New Trent Oster's interview: NWN's 15 years, and more
JuliusBorisov
Member, Administrator, Moderator, Developer Posts: 22,723
GoG has just published an interview with Trent Oster.
"Would you do things differently now, if you had another go at starting NWN? Would it even exist?
Trent: If I started on NWN today I would do a few things differently. In the development of NWN we designed a ton of systems from scratch. If I were to build the game concept again, I'd really try to embrace more open standards. The .PLT files for one are a notorious pain, both for a development team and modding. I still think NWN is a brilliant product idea and I'd do it again if the stars aligned to make it happen"
"Can you share anything truly awesome you wanted to have in the game but had to be dropped?
Trent: I wanted to do a lot of things that had to be dropped. An online character vault was a big feature we had to step away from. We had ideas around supporting modules in-game which we backed away from due to concerns around legal content ownership issues (this was pre-DMCA). I think if NWN had made it a lot easier to share modules, we could have increased the community even further."
"Bioware drew some talent from the community when first developing and later supporting Neverwinter Nights. You did something similar for Beamdog's EE titles. How has this been working out? Do you see a change in how some game studios will operate in the future or is Beamdog unique in this regard due to the nature of your games?
Trent: We drew heavily from the community, with almost half the people working on some of the Enhanced Edition games coming from the community. I think the studios that embrace user-created content will drive this approach going forward and we hope to be on the front lines of this trend."
"People have imported Witcher 1 and 2 assets, even whole areas, into their NWN game worlds. How did CD Projekt come to use the Aurora engine? Do you have any great stories to share there?
Trent: We had known the CD Projekt fellows from the BG1 days when they translated Baldur's Gate without external support. They basically reverse engineered the text system and injected their localization.
We later met with the CD Projekt team as they started on the Witcher series. They were interested in licensing the Aurora engine and tools as the starting point for the Witcher game. They pulled together a really impressive internal demo and without much further discussion we licensed the team the engine, which they did a ton of work on before shipping the first Witcher game. I'm certain some of the ideas behind Neverwinter Nights and the Aurora engine live on in their team and their products. "
"People will lynch me if I don't ask this: You've done BG: EE, BG2: EE, IWD: EE, and PST: EE. Is NWN next?
Trent: I hope you survive the lynching process ;-). I've always said I'm not done with Neverwinter Nights and the multiplayer space. At the moment we don't have anything to talk about, but I'm keeping my eyes open for opportunities."
Read the whole interview here.
P.S.
"Gnomes or Doppelgangers? I’ve heard you have a thing against gnomes.
Trent: Ick. Both are unpleasant options. Although a doppelganger party member could be useful in some scenarios, whereas a gnome, there is just no hope."
...
Gnomes... are unpleasant options... whereas a gnome, there is just no hope... @Anduin needs to see this.
"Would you do things differently now, if you had another go at starting NWN? Would it even exist?
Trent: If I started on NWN today I would do a few things differently. In the development of NWN we designed a ton of systems from scratch. If I were to build the game concept again, I'd really try to embrace more open standards. The .PLT files for one are a notorious pain, both for a development team and modding. I still think NWN is a brilliant product idea and I'd do it again if the stars aligned to make it happen"
"Can you share anything truly awesome you wanted to have in the game but had to be dropped?
Trent: I wanted to do a lot of things that had to be dropped. An online character vault was a big feature we had to step away from. We had ideas around supporting modules in-game which we backed away from due to concerns around legal content ownership issues (this was pre-DMCA). I think if NWN had made it a lot easier to share modules, we could have increased the community even further."
"Bioware drew some talent from the community when first developing and later supporting Neverwinter Nights. You did something similar for Beamdog's EE titles. How has this been working out? Do you see a change in how some game studios will operate in the future or is Beamdog unique in this regard due to the nature of your games?
Trent: We drew heavily from the community, with almost half the people working on some of the Enhanced Edition games coming from the community. I think the studios that embrace user-created content will drive this approach going forward and we hope to be on the front lines of this trend."
"People have imported Witcher 1 and 2 assets, even whole areas, into their NWN game worlds. How did CD Projekt come to use the Aurora engine? Do you have any great stories to share there?
Trent: We had known the CD Projekt fellows from the BG1 days when they translated Baldur's Gate without external support. They basically reverse engineered the text system and injected their localization.
We later met with the CD Projekt team as they started on the Witcher series. They were interested in licensing the Aurora engine and tools as the starting point for the Witcher game. They pulled together a really impressive internal demo and without much further discussion we licensed the team the engine, which they did a ton of work on before shipping the first Witcher game. I'm certain some of the ideas behind Neverwinter Nights and the Aurora engine live on in their team and their products. "
"People will lynch me if I don't ask this: You've done BG: EE, BG2: EE, IWD: EE, and PST: EE. Is NWN next?
Trent: I hope you survive the lynching process ;-). I've always said I'm not done with Neverwinter Nights and the multiplayer space. At the moment we don't have anything to talk about, but I'm keeping my eyes open for opportunities."
Read the whole interview here.
P.S.
"Gnomes or Doppelgangers? I’ve heard you have a thing against gnomes.
Trent: Ick. Both are unpleasant options. Although a doppelganger party member could be useful in some scenarios, whereas a gnome, there is just no hope."
...
Gnomes... are unpleasant options... whereas a gnome, there is just no hope... @Anduin needs to see this.
Post edited by JuliusBorisov on
11
Comments
I love the games he has helped to produce...
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He hates me...
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But who cares if he manages to pull off a NWN:EE!!!
I LOVE YOU TRENT! LET'S MAKE GNOMELINGS!
Except for the gnome comment. That was just out of line.
Did the creation of this game bring any personal epiphanies?
Trent: Yes, companions are an excellent storytelling vector and AI companions can be the most frustrating thing in the universe.
Oh yes... that was not so good. I'm pretty sure I used the ''stand your ground'' command more than I let them follow me. Mostly to avoid letting them suicide on traps^^
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This changes EVERYTHING!
It is the 15th anniversary to NWN.
Is anyone thinking about booting the game up again? I'm creating a Sorcerer character.
Well, here's the link: https://www.gog.com/news/interview_with_the_project_director_of_neverwinter_nights