chevalier
Sun, 13th Aug '06, 2:35pm
Here are today's Neverwinter Nights 2 forum highlights, collected by NWVault (http://nwvault.ign.com). Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">J.E. Sawyer, Lead Designer</font>
Exclusive NEW screens @ nwn2news (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492108&post=4256455&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />Also, it looks like the hair is rendering with a 1-bit alpha. Are there any plans to include an 8-bit alpha in the final build? I think it would look a lot better.<hr />This was a topic of great debate. 8-bit alpha would look much better, of course. Adam Brennecke can probably explain why we chose to go with the 1-bit alpha (read: performance reasons).
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Patrick K Mills, Production Tester</font>
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492213&post=4256052&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />- PC buffs are displayed just like in NWN1 -- with icons in the upper right hand corner of the screen. I took pictures of it which I'll upload tonight. The icons are color though. They don't have tooltips when you hove the mouse over them, but Ryan thought it should be added and said he would look into it.<hr />Also, most buffs and debuffs display a "frame effect" on impact with the target. A little icon that floats up above the character. Tooltips on the status effects things is actually just broken right now, it's normally in and working.
<hr />- Resting is now done standing up. Ryan said resting is so quick, there's no sense sitting down.<hr />In the build after that one characters now kneel down when they rest. It looks cool.
<hr />- I took pictures of all the nwscript constants -- and there's a lot of them! Who's going to type that up? http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif I noticed a few epic constants, so perhaps the NWN1 constants are still included?<hr /> At least with spell scripts, which is what I'm in charge of, I've removed none of the old constants, though I only use a few of them. The old stuff has helpful placeholder VFX & sound that play when an old constant is called, so if you have scripts you want to use it's easy to load them up in game and quickly determine which constants need to be changed and which I've updated.
More: <hr />words<hr />What makes you think we removed keyboard shortcuts?
One of the design goals of our UI was that it should be possible for someone to play entirely with the mouse, since this was something people had asked for. The design goal was not to force people to play JUST with the mouse.
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) part 2 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492293&post=4256166&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />Hey Patrick,
What is this a picture of: Click Here (http://gallery.usticke.org/v/gaming/gcnwn2/CIMG3590.JPG.html)
cdaulepp<hr />Party roster, allows you to pick who will be in your party. GUI there is temp as far as I'm aware.
More: <hr />So Tattoo colors are reglemented by eye colors. are tatoos toggleable?<hr />They are on a per-head basis. Some heads have tats, some don't.
You call these horns? (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492240&post=4256502&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />yeah, i preferred the art style of the nwn ones. These look more kinky than demonic.<hr />This is a bad thing?
My female tiefling bard is named "Cutie Buttonhead." Cause she's cute.
There are a variety of horns. Sadly, we don't have any big ram horns, but it *would* have looked pretty silly.
More: <hr />Now about those tails and hooves instead of horns, care to give a comment about those?<hr />:smokebomb:
More: <hr />I heard the magical word "robe".
so, what about robes, cloaks and coats? what about hoods?<hr />We have those.
Pre-order plz.
More: <hr />
are there helmets that works as a hat? (as in it doesn't cover the entire face, like in NWN1)<hr />Helmets that work like hats? Yes. Even better, we have hats.
Pimp hats with feathers.
Get your friends to pre-order, too.
More: <hr />You sure that you are a Production Tester?<hr />I am a name, not a number.
More: <hr />It would be awesome if someone at Gen Con (hint hint) would take a picture of the Duelist during character creation, preferably a male human. That is the BEST costume in the game, hands down.<hr />This is the truth.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">George Ziets, Designer</font>
Resting Animations (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492289&post=4256586&forum=95&highlight=)
In fact, there is a kneeling animation in the build now. (It's more of an on-one-knee thing, but it does give a visual cue that you're resting.)
