No DM client shipping with NWN2

[pstanton]

They said they've focused on story MUCH more on NWN2 as compared to NWN1. ~Kharkiv

errrgh, while single player in NWN was ok, it wasn't really that amazing....

I hope they got a slightly more engaging plot....

And really, NWN has really struck me as being a game made for multiplayer and PWs, I've never really taken single player seriously.

[Krator]

And really, NWN has really struck me as being a game made for multiplayer and PWs, I've never really taken single player seriously.

Some Single Player modules out there own Avlis and any other form of NWN multiplayer. Shadowlord/Dreamcatcher/Demon series, Blackguard series, etc.

[bolo]

And really, NWN has really struck me as being a game made for multiplayer and PWs, I've never really taken single player seriously.

Some Single Player modules out there own Avlis and any other form of NWN multiplayer. Shadowlord/Dreamcatcher/Demon series, Blackguard series, etc.

+1 big time!

While the OC that Bioware came up were fairly lame, the mods listed above as well as a good number of others ( too many really to name )
are just kick ass! If youve never at least tried out Shadowlord, or the Blackguard series ( one fo the few series of mods made for evil characters), you're missing out on the best available for NWN.
And some of thoise are made even better if you play through them with friends (shadowlord has some bonus areas in at least one dungeon that';s made with multiplay in mind.
Think rangers in NWN blow? Kale's Rangers is a great mod that may change your mind.
Like funny adventures in the Xanth vein? Penultima and Penultima re-rolled are great ( especially Penultima re-rolled.
Just too many great mods to mention.That's the tip of the iceburg.

[Zebranky]

I'm a bit worried about all of the "I'm not buying NWN2 until..." posts. It's sort of a large-scale prisoner's dilemma: Unless Atari gets enough financial support from the release of NWN2 to keep afloat, they could go under, and that means that Obsidian (possibly) loses THEIR funding. Maybe it's pessimistic, but for reasons already expressed (development needs to start at some point; I liked NWN's single player campaigns), I plan to buy it sooner rather than later.

[IceThorn]

I'm a bit worried about all of the "I'm not buying NWN2 until..." posts. It's sort of a large-scale prisoner's dilemma: Unless Atari gets enough financial support from the release of NWN2 to keep afloat, they could go under, and that means that Obsidian (possibly) loses THEIR funding. Maybe it's pessimistic, but for reasons already expressed (development needs to start at some point; I liked NWN's single player campaigns), I plan to buy it sooner rather than later.

Yes, people. Please show your support for Obs and NWN2 by purchasing the game. If it doesn't sell well during the first x days Atari might pull future funding. I also agree about being an angry, unpaid beta tester, but complain by posting on forums, sending emails, screaming at the box (at home not store) - not by witholding support.

[Nitro18]

Or, dismal sales in the first few weeks might inspire them to get that DM client out as soon as possible. The coin has two sides.

The only real voice any individual consumer has is their wallet. I would counsel disgruntled consumers to refrain from purchasing the game while simultaneously making Atari aware of the underlying reasons via the aforementioned feedback methods.

I believe that urging individuals to purchase the game based upon an unsubstantiated fear that the DM client may be permanently withheld is doing a disservice to both the NWN2 community and the industry as a whole. As a general rule, video game manufacturers need to absorb and comprehend the message that shipping what essentially amounts to a buggy beta client sans full functionality is no longer an acceptable or tolerated practice. I’m sick and tired of waiting for patches to solve issues that should have been dealt with long before the game goes gold.

[IceThorn]

I've been working in developmental engineering and marketing for a long time. I seriously doubt when an Atari exec sees the dismal 1st week sales of NWN2 he's going to think, "Crap! I knew we should've waited until that DM client was ready!" When Obs comes to them for more money to finish other projects, Atari would more likely be hesitant to give any.

[Heed]

Guys, if everyone who made use of the DM client refused to buy the game because a lack of it, then the difference in sales would barely be noticeable. The whole "boycott" mentality fails to recognize that you need a significant weight of numbers to affect things. The DM client is a niche of the NWN market. It is not the main selling point-- single player is.

