Neverwinter Nights Forum News

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(Originally posted by Veldrin)

Here are today's Neverwinter Nights forum highlights. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

David Gaider, Designer

SoU Name: I think the "shadows" of the title is meant to imply that Undrentide is very dark and spooky... as opposed to referring to the Shadovar specifically. I guess it could also mean the shadow that the city casts when it is flying. Which, if you're in it, might be a rather frightening experience considering the Netherese predisposition towards crashing to the earth. Mind you... then I suppose it would be called "Shadow of Undrentide", wouldn't it? That's my guess, anyway. Could also be that "shadows" is on the publisher list of "words that make dem good titles".

New Features: I appreciate the idea of adding these things... but "more", while being nice, must come at the price of less of something else. The interesting thing I notice is that when some things are brought up before the community and they are asked if they want them, the answer (rather universally) is Yes!

"Oh, yes! Having these would be wonderful and would add so much to role-playing!" (It seems everything does.)

Quickly followed by "How could they have not implemented this feature already? Don't they understand how important it is?"

What is generally not asked, however, is what the community would like to give up in order to have this feature created. Zots are not infinite, after all... zots represent a set number of man-hours that are available and that must be assigned. Normally we try to go for the stuff that has the "biggest bang" for our zots... meaning the stuff that will make the greatest difference in play to the largest number of people for the least amount of creation time.

(write that down... that's point #1 in Zot Distribution Theory.)

And remember we're talking about expanding a game, not it's initial creation. When a game is first made, there are so many zots to go around that there is time for "little extras"... stuff that ultimately doesn't affect the game's commerciality but would be really cool to have in anyway. Once a game is made, however, the zots available for expanding it are limited... and, more importantly, not free. The makers must think more about what the game currently is rather than what it would be nice to be. So what does all this have to do with dresses and shoes and cats? Well, think of it in terms of what you'd be willing to lose, art-wise (since this would be entirely in Art's bailiwick), in order to have these things... and (more importantly) how many people you think would agree with you. Would, for instance, it be acceptable to add a small collection of these clothing items in exchange for, say, a Beholder model? Would advertising a selection of new faces and clothing options (a small selection... this is just one creature model, after all) make the expansion more sellable than including a Beholder? Maybe it would. Let's hear it. I'm not going to dismiss any opinion out of hand. If you want to be taken seriously, however, then your proposal must take into account the potential costs... that's how we need to look at it, after all, now that the game is complete. Don't get me wrong, though... I'm not saying don't express what you want. Most people don't want to concern themselves with zots or what-not... you want what you want and it doesn't matter to you what other people want (makes sense), and that's cool. Maybe next time we are working on a game like this, having more character creation options will be a higher priority (it will if enough people say it is important) and doing something like that will be more implementable at that point. Enough out of me.