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Elven retreat?

IskandryuIskandryu Member Posts: 2
edited December 2016 in Icewind Dale: Enhanced Edition
Hello,

I've been playing IWD for the second time now, after about 8 years. In the meantime i've become more knowledgeable of the Forgotten Realms lore, and a thing struck me as odd. In the game there is a lot of talk about an elven Retreat to Evermeet, that either happened sometime in the near past or is still ongoing... but how is that possible? The game takes place in the DR 1280 or something, but the FR lore says the Retreat happened about 1340.

Is there something i'm missing, or is the game just mixing up facts? Which would be pretty disappointing seeing how such a classic game got wrong such an important event in the fiction of FR.

Comments

  • elminsterelminster Member, Developer Posts: 16,317
    edited December 2016
    I think there has been more than one retreat to Evermeet. They may be referring to the retreat after the collapse of Eaerlann (which still wouldn't make any sense, but that is about the only thing that immediately comes to mind).

    That said, Icewind Dale 1 did include some books that did not make sense given the time frame of the game (they would talk about events in 1360's DR) so you will sometimes see that. I think the EE may have removed some of them, but if you are playing the original game (and you make the effort to read the books you come across) you will certainly still see them.

    Edit: So yea, after looking into this a bit further it looks like Black Isle probably got it wrong.
  • sarevok57sarevok57 Member Posts: 6,002
    black isle made a few mistakes here and there, there was another big one in the BG series about your mother:

    in bg1 there is a note from gorion saying something about how he was a lover with your mother, but then in ToB gorion says he slayed your mother to save you from the bhaal temple, so sometimes black isle just made mistakes in their writing
  • IskandryuIskandryu Member Posts: 2
    edited December 2016
    Yeah, that is unfortunate. I do like the game very much, and the story is okay too, but it all seems like it might as well have been set in the same period as all the rest of Forgotten Realms games. As Elminster said, there are more small anachronisms in there. I'm playing the EE, but it still has some curious references there.
    And that defeats the point of setting the game in "historical times". It gives me the impression that the game was supposed to be set in the present (as in.. around 1370's), and at the last moment someone decided it should be set in 1281, but they didn't have time to adapt anything. Maybe it was because they realized they haven't made any reference to the events in the Icewind Dale Trilogy of novels, and just set the game in the past, so they can get away with that :wink:
  • PokotaPokota Member Posts: 858
    Iskandryu said:

    Maybe it was because they realized they haven't made any reference to the events in the Icewind Dale Trilogy of novels, and just set the game in the past, so they can get away with that :wink:

    *cough*Crenshinibon*cough*

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