Black Isle Studios Board Update

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(Originally posted by Darien)

Here's a quick read from the official message boards. They've added a forum for Neverwinter Nights, so be sure to check here for those comments in the future.

Neverwinter Nights

Rob Bartel, Co-Lead Designer:

Release Date Spring 2002?: Hi! Yes, we do post to this board (just started today, actually).

Just to clarify this whole March 2002 release date issue, we're... uh... not really sure where they pulled that date from. As always, we don't have an official release date at this time but our current target is still the one we announced at E3 - Winter 2001. Development is still progressing according to our latest schedules and Winter still seems perfectly feasible.

Marc Taro Holmes, Art Director:

Tieflings: Spirited discusson about these bastard child Tieflings...I can't tell you there are going to be in, but we ARE working on a neat-o technique to add tail animations to the player characters.....don't yet know how well it's going to work...we shall see...

Clothing and Architecture: The style of items in NWN is kind of unique to the game. We have blended a lot of different sources, and made art that works with the polygonal nature of the engine...I think it works quite well as a fantasy world in it's own right, rather than sticking to any one historical area. There are a lot of flavors to the Forgotten Realms.

Prestige Classes: Our guys in design are very alert to play balance problems...they're total power gamers so they find stuff pretty fast...plus we're planning to handle rules glitches in NWN with careful monitoring and patching after ship....(that does NOT mean we will skimp on QA !)...so I guess if we ever get around to prestige classes we'll make sure to do it well. (Like everything we do... )

JESawyer, Black Isle Moderator:

Druids: 3E druids don't have the goofy heirophant levels or trials by combat for mid-teen levels. They gain wildshape starting at 5th level. As they advance, they can change into more powerful creatures (Large, Tiny, and Huge animals at 8th, 11th, and 15th level, Dire animals at 12th level, and elementals at 16th level), and more often. They also gain venom immunity, trackless step, timeless body and all of that other jive. One of the only new things they have is a thousand faces, the ability to alter their appearance at will at high levels.

Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal

David Gaider, Senior Designer:

The End of the Infinity Engine: Well, it's a decision made largely by our CEO's, Ray and Greg, but to a degree by everyone who makes the games here.

I don't disagree that more games could be made with the Infinity Engine, but let's put it this way: the engine was made to accommodate Baldur's Gate, the first game, and really wasn't made to be expandable. By the time BG1 was finished, there were quite a few things noticed that we didn't do right...a lot of areas where it would have been better had we known it would be a problem right from the get go and a lot of other things we wished we had implemented differently. At the point when an engine is done it's simply impossible to go back and make fundamental changes.

But OK, it's good enough at that point...lesson learned. But THEN we go and make a sequel...we stretch the engine in ways it was never meant to be stretched. Stuff that would have been pretty simple to do if it was included from the get-go becomes difficult simply because we have to do it the hard way, now.

By the time Throne of Bhaal comes around, we've stretched it even more. And it shows.

The technology is advancing and it's available...and we as developers would like just as anyone else would to move on, to start a new project that not only takes advantage of our experience but also updates in technology.

And, to a lesser degree, there's also a pressure to change because the majority of the customer base wants us to take advantage of their rapidly-upgrading systems. Or maybe it's just the media...hard to say. Regardless, it's a bit self-defeating to publish a game when every reviewer will automatically deduct points simply because the engine is a few years old regardless of whether it works or not.

As for whether or not the Infinity Engine would ever be made public, it's hard to say. BioWare built it and it's BioWare’s choice...but I will say that I think the engine's in no condition to be publicly released. Sure, we could say "here it is but take it as it is, we don't want to deal with it if you have any problems"...but that's just unlikely to happen. I won't say that it won't happen...it's up to Ray and Greg, I guess...but it's just unlikely. If there's a demand for it, I guess it's the responsibility of those people who want it to make themselves heard.

Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter

Kevin Osburn, Line Producer:

International versions of ToTL: We anticipate on having the rest of the languages done within the next week or two. As soon as I have anymore information regarding this I will let you know right away.

Reported bugs in ToTL: Trials of the Luremaster was in QA for about four weeks. When we decided the game was finished, almost all of the bugs that were found by Harold (Lead QA Tester) and the guys were fixed. The bugs that you mention none of us have ever seen. I am not saying that they aren't happening, but we have been unsuccessful at reproducing them. The difficult thing about making a PC game is the fact that there are so many configurations for PC's out there it is impossible for any game to be perfect. Our goal is to get it as clean as possible before we release it to the public. This is why there is a QA, and we work very closely with them so we can get the game running great.

I am sorry you seem to be having so many problems. If you would like you can send a save game to icewind@blackisle.com, include a description of the bug that is in the save game and I will try it with your save game so I can see what exactly is going on.

Tom French, Programmer:

Reported bugs in ToTL: Huh. We in fact ran it through QA for a couple of weeks to work out bugs. I don't in fact think I had a single bug on my list when we shipped it (this is just my bug list I’m talking about) and i don't remember any "glitch full" pages of bugs being on the master bug list. If your sounds are acting screwy I'd recommend updating your drivers and/or re-installing the game clean. It seems to have fixed tons of peoples problems so far.

Do you have your AI updates turned up? I've seen this make the trolls go down without fire weapons. Just a suggestion.

ToTL on CD: Eventually we hope to release an IWD pack with all the games in it, but that's just our teams hopes. Maybe someday.

It will probably happen sooner or later. Hopefully not too long. I'd also like to see it all released on one DVD too. Darren and I joked about putting all the resources together before we move onto other projects so that we can clean off our hard drives and not have to set everything back up someday and try to remember how it all worked.

Keep your fingers crossed.

JE Sawyer, Designer:

Working on ToTL: I deserve almost no credit for Trials of the Luremaster. The only things I helped out with were a few dialogues (The Luremaster, Hobart, Crieck of Bane, Harald), some story ideas, and two items (Wind of Heaven and Dead God's Dreaming). Steve Bokkes and John Deiley did the vast majority of the design work for the expansion.