BioWare Interviews
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Q: Future plans for the store?
A: We're interested in talking with computer game developers who want to reach a very targeted, receptive market of fans at the BioWare Community, so if developers or publishers have a great, high-quality story-based game they'd like to distribute to an audience of over 2 million avid fans, they should feel free to contact us. We definitely have a long-term vision and plan for the BioWare Community and the BioWare Online Store. We have a number of ideas for future content we'd like to roll out, ranging from smaller expansion-type content all the way to full-sized products. Having 2.2 million fans who enjoy story, exploration, character interaction, and character progression provides a lot of opportunities to reach them with a variety of different kinds of products in the future. Additionally, in the future we'll be offering physical goods like shirts, mugs, caps, and so on to our fans.
And in addition to the digitally distributed games like the Neverwinter Nights modules we're offering at launch, we plan to expand the type, size, and variety of digitally distributed products sold in the BioWare Community. We're really excited to see how our fans like the content we're offering, and we plan to respond to their suggestions by offering a wider variety of content in the future.
And the second is over at HomeLan Fed with joint-CEOs Ray Muzyka & Greg Zeschuk, community manager Jay Watamaniuk, BioWare Live Team lead designer Rob Bartel, and senior executive producer Diarmid Clarke fielding the answers:
Q: What can you tell us about the first BioWare produced new paid modules for Neverwinter Nights?
A: Our first wave consists of three BioWare premium modules. Our flagship title, Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker, was developed internally by BioWare designers Dan Whiteside and Cori May. It's a highly replayable adventure offering between 5 and 8 hours of gameplay with each playthrough. It's got romance, some great combats, a wonderfully inventive storyline, your choice of four different henchmen, an intelligent weapon, and lots more. They've done an excellent job and it really is a joy to play. What's more, we've worked with professional actors to record more than 500 lines of voice-over, providing the module's interesting characters and henchmen with loads of personality. A Lite version of the module, without all of the voice-over, is available for those on low-bandwidth connections, at a reduced price.
Our second offering, Neverwinter Nights: ShadowGuard, was actually created by Ben (Altaris) McJunkin, the community member who developed the acclaimed Lone Wolf series of Neverwinter Nights modules. As with Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker, BioWare technical designer Keith Hayward and I have gone in and worked with Ben, overhauling the module to bring it up to the high standards we've set for BioWare premium modules. It's a shorter module than Neverwinter Nights: Kingmaker, with less emphasis on voice-over. At its heart, however, Ben's created a touching coming-of-age story about a young adventurer who has a troubled relationship with their father and a desire to see more of the world than the small and divided city of Ghaarak at the distant edge of the vast Sharakhan Empire.
And, finally, we're also releasing a '˜remastered' version of Neverwinter Nights: Witch's Wake, the highly popular module I initially created almost two years ago now. Two expansion packs have come and gone since then and there've been a great many changes both to Neverwinter Nights itself as well as to the broader BioWare Community. This remastered version is essentially a '˜Designer's Cut' of the module, following the same storyline but chock full of new content and things I had always wanted to include like proper subraces, improvements to the various subsystems, database functionality to carry plot variables into the upcoming sequel, and so forth. We also recorded close to 250 lines of voice-over narration that really transform the module into something quite magical. Neverwinter Nights: Witch's Wake will be available for free with the purchase of Neverwinter Nights: ShadowGuard.
