Neverwinter Nights

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Neverwinter Nights
Neverwinter Nights Series Logo.png
Genre(s) Role-playing video game
Developer(s) BioWare, Obsidian Entertainment
Publisher(s) Atari (formerly Infogrames)
Platform(s) Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iOS, Android, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
First release Neverwinter Nights (Microsoft Windows)
June 18, 2002
Latest release Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition (Nintendo Switch, Playstation 4, Xbox One)
December 3, 2019

Neverwinter Nights is a series of video games developed by BioWare and Obsidian Entertainment, based on the Forgotten Realms campaign setting of the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. Aside from also being set around the city Neverwinter, it is unrelated to both the 1991 Neverwinter Nights online game and the 2013 online game called Neverwinter .

Contents

Overview

The Neverwinter Nights series take place primarily in the city of Neverwinter, located in the Sword Coast region of the fictional land of Faerûn. [1] Also commonly referred to as the City of Skilled Hands, [2] Neverwinter grew from a multi-racial settlement named Eigersstor founded several hundred years prior to the start of Neverwinter Nights . [3] At the time the first game takes place, the city of Neverwinter was beset by a magical plague named the Wailing Death, [4] whereas in the second game the city is threatened by an invasion from its ancient enemy named the King of Shadows. [5]

Gameplay

The Neverwinter Nights series is a franchise of role-playing games with a third-person isometric perspective. [6] The systems of the games are based on the rules of Dungeons & Dragons, a table-top role-playing game originally developed by TSR, Inc. [7] Both Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2 contain three game modes: a default campaign, a multiplayer mode, and custom contents. [7]

Campaign

Both Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2 include a default campaign, which focus on the development of the player character through a series of distinct acts. [8] In addition to the main story, the player also has the opportunity to undertake a variety of side quests, some of which form storylines that span the entire game. The player has the ability to make key choices in specific quests can affect combat encounters, key plot points, and the outcome of the overarching story. [9]

Before the player can begin the campaign, they must first create a new character through the game's character creation interface. The player may customize a new character from scratch, or select one of the pre-set characters provided by the games. If the player chooses to create a new character, they are then guided through a series of choices about their character, including race, class, appearance etc.. Some of the choices such as gender and appearance are purely cosmetic, whereas others such as race and class affect how the player character fights and what abilities they have access to. [10]

Custom content

In addition to the base campaign and the multiplayer mode, both Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2 also included sets of software development tools which allow the players to create custom campaigns which they can then share with other players. [11] Neverwinter Nights shipped with the Aurora Toolset , [11] while Neverwinter Nights 2 shipped with the Electron Toolset , which was completely rewritten by Bioware using the programming language C#. [12]

Reception

The first instalment in the series, Neverwinter Nights, was generally well received according to review aggregator Metacritic, which gave it a score of 91/100 based on 34 critic reviews and a score of 8.1/10 based on 608 user reviews. [13] Greg Kasavin of GameSpot praised the game's accessibility, calling it "one of those exceedingly rare games that has a lot to offer virtually everyone, even if they aren't already into RPGs". [14] Gamezone appreciated the game's graphic and sound design, and that "the musical score foreshadows game action (the music picks up in intensity when combat looms), and is well done". [15] Allgame reviewer Mark Hoogland commended the Aurora toolset shipped with Neverwinter Nights, calling the breadth of level, story, environment, and module creation options "impressive". Eurogamer reviewer Gestalt was less convinced, criticising the single-player campaign's emphasis on combat encounters over "actual roleplaying", but was optimistic that the game's mod support will give it longevity. [16]

Legacy

The Neverwinter Nights series has been adopted by a number of educators for use in the classroom. University of Alberta's Professor Mike Carbonara and colleagues made use of the Aurora Toolset to develop an "economics game" aimed at teaching the concepts of fixed price commerce, mark up, and supply and demand. [17] Squire & Jenkins at MIT Education Arcade created the multiplayer game Revolution, which allows players to roleplay characters with different dispositions and political views in 1770s colonial Williamsburg, with an aim to improve the student's understanding of the American Revolution. [18] In 2005, researchers Nora Paul and Kathleen A. Hansen designed a custom module for journalism students; players took on the role of a journalist investigating a train derailment in the fictional American town named Harperville, during which they must investigate and analyse multiple sources. [19]