I kinda hated the stand-up-rest thing too, and the programmers kindly changed it. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Erik Novales, Programmer</font>
Can 2das be 32 chars long? (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=491517&post=4256367&forum=100&highlight=)
All resrefs in the game are 32 characters now.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Anthony Davis, Programmer</font>
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) part 2 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492293&post=4256162&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />Hey Patrick,
What is this a picture of: Click Here (http://gallery.usticke.org/v/gaming/gcnwn2/CIMG3590.JPG.html)<hr />I'm not Patrick, but I can tell you what that is...for a price.
Just kidding!
That is the OLD Party Selection screen. The new party selection screen is still living in my code tree on my machine.
More: <hr />There was another thread in the past couple days where a dev mentioned about the game fonts. What I'd like to know is if we can change the fonts of the game (dialogs, descriptions, etc.) using the toolset or script or 2da? At best, I'd like to change the font "per item" or conversation so I can use different language sets, but maybe they only support game wide font changing. It'd be cool to know.
Cheers and thanks!!!
Sessh<hr />That was me.
Basically, there is a fontfamily.xml in the UI directory which defines the font families.
For example, Code: View Post/Code in separate window (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/viewcodepost.html?post=4256171)<hr />
You can just go change that file and every GUI that use the NWN2Dialog fontfamily will change.
edit:
that didn't take well in the code window..oh well you get the idea.
The style sections of the font family have dual functionality.
1. You can use them to specify the bold, italic, etc for a font so that the game will automatically know which font to use for a BOLD markup tag or something.
2. Or, it can be used as a specific entry, for example, I have a button let's say, that I want to use a specific font ina specific family, I can do:
fontfamily="Custom_1" style="1" (or "normal")
Anyway, that's just an example.
More: I would bet that someone who was sufficently clever could do that through the script functions to hide and show GUI and through use of the font family functionality. I don't know for sure, but I bet it would be possible.
More: <hr />Can you have more then one quickbar on the screen at a time. I have a large screen and have plenty of space. If no would be great for an expansion.
Looks great devs. Keep up the great work.<hr />No, that is the hotbar we are shipping with (minus maybe some art tweaks). However, this is one of the simpler things to change in the GUI so I expect people will be changing that to meet their own tastes.
More: <hr />The constant switching of 2das seems like a pretty serious issue to me. That is how it works, isn't it?<hr />Is this addressed to me?
More: <hr />Woohoo, austicke is on fire. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
<hr />- I took a few pictures of drow skin color options. There's a lot.<hr />Thanks a lot for that. I’ve got an entire community waiting for those. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif
<hr />- The 3d character portraits are not animated; they're static pictures. Ryan said it was originally considered, but it took up too much overhead.<hr />Ah drat, that’s too bad. Maybe it should be an option for those with the machine to handle it? Future proofing and all. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif
<hr />- Gnolls are in. I have pictures.<hr />Yay, that means I don’t have to tint orcs brown or something silly like that. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
<hr />I think [the elves seeming fat is] a combination of warping due to the curvature of the screen and the monitor being widescreen.<hr />Does that mean that NWN2 has no proper widescreen support? http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_frown.gif
Please, somebody tell me that NWN2 has proper widescreen support…
Love -x-x-x-
Shir'le<hr />Of course we do support widescreen.
The bottom line is that our females are a little 'hippy'. Personally, I likes me a woman with some meat on her bones, but I do see the point that the elves are supposed to be more slender.
The reason, without getting into too much technical detail is that our elves and humans use the same skeletons and the human females were made to be... robust.
More: <hr />Thanks for the answers to that 2da question.
I Have another one though. There aren't any screenshots yet that show some appearance options for human/planetouched characters. I'm sure they'll be up eventually, but untill then, here's my question; Is it possible to make young looking human/planetouched characters (around 17-28)? Considering that NWN1 had 2 faces like this, I wouldn't normally be very concerned. But none of the screenshots so far look like that, and in DDO everyone looked like they were 40+ whether they wanted to or not (not by the same people, but it still has me freaking out). Also, when you think about it 2 faces isn't very much compared to how many faces they had...<hr />I think most of the heads look like they span the range from 18 to 30. It is kind of subjective though.
