Neverwinter Nights Online. (Cryptic Studios)

[UnSub]

Dropping the 'massively' part does make sense (to some extent) for heavily instanced titles as Cryptic's tend to be.

Also, it seems from this early press that Cryptic is aiming to make Neverwinter reflective of the NWN toolset experience rather than a full MMO.  

Release for Q4 2011.

EDIT: Interesting that RA Salvatore's work is going to fuel both this and 38 Studio's title.

[Pyran]

For his next trick, Jack Emmert shall invent the wheel !   

[Malakili]

Dropping the 'massively' part does make sense (to some extent) for heavily instanced titles as Cryptic's tend to be.

Also, it seems from this early press that Cryptic is aiming to make Neverwinter reflective of the NWN toolset experience rather than a full MMO.  

Release for Q4 2011.

EDIT: Interesting that RA Salvatore's work is going to fuel both this and 38 Studio's title.

I actually agree that its better that they make in a multiplayer rather than "massively" multiplayer game.  What I don't understand is why they are trying to market this as something new or ground breaking.  A new genre called Online Multiplayer Game, COME ON.  I really hope he was being ironic or something.

[Shinjin]

In the tabletop game, an action point lets a player perform a reroll or add an additional die to a roll.

His ignorance is disheartening.

Cryptic?  Really, WotC?  *sigh*  RIP, NWN.

[Malakili]

In the tabletop game, an action point lets a player perform a reroll or add an additional die to a roll.

His ignorance is disheartening.

Cryptic?  Really, WotC?  *sigh*  RIP, NWN.

Well, that is what action points did in some of the d20 system games.  In 4th they let you take an addition action, but its not a totally wrongheaded statement.

[Ghambit]

Oh Gods.  Let me stay out of this discussion now.

[shiznitz]

Well they do seem to be doing something "new"ish: CoH/CoV character customoization in a fantasy game. This is long overdue.

A Legend Arises
Unprecedented character customization as only Cryptic can deliver. Imagine a hero, make a hero, become a hero.

From: http://www.playneverwinter.com/about

[Ard]

This does bring up the question of what happened to the Turbine and Hasbro lawsuits that I was pretty sure would have caused this to be torpedoed.  Anyone been keeping up?

[HaemishM]

Cryptic and DND. Two phrases that make me completely uninterested in whatever is talked about after that.

[shiznitz]

Cryptic and DND. Two phrases that make me completely uninterested in whatever is talked about after that.

I am more optimistic. The 4E rules - which I like - has things that Cryptic has proven do do reasonably well: push, knockdowns, teleporting, etc.  These things haven't been in prior versions of DnD.  CoH felt like as real 3D world for the most part.  I think instancing is the best way to handle DnD as well.

[Stabs]

This does bring up the question of what happened to the Turbine and Hasbro lawsuits that I was pretty sure would have caused this to be torpedoed.  Anyone been keeping up?

Best source of data that I've discovered on this is the DDO forums. Read this thread from page 11 onwards:
http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=208807&page=11

In short Turbine v Atari was settled out of court shortly before Turbine's incorporation into Time Warner. Hasbro v Atari seems to be ongoing.

Hasbro can no longer trust its brand in the hands of Atari, and brings this action to confirm its right to terminate Atari's license to Dungeons & Dragons.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2009/12/has-atari-gone-chaotic-evil-over-dd-dd-franchise.ars

In any event Atari's licence to operate a D&D MMO runs out in July 2017. It seems unlikely at this point in time that Wizards of the Coast (a subsidiary of Hasbro) will be enthusiastic about renewing it so that might mean that this new Neverwinter MMO closes in 2017 regardless of how popular it is.

[koro]

Seven years is an eternity in the gaming industry. So many things can change before that license runs out.

Speaking of, why on earth would Hasbro let Atari have the license for that long of a time?

[Tearofsoul]

Thank god, it is NOT an MMO ... 

[Stabs]

Heh, well I haven't read the licence so I can't relate exactly what rights Atari has in relation to online provision of Dungeons and Dragons games. It would seem though that they have the rights to release this Neverwinter game even if it is not technically a MMO.

It would be hilarious schadenfreude if, in the desire to reach new heights of rhetoric, Emmert has put them in the position where they don't have the right to release it because they only own a MMO licence.

[ezrast]

The 4E rules - which I like - has things that Cryptic has proven do do reasonably well: push, knockdowns, teleporting, etc.  These things haven't been in prior versions of DnD.  CoH felt like as real 3D world for the most part.

I don't disagree with you, but it's a pet peeve of mine when people treat CoX as part of Cryptic's current repertory. Cryptic as we now know it has entirely changed from the Cryptic that made CoX; it has none of the same employees except for Emmert and maybe one other guy. You might as well say their next game will probably involve lots of clicking because Diablo 2 did.

That said, the online model that Emmert is floundering at describing sounds like it falls somewhere between Guild Wars, Neverwinter Nights custom multiplayer, and Diablo 2 closed servers. It would amuse me if the game ends up being a worse-designed Guild Wars with a worse-designed CoX-like mission creation system, establishing a "let's make a poor version of whatever was popular with NCSoft a few years ago" trend at Cryptic.

[Ingmar]

Argh why Cryptic arghghghghgh

[waffel]

We already have WOW, LOL, and now OMG.... when is someone going to create a WTF and a ROFL video game?

[Xilren's Twin]

We already have WOW, LOL, and now OMG.... when is someone going to create a WTF and a ROFL video game?

I get a chuckle every time i see Duke Nukem Forever listed as DNF, as in "Did Not Finish"...

Oh yeah, in terms of this game, devils in the details and all that.  Focused on small group adventures with no massive overworld and a content creation toolkit?  Sounds good.
Cryptic doing it? Eh, we shall see.

