Yes, it's time to have a look at MMOs again, particularly of the free-to-play kind and specifically the last big profile title that came out, Cryptic's Neverwinter.
Neverwinter is a name well-recognized to PC Gamers; an expansion of Dungeon & Dragons (DnD), it became popular thanks to the two Neverwinter Nights games, developed by Bioware and Obsidian respectively. The question Cryptic had to answer in developing this title, however, was simple: with Dungeons & Dragons: Online (DDO) already on the scene and well-established, what new could they do with the game?
Apparently the answer to this was to simply not make a DnD game, which isn't as bad as it sounds. The developers decided to make a far more traditional MMORPG that follows most of the conventions of the genre and just wrap it in a nice DnD bow.
So, if players expected this to be DDO 2, it's not. The relationship between DDO and Neverwinter is more akin to that of City of Heroes and DC Universe Online; roughly the same setting, roughly the same
feel, but entirely different games.
Neverwinter does away with the dice roll and the dungeon master voice-overs and instead plays it fairly straight. Character customization is rich and features all the major races and classes and their respective perks, from the reliable humans to the devilishly fast and accurate halflings and from warrior tanks to healing clerics and deadly rogues. There are also plenty of cosmetic and lore-related additions, such as religion and place of birth to help with immersion and RPing.
Once the game's intro, which serves as the tutorial passes, the deal is fairly standard: talk to people with exclamation marks over their heads, do some
busy-work, fight some bad guys, earn loot. Quests are divided into main
and secondary; the main quests tie together in the form of a storyline, that's choke-full of distractions and ultimately forgettable. There is also a noticeable lack of
secondary quests, with most of them being just mini-tutorials to new skills or game features.
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| Protector's Enclave is the main safe-zone where all activities outside combat take place. |
Party-questing, while rare outside of special dungeons, works
surprisingly well and makes all members feel organic to combat. Sadly
the same can't be said about dungeon exploration, as in its effort to
balance out teaming and soloing, the game almost eliminates traps and
door switches and loot chests. They exist, but can either be opened by
non-specialized classes using "kits" or don't impact the game as much as they should.
On the bright side, it's one of the few newer RPGs where the various potions matter and can impact gameplay significantly, while the addition of portable altars is a genre staple I haven't seen in a while. The portable altars are necessary for creating rest zones to heal in the midst of the bigger dungeons and make a great and helpful addition, as Neverwinter is also the first RPG in a while not to feature regenerating health in or out of combat.
During the sixty levels leading up to the endgame, the players will fight thugs and beasts, clear plenty of dungeons, hunt for loot and travel to the various districts of Neverwinter. As they grow more powerful they will gain access to more features, such as professions, pets and later mounts to make traversing the bigger maps easier.
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| Using a Portable Altar to rest before a tough battle. |
What really stands out in all of this and it's where Cryptic really takes heavy liberties with the title is the combat system. Cryptic has a knack for a more direct, action system (also see: Champions Online) and they
implemented one in Neverwinter as well. This is what most DnD fans will
find jarring, but it'd be unfair to simply write it off as
"casual-friendly".
It's a system that demands constant player involvement and attention, as encounters rely on the proper use of different attacks, dodging and blocking. Other action-oriented MMOs also feature similar block/dodge functions, but they are usually to guard specifically from heavy enemy attacks.
Where Neverwinter differs is that timing is of the essence, as is choosing whether to sacrifice a guard for an attack and vice-versa, which actually makes it possible to leave any encounter completely unscathed and victorious. As blocking relies on stamina/mana (depending on class), it's not a magic shield button and fights are both exciting and present a genuine challenge, especially since the player can't auto-heal in-between encounters.
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| Combat relies heavily on timing attacks and senseless button mashing is guaranteed to get you killed. |
There are three types of actions: basic, heavy and "super". The basic attacks are assigned to the mouse buttons and do most of the hack and slash. The heavy actions are more traditional RPG attacks and buffs, slotted in the hotbar and with a cool-down time. Finally the "super-moves" can turn the tide of an encounter and rely on action points that need to be accumulated by defeating enemies.
The hotbar has a limited number of slots and as such players will need to choose what actions fit them and their roles and make the best builds possible for their play-style.