The whole thing went like this:

Obsidian: "We may have to supply the client in a patch after ship".

Rabid fans: "OMG we're not getting any DM client!!!!. Let's boycott these dudes 'cause they suxxorz!!!"

If you think about the logisitics and finance behind the game, then it makes perfect sense to delay the client if they are squeezed for time (which they obviously are).

Regardless, it's a moot point really. They are now saying the client will ship in some form.

Oh yeah, and everything Doug has said in this thread, +1. Read and grok his wisdom.

EDIT: Just a couple of more big improvements over NWN1:

1) The function SetDescription() is in. Can you say craft coders will be happy?...oh yes.

2) Custom content will be loaded for character creation. No more golem creator thingy for custom races/classes and it fixes a lot of niggly issues using custom content in a server environment.

[PlasmaJohn]

Guys, if everyone who made use of the DM client refused to buy the game because a lack of it, then the difference in sales would barely be noticeable. The whole "boycott" mentality fails to recognize that you need a significant weight of numbers to affect things. The DM client is a niche of the NWN market. It is not the main selling point-- single player is.

I don't see too many people here calling for a boycott. It's more of a vote of no-confidence. Again, it's not the lack of a DM client, but the fact that Obs is decontenting to meet a deadline. You don't ever do that unless you're desperate.

A PW is an enormous amount of work. We depend on a (relatively) stable platform. It would be foolhardy to bet the farm on it until Obs or whoever picks up their contract after Infogrames goes BK proves that they can and will support the community.

Let me shift gears a bit. The Obs Team is the same crew that gave us Fallout and Torment, arguably some of the best of the storytelling RPG's. If these guys are doing the story, as long as the game itself isn't terminally buggy or is half done, then they very well may pull off the Hail Mary.

(Now if we can only get Sawyer to stop pretending to be an engineer and Urqhart to stop pretending to be an Executive...)

[Heed]

Guys, if everyone who made use of the DM client refused to buy the game because a lack of it, then the difference in sales would barely be noticeable. The whole "boycott" mentality fails to recognize that you need a significant weight of numbers to affect things. The DM client is a niche of the NWN market. It is not the main selling point-- single player is.

I don't see too many people here calling for a boycott. It's more of a vote of no-confidence. Again, it's not the lack of a DM client, but the fact that Obs is decontenting to meet a deadline. You don't ever do that unless you're desperate.

A PW is an enormous amount of work. We depend on a (relatively) stable platform. It would be foolhardy to bet the farm on it until Obs or whoever picks up their contract after Infogrames goes BK proves that they can and will support the community.

Let me shift gears a bit. The Obs Team is the same crew that gave us Fallout and Torment, arguably some of the best of the storytelling RPG's. If these guys are doing the story, as long as the game itself isn't terminally buggy or is half done, then they very well may pull off the Hail Mary.

(Now if we can only get Sawyer to stop pretending to be an engineer and Urqhart to stop pretending to be an Executive...)

The boycott reference was more directed to those that were either worried the lack of DM client would hurt sales or that it would be a good tactic to effect change (i.e. get the client included).

Either way it is unlikely to even register on the sales radar.

I agree it does show they are under time pressure. But, I'm not sure that's anything particularly new. So was Bioware with NWN (there's still remnants of subdual damage pointers in the 2da's, for example). In fact, insert company "x" and title "y" and you will most likely find similar scenarios. It does depend upon how they manage to deal with the pressure, of course.

As far as betting the farm, I wouldn't either. That's probably the biggest uncertainty-- the after ship support. Bioware spoiled us in that regard and anything less for NWN2 will be hard to accept.

I'm still buying the thing, though. I would have bought NWN1 with simply the new toolset if they packaged it up and sold it as NWN2. For me, the new toolset would be enough. If I get one tenth of the use out of NWN2 as I did with NWN1 I'll still be getting 100 times my monies worth.

