NWN MMO?

[420]

Atari’s secret weapon – Neverwinter Nights

OK, first of all, a NWN MMO? As if MMO's aren't shutting down faster than they are being made. Atari's marketing department must be one inbred waterhead who thinks Pac Man is still a new and innovative concept.

Second, a NWN title developed by someone other than BioWare? We already know how that goes...

I recommending selling any of your Atari stocks while you still can.

-420

[Elessar Telrunya]

I would like to point out that this sentence is fucked up in my tired brain's eyes.

The company could currently be financing the game with the recent sale of its of a sales, marketing and retail distribution business to Namco Bandai.

And: I sincerely hope that if they do finish this game that it does well, because NWN deserves some success after the Obsidian-NWN2 debacle.

[Mo]

Hmmm odd.  Cryptic is currently working on Champions Online and Star Trek Online.  Add NWN Online and now you've got 3 MMORPGs being developed by a company with under 200 employees.  Hmmmm can they deliver?

[Meclar]

Yeah I don't plan on buying any RPGs for a while.  If it turns out that it's good I'd get an MMO NWN.  The next game I'm buying is Starcraft 2.

Cryptic is currently working on Champions Online and Star Trek Online.

What Star Trek is that going to based on?

[Mercy]

Star Trek universe. It's going to be just the universe I believe.

Bioware is pwning out a Star Wars MMO anyway.

NWN will never be touched by Bioware again because of the EA buyout. Which sucks because they are the only crew who will actually make NWN work imo. I don't think that I would play a NWN MMO. I dunno though, maybe it will be good. But I doubt it.

[Mo]

I'd play it, if it were a FR setting with tons of content and good graphics.

That being said, to get that out by 2011 (isn't that what the article said?) sounds impossible if you ask me.  WoW was in development for 5 years.

[Meclar]

Star Trek universe. It's going to be just the universe I believe.

Is it the look of SNG or the original or the current look or DSN or what.

[420]

NWN will never be touched by Bioware again because of the EA buyout.

Even worse, BioWare seems to not even acknowledge that they ever had anything to do with NWN: Dragon Age Web Site

From the makers of Mass Effect™, Star Wars®: Knights of the Old Republic™, and Baldur's Gate™ comes an epic tale of violence, lust, and betrayal.

Ouch!

Is it the look of SNG or the original or the current look or DSN or what.

Apparently it will take place in the future, after all the series/movies.

From the Star Trek Online Site

Immerse yourself in the future of the Trek universe as it moves into the 25th century: a time of shifting alliances and new discoveries.

-420

[Soul Sojourner]

That being said, to get that out by 2011 (isn't that what the article said?) sounds impossible if you ask me.  WoW was in development for 5 years.

That's because Blizzard actually finishes developing their games when they release them. Sure they come out with expansion packs and updates later, but those aren't to finish the game they never completed. Those are to add more to a game they did finish.

Nowadays companies are releasing unfinished games and then making you pay more to get the rest of the game they didn't have completed in the first place.

[cuchulann]

I can see this as not even living up to half of what NWN is. Some of the RP servers act as small MMO's already and they have a lot of content developed by the hosts. One of the best things about the game was the template for the community to create their own content, and make adjustments to existing features to suit their needs. A proper MMO won't allow that. To my knowledge there are not any MMO's which allow you to alter your clothing/ armor appearances in game to suit your vanity. GW has some nice functionality on the color pallete if you have the right dyes, but that is the most i have seen. My sister plays WoW and shes thankful that her guild tabbard can cover the horrid clashing color scheme of her armor components. Then of course there is the fun times one has in trying to make things work properly according to D&D rules. 420 could probably provide an extensive list of such instances which he had to correct for his server. Well if it flys I'll likely get it but I'm thinking if Atari thinks they can make a Hood to go against Blizzard's Bizmark then they should change their name to White Star.

[Mo]

To my knowledge there are not any MMO's which allow you to alter your clothing/ armor appearances in game to suit your vanity.

I think Second Life allows you to do such things.  Well this obviously comes down to $$.  Atari doesn't make a dime off all the community content.  One could argue that the strong community improves sales of the game and it's expansions.  I'd agree.  But still Atari must believe it's leaving lots of dollars on the table when it see just how many small "mini MMO mods" there are.  Some of them are truly excellent.

