Co-op Neverwinter RPG Announced For 2011

Atari and Cryptic Studios are teaming up to make a new Dungeons & Dragons-based RPG called Neverwinter, planned for Q4 2011. Gameplay will center on five-person groups that can include other players and/or AI allies, and there will be an extensive content generation system. Gamespot spoke with Cryptic CEO Jack Emmert, who explained parts of the game in more depth: "I think there are two very unique gameplay elements in 4th Edition that we've done something interesting with: action points and healing surges. In the tabletop game, an action point lets a player perform a reroll or add an additional die to a roll. In our game, action points are earned through combat and spent to power special abilities called 'boons.' These boons give players special boosts, but only in certain circumstances. Healing surges represent the amount of times a player can heal himself before resting. In D&D and Neverwinter, various abilities let players use a surge immediately or perhaps replenish the number of surges available. It's a precious resource that players will need to husband as they adventure in the brave new world. Positioning, flanking, tactics, and using powers with your teammates are also all things that come from the 4th Edition that are interesting. Of course, we're using power names and trying to keep power behavior consistent with the pen-and-paper counterparts. Neverwinter will definitely feel familiar to anyone who has played the 4th Edition."

Comments

Re:4th Edition?

[geminidomino]

I wish I still had people like that to game with.

Every group I've been part of in the past decade or so (before I finally threw in the towel) would have just killed the cultist, stashed the body, and then killed the contact.

And then demand extra XP for being "clever."

4e as a computer game - Yeah Right

[dmgxmichael]

4e may copy the feel of WoW, but it's Magic: The Gathering at it's heart. As a foundation for a computer game it's a hopeless joke. Over a third of the powers in the game "interrupt" another power. That's great for a table top game, but every one of them will have to be rewritten for a computer game in real time. By the time they are done with it they're going to have a new system in place entirely.