Welcome to my fan page on Neverwinter Nights, the new Role Playing Game from Bioware. Since 1997 Bioware has been trying to put together the first 3D Role Playing Game that would revolutionize the genre. When it came out it wasn’t the first real 3D role Playing Game. I really thought Dungeon Siege was the first when it came out August 2001. It’s been that long already. Diablo 2 has already been 3 years know. Actually the game was planned to evolve around the highlights Diablo 2. Diablo 2 had a couple things going for it at the time. Ability to trade items was a biggy. The “ask player to trade” option was created in Diablo I and has become a standard in all RPGs since then. The abilty to have random creatures in Diablo was a big achievement. Ninety Percent of console RPGs didn’t have random battles until after Diablo I. Diablo 2 just created more random battles. But it was in all in real time, unlike Never Winter Nights isn’t revolutionary today, but back then, the gaming industry was yet to see huge vast worlds in RPGs today what is called the MMORPG or Massive Multiplayer Role Playing Game. Sure, Baldur’s Gate was released in 1998 and was giant and the largest computer RPG on the market. I was in Diablo instead; I haven’t even got into Elder Scrolls II – Daggerfall, the most revolutionary RPG at the time. At the time I didn’t even know it existed. Bioware also packaged a level editor with the game so gamers could design levels like they can in Warcraft III Reign of Chaos and Dungeon Siege. I was only into Warcraft III for about 2 weeks. The difference between Warcraft III and Neverwinter Nights is that Warcraft involves you to take control of a race to develop and rage war on another race. All games are pressured for time and development costs. Neverwinter Nights has been in development for 3+ years and Bioware hasn’t been able to put in everything they originally planned. For example, they were going to add more characters, another town and upgrade the graphics engine, and a real time voice option. Bioware says it is still working on it. Neverwinter Nights is still in 3D and the textures don’t look too bad. Bioware got most of it. Like a mature battle system, that in a instant success. Most everything is done with the mouse and you hardly use the key board at all!. Bioware, unlike Diablo 2, has two expansion packs in development, NeverWinter Nights : Shadows of Unrentide and one other expansion coming out later this year. That’s one big RPG we have with Neverwinter Nights. Why haven’t I mentioned Elder Scrolls III – Morrowind / Bloodline Expansion in my development status? I had owned Morrowind for Xbox. So I haven’t discussed it. Although if you want to read my Morrowind Review, head on over to my Xbox section. Morrowind is also very popular. The graphics are superior to those of Neverwinter Nights. As you know with all the RPGs released this year, there is always this one State of the Art RPG, although all RPGs now-a-days, unlike 3 years ago, run in high resolution. His year it’s World of Warcraft, a massive multiplayer role playing game, unlike previous Warcraft games that were strategy. World of Warcraft can relate well to Diablo 2 fans I think. Diablo 2 fans should know, if you get caught cheating on the server, you get kicked off. At least that’s what Battlenet is trying to do. They say their upcoming RPG, World of Warcraft, will have a secure connection much like EverQuest. You pay a small fee that’ll cover the server costs if an anti-hacker game (in multiplayer). Neverwinter Nights would have been like this if it wasn’t for the sponsorship of Gamespy Network, a free game server community sponsored by ads and a dozen game companies. For the price of retail, the gamer gets unlimited access in Neverwinter Nights online. Game companies find that free is better then small online fees. More people pay through the network this way. With the small exception of the online rpg only for consoles, Phantasy Star Online. PSO wasn’t always that way, on Dreamcast all you had to do is have an isp and you where playing online, no attachment fees. Although I do own PSO v1 for Dreamcast, I never played it online. I should of though. The sort lived SegaNet is only a memory … One thing that Bioware did, and you don’t here as much, is the partnership with Loki Entertainment to release a special Linux version of Neverwinter Nights. It was a massive undertaking and probably a milestone for Linux users to have a fully 3D role playing game on their open source operating system. Loki charges 30 dollars for the Linux copy. The Linux version does not have Direct3D support, only OpenGL. | |