Cryptic has done an admirable job delivering on the aesthetics of Neverwinter. The look and feel of the game, the music and the sound all fit the theme and setting perfectly, while the developers clearly know and care deeply about DnD, with pages of lore noted down on the journal for creating context and helping the players understand the world they play in.
Having said that, my biggest problem with the game comes from the lacking content. Calling it meager would be an exaggeration and there's definitely a lot to do until one hits end-game, but the problem is that most of it is just the same thing.
The way the game progresses is extremely formulaic and becomes repetitive fairly early on, but the thing that's sorely missing is the sense of an open-world available for exploration. Neverwinter, the region, feels small and completely staged by some unseen god that decides who should stand where and what they should be doing.
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| There are well-written journal entries to flesh out the game world. |
Perhaps there is a technical justification behind this recent trend
of fragmenting the game-world of MMORPGs into zones. However, one of the biggest appeals of
any fantasy-setting and especially a slow-building RPG is the option to
explore that setting.
That's the reason why I can play a vacuous game like Perfect World International or why I kept going back to
that grind-fest that was Lineage II back in its prime. I loathed the
game mechanics, but taking a wrong turn I could end up walking for hours
on-end on new and exciting areas without the game spitefully directing
me to them. That's also why every now and then I pop in Skyrim, even
though I'm a fairly outspoken detractor of the game.
The
only MMO I remember working Zones properly was City of Heroes and
that's because every zone of Paragon City was designed as its own mini-game
world, complete with NPCs and enemies interacting with one another, making it feel like an actual living city instead of a theater stage where everyone had their role.
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| The mini-map is the sole means of moving from district-to-district, making the game-world feel small. |
Considering that Neverwinter also suffers from fairly unimaginative
dungeons, which is a problem for a game with the Dungeons & Dragons
monicker, the zones just shrink the scale of the game and make it feel a lot less impressive than it should.
But speaking of dungeons, special nod has to be given to the Foundry. The Foundry is a collection of quests made by the players themselves using the game's mission architecture tools. It's a great idea very much in line with the title's DnD origins, as it puts the players in the role of the Dungeon Master and lets them shape their games as they see fit. Its importance isn't just theoretical either; two months into the game and the Foundry features several excellent quests by a very imaginative community with knowledge of and love for DnD lore and beyond. They stand tall above the official dungeons and have unofficially tasked the community with providing new and exciting mission content for the endgame portion, making a good deal of the game self-sustained.
Neverwinter is not original, for the most part anyway. But that doesn't mean it's lazy or generic. By its very nature, the game is a double-edged sword, because of the legacy it carries. Most western PC RPGs have been defined by classic DnD and most of their mechanics and design philosophy are a direct adaptation of the table-top game.
Let's not forget that major RPGs today, such as the Ultima series and even The Elder Scrolls were originally custom DnD games the original developers used to play in their free time. Any electronic RP experience with the DnD monicker is doomed to live in the shadow of its imitators, while at the same time being unable to innovate in fear it will stray too far from the source material.
Add to that the existence of DDO as a "proper" MMO DnD and the burden of accessibility for new-comers; a major concern for a free-to-play title like Neverwinter which can only survive via a large player-base that will invest in microtransactions. As such, it cannot be judged too harshly for its deviations from standard DnD mechanics.
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| The user-friendly Foundry menu, where user-made quests are listed. |
Its combat system is engaging and its world well-realized. The lack of content, which may be countered with expansions, is an issue and while it's not terrible at it, the game also doesn't feature the best microtransactions system I've seen either.
But for all its problems, there is great potential. The real question that remains to be answered is why would anyone pick Neverwinter over another fantasy MMORPG they're more familiar with and currently I don't think the answer is in Cryptic's favor. But at the same time, if one gets into it, there's not much reason to leave Neverwinter either.
The vanilla game is available for free and no purchases are required to genuinely affect the gameplay experience. It's well-worth trying out, if you're hungry for a free, high-fantasy RPG online experience with some legacy behind it. Cautiously recommended.
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| A rest zone amidst the haunted Neverdeath Graveyard. Lots of quest-givers, too. |
"D&D: NEVERWINTER" was developed by Cryptic Studios and published by Perfect World Entertainment.
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