[Pezzle]

I still play on a NWN persistent server.  Just give me an updated NWN!!!  Argh

[UnSub]

I don't disagree with you, but it's a pet peeve of mine when people treat CoX as part of Cryptic's current repertory. Cryptic as we now know it has entirely changed from the Cryptic that made CoX; it has none of the same employees except for Emmert and maybe one other guy.

Sorry, but wrong.

A number of Cryptic people cut their teeth on CoH/V and kept on to ChampO and STO. Geko, Poz, Tumerboy, Zinc (recently left) and others (Arkayne, Balseraph, I think, plus those never given catchy forum nics) have worked across different Cryptic outputs. Cryptic have certainly expanded during that time and there have been changes - for instance, I only found out recently that when Atari bought Cryptic, then President Michael Lewis sold out and the head of Cryptic is CEO John Needham (ex-SOE). True that the CoH/V live team plus one (pohsyb) elected to stay on CoH/V, but they were around 25% of Cryptic's staff at the time of sale iirc.

There's a meme out there that Cryptic was just Emmert when NCsoft bought CoH/V and they parted ways, but it's wrong. Now, Emmert may be the face that people assign the cult of personality to, but he's not the only employee either then or now.

EDIT: The title thread needs to be changed to "It's not a rumour!".

[ezrast]

Gah, my bad then. Thanks for correcting me.

[Lucas]

Yeah, it's not a rumor!!! It's...

[koro]

And this is virtually guaranteed to be using that asstastic Champions engine as well. Great.

My girlfriend got burned on Champions and I got burned on STO. Sorry Cryptic, no matter how polished your turds get six months to a year after release, I'm not falling for it again.

[palmer_eldritch]

Forge (tentative name) will enable players to write adventures, to create maps, and to attach their quests to in-game entrances and NPCs. Our key philosophy is that Forge needs to be accessible (i.e. usable to many people) and that user-generated content is an optional form of content. In other words, a player knows that he's playing UGC and not the game.

Source

It sounds as if players will be able to add dungeons and quests to the official game world rather than creating their own separate worlds as stand-alone servers or downloadable modules, as they could with the previous Neverwinter Nights games.

[DayDream]

Any bets on their plans for the just how much they'll rely on user made dungeons at release?

[Tannhauser]

Yeah, instead of adding enough content (like STO) they will have contests for the 'user made dungeon of the month'.  Then they'll patch it into the game.  Don't have to pay silly devs and the fanbase finishes your game for you!

Once again we fall victim to classic Cryptic marketing voodoo. Bazinga!

[UnSub]

Given the MA / user-generated content experience of CoH/V, having this implemented at launch may help get around some of the problems seen in CoH/V.

But for this to really work, Cryptic is going to have to deliver map-building tech - something they had problems with when superbases were implemented. Parts of the system were very robust (someone built a base with over 16 000 items in it before instability issues set in) but others weren't (like pathing through the base). And those were just static items or turrets.

No issues with Cryptic's ability to deliver a good character / monster creater, but other elements are certainly open to question. But a title where you can build your own maps and missions could have legs. Too soon to tell though.

[Threash]

Ok, so no massively just multiplayer.  You can create your own maps and missions.  Isn't this exactly the same as previous NWN games but without the shitty single player story?

[palmer_eldritch]

Ok, so no massively just multiplayer.  You can create your own maps and missions.  Isn't this exactly the same as previous NWN games but without the shitty single player story?

Previous NWN games allowed people to set up their own servers with their own settings, rules and character databases. From the information that Cryptic have released so far, it doesn't look as if the new game will allow anything like that.

[Mrbloodworth]

That would suck, I haven't used it myself, but I hear the suite of tools that came with the NWN series was a huge selling point for the series and its life span.

[HaemishM]

It was a huge selling point, the tools just happened to be buggy as fuck for the first year after release and not nearly as accessible as promised.

[koro]

It should also be noted that this game is slated for Q4 of next year, 2011. I don't know how long Cryptic's been working on this, but I'm willing to guess "not very long."

I wonder if, a month from launch, the user-generated content system will be pushed back to a "six week patch."

[Xilren's Twin]

NWN1 is still around; if the toolset had been designed from the ground up to better support content creators (i.e. persistant world support, importing new models, better DM interface, erx) it would have been awesome, but even with what it delievered the gamer gestalt delivered a ton of fun and usable content.

BTW, did anyone else notice they are only going to have 5 classes and a few limited races?

Way to proactively set the stage for future expansion pack material guys! 

[Muzadi]

The 4E rules - which I like - has things that Cryptic has proven do do reasonably well: push, knockdowns, teleporting, etc.  These things haven't been in prior versions of DnD.  CoH felt like as real 3D world for the most part.

I don't disagree with you, but it's a pet peeve of mine when people treat CoX as part of Cryptic's current repertory. Cryptic as we now know it has entirely changed from the Cryptic that made CoX; it has none of the same employees except for Emmert and maybe one other guy. You might as well say their next game will probably involve lots of clicking because Diablo 2 did.

That said, the online model that Emmert is floundering at describing sounds like it falls somewhere between Guild Wars, Neverwinter Nights custom multiplayer, and Diablo 2 closed servers. It would amuse me if the game ends up being a worse-designed Guild Wars with a worse-designed CoX-like mission creation system, establishing a "let's make a poor version of whatever was popular with NCSoft a few years ago" trend at Cryptic.

About a third of the design staff currently at Cryptic has been here since CoH/CoV shipped.  The ratio is somewhat higher on the Neverwinter project.

[koro]

BTW, did anyone else notice they are only going to have 5 classes and a few limited races?

Way to proactively set the stage for future expansion pack material guys! 

Expansion pack my foot. It's virtually guaranteed you'll see extra races and classes on the C-Store under a month after release.