If there were ever a mmorpg that I might play it would be one of the NWN franchise.  However I don't know much about 4th Edition but from what little I've read about it, I wasn't overly impressed.

The PvE elements need to be excellent.  I assume they would start with the Sword Coast. Neverwinter, Waterdeep and Baldur's Gate with surrounding areas would be a nice start.  Expanding that out through to the Dragon Coast in a future expansion.  Undermountain, Underdark (at least one Drow city for appropriate characters to start), The Abyss and Nine Hells should be accessible areas to high and epic level characters (hmm devil PCs might be an interesting idea).  The FR setting makes it near impossible to run out of content to quickly deliver.

[Elessar Telrunya]

ugh, they aren't going to make it e4 are they? I didn't actually see anything about which edition it would follow, so I kind of assumed it would be 3.5 like the original NWN...I suppose since NWN2 used e4 it might.

[Mo]

ugh, they aren't going to make it e4 are they? I didn't actually see anything about which edition it would follow, so I kind of assumed it would be 3.5 like the original NWN...I suppose since NWN2 used e4 it might.

NWN2 used 3.5 Edition like NWN.  The SoZ storyline is a foreshadow to the 4th Edition events.

[420]

Yeah, I pretty sure that any D&D products approved by WotC at this point will be 4E. Unfortunately all the flavor was sucked out of D&D in 4E so I don't know how they are going to make a compelling storyline for a computer game with it.

-420

[Calia]

From what I can tell 4e already plays like a video game that is the way they made it so it will appeal to the massive group of gamers out there so system wise it would be easier for them to set it up in a virtual world so to speak so yeah the only problem will come from the story crew and if the expected release date is 2011 im not so sure it will live up to anything at all considering most mmo's that are still running WoW Final Fantasy so on spent alot of years in dev. ....though I supose if its based off forgotten realms as it most likely will be they wont even have to write stories in becasue they can just use old and new existing source data from Wotc pick up a camp. book and copy it over to video game info -shrugs- not sure a big selling point of nwn and nwn2 was the community and user data and creations they will really have to hammer out systems to allow customized armor outfits play style because other wise it endsu p being a WoW clone i mean the RP servers i played on in nwn one played like a MMO pretty much so not really sure what will be accomplished by running it like this and more than likly having a heafty subscription fee every month for players to fork out

-Cal

[Meclar]

I think to get away from a WoW clone there needs to be those customizations like armor, hair, voice etc details.  Also I think it would have to look really nice like some of these FPS console games and it wouldn't hurt to put some adult content (blood and guts) in some of these games.  But all of these things not only need a maturity rating but computers that can run the graphics.  That's why WoW appeals to so many is that it's relatively easy to setup and play.  Geesh even my sister plays it now.
It just seems like the RPGs have taken an evolutionary step back. Since I went to NWN from D1 now I feel like I'm playing D1/D2 again when each character of a  class looks so similar on GW and WoW.  People think that having a celestial sword or storm bow is character customization.  And what about the online community aspect?  With as many people that play online I would think that private servers like we had in NWN would personalize game play, strengthening the longevity and loyalty to the game.
Oh and there's is a lot to character tweeking in WoW.  Check out http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Arygos&n=Shuckstack the warrior I play sometimes.  There's title like in GW and reputation well it's all there 

[Mo]

With as many people that play online I would think that private servers like we had in NWN would personalize game play, strengthening the longevity and loyalty to the game.

Yes but MMORPGs are worth oh so much more $ if they work out.  I don't think Atari is after the WoW crowd.  As was already pointed out, more people do not play MMORPGs than do.  That is to say the market is not saturated yet.  I'd guess the reason why MMORPGs fail is that they aren't appealing to enough people.  I've already said that if there were a MMORPG that I'd consider playing it would be a NWN one.  The endless amount of lore to the FR setting could make for a very rich experience, the drawback I thought of the original DnD MMORPG was the setting the chose.  Did anyone play that one? Stormreach was it called?

**Edit** Rest of topic split to --> D&D Online: Ebrron Unlimited here