More: <hr />Will that be a problem that persists? Or is it the sort of thing we will help you fix from Monday, when BETA starts?<hr />It is not a problem 'techincally'. This is a design choice. That is what our females will look like. There are hundreds of animations tied to those skeletons and it cannot be changed at this juncture. I know some of you disagree, and we do hear you, and your points, believe me.
I think people usually will find that once you get your dress, robe, or armor on that it won't be an issue anymore though.
More: <hr /><hr />I think people usually will find that once you get your dress, robe, or armor on that it won't be an issue anymore though.<hr />Wait, does that mean that anyone who wants to play a female character will be forced to be fat? I'm fine with them not being crazy-thin like in most games, but how would an adventurer manage to become fat? Feasting on the remains of all those orcs they slay?
So no ones offended, by "fat" I'm talking about the 160+ range.
I Hope you just mean healthy, 'cause it seems a little unfair if they really are all over-weight/obese.<hr />They don't look FAT in the game. They look like they could actually inflict some damage if the punched you.
Well hopefull there will be more material released soon theat will help. Seeing things in motion is a lot better.
More: <hr /><hr /><hr />Quote: ....<hr />Helmets that work like hats? Yes. Even better, we have hats.
Pimp hats with feathers.
Get your friends to pre-order, too.<hr />hah that won't be a problem http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
Need to get those pimpin' hats. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_cool.gif<hr />It would be awesome if someone at Gen Con (hint hint) would take a picture of the Duelist during character creation, preferably a male human. That is the BEST costume in the game, hands down.
note:
We realize you cannot choose a prestige class during character generation, but you do get to see them in a stylized outfit if you click on them.
Trust me, I wrote it.
More: <hr />It's disturbing to be forced to see this ugly artwork.<hr />
http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_cry.gif
That is my tear for you. I think the game looks awesome, and it gets better everyday.
More: <hr /><hr /><hr />I'm hoping a Dev. pipes in to say that is an old rendition of the grass and it looks much better now.<hr />Lol, that is so... old.
When you know the answer already, why bother posting comments like that. I'm sorry but in my humble opinion that represents and extremely bad taste of humour... Intentional or not.
Anyway, it's a great thing that people like austicke exists and let the world know of the hottest nwn2 news bits! Thanks a lot http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif
-Flendil<hr />I guess it's possible that they've redone every single texture since the version that is being demoed at Gen-Con, but I highly doubt that ALL the artwork is redone. There's a chance that the grass in that picture hasn't been redone and that we're actually looking at the way it's going to be.
I'm hoping that is "old" grass, but we have to admit there's a possibility that isn't old grass. A Dev could clear it up.
cdaulepp<hr />About the grass, I don't know (I'm not an artist). However, it is quite possible that many thigns are different and changed even from the build that is present currently at GenCon.
Changes sit in the queue to get into the build. I myself am sitting on almost a weeks worth of GUI work that no one outside of Obsidian has seen.
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) part 2 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492293&post=4256627&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr /><hr /><hr />Guys, the photographs are distorted by the camera lens. You are viewing the screen through a convex distortion, so everything appears slightly wider than reality.
The female characters are not fat. They look like they're Xena-ish - possibly a little trimmer.
<hr />Wait, so now all the females are made by a real life black female standart (I read it's avearge 160 lb on 5'5 or something) ? http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_eek.gif This is disturbing news indeed. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_look.gif <hr />How exactly is that "disturbing"?<hr />It's disturbing to be forced to see this ugly artwork.<hr />What's this good for? You are not forced to see anything, besides, it was explained already that the photographs are distorted by the camera lens, so this is not what the artwork looks like anyway.<hr />They are 'hippy', don't get me wrong. They are not fat however. Again though, this is all subjective. If we all agreed on what was fat and what was thin, no one would have anorexia/bullemia OR we ALL would have it.
Finally, seeing the game in motion is different from seeing photos from a screen.
More: Actually, a lot of the prestige classes have need costumes. The weapon master looks cool, as does the NW9. The Arcane Archer looks nice as well...
