretty much every plot.

Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker
*******SPOILER********Calibast and Kaidala are the two romance characters, and you really have to take time and explore between votes to develop the relationship.

Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker
Also I want to take this opportunity to publicly thank Rob Bartel and Keith Hayward for all their excellent work in getting Kingmaker out the door. After the initial betetesters were done (and thanks to all of you as well), I was working on Dragon Age, so Rob took over for me, and Cori moved on to Jade Empire, so Keith took over for her. Both did some wondrous things, including the marvelous tileset for outside the keep, and the Haunted House plot, which was just a kill fest when I did it, due to time constraints. Overall I think everyone who worked on this project, from the custom portraits to the v.o. actors and director, did an excellent job bringing the mod to life. Thanks to all of you!

[Spoilers] Okay, here's my KingMaker review
*******SPOILER******** Sorry you feel that way. In truth the original ending had a meeting with your Grandmother, who explained a lot. (The reason has to do with the information found with Ohio Jones.) When it was betatested (by community members) the general consensus was that too much was tied up. They wanted more loose ends left for a sequel. The main plot for this chapter was "Become the Lord/Lady of the Keep and stop the invaders." You did that. Why you needed to be Lord of the Keep will become clear in future chapters, should the series prove successful enough to continue. (Fingers crossed here.)

Question and Slight Spoliers about begining of Kingmaker
Yes, double weapons are exotic, so you must have that proficiency. We really tried to get ranged weapons in, but there were so many problems that we ended up cutting them. If you can't do something right... I appologize to all those Arcane Archers out there. I was sad to see the bows go too.

Kingmaker impressions (SPOILERS)
*******SPOILER******** Oops, sorry. I misled you there. Apparently once the election was done it cut off the quests. My bad, but I've been working on Dragon Age for a while now, so I forgot.

Does the election break quests? (spoilers)
*******SPOILER******** Yes, sorry. If you have a save from before the election, you should run around and complete them and then get the election going.

Nathrock's Unofficial FAQ
Kingmaker requires Hordes because we use some of the tilesets and monsters and most importantly, because of the multiple henchmen modifications.

Kingmaker impressions (SPOILERS)
*******SPOILER******** The graveyard is purely an exploration Easter Egg. Did you give us presents? If we like the presents, we might just give you something nice in return.

Whats the next one to hit the store?
I could whip one up really fast. Lots of characters walking around muttering, "Stories! We don't need no stinking stories!" Big open areas with lots of monsters to kill. No scripted events or cutscenes. Oh, you meant a GOOD dungeon crawl.
Guess we shall see what some of the other designers can come up with.