Reply With QuoteGreat. By the time he's done, NWN 2 will be fully patched, playable, and cheap. I'll pick it up then.
Great. By the time he's done, NWN 2 will be fully patched, playable, and cheap. I'll pick it up then.
I'm betting the AI will still be retarded.
Great idea - fuck up both franchises at once!
This will get canned by legal if it starts to look promising. Atari owns BG3 and will protect the name, no if ands or buts.
Galder's Bate 3?
I bet J.E. Sawyer was pretty pissed when his Jefferson got canned forever when he was at Black Isle. Remaking it as a NWN2 mod is pretty cool though since professional developer level mods (or personal projects) are rare to see.
Except this isn't just anyone doing it. It's being done by, uh, the original designer of BG3.
Who, I bet, kinda has a head start. Also being the lead designer on NWN2 and all.
Which is completely and totally cool. Hopefully Obsidian/Atari doesn't squat on him, but based on his posts it sounds like he's already sounded out legal about it (can only use design docs he wrote, no art assets, etc)
It doesn't look like he intends to use that name, particularly since the game was only loosely related to the BG franchise. He could call it "The Black Hound" (which was the planned subtitle) or the article also mentions "The Black Hand." Keep in mind that at the time Interplay had to use the "Baldur's Gate" name because all they were allowed to do was continue existing series. Sawyer was very clear in all his comments back then that the game was not an actual sequel, though I suspect they might have thrown in some sort of reference or two just to ensure no issues.Originally Posted by Kunikos
Whatever happens to the "Baldur's Gate" name in the future it is very doubtful that it will involve Sawyer's story.
I'm only bummed because of his "1 to 3 years" estimate of completion.
Oops on "The Black Hand". In the process of typing "The Black Hound" my brain reinterpreted Nick Cave's "Red Right Hand" that I was listening to and came up with that bastardised error. Apologies for any confusion.
Anyway, I can't see this as anything but good. Josh had some nice ideas (particularly for complex dialogue through various tags and factional recognition) for Jefferson/BG3/The Black Hand. He has a clear headstart (all design docs done, all dialogue written, lead designer on Jefferson and (for part of) NWN2. He has clearly run the idea past Feargus (or someone appropriate) because he says the Guard Dog cleared it, which also seems to indicate to me he is taking this endeavour seriously, even though it's just a private pet project.
From Atari's point of view, surely it's just another NWN2 mod - the BG3 connection was never officially acknowledged by anyone that counts and Josh will never mention it.
NWN1/2 was pretty much designed to be used as a photo copier of Wizards of the Coast property. Atari hasn't squashed remakes of ToEE or Dragonball Z on NWN. With Atari, BioWare and WotC all having a stake in the profits and success of NWN2, I'd think Sawyer would get nothing but a thumbs up. But he probably won't use the BG name because, well it's not really BG3 is it since "BG3" is nothing but a way to market a game.
Sarkus is right. The only reason TBH was called Baldur's Gate 3 was that Interplay was only allowed to make Forgotten Realms games that carried the name Baldur's Gate or Icewind Dale.
There are some connections to Icewind Dale 2, though. Maralie Fiddlebender, the gnome narrator of IWD2 has moved to Dalelands (the area where The Black Hound is set).
This is why Neverwinter Nights absolutely rocks. In two years there would be like 50 solid new games and mods, just using a new game.
I will wait for this project, hope it can be done.
Last edited by Acosta; 01-10-2007 at 02:51 AM.
Well, it's something to hope for but in the more immediate future the Pools of Radiance Remastered and Planescape Trilogy mods will keep fans of NWN2 mods happy. PRR has hit beta status for Chapter 1 and should release at the end of this month, and PT's Chapter 1: Purgatorio should release in the next month or two. By the time those two mods are finished up for their series, we'll have two separate campaigns available for players of NWN2 besides the original one.
There is some debate over whether they had IWD rights or not at the end. I read the SEC filings for Interplay in those years and it was clear to me that the deal they had with TSR/WOTC/Hasbro/Atari said they had to choose one franchise to continue after a certain point. When they discontinued work on Jefferson it was pretty clear that they had lost the right to do "Baldur's Gate" on PC (though they were still allowed to do the second Baldur's Gate console game). I don't think they had IWD rights at that point because if they had why wouldn't they have finished Jefferson as an IWD title? Instead they suspended work altogether on it and started working on Fallout 3.
What those SEC filings also revealed is that at the time of the NWN to Atari deal, Interplay was significantly behind on royalty payements to Atari. That likely continued after that as well and probably was the reason why they lost D&D PC rights when they did. I'm guessing Atari said something like "you haven't paid us for months so we are revoking either console or PC rights - your choice." They choose to sacrifice PC rights and that's when Feargus Urqhart left and Black Isle began to disintegrate.
Yeah, they chose BG: Dark Alliance over BG3 even though the latter had much more name recognition, would have been finished at the same time and would have sold more. :(
Wow. Wow. Wow.
...and in 3 years, the NWN2 engine will probably be patched enough to do this mod justice, too! Give me click and drag infinity engine style controls plz.
Wow, that is great. I can't wait to try it. (and hey, maybe NWN2 will be playable by then)
http://www.crsponseller.com/images/theblackhound.jpg
old art for the Black Hound when it was in dev at BIS. Cool :)
I can't believe it's been this long. I guess Sawyer is waiting until MotB is out the door before even thinking about this one at this point. Has anyone heard anything new about the Black Hound?
Nope, and I was actually researching it a little yesterday or the day before.
Shit, I would pay for it as the first Premium module for NWN2. :)
He always said it was going to be a private project and that it would take quite a while, perhaps even a year or two.
I thought it would have been neat for Obsidian to do it as an "official" product, perhaps as something released for free. However, there may be legal issues with who owns it that might restrict Obsidian but not Sawyer as an individual releasing it for free.
Nobody owns it; there is no registered IP for it (other than it being set in the FR and using D&D). There were good Premium modules for NWN1 (not always developed by Bioware), so I don't see why they couldn't do the same for NWN2. DLA did the Wyvern Crown of Cormyr, AFAIK, nothing to do with Bioware except maybe QA. DLA did say that they had such a bad experience working with Bioware, Atari, and Wizards on both the IP and QA side of things that they would never, ever, do it again.
About time someone made a bald mod for BG.
Please read the thread before posting. It has nothing to do with Baldur's Gate other than FR and D&D. Black Isle was only allowed to make FR/D&D games under the Baldur's Gate name so that's the only reason it was originally called BG3.
I'm not saying it's licensed but its my understanding from various sources that when ideas are used for a particular project, even if it never gets released, that those ideas can then belong to the company you were working for. In that sense Interplay could theoretically sue Obsidian/Atari if they released something that was close to Sawyer's original concept. However, a free module done by a private individual for no profit would likely be protected. That's why all the remake mods are protected and why stuff like the KOTOR2 project have been allowed to continue.
Now you might argue that if Sawyer can do it why can't Obsidian do it as a free mod and I would tend to agree, though I suppose that Obsidian would indirectly profit and as a for profit company their legal staus and rights are different than those of a private individual.
Or Obsidian can just modify it to pass the 10% rule, which bypasses it all neatly. Instead of the Black Hound, it's the Black Wolf and the character and plot are sufficiently different enough to pass in court.
See Capcom vs SNK in the late 80's.
You could but most of the interest in this is to see what they missed. My guess is that most people who care about it don't want it modified.
Truthfully, I doubt it would cost Obsidian/Atari much to buy the rights from Interplay but then again even spending $25k for it might be more than it's worth for a mod.
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