Games

Neverwinter Nights Series
TitleReleasePlatformsAdditional Info
Neverwinter Nights 2002Windows, Mac, Linux
Neverwinter Nights: Shadows of Undrentide 2003Windows, Mac, Linux expansion pack
Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark 2003Windows, Mac, Linuxexpansion pack
Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker 2004Windowspremium module* (requires Hordes of the Underdark)
Neverwinter Nights: Pirates of the Sword Coast 2005Windows, Mac, Linuxpremium module*
Neverwinter Nights: Infinite Dungeons 2006Windows, Mac, Linuxpremium module*
Neverwinter Nights: Darkness over Daggerford 2006Windows, Mac, Linuxpremium module*
Neverwinter Nights: Wyvern Crown of Cormyr 2006Windows, Mac, Linuxpremium module*
Neverwinter Nights 2 2006Windows, Mac
Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer 2007Windowsexpansion pack
Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir 2008Windowsexpansion pack
Neverwinter Nights 2: Mysteries of Westgate 2009Windowsadventure pack**
Neverwinter Nights: Tyrants of the Moonsea [20] 2019Windows, Mac, Linuxpremium module*
Neverwinter Nights: Dark Dreams of Furiae [21] 2020Windows, Mac, Linuxpremium module*

Related Research Articles

Forgotten Realms is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. Commonly referred to by players and game designers alike as "The Realms", it was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a setting for his childhood stories. Several years later, Greenwood brought the setting to publication for the D&D game as a series of magazine articles, and the first Realms game products were released in 1987. Role-playing game products have been produced for the setting ever since, as have various licensed products including novels, role-playing video game adaptations, comic books, and the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">BioWare</span> Canadian video game developer

BioWare is a Canadian video game developer based in Edmonton, Alberta. It was founded in 1995 by newly graduated medical doctors Ray Muzyka, Greg Zeschuk and Augustine Yip, alongside Trent Oster, Brent Oster, and Marcel Zeschuk. Since 2007, the company has been owned by American publisher Electronic Arts.

<i>Neverwinter Nights</i> (2002 video game) Dungeons & Dragons video game

Neverwinter Nights is a third-person role-playing video game developed by BioWare. Interplay Entertainment was originally set to publish the game, but financial difficulties led to it being taken over by Infogrames, who released the game under their Atari range of titles. It is the first installment in the Neverwinter Nights series and was released for Microsoft Windows on June 18, 2002. BioWare later released a Linux client in June 2003, requiring a purchased copy of the game to play. MacSoft released a Mac OS X port in August 2003.

The Underdark is a fictional setting which has appeared in Dungeons & Dragons role-playing campaigns and Dungeons & Dragons-based fiction books, including the Legend of Drizzt series by R. A. Salvatore. It is described as a vast subterranean network of interconnected caverns and tunnels, stretching beneath entire continents and forming an underworld for surface settings. Polygon called it "one of D&D's most well-known realms".

NWScript is the scripting language developed by BioWare for the role-playing video game Neverwinter Nights. It is based on the C programming language and is implemented in the Aurora toolset. Neverscript, an open source 3rd party editor, has been created for the Mac OS X and Linux versions of Neverwinter Nights because the Aurora toolset has not been ported to those platforms.

Neverwinter is a fictional city-state in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. Neverwinter was founded by Lord Halueth Never. It sits on the northwestern coast of the subcontinent of Faerûn.

<i>Neverwinter Nights 2</i> 2006 video game

Neverwinter Nights 2 is a role-playing video game developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Atari Interactive. It is the second installment in the Neverwinter Nights series and is the sequel to BioWare's Neverwinter Nights, based on the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy tabletop role-playing game. Neverwinter Nights 2 utilizes an adaptation of the Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 edition rules. Players create player characters to represent themselves in the game, using the same character creation rules as found in the Dungeons & Dragons game. They may gain the assistance of additional party members, and they eventually acquire a keep that can be used as a base of operations. Neverwinter Nights 2 is set in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting—in and around the city of Neverwinter. The story is mostly unrelated to Neverwinter Nights and follows the journey of an orphaned adventurer investigating a group of mysterious artifacts known as "silver shards" and their connection to an ancient, evil spirit known as the King of Shadows.

<i>The Ghost Tower of Inverness</i>

The Ghost Tower of Inverness is an adventure module for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game, set in the game's World of Greyhawk campaign setting. The module's title refers to an ancient magical tower located in the southern Abbor-Alz Hills. The "C" in the module code represents the first letter in the word "competition," the name of C1 – C6 module series.

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<i>Neverwinter Nights</i> (1991 video game) 1991 role-playing video game

Neverwinter Nights was an early graphical multiplayer online role-playing game, which ran from 1991 to 1997 on AOL.

<i>Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark</i> 2003 video game

Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark is an expansion pack for the role-playing video game Neverwinter Nights produced by BioWare and published by Atari. The follow-up to the Shadows of Undrentide expansion, Hordes of the Underdark adds a campaign, prestige classes, and other features. The Windows version also includes new scripting options for the Aurora toolkit.

<i>Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker</i> Expansion pack for Neverwinter Nights

Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker is an expansion pack released for BioWare's Neverwinter Nights that includes three premium modules: Kingmaker, Shadowguard, and Witch's Wake. Released in November 2004, Kingmaker won the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences' "Computer Role-Playing Game of the Year" award in 2005.