The duelist though, there is something DASHING about the outfit, and I don't say that lightly.
More: <hr /><hr /><hr />Yes, I am forced, because I will be buying and playing this game anyway. I know it's a messed up photos, but my thoughts were in the reply to Dev comment about the females in the game being muscular/overweight/fat.<hr />But the Dev actually said that they were NOT fat.
Am I misreading something here, or you?<hr />He said they were "hippy". To me and many people I know >120 is fat. This is subjective indeed. I was not going to argue about personal preference.
I was just quite surprised because in most of the games the females are made by a "Holywood" type, so why did Obsidian stepped out of this scheme.<hr />Your points and observations ARE valid. Many games do take the Hollywood route. Our artists tried something different. *shrug*, I like it - but you mileage may vary.
Again, it is a subjective thing, and it is a preference thing.
More: <hr />I don't like the female models, they look like transvestites.<hr />
http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif
Whether I agree or not, that made me laugh.
More: <hr />Okay, I've tried to fix the lensing in one of the photographs of a female player.
http://www.jessesky.com/femalefix.jpg
That looks pretty accurate to me - devs or austicke correct me, otherwise
In any case, I think that body type is very appealing for a female adventurer. Those of you who think all elves should be petite and waif-like have apparently never read the Silmarillion..<hr />That is pretty accurate. Wow, nice job straightening it out.
Discipline and parry? (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492316&post=4256663&forum=95&highlight=)
I don't know if these have changed or not. I wasn't the programmer who worked on these skills.
Maybe when Josh gets back he can talk about this.
Diety Selection part 4 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=491924&post=4256649&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />The GenCon pictures show that the deity lists have just a short paragraph description for each deity, plus their portfolio (or, at least, for the deities depicted that's how it went).<hr />and an Icon! Don't forget the little picture!
Josh did a really good job setting up the deity list 2da. It has a lot of room for expansion, both from the community and from the industry.
More: <hr />a deity icon? I hope someday that they change as you fall in and out of favor with your deity. Id love to see Lolth smile at my Drizzy clone....
potato<hr />I might have chosen a poor term. In our world, Icon == Image.
You have an image column in the 2da so you can specify the image for the deity that shows up in the character screen and character generation.
More: <hr />I so wanna make myself a god. A little neat photo of myself and a sweet description of my ultimate divine powers of hellish destruction. That is possible right? I seemed to understand that you could add your own images to the 2da.<hr />Yes...and I must admit this venue for rampant egoism being unleashed on the mod community was something I did not predict when I helped Josh do this...
JOSH! WHAT HAVE YOUR UNHOLY HANDS WROUGHT?!
http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_cry.gif
More: <hr />Making yourself a god in Nwn 2 might just carve out its own nitch in the Geek hierarchy list. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_razz.gif<hr />As long as Josh and I get credit for this new found ability when it reaches the wiki or wherever else this kind of thing gets recorded.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Rich Taylor, Programmer</font>
NWN2 GUI - Script Interaction (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=477320&post=4256512&forum=100&highlight=)
Sorry, I've been quite swamped, so I haven't been able to comment much on this.
Regarding the "gui_" prefix, the discussion in this thread on the subject clearly explain how it is a viable security measure. Not to say additional options won't be added down the line, but I'm pretty comfortable shipping with the "gui_" prefix security measure for now. Scripters can just implement whatever security they feel is appropriate in the "gui_*" script, and have that script fire off the non-GUI level scripts as appropriate.
One thing new I don't remember if I've mentioned yet is that it is now possible to send parameters back to the script that is being executed. I don't have time to go into details on that right now, but it is completely possible to prompt the user with a GUI (Say an input box for example), have them type something in and hit enter, and have a script fire on the server with the string the user typed in as a parameter to that script.