Ah c'mon, lay off Sawyer and Feargus. Sawyer was relaying info. the programmers were feeding him. I don't really think he was trying to be an engineer. He just got hit with questions beyond the scope of the info. he was given and attempted to answer one or two of them. He was the guy that came forward and at least started bringing the issue of memory requirements and PW's up. Feargus is an executive-- just because he sounds like a nerd doesn't mean he can't do his job. I don't think it's bad to have a nerd running a company that's producing geek feed for the rest of us.

In the end we get what we get and either find a way to work with it or don't. That's what happened with NWN1.

[Isengrim]

Bah, if it's going to be released as "finished" as, for example, Battlefield 2 - I doubt I would be buying it. Not to boycott anyone, just to spare myself hours of failed patching and near-to-heart-attack situations.

[Gimlor]

This on the Vault today.

So, this week we're going to try and load you up with information to help clear the air and set the record straight on a few things. The first being the DM Client. The DM client will not ship with the game in the box. We looked at a number of different scenarios and the best one that the team decided upon is to release the DM Client in full as a download the same day of the release. So while it will not ship in the box it will come out with the game. That's the official word as of today.

[Marijn]

This on the Vault today.

So, this week we're going to try and load you up with information to help clear the air and set the record straight on a few things. The first being the DM Client. The DM client will not ship with the game in the box. We looked at a number of different scenarios and the best one that the team decided upon is to release the DM Client in full as a download the same day of the release. So while it will not ship in the box it will come out with the game. That's the official word as of today.

is it me or is this just strange? why not include it with the game straight away? lack of time or money?

[Alphonse]

This on the Vault today.

So, this week we're going to try and load you up with information to help clear the air and set the record straight on a few things. The first being the DM Client. The DM client will not ship with the game in the box. We looked at a number of different scenarios and the best one that the team decided upon is to release the DM Client in full as a download the same day of the release. So while it will not ship in the box it will come out with the game. That's the official word as of today.

is it me or is this just strange? why not include it with the game straight away? lack of time or money?

because there will be a period between the game going to the publishers, and the day of release. They can work solely on the DM client at that point

[DanishPastry]

is it me or is this just strange? why not include it with the game straight away? lack of time or money?

*points to the reply above* AND lack of money and thus lack of time...

[dougnoel]

is it me or is this just strange? why not include it with the game straight away? lack of time or money?

*points to the reply above* AND lack of money and thus lack of time...

A reduction in features does not necessarily translate into a lack of money. Adding people to a project does not make things go faster. Each person added takes at least a month to train on the project, which requires one of your existing developers to spend the same amount of time training them. Then it can take up to 6 months for a person to become a fully productive member of a team. May+June+July+August+September = 4-1/2 months.

They've told us they're going to give us the DM client on the ship date. Good enough for me. This also indicates their willingness to support the game IMO, as it's been pointed out that the number of DM client users is a drop in the bucket compared to the number of people who will (hopefully) buy this game.

[DanishPastry]

Dougnoel, what I meant but failed to state clearly was that they are likely in need of money right now to pay off the creditors etc. etc. So postponing a release to have the DM Client ship with the game in the box was not a viable option.

[frogmella]

This on the Vault today.

So, this week we're going to try and load you up with information to help clear the air and set the record straight on a few things. The first being the DM Client. The DM client will not ship with the game in the box. We looked at a number of different scenarios and the best one that the team decided upon is to release the DM Client in full as a download the same day of the release. So while it will not ship in the box it will come out with the game. That's the official word as of today.

is it me or is this just strange? why not include it with the game straight away? lack of time or money?

Could also be due to the cost and difficulty of distributing the DM Client to the packages and lack of time for the so-called 'localisation' matters of translation to various languages.

[Paul]

Also, you have to think of how much time it takes to produce and package the actual disks and manuals. How many copies will they ship on the release date a million, two, three? I'd have to think that kind of project takes a few weeks if not months.

[dougnoel]

You will see the announcement of the game going gold. This means that the version they are shipping with has been put on a CD (or DVD) and shipped to the publisher. It also means that the manual and box art is done, but usally the software is the last thing to be finished. The publisher will take the gold master and make copies, which will be dumped in boxes with manuals and shipped to stores prior to the release date. Generally games go gold about a month before their release date.

[bolo]

Bah, I'm too damn slow. what Doug said