Neverwinter Nights Fact Sheet
Description:
Neverwinter Nights is a revolutionary new computer role-playing game (RPG) developed by BioWare, developers of the immensely popular Baldur's Gate series, and published by Infogrames, publisher of the Unreal Series, Driver, Civilization III, and many other huge titles. Using the fully-3D BioWare Aurora Engine and the 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) ruleset, Neverwinter Nights contains an enjoyable full-length campaign of about 100 hours playable in both single and multiplayer mode. More than just a game, Neverwinter Nights is designed as an entire role-playing system, allowing its players to tell their own stories in the spirit of the exciting pen and paper experience.
The five fundamental components of Neverwinter Nights are:
- The Official Campaign: Players create a character in accordance with 3rd Edition D&D rules, then adventure through an epic story, battling fearsome creatures, improving their character, and immersing themselves in the popular fantasy milieu of the Forgotten Realms. Players can expect over 60 hours of story-based gameplay from the official campaign. Neverwinter Nights is fully playable in both single player and multiplayer: Play through the game by yourself or, if you have an Internet or LAN connection, share the adventure with friends from around the world using our dedicated in-game matching service. Players can move their characters seamlessly between the two modes with no need to convert files back and forth or maintain separate versions of their characters.
- Other Modules: Neverwinter Nights will also have an assortment of modules, both at ship and at post-release, in the game and on the community site. These other modules will offer a high replay value outside that provided by the official campaign, and may also be built by BioWare, and other partners subsequent to the initial release of Neverwinter Nights.
- The Dungeon Master (DM) Client: Pen and paper role-playing games draw their appeal from having someone who controls the flow of the story, making sure that the players are having a fun time. In D&D, this person is called the Dungeon Master (DM). With its fully integrated DM Client software, Neverwinter Nights revolutionizes the computer role-playing genre by putting that power back in the hands of our users, where it belongs. As the game progresses, Dungeon Masters will have the power to control the difficulty of the game in real time; place and remove creatures, items, and other objects within the gameworld; possess non-player characters and monsters to speak through them and control their actions; and use various other tools to enhance the mood and heighten the gameplay experience of their players. Neverwinter Nights does not require a Dungeon Master to play the game, however in multiplayer mode a Dungeon Master will certainly enhance the enjoyment of the game of all playing.
- The Neverwinter Aurora Toolset: The true power of any role-playing system lies in its ability to unleash the imagination. The Neverwinter Aurora Toolset does just that. It is a powerful but user-friendly RPG creation toolset – the same one BioWare is using to create their Official Campaign. A series of &dquot;wizards&dquot; and automated assistants will speed up the workflow of advanced users while at the same time providing novice users with the necessary help and guidance to bring their dreams to life. The average user will be able to construct an enjoyable dungeon crawl in under an hour. Advanced users will be able to add narrative depth using our extremely flexible conversation editor and NWScript, our powerful C-styled scripting language.
- The Portal System: Massively multiplayer games are becoming increasingly popular and prevalent within the industry. While the Official Neverwinter Nights Campaign will not include a massively multiplayer component, the toolset will give players the power to create their very own persistent worlds. This is made possible by our innovative Portal System. Through the placement of Portals within your gameworld, you will be able to connect your Neverwinter module to modules running on the machines of friends, guildmates, and fellow players. This modular structure allows for a persistent gameworld of theoretically infinite dimensions and with an equally infinite player capacity.
Story Summary:
Players begin the official campaign in the northern city of Neverwinter on the eve of a deadly and all-consuming plague. The sickness spreads quickly from its origin in the beggars' quarter, and soon all of Neverwinter is under quarantine and falling victim to what will become known as the Wailing Death. A plea for help is sent to the allied city of Waterdeep and the powerful wizard, Khelben "Blackstaff" Arunsun, arranges for a collection of rare and magical creatures to be delivered to Neverwinter where they might serve as reagents to a cure. The heavily guarded caravan enters the troubled city with great secrecy, but to no avail. Somehow betrayed, the caravan is beset by unknown assailants who succeed in releasing the Waterdhavian creatures into that Neverwinter night.