GUI/Script interaction is something I'm hoping to have the chance to explore further for post-release content. :) I just wanted to make sure that the basics were in place by the release version.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">J.E. Sawyer, Lead Designer</font>
Exclusive NEW screens @ nwn2news (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492108&post=4256455&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />Also, it looks like the hair is rendering with a 1-bit alpha. Are there any plans to include an 8-bit alpha in the final build? I think it would look a lot better.<hr />This was a topic of great debate. 8-bit alpha would look much better, of course. Adam Brennecke can probably explain why we chose to go with the 1-bit alpha (read: performance reasons).
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Patrick K Mills, Production Tester</font>
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492213&post=4256052&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />- PC buffs are displayed just like in NWN1 -- with icons in the upper right hand corner of the screen. I took pictures of it which I'll upload tonight. The icons are color though. They don't have tooltips when you hove the mouse over them, but Ryan thought it should be added and said he would look into it.<hr />Also, most buffs and debuffs display a "frame effect" on impact with the target. A little icon that floats up above the character. Tooltips on the status effects things is actually just broken right now, it's normally in and working.
<hr />- Resting is now done standing up. Ryan said resting is so quick, there's no sense sitting down.<hr />In the build after that one characters now kneel down when they rest. It looks cool.
<hr />- I took pictures of all the nwscript constants -- and there's a lot of them! Who's going to type that up? http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif I noticed a few epic constants, so perhaps the NWN1 constants are still included?<hr /> At least with spell scripts, which is what I'm in charge of, I've removed none of the old constants, though I only use a few of them. The old stuff has helpful placeholder VFX & sound that play when an old constant is called, so if you have scripts you want to use it's easy to load them up in game and quickly determine which constants need to be changed and which I've updated.
More: <hr />words<hr />What makes you think we removed keyboard shortcuts?
One of the design goals of our UI was that it should be possible for someone to play entirely with the mouse, since this was something people had asked for. The design goal was not to force people to play JUST with the mouse.
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) part 2 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492293&post=4256166&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />Hey Patrick,
What is this a picture of: Click Here (http://gallery.usticke.org/v/gaming/gcnwn2/CIMG3590.JPG.html)
cdaulepp<hr />Party roster, allows you to pick who will be in your party. GUI there is temp as far as I'm aware.
More: <hr />So Tattoo colors are reglemented by eye colors. are tatoos toggleable?<hr />They are on a per-head basis. Some heads have tats, some don't.
You call these horns? (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492240&post=4256502&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />yeah, i preferred the art style of the nwn ones. These look more kinky than demonic.<hr />This is a bad thing?
My female tiefling bard is named "Cutie Buttonhead." Cause she's cute.
There are a variety of horns. Sadly, we don't have any big ram horns, but it *would* have looked pretty silly.
More: <hr />Now about those tails and hooves instead of horns, care to give a comment about those?<hr />:smokebomb:
More: <hr />I heard the magical word "robe".
so, what about robes, cloaks and coats? what about hoods?<hr />We have those.
Pre-order plz.
More: <hr />
are there helmets that works as a hat? (as in it doesn't cover the entire face, like in NWN1)<hr />Helmets that work like hats? Yes. Even better, we have hats.
Pimp hats with feathers.
Get your friends to pre-order, too.
More: <hr />You sure that you are a Production Tester?<hr />I am a name, not a number.
More: <hr />It would be awesome if someone at Gen Con (hint hint) would take a picture of the Duelist during character creation, preferably a male human. That is the BEST costume in the game, hands down.<hr />This is the truth.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">George Ziets, Designer</font>
Resting Animations (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492289&post=4256586&forum=95&highlight=)
In fact, there is a kneeling animation in the build now. (It's more of an on-one-knee thing, but it does give a visual cue that you're resting.)
I kinda hated the stand-up-rest thing too, and the programmers kindly changed it. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Erik Novales, Programmer</font>
Can 2das be 32 chars long? (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=491517&post=4256367&forum=100&highlight=)
All resrefs in the game are 32 characters now.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Anthony Davis, Programmer</font>
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) part 2 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492293&post=4256162&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />Hey Patrick,
What is this a picture of: Click Here (http://gallery.usticke.org/v/gaming/gcnwn2/CIMG3590.JPG.html)<hr />I'm not Patrick, but I can tell you what that is...for a price.
