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Neverwinter Nights Preview
By Trish Bennon

Despite all of the potential inherent in the concept of "massively multiplayer games", few titles manage to capture all that this genre has to offer. Most are little more than standard CRPGs with thousands of player-characters running around instead of just one. But one title, due out in the second quarter of 2001, promises to raise the bar in MMOGs, and set the standard for games to come. Neverwinter Nights will be the first massively multiplayer title to make use of the Dungeons & Dragons ruleset, a system that is practically synonymous with roleplaying. In development from Bioware, the company behind the amazingly successful Baldur's Gate series, Neverwinter Nights will take place in the Forgotten Realms scenario, one of the more popular Dungeons & Dragons world.

The Dungeons & Dragons Legacy

Neverwinter Nights will utilize the 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons ruleset. Not only has the D&D system been used successfully in tabletop RPG games, but it has also been implemented in numerous critically and commercially successful computer games. For those unfamiliar with this particular gaming system, what sets D&D apart is the degree to which it allows character customization, its unique combat system that combines random effects with strategy and skill, and its rich worlds, many of which have been adapted to literature. Players can choose to play from among 7 unique races, ranging from elves to half-orcs, and 11 classes, ranging from paladins to druids. Furthermore, the D&D ruleset allows for further customization with the concept of alignment, in which players can determine how "good" or "evil" they are.

Although not much is known of the story at this point, the game will be set in and around the city of Neverwinter, which is in the world of Faerun, a land loosely based on medieval Europe, full of dragons and sorcerers and demons. Neverwinter is set along what is known as the Sword Coast, an area that is ravaged by wind and cold, and of which much is still termed wilderness. While north of the great city Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter still remains south of Icewind Dale. Within this scenario, there are many different locales you can visit, ranging from great and majestic cities to deadly dungeons to seemingly deserted grasslands and forests.

While at first glance, the sheer amount of options available in the Dungeons & Dragons system can seem overwhelming, it soon comes together and makes sense. At the heart of this system is the dice. What you roll on the dice determines your character's stats and skills. Then as you encounter various situations where you must use these skills (in combat or otherwise), another roll of the dice is compared to your skill values to determine the outcome. This system has proved to be so successful, that many computer based RPG titles have been based on it.

A Whole New (Online) World

Unlike Baldur's Gate I or II, Neverwinter Nights will be in 3D, though it will utilize a perspective that is similar to the previous titles. The difference will be, that you, as the player, will have complete control over the camera, able to rotate around your character, zoom in, or zoom out at will. But what really makes Neverwinter Nights unique is its multiplayer component.

You can choose to play Neverwinter Nights in singe-player mode, importing your character from previous Bioware titles. The game itself will come with a preset plot that you can play through. But where the true potential of Neverwinter Nights will emerge is in the multiplayer component. Classifying Neverwinter Nights is somewhat difficult. It is not a massively multiplayer game in the sense of thousands of players coexisting in one online world at the same time. Nor is it simply a computer RPG with the ability to adventure with a few online pals. The best comparison to what Neverwinter Nights has to offer is the classic tabletop roleplaying game.

Neverwinter Nights will be released with the Neverwinter Toolset, a powerful system that promises to blur the line between player and game designer. With these tools, players will possess the ability to create their own games, building their own worlds using the existing tile set, placing the monsters they like, and scripting the various encounters the players will come across. Furthermore, players will be able to open these worlds to others, hosting as many as 64 players at one time (an estimated amount based on cable modem technology). Furthermore, players will have the ability to link these worlds, potentially creating universes as large and varied as anything Ultima Online or EverQuest has to offer.

I've Got the Whole World In My Hands

The bestselling The Sims provided players the opportunity to design and decorate their own houses and lead people through their mundane lives. Neverwinter Nights takes that a step further by letting players design and decorate their own worlds, and lead other players through their lives, in essence making them the Dungeon Master (for those of you familiar with MMOGs, this is equivalent to a seer and a GM wrapped up in one package).

As the god of your particular world, you can customize it to suit your own playing style. While Ultima Online and the rest debate about how to control player killing, you can choose to limit it as much or as little as you like in your gaming world. You can also choose who is able to enter your world. Maybe the realm you create is only for noble elves. Maybe it exists solely for evil ones to hunt each other down. The choice is entirely yours. You can even choose to allow or disallow character-hacking in your worlds. And as you meet likeminded players, you can decide whether to link to their worlds or not, via the use of portals. Shouldf you have no desire to create your own worlds, but would rather explore in worlds that others have created, Bioware and numerous fansites will be providing guides to the various worlds out there.

After witnessing these world-building tools in action at a recent conference, I was amazed by the ease and flexibility with which one can create a dynamic and visually stunning environment. One does not have to possess artistic skills or be a programming guru to build a world. All the tilesets are available via a simple pulldown menu. After placing everything where you wish it to go, you can opt to render the world, and the game itself will fill in all of the visual detail based on your own specifications. This really allows you to be as wild as your imagination will let you, and for all of those who have dreamed of designing their own games, this will be a godsend. In fact, I predict that the simple building (and trading!) of gaming worlds will be one of the more popular aspects of Neverwinter Nights.

Because Bioware themselves will not be hosting the servers, Neverwinter Nights will command no monthly fee. The only money you will invest is for the game itself. Furthermore, Bioware will be providing a character bank in which players can store their characters when offline for security. This character bank checks your characters skills on check-out and check-in to verify if the amount of skill gain was "possible". In this way, it guards characters against hacking. And for certain worlds that exclude hacked characters, participation in this character bank is mandatory. In short, it's a great system to ensure that no hacked players come to your world to tear things up.

Game Features

In addition to offering a rich and varied world that you can help define, Neverwinter Nights offers many different gaming possibilities. As a mage, you can opt to have a familiar, whom you can even take control of from time to time for scouting and spying. You can choose the entire look of your character, be it thin or fat or otherwise. You can even dress up to fool others (ie. be a mage in full knight garb to throw off suspicion). With a variety of colors (and types) of armor and clothing to select from, you can customize your character's look as much (or as little) as you choose.

Character death is another feature that is handled in a sensible manner. When you "die" you are in fact knocked unconscious. At this point you can opt to respawn with a small loss in experience points, or wait for someone in your party to heal you. However, should a monster (or player) continue to attack you once unconscious, you would be "dead". At this point you must choose to once again respawn with an experience point penalty, or wait for someone in your party to resurrect you.

The look of the game itself is simply stunning. Again, at the demonstration I saw, the camera started from top down and swiveled around to a close up on the character's face as they reacted to a monster. One of the more visually compelling pieces of the game is its use of light and shadow. Light dances around effectively, causing your grow and stretch depending on the angle and intensity. This feature, of course, can also be turned off for slower machines. Initial screenshots give the impression that the user interface is "transparent", meaning that your screen will not get cluttered with your dialogue windows and such...you will still be able to see the full action around you.

Is it Summer Yet? Is it Summer Yet?

Estimated to be released this summer, Neverwinter Nights promises to be one of the more addictive games out there. Rather than relying on employed GMs and seers to create stories and keep the player involved, Bioware has opted to give full control over to the players, allowing them to create and control their own worlds. Even to create and control their own single-player adventure for them to participate in alone. This enormous flexibility, along with no monthly fee, will undoubtedly shatter genre conventions, placing the game in a niche of its own.

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