At the behest of Lord Nasher and the young Tyrist paladin, Aribeth de Tylmarande, the adventurers of the city set out to recapture the dangerous creatures of Waterdeep, cure the Wailing Death, and unravel the conspiracy of Neverwinter's mysterious betrayers. With the lifting of the quarantine, the players follow the web of betrayals north, in search of answers and the words of a lost prophecy.
Features:
- Brand equity: Developed by BioWare – BioWare is recognized as a producer of high-quality computer role-playing titles. Dungeons & Dragons created the role-playing genre back in 1973 and continues to hold the greatest share and name recognition within the pen-and-paper role-playing market to date. BioWare is acknowledged as an industry leader in working within the Dungeons and Dragons universe based on its work on the Baldur's Gate series.
- Classic Dungeons & Dragons role-playing using the 3rd Edition ruleset.
- Takes place in the Forgotten Realms, D&D's most popular campaign setting.
- Highly customizable characters. All 7 races and 11 classes outlined in the 3rd Edition Player's Handbook. A wide selection of unique spells, skills, and feats. A flexible armor and clothing creation system allows for literally billions of unique looks for your character.
- Powered by the fully 3D BioWare Aurora Engine, offering dynamic shadows, advanced particle and animation systems, and dynamic weather effects among its many other features.
- Integrated matching service via Gamespy for free multiplayer gaming. No monthly fees for the matching service or playing time.
- Includes a 60+ hour campaign that weaves an epic tale of faith, war, and betrayal along the windswept Sea of Swords. The campaign can be played in both single-player and multiplayer modes.
- In multiplayer mode you can play with a live Dungeon Master to guide you through the story, tailoring it to your needs and desires as no computer ever could.
- When our story's over, yours has just begun: extend the life of your game by playing all-new adventures created by the talented members of the fan community. This process will be facilitated via the BioWare Live Community Team that will be both developing new content for the game, and working with the community to help them build adventures for the game.
- The powerful and user-friendly Neverwinter Aurora Toolset allows players to create entirely new adventures, campaigns, and worlds of their own devising. The toolset is a major feature of the title and will receive full post-product support.
- Capable of supporting as many as 64 players per server. Link multiple servers together using our innovative Portal System to create a web of distributed servers - effectively a massively multiplayer world.
Developer: BioWare Corp.
BioWare Corp. is an electronic entertainment company that produces interactive computer games, console games and entertainment. Past projects include Shattered Steel, the genre defining role-playing game series Baldur's Gate, its expansion pack Tales of the Sword Coast, Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, the conclusion to the Baldur's Gate series Throne of Bhaal, and the critically acclaimed third person shooter, MDK2. Other titles under development by BioWare include Neverwinter Nights (to be published by Infogrames), an online computer role-playing game, and Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic, a role-playing game set in the Star Wars universe (with Lucas Arts as publisher for the SW RPG). BioWare was established in 1995, is headquartered in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and hosts more than one hundred and twenty employees. For more information, visit the BioWare website at http://www.bioware.com.
Publisher: Infogrames
New York-based Infogrames, Inc. (Nasdaq: IFGM) is one of the largest third-party publishers of interactive entertainment software in the U.S. The Company develops video games for all consoles (Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft), PCs, and Macintosh systems. Infogrames' catalogue of more than 1,000 titles includes award-winning franchises such as Civilization™, Backyard Sports™, Deer Hunter®, Driver™, RollerCoaster Tycoon®, Test Drive®, and Unreal®, and key licenses including Survivor™, Warner Bros. Looney Tunes™, Nickelodeon's Blue's Clues™, Dragon Ball Z®, Mission Impossible®, Harley-Davidson®, Major League Baseball®, and the National Football League®, among many others. The Company's Humongous Entertainment and MacSoft labels are leaders in children's and Macintosh entertainment software, respectively.
Infogrames, Inc. is a majority-owned subsidiary of France-based Infogrames Entertainment SA (IESA) (Euronext 5257), a global publisher and distributor of video games for all platforms, as well as interactive digital television, and mobile smart devices (WAP, HDML). In 2001, IESA acquired Infogrames Interactive, Inc. (formerly Hasbro Interactive), including its line of software based on well-known licenses such as MONOPOLY, Jeopardy®, TONKA, and Atari®, which are published and distributed in the U.S. by Infogrames, Inc. For more information, visit the Company's Web site at http://www.infogrames.com.
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