Just kidding!
That is the OLD Party Selection screen. The new party selection screen is still living in my code tree on my machine.
More: <hr />There was another thread in the past couple days where a dev mentioned about the game fonts. What I'd like to know is if we can change the fonts of the game (dialogs, descriptions, etc.) using the toolset or script or 2da? At best, I'd like to change the font "per item" or conversation so I can use different language sets, but maybe they only support game wide font changing. It'd be cool to know.
Cheers and thanks!!!
Sessh<hr />That was me.
Basically, there is a fontfamily.xml in the UI directory which defines the font families.
For example, Code: View Post/Code in separate window (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/viewcodepost.html?post=4256171)<hr />
You can just go change that file and every GUI that use the NWN2Dialog fontfamily will change.
edit:
that didn't take well in the code window..oh well you get the idea.
The style sections of the font family have dual functionality.
1. You can use them to specify the bold, italic, etc for a font so that the game will automatically know which font to use for a BOLD markup tag or something.
2. Or, it can be used as a specific entry, for example, I have a button let's say, that I want to use a specific font ina specific family, I can do:
fontfamily="Custom_1" style="1" (or "normal")
Anyway, that's just an example.
More: I would bet that someone who was sufficently clever could do that through the script functions to hide and show GUI and through use of the font family functionality. I don't know for sure, but I bet it would be possible.
More: <hr />Can you have more then one quickbar on the screen at a time. I have a large screen and have plenty of space. If no would be great for an expansion.
Looks great devs. Keep up the great work.<hr />No, that is the hotbar we are shipping with (minus maybe some art tweaks). However, this is one of the simpler things to change in the GUI so I expect people will be changing that to meet their own tastes.
More: <hr />The constant switching of 2das seems like a pretty serious issue to me. That is how it works, isn't it?<hr />Is this addressed to me?
More: <hr />Woohoo, austicke is on fire. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
<hr />- I took a few pictures of drow skin color options. There's a lot.<hr />Thanks a lot for that. I’ve got an entire community waiting for those. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif
<hr />- The 3d character portraits are not animated; they're static pictures. Ryan said it was originally considered, but it took up too much overhead.<hr />Ah drat, that’s too bad. Maybe it should be an option for those with the machine to handle it? Future proofing and all. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif
<hr />- Gnolls are in. I have pictures.<hr />Yay, that means I don’t have to tint orcs brown or something silly like that. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
<hr />I think [the elves seeming fat is] a combination of warping due to the curvature of the screen and the monitor being widescreen.<hr />Does that mean that NWN2 has no proper widescreen support? http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_frown.gif
Please, somebody tell me that NWN2 has proper widescreen support…
Love -x-x-x-
Shir'le<hr />Of course we do support widescreen.
The bottom line is that our females are a little 'hippy'. Personally, I likes me a woman with some meat on her bones, but I do see the point that the elves are supposed to be more slender.
The reason, without getting into too much technical detail is that our elves and humans use the same skeletons and the human females were made to be... robust.
More: <hr />Thanks for the answers to that 2da question.
I Have another one though. There aren't any screenshots yet that show some appearance options for human/planetouched characters. I'm sure they'll be up eventually, but untill then, here's my question; Is it possible to make young looking human/planetouched characters (around 17-28)? Considering that NWN1 had 2 faces like this, I wouldn't normally be very concerned. But none of the screenshots so far look like that, and in DDO everyone looked like they were 40+ whether they wanted to or not (not by the same people, but it still has me freaking out). Also, when you think about it 2 faces isn't very much compared to how many faces they had...<hr />I think most of the heads look like they span the range from 18 to 30. It is kind of subjective though.
More: <hr />Will that be a problem that persists? Or is it the sort of thing we will help you fix from Monday, when BETA starts?<hr />It is not a problem 'techincally'. This is a design choice. That is what our females will look like. There are hundreds of animations tied to those skeletons and it cannot be changed at this juncture. I know some of you disagree, and we do hear you, and your points, believe me.