<i>Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer</i> 2007 video game

Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer is a role-playing video game developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Atari Interactive. It is an expansion pack for Neverwinter Nights 2. It was released in 2007 for Microsoft Windows in North America, Europe, and Australia. Like the first game, Mask of the Betrayer is set in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting of the fantasy tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons and employs the 3.5 edition rules.

<i>Neverwinter Nights 2: Mysteries of Westgate</i> 2009 video game

Neverwinter Nights 2: Mysteries of Westgate is an expansion pack for the role-playing video game Neverwinter Nights 2. It was developed by Ossian Studios and published by Atari Interactive on April 29, 2009. The player creates a character and controls it, along with a group of three pre-designed companions, journeying through the game world. The gameplay is very similar to that of the base game. Mysteries of Westgate also includes new monsters, music, and other tools, which can be used by players to create their own Neverwinter Nights 2 levels.

<i>Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir</i> Expansion pack

Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir is an expansion pack for the role-playing video game Neverwinter Nights 2, developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Atari Interactive. It was released in late 2008 in North America, Europe, and Australia. Like previous entries in the Neverwinter Nights series, Storm of Zehir is based on the paper and pencil fantasy role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, and uses the game's 3.5 edition ruleset.

<i>Neverwinter Nights: Darkness over Daggerford</i> 2006 video game

Darkness over Daggerford is a premium module for BioWare's Neverwinter Nights role-playing video game. It was released for digital distribution on August 16, 2006. Considered a user-made mod, the game was created by Canadian company Ossian Studios, headed by former BioWare employee Alan Miranda. It was remastered and released as an official premium module on June 1, 2018.

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Neverwinter is a free-to-play massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by Cryptic Studios for Microsoft Windows in 2013, Xbox One in 2015, and PlayStation 4 in 2016. Based on the fictional Forgotten Realms city of Neverwinter from Dungeons & Dragons, Neverwinter is a standalone game and not part of the previous Neverwinter Nights series.

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References

  1. ↑ "TTRPG Products & Accessories | Roleplaying Games | Dungeons & Dragons".
  2. ↑ Matt Sernett, Erik Scott de Bie, Ari Marmell (2011). Neverwinter Campaign Setting (pp.2). Wizards of the Coast. ISBN   0-7869-5814-6.
  3. ↑ Jennell Jaquays (1988). The Savage Frontier (pp. 13). TSR, Inc. ISBN   0-88038-593-6.
  4. ↑ "TTRPG Products & Accessories | Roleplaying Games | Dungeons & Dragons".
  5. ↑ Onyett, Charles (November 3, 2006). "Neverwinter Nights 2 Review". IGN. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  6. ↑ "TTRPG Products & Accessories | Roleplaying Games | Dungeons & Dragons".
  7. 1 2 Kasavin, Greg (June 24, 2002). "Neverwinter Nights Review". GameSpot. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  8. ↑ Dubin, Jayson (May 4, 2012). "Neverwinter Nights 2 - PC - Review". GameZone. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  9. ↑ Chadwick, Gareth (March 12, 2020). "Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition Review". TheSixthAxis. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  10. ↑ Mueller, Greg (November 1, 2006). "Neverwinter Nights 2 Review". GameSpot. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  11. 1 2 "Aurora Toolset - Neverwinter Nights 1: EE - NWN.wiki".
  12. ↑ Robertson, Judy & Good, Judith (2004). Children's narrative development through computer game authoring. TechTrends 49(5), 57-64. doi : 10.1145/1017833.1017841
  13. ↑ "Neverwinter Nights". Metacritic. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  14. ↑ "Neverwinter Nights Review".
  15. ↑ Dubin, Jayson (May 4, 2012). "Neverwinter Nights - PC - Review". GameZone. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  16. ↑ Gestalt (July 31, 2002). "Neverwinter Nights". Eurogamer. Retrieved May 3, 2022.
  17. ↑ Carbonaro, Michael et al. (2006, January). Adapting a Commercial Role-Playing Game for Educational Computer Game Production. Conference: 2nd International North-American Conference on Intelligent Games and Simulation, Game-On NA 2006.
  18. ↑ Squire, K., & Jenkins, H. (2003). Harnessing the Power of Games in Education. Insight 2003 (3), pp.7-33.
  19. ↑ Paul, N., Hansen, K., & Taylor, M. (2005). Modding' Education: Engaging Today's Learners. International digital media and arts journal, 2(1), Spring.
  20. ↑ "Tyrants of the Moonsea - a new premium module for Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition". Beamdog. 2019-08-16. Retrieved 2023-03-03.
  21. ↑ "Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition - Dark Dreams of Furiae Module Announced". GameBanshee. 2020-03-24. Retrieved 2023-03-03.
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