Deamon Blackrazor had the decency to admit he didn’t sleep because he was so looking forward to seeing the toolset. I just blamed it on jet lag. Either way, we were all pretty keen to see how the day unfolded, and after stuffing a couple of the free Hershey minis in my swag bag, I was ready to get to the ‘real deal’.

After a pretty sumptuous breakfast we headed over to the studio for a live look at the game, presented by Project Director Dan Tudge. You can check out the demo they are showing off at the Dragon Age site. I have to say though that the videos don’t really do it justice. Up close and personal the game looks awesome, and you also get a much better feel for how it plays. You won’t find any spoilers here, but I will say I was impressed both with the camera control and also how the game ‘felt’; a sort of combination of Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights. For me, looks come after gameplay, but I felt pretty satisfied with both, though we didn’t actually have hands-on time on the game itself. The ogre fight in particular was pretty cool – see for yourself in the demo vids.

During the game presentation itself and also during the whole event, we got to meet a lot of the ‘Bioware legends’ who make the games and lurk on the boards. It really impressed me that, despite a clearly busy schedule, many of these guys were on hand to help out and to give us tips, and what’s more, they were clearly passionate about the game and genuinely interested in seeing what our impressions were. One couldn’t help wondering before we got there whether us rather lowly amateurs and half-amateurs would actually be worth listening to, so the attitude of the folks at Bioware and EA in getting this event scheduled and then following it through with such passion was a big positive that I took away. These guys are really serious about the community, and that bodes well for all of us. As far as I’m aware, this was the first time there was a hands-on of the toolset for anyone outside Bioware. Whatever your hopes or fears about Dragon Age: Origins, you can’t argue with that kind of commitment.

I’ll talk a bit more about my toolset impressions in tomorrow’s update, but first a little about some of the Bioware names. Unfortunately I didn’t get to meet up with Stan Woo or Rob Bartel, but I did meet many of the other names you’ll all be familiar with. I got lots of unpublishable insights into Derek French and Ferret Baudoin, and it’s also pretty clear that Georg Zoeller is some kind of scripting god, even in Bioware. I also got to spend a bit of time with Lead Writer David Gaider, and gain some insights into how the writing and the world of Dragon Age came into being (he’s the guy on the right in the picture). The biggest scoop for sure was the Incontrovertible proof that Brian Chung does not have any bikini clad fans.

David Gaider talks to (from left) Alazander, B G P Hughes, Alex ‘Hugie’ Hugon and Beerfish

To get your own view of the Dragon Age Toolset, why not head over to the Dragon Age site and check out the videos?

Earlier this week I returned from an extended trip overseas, the highlight of which was a visit to Bioware’s studios in Edmonton for a special invitation event to take a look at the Dragon Age toolset. Why was I there? Good question. Apparently I had been mistaken for an important contributor to the NWN community, so I kept the visor of my hat down low while I rubbed shoulders with the likes of Adam Miller, Beerfish, Hugie, Stratovarious, Alazander, Daemon Blackrazor and fluffyamoeba, and did my best not to get ‘rumbled’ by security. It wasn’t long before a number of us were sitting at our PCs and ‘ooohing’ like a bunch of schoolgirls in front of a Brad Pitt movie.

Rewind a few weeks, and I receive an email from Jay at Bioware inviting me to a ‘secret event’ and warning me to pack warm clothes and be prepared for ‘ice wolves roaming the tundra’. After a brief panic over flights and the happy discovery I didn’t need a visa, I found myself in a not-so-cold Edmonton, sadly devoid of the wolves and tundra, but fairly well endowed with cars, parking lots and steak.

An early highlight was a bag of swag deposited in my room, then it was out for an early dinner, and a chance to meet some of my fellow adventurers. Hugie and Adam looked pretty much exactly as I had imagined, while Strat and Beerfish did not – and actually nor did most of the Bioware folks I met, so it was great to start getting names to faces. It was pretty clear early on Jay was a swell guy who will want to invite me to all future events. The other adventurers were a nice crew (though not as nice, since I’m not sure they have any cool events to invite me to). It was pretty clear we were all eager to get our hands on the game or the toolset, but since we didn’t really know what we were going to see, all we could do is speculate. So I’m going to go off and check my NDA now, and see what I can tell you in tomorrow’s update. For now I’ll leave you with this neat screenshot of the ogre from Dragon Age: Origins.