I think people usually will find that once you get your dress, robe, or armor on that it won't be an issue anymore though.
More: <hr /><hr />I think people usually will find that once you get your dress, robe, or armor on that it won't be an issue anymore though.<hr />Wait, does that mean that anyone who wants to play a female character will be forced to be fat? I'm fine with them not being crazy-thin like in most games, but how would an adventurer manage to become fat? Feasting on the remains of all those orcs they slay?
So no ones offended, by "fat" I'm talking about the 160+ range.
I Hope you just mean healthy, 'cause it seems a little unfair if they really are all over-weight/obese.<hr />They don't look FAT in the game. They look like they could actually inflict some damage if the punched you.
Well hopefull there will be more material released soon theat will help. Seeing things in motion is a lot better.
More: <hr /><hr /><hr />Quote: ....<hr />Helmets that work like hats? Yes. Even better, we have hats.
Pimp hats with feathers.
Get your friends to pre-order, too.<hr />hah that won't be a problem http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif
Need to get those pimpin' hats. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_cool.gif<hr />It would be awesome if someone at Gen Con (hint hint) would take a picture of the Duelist during character creation, preferably a male human. That is the BEST costume in the game, hands down.
note:
We realize you cannot choose a prestige class during character generation, but you do get to see them in a stylized outfit if you click on them.
Trust me, I wrote it.
More: <hr />It's disturbing to be forced to see this ugly artwork.<hr />
http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_cry.gif
That is my tear for you. I think the game looks awesome, and it gets better everyday.
More: <hr /><hr /><hr />I'm hoping a Dev. pipes in to say that is an old rendition of the grass and it looks much better now.<hr />Lol, that is so... old.
When you know the answer already, why bother posting comments like that. I'm sorry but in my humble opinion that represents and extremely bad taste of humour... Intentional or not.
Anyway, it's a great thing that people like austicke exists and let the world know of the hottest nwn2 news bits! Thanks a lot http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif
-Flendil<hr />I guess it's possible that they've redone every single texture since the version that is being demoed at Gen-Con, but I highly doubt that ALL the artwork is redone. There's a chance that the grass in that picture hasn't been redone and that we're actually looking at the way it's going to be.
I'm hoping that is "old" grass, but we have to admit there's a possibility that isn't old grass. A Dev could clear it up.
cdaulepp<hr />About the grass, I don't know (I'm not an artist). However, it is quite possible that many thigns are different and changed even from the build that is present currently at GenCon.
Changes sit in the queue to get into the build. I myself am sitting on almost a weeks worth of GUI work that no one outside of Obsidian has seen.
Gen Con Pictures (from NWN2Wiki) part 2 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492293&post=4256627&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr /><hr /><hr />Guys, the photographs are distorted by the camera lens. You are viewing the screen through a convex distortion, so everything appears slightly wider than reality.
The female characters are not fat. They look like they're Xena-ish - possibly a little trimmer.
<hr />Wait, so now all the females are made by a real life black female standart (I read it's avearge 160 lb on 5'5 or something) ? http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_eek.gif This is disturbing news indeed. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_look.gif <hr />How exactly is that "disturbing"?<hr />It's disturbing to be forced to see this ugly artwork.<hr />What's this good for? You are not forced to see anything, besides, it was explained already that the photographs are distorted by the camera lens, so this is not what the artwork looks like anyway.<hr />They are 'hippy', don't get me wrong. They are not fat however. Again though, this is all subjective. If we all agreed on what was fat and what was thin, no one would have anorexia/bullemia OR we ALL would have it.
Finally, seeing the game in motion is different from seeing photos from a screen.
More: Actually, a lot of the prestige classes have need costumes. The weapon master looks cool, as does the NW9. The Arcane Archer looks nice as well...
The duelist though, there is something DASHING about the outfit, and I don't say that lightly.
