Enchanced Edition - Discussion

[If Valor Were Inches]

When is phase 2 taking place? Sorry if this has already been mentioned but I didn’t want to have to through 18 pages.

Phase 2 (as in, within a couple of days from now), we will be launching the Arelith EE module, which is seperated from our current Arelith 1.69 modules, but will be merged to it later. As in, players/characters will be remain.

[Purplemyst]

Thanks Valor

[Dovesong]

When is phase 2 taking place? Sorry if this has already been mentioned but I didn’t want to have to through 18 pages.

+1

[Ozzy.nl]

There's another livestream tonight!

https://twitter.com/BeamdogInc/status/9 ... 9494706176

I can never make that time can someone pm me a link or set it up somewere that aint this tread so we can watch it back later?

Also is there a expected release date alright. And perhaps steam costs in euros known?

[Xuuldar]

I was actually more afraid when I first heard rumor of it, that Arelith wouldn't move to it. I think it will breathe life into the game and allow the Devs to take Arelith to the next level. Over the years Arelith has benefited from other servers dying off and getting those refugees but at this point Arelith is one of the last servers standing (which is a true testament to the devs).

I am a little disappointed that there is not more of a graphics update but I also fully understand why. I do have a question though. If eventually an integrated HAK downloader is built, would there come a time where community created assets could be added? I dabble in 3D modeling a bit and I have always wished it would be possible to build new creatures and various assets. I have made assets for use in Unity and I making things for NWN would not be much different. I would absolutely love to be able to model and animate assets and be able to hand them off to the devs to use as they wished. Might someday this be possible?

[Freyason]

There's another livestream tonight!

https://twitter.com/BeamdogInc/status/9 ... 9494706176

11:30am pst /2:30pm est (so in few hours)

I suppose it is technically night in Australia

[Seekeepeek]

live trailer for NwN EE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rr7oipQkCfc

[Punished Hans]

live trailer for NwN EE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rr7oipQkCfc

at least it wasnt rick astley........

[Cyanide_bullet]

This whole thread reinforces my feeling of dread for this forum, the minority of the server gains a foothold to spew negativity. Great decision on the Devs and dms, i am super excited for the future of the server! And i think you are doing great work.

An influx of new players is what the server is in dire need of, if you can't be wholesome, perhaps itis time you leave?

[Cortex]

This whole thread reinforces my feeling of dread for this forum, the minority of the server gains a foothold to spew negativity. Great decision on the Devs and dms, i am super excited for the future of the server! And i think you are doing great work.

An influx of new players is what the server is in dire need of, if you can't be wholesome, perhaps itis time you leave?

This post is no less negative or aggressive than the ones you criticize.

[BegoneThoth]

Beamdog would serve the gaming community better if they had made a new game in the spirit of NWN, or baldur's gate, icewind dale and so forth instead of trying to keep a dead horse alive. Games cannot last forever and they should not. I"d rather have better new games than trying to keep old ones viable.

Maybe!

But consider this - nobody has made anything NWN-like since NWN2, which... wasn't exactly a resounding success.

Mask owned though, up there as one of the best single-player RPG games ever made.

[Trunx]

An influx of new players is what the server is in dire need of, if you can't be wholesome, perhaps itis time you leave?

I don't think anyone is claiming NWN:EE will be bad for the server. If you can't handle some negativity, perhaps it's time for you to leave? The forums aren't supposed to be some hugbox where only positive things are allowed to be said, and everything has to be welcomed with unquestioning love.

[nobs3]

But all this means we weren't really expecting a significant number of people to be seriously upset over the prospect of paying $20 to refresh their game for another decade plus. With hindsight, we should probably have anticipated that and made our announcements with that in mind.

I dont think it is such a high number of players. (Still every single player counts.). I have the feeling this is a typical social media phenomenon, where one topic did start its own dynamic that dominates the topic.
There were different motivations to react skeptical at the first point (lack of money, fear that the system requirements will be too high, former experiences with other game updates, different perspectives on the mix of commercial and intrinsic/non-profit and quality motivations, the big focus on background functions/ selling not a game but a game-infrastructure…).
Much has been said, interesting information was given (e.g. by the last posts of RedGiant and Scimiter), and some things were even solved.

So IMO we should make a cut here in this (mostly) meta-discussion. (But that is my opinion. (Damn one needs to be careful atm.))

I have a question: Will there be a functional PGCC now? Will this be added as a nice tool for player? And adjusted to Arelith? (I needed long to find out what a PGCC is: a pretty good character creator)

[Ebonstar]

looking on the Beamdog forums, those other remaining servers which are quite hak heavy, are in panic mode. Sinfar for one has put up posts that Liareth answered to that they need alot of help from Beamdog to simply migrate over, or they will have to start from scratch and rewrite most of their server, or something to that end from my read on it.
From the aspect of other PWs some are being taken out of mothballs,but most seem a year or more behind where we stand. Kudos to our team and staff helping out before the sheet was taken off for getting us situated and ready for a smooth transition.

for those who are still skeptical, please watch the next stream at noon pst. These guys are far from fanboys out for a buck playing on nostalgia

the negativity being remarked on really is out of place, if you dont intend to migrate to EE, thats fine and dandy, but at least walk out without throwing mud

[Ozzy.nl]

The point for sinfar is that they are so hak heavy it trows in another 10gb to nwn. As well as they use a custom nwn launcher with nwnx but sobthat special scripts load in that ever player can ajust the own height of a character.bQuiet a good feat actualy to have ingame.

