For the final eight years on Xbox, gamers have been in a position to enter the Forgotten Realms and expertise the world of Dungeons & Dragons for themselves, by the free-to-play MMO Neverwinter. Now, as Neverwinter brings its Menzonberranzan arc to an finish with the newest launch, The Demonweb Pits, we sat down with Neverwinter’s Lead Content material Designer, Elliot Minner, to speak concerning the final decade of adventures.
The Forgotten Realms is a basic setting, and gave the Neverwinter workforce the prospect to convey basic Dungeons & Dragons characters to life and let gamers work together with them. Doing this has allowed the builders to discover a few of their favourite heroes and villains.
“We’ve been fortunate sufficient to place a few of our absolute favorites within the recreation,” Minner mentioned. “Antagonists like Strahd von Zarovich and heroes like Drizzt Do’urden and the Companions of the Corridor. In actual fact, we lately had been in a position to accomplice with R.A. Salvatore and his son Geno Salvatore to put in writing an authentic story involving Menzoberranzan and Drizzt.”
Lots of Neverwinter’s updates, referred to as Modules, are based mostly straight on the modules launched by Wizards of the Coast for the final two editions of Dungeons & Dragons. When crafting these tales into gameplay experiences, Minner says they’re cautious to comply with the unique plotline, however put their very own twist on it.
“We attempt to keep true to the character and story, however adapt it to what the sport wants,” Minners explains. “So we’ll typically change or add talents to make a cool combat, or place the characters in a special model of the plot as a result of we aren’t in a position to comply with the module one to 1. With the whole lot we make, we work with Wizards of the Coast to ensure it matches their imaginative and prescient, and so they’re very supportive after we add our personal touches to the IP.“
After all, bringing beloved D&D characters like Jarlaxle to life comes with its personal tasks. Gamers can have their very own imaginative and prescient of those characters that’s lived of their heads for literal a long time. Whereas no model may be excellent, the workforce are all big Dungeons & Dragons nerds, and work to get as shut as they will.
“Our content material writers sit down and take into consideration the characters and their plot traces, and write to the character’s historical past,” Minner says. “Now we have an enormous bookshelf of Dungeons & Dragons novels within the workplace, if anybody must reference a personality’s established voice. Then we ship that writing to our gifted audio workforce, who forged the fitting particular person for the job and direct them to provide a satisfying efficiency.”
Neverwinter isn’t the primary Dungeons & Dragons recreation, and it isn’t the primary to convey these basic heroes and villains to life. Requested what units Neverwinter aside from different video games within the Forgotten Realms, Minner says: “As an MMO, Neverwinter is all about taking part in collectively. You possibly can meet Elminster with your folks, and work together with him as a celebration. I really like the sensation of getting a bunch of buddies collectively to battle considered one of our epic bosses, like Lolth herself.”
When requested about one character he would add if given the prospect, Minner laughs. “Bahamut, undoubtedly,” he says. “The dragon god of justice. I imply, how cool would that be?”
Neverwinter’s The Demonweb Pits is offered on Xbox consoles now.
Neverwinter
Gearbox Publishing
Neverwinter is the premier Dungeons & Dragons MMORPG expertise, that includes fast-paced fight and epic dungeons. Discover the huge metropolis of Neverwinter and its surrounding areas, battle its many enemies, and be part of Forgotten Realms historical past.
Expertise Dungeons & Dragons Like By no means Earlier than – Neverwinter is an motion MMORPG that bridges intense fight with basic D&D gameplay. Journey by the town of Neverwinter and the legendary subcontinent of Faerûn, and face off in opposition to the best adversaries from D&D legend.
Construct Your Personal Legend – Carry your adventures to life by iconic D&D courses and races, superior paragon paths, companions, and a exceptional vary of customization choices. Whether or not you’re looking dragons and beholders inside crumbling dungeons or battling different gamers within the icy reaches of Icespire Peak, you’ll uncover why Neverwinter is the definitive Dungeons & Dragons expertise.
Optimized for Xbox One – Neverwinter evokes basic Dungeons & Dragons adventures with a completely optimized participant expertise for Xbox One. The fast-paced motion gameplay of Neverwinter has been mapped to the Xbox One controller, giving adventures the power to maneuver across the battlefield and forged highly effective spells with ease. Xbox One gamers also can use their Xbox One buddies listing to seek out and occasion up with others as they discover iconic areas of the Dungeons & Dragons universe.
This recreation helps English, French, German, Italian, and Russian.
Extra System necessities: Minimal broadband web connection of 512 Kbps is required to entry all options.