More: <hr /><hr /><hr />Yes, I am forced, because I will be buying and playing this game anyway. I know it's a messed up photos, but my thoughts were in the reply to Dev comment about the females in the game being muscular/overweight/fat.<hr />But the Dev actually said that they were NOT fat.
Am I misreading something here, or you?<hr />He said they were "hippy". To me and many people I know >120 is fat. This is subjective indeed. I was not going to argue about personal preference.
I was just quite surprised because in most of the games the females are made by a "Holywood" type, so why did Obsidian stepped out of this scheme.<hr />Your points and observations ARE valid. Many games do take the Hollywood route. Our artists tried something different. *shrug*, I like it - but you mileage may vary.
Again, it is a subjective thing, and it is a preference thing.
More: <hr />I don't like the female models, they look like transvestites.<hr />
http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif
Whether I agree or not, that made me laugh.
More: <hr />Okay, I've tried to fix the lensing in one of the photographs of a female player.
http://www.jessesky.com/femalefix.jpg
That looks pretty accurate to me - devs or austicke correct me, otherwise
In any case, I think that body type is very appealing for a female adventurer. Those of you who think all elves should be petite and waif-like have apparently never read the Silmarillion..<hr />That is pretty accurate. Wow, nice job straightening it out.
Discipline and parry? (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=492316&post=4256663&forum=95&highlight=)
I don't know if these have changed or not. I wasn't the programmer who worked on these skills.
Maybe when Josh gets back he can talk about this.
Diety Selection part 4 (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=491924&post=4256649&forum=95&highlight=)
<hr />The GenCon pictures show that the deity lists have just a short paragraph description for each deity, plus their portfolio (or, at least, for the deities depicted that's how it went).<hr />and an Icon! Don't forget the little picture!
Josh did a really good job setting up the deity list 2da. It has a lot of room for expansion, both from the community and from the industry.
More: <hr />a deity icon? I hope someday that they change as you fall in and out of favor with your deity. Id love to see Lolth smile at my Drizzy clone....
potato<hr />I might have chosen a poor term. In our world, Icon == Image.
You have an image column in the 2da so you can specify the image for the deity that shows up in the character screen and character generation.
More: <hr />I so wanna make myself a god. A little neat photo of myself and a sweet description of my ultimate divine powers of hellish destruction. That is possible right? I seemed to understand that you could add your own images to the 2da.<hr />Yes...and I must admit this venue for rampant egoism being unleashed on the mod community was something I did not predict when I helped Josh do this...
JOSH! WHAT HAVE YOUR UNHOLY HANDS WROUGHT?!
http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_cry.gif
More: <hr />Making yourself a god in Nwn 2 might just carve out its own nitch in the Geek hierarchy list. http://forums.bioware.com/_commonext/images/smiles/icon_razz.gif<hr />As long as Josh and I get credit for this new found ability when it reaches the wiki or wherever else this kind of thing gets recorded.
<font size="3" face="Verdana, Arial" color="#cc6600">Rich Taylor, Programmer</font>
NWN2 GUI - Script Interaction (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com//forums/viewpost.html?topic=477320&post=4256512&forum=100&highlight=)
Sorry, I've been quite swamped, so I haven't been able to comment much on this.
Regarding the "gui_" prefix, the discussion in this thread on the subject clearly explain how it is a viable security measure. Not to say additional options won't be added down the line, but I'm pretty comfortable shipping with the "gui_" prefix security measure for now. Scripters can just implement whatever security they feel is appropriate in the "gui_*" script, and have that script fire off the non-GUI level scripts as appropriate.
One thing new I don't remember if I've mentioned yet is that it is now possible to send parameters back to the script that is being executed. I don't have time to go into details on that right now, but it is completely possible to prompt the user with a GUI (Say an input box for example), have them type something in and hit enter, and have a script fire on the server with the string the user typed in as a parameter to that script.
GUI/Script interaction is something I'm hoping to have the chance to explore further for post-release content. :) I just wanted to make sure that the basics were in place by the release version.