[Nitro]

Mask owned though, up there as one of the best single-player RPG games ever made.

Perhaps critically acclaimed, but it did poorly in sales. Didn't even scratch 1 million units sold worldwide.

[Improv]

Building a "new NWN" would be a massive, humongous, vast commercial risk. The cost to create a modern equivalent to NWN would be orders of magnitude greater than the investment into EE - money that would need to be recouped by game sales, which in today's climate would be far from certain.

It would be a massively different venture from Beamdog's core business, so they'd be unlikely to be the people doing it.

I doubt Beamdog could afford to license Dungeons and Dragons if the system wasn't tied to older game rights either. Which may not be a bad thing to some people but this being a place to play a pretty faithful version of D&D online is a major draw for many of us.

[DM Rakshasa]

An influx of new players is what the server is in dire need of, if you can't be wholesome, perhaps itis time you leave?

I don't think anyone is claiming NWN:EE will be bad for the server. If you can't handle some negativity, perhaps it's time for you to leave? The forums aren't supposed to be some hugbox where only positive things are allowed to be said, and everything has to be welcomed with unquestioning love.

RULE 4: Be Nice
There is a vast age range that plays on Arelith, for this reason, restrict any conduct you may be involved in to a "PG-13" level of interaction. Unwarranted rudeness, potentially offensive role play, inappropriate sexual references, foul language, harassment, killing non-hostile NPCs without DM supervision, and poor gamesmanship (including wanton destruction, griefing of any kind, exploiting known or unknown bugs, transferring items, logging to avoid consequences, etc) are prohibited.

I would like to remind you that there is a difference between only allowing positive things to be said on the forums and telling other players to grow a thicker skin because you want to be rude. If this defines the forum as a 'hugbox', then that's what it's going to be.

Please remember this when going forward with this topic.

[Sab1]

I for one am not someone who enjoys loading Beta of anything on my computer. If it's finished I will consider it but it's still in beta stage I'm not loading it.

[Punished Hans]

An influx of new players is what the server is in dire need of, if you can't be wholesome, perhaps itis time you leave?

I don't think anyone is claiming NWN:EE will be bad for the server. If you can't handle some negativity, perhaps it's time for you to leave? The forums aren't supposed to be some hugbox where only positive things are allowed to be said, and everything has to be welcomed with unquestioning love.

RULE 4: Be Nice
There is a vast age range that plays on Arelith, for this reason, restrict any conduct you may be involved in to a "PG-13" level of interaction. Unwarranted rudeness, potentially offensive role play, inappropriate sexual references, foul language, harassment, killing non-hostile NPCs without DM supervision, and poor gamesmanship (including wanton destruction, griefing of any kind, exploiting known or unknown bugs, transferring items, logging to avoid consequences, etc) are prohibited.

I would like to remind you that there is a difference between only allowing positive things to be said on the forums and telling other players to grow a thicker skin because you want to be rude. If this defines the forum as a 'hugbox', then that's what it's going to be.

Please remember this when going forward with this topic.

Nobody said anything about unwarranted rudeness, however. The inquiry was to be either wholesome and positive or to leave.

Being negative does not equal being rude.

In my personal opinion, dismissing valid concerns as negativity is rude. Telling people that don't share your opinion to leave a space that is not yours, is rude.

[Sockss]

Negativity is key. The fact is that the launch provides next to nothing. You can achieve the same results for free with community content.

People being content with next to nothing means it's more likely it'll stay that way. Likewise, voicing criticism as a consumer will hopefully lead to improvement.

Nothing improves if you just smile and say everything's going to be okay.

[One Two Three Five]

No one's saying to do that? But people on either side of it can voice their opinions and still be civil.
Also for real, that key negativity towards the EE isn't going to do anything over here. It might do something over here, however.

If you have an opinion to voice about the content, by all means voice it, but being realistic there's only so much we can accomplish with regards to a non-Arelith entity on the Arelith forums. At a certain point the arguments become circular on either side (page 3 give or take).

[kTravio]

Negativity is key. The fact is that the launch provides next to nothing. You can achieve the same results for free with community content.

A lot of what's been done can't be done with community content. Both the game itself and the toolset work better on modern hardware and systems now - the ability to actually run it at full screen with risking a migraine alone was worth the $20 for me (and there was promise of a borderless fullscreen mode to come, which will be the only other real graphical change I need).

But yes - I understand people's... I don't want to use the word negativity but instead perhaps hesitation at EE. They showed it off earlier than they really should have... but they've made it clear they want community feedback on what needs to be included/added/fixed etc. - and the only real way to do that is to show what they've already done. I'm pretty sure that, by the time EE is ready for full release, most people will see it as an upgrade.

[RedGiant]

I for one am not someone who enjoys loading Beta of anything on my computer. If it finished I will consider it but it's still in beta stage I'm not loading it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_adopter

I'm with Sab1. I will wait juuust a bit.

Developers = Innovaters
Ebonstar = Early Adopters

Sab1
RedGiant = Early Majority
(When the bugs are comfortably worked out and a friend can tell us what levers we need to flip to optimize. )

[Sockss]

It is in fact, possible to do both of those things. You can check out the NWShader project, for example.

I'm all for the concept of EE, truly. NWN having improvements would be fantastic.

However it's important to know that there is very little, if anything, that is new here.

As I've stated before, Beamdog have a tendency to launch with exceptionally lackluster titles and then improve them over time. This will likely be the case.

However, they are not contractually obligated to do so and without pressure from consumers, they are more likely to not.