The long-rumoured unofficial patch for Neverwinter Nights is finally announced!

Rather than giving you a synopsis of what Project Q is, I’ll use their own words…
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ProjectQ philosophy
Q stands for quality, and quality is, above and beyond everything else, the prominent trait of each and every project resource. The team will not compromise on the quality of the material, and will endeavor to make the game richer and better for the benefit of players and builders.
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ProjectQ goals
– facelifting and overhauling the stock Neverwinter Nights art resources, overriding the old content with newer versions in line with the standards of the latest material published through the final 1.69 game patch, when not of higher quality altogether.
– expanding the game, injecting and integrating more material into the official game resources while, unlike previous custom content releases, not compromising about the quality of the new material.
– integrating in the game all the bug fixes that, due to Bioware ceasing to support the game with future patches, would have remained unaddressed. Because of legal and technical limitations, bug fixes will only address art resources and scripts, so creatures, placeables, items, spells etc etc.
– delivering the additions and changes automatically, through the implementation of a rsync system to bypass the need for players and builders to manually find and download the required hakpacks.
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What Q will offer to players:
– the opportunity to install the haks and play any module with the improved graphics without the need to modify them in the toolset.
– integrated extended version of ACPv4 to automatically offer the option to choose a custom fighting style for their characters, combined with the option to pick a Tall and Slight phenotype while retaining all horses functionality.
– full compatibility with PRC by default.
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What Q will offer to builders (beyond what already mentioned for players):
– full compatibility with CTP and other custom tilesets.
– full compatibility with NinjaWeaselMan’s animations, and integration with all major phenotypes and custom animations (Vaèi’s, Tom_Banjo’s)
– improved developer toolkit to assist integrating the new material
– the ability to suggest new features to better tailor the new content around their actual needs.
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Visit and register on Project Q forums, and get the opportunity to see the previews of the material under development, and to suggest features or report game bugs that will be fixed and distributed with Q.

It’s supposed to be a quiet time here at the Academy, as our members catch up on some much needed holidays, and we prepare for our next recruitment drive…

…but that doesn’t mean there isn’t still loads of news! For one, the NWNPodcast team have started running a series of interviews with the Golden Dragon winners. Already released are great interviews with Andarian, Lance Botelle, axe_murderer and the Citadel Team, and there are even more to come! Why not check them out?

That’s right, the log of the chat with the NWN Golden Dragon winners is out. We had another great session organised by Tybae, with the usual mix of information, announcement, exclusives and messing about. Enjoy it here!

Marc Price left the community some time ago, but before he left, he released his swansong module as part of the Tales of the Sundering Series. We quized him about the inspiration behind the modules he built for NWN, as well as how he felt working in the HoF team and what it takes to build a community. Click here to read the whole interview.

Today we feature a new interview with the NWN1 winner of the Best PnP Conversion Golden Dragon Award, which was awarded to the Ghost Tower of Inverness. Sir Otus tells us about the inspiration for his modules, what he likes about them, and what’s coming next…

Read more

Yesterday (or today, depending on your timezone), we had a great chat with some of the winners of the NWN2 Golden Dragon awards. You can hear what they had to say in response to a bunch of questions from community and AME members. It was a great chat, with some gems of information, and of course, some screenies!

Click Here for the log

Coming shortly we have two new cracking interviews, with the Golden Dragon winners Marc Price and Sir Otus. Watch this space!

Great news! Tybae has worked his magic and organised the Golden Dragon winner IRC chats! So why not get over to the news threads and post your questions for the winners?

You can find more details and post your questions here:

NWN2 Chat, 13th September.

NWN1 Chat, 20th September