Baldursgate compatible

Stilgar · Post by **Stilgar** » Fri Apr 30, 2004 1:51 am

Here at Atari they are talking about NWN being Baldur´s Gate compatible what is meant by this?

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Fri Apr 30, 2004 4:18 am

For some reason I think Atari have been left back in time

Waaay back in time, there were plans for making NwN compatible with BG2 so you could import your character from BG2 into NwN.

Now many things happened in the development of NwN which made this impossible, most obvious where:

- High level in BG2 and especially in BG2: ToB

-Changing of D&D rules from 2.edition to 3.edition. This meant new character creation, development and the introduction of skill/feat system. And 3.edition had a max level of 20 which clashed with the levels attainable in BG2/ToB.

-Another Graphics engine

Now all these things ment that the only thing you could import would be your name. And thus importing from BG2 was scrapped (thank god - imo

).

But ....
What Atari means by writing "BG2 Compatible" on their own product, I can't be sure of (mail them and ask

) - but my guess is, that it is an un-updated description of NwN from way back in time, when the import of characters were planned, and they have simply forgotten to remove it.

There is no such link between (the released) NwN and BG2 that I have seen/heard/read.

ZealZilla · Post by **ZealZilla** » Sat May 01, 2004 7:33 am

Importing and Exporting a character has nothing to do with graphics engine.

A character is built using math and stastics that operates within the limits of certain rules. These rules have changed in NWN, and i'm sure that's why they chose not to make them compatible with NWN.

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Sat May 01, 2004 7:41 am

There is a big difference between the 2D graphics engine from BG2 and 3D engine from NwN.

To convert the 2D characters models into the 3D models/skin would take more work then simply creating new models/skin. It would requiere them to take all character possiblities from BG2 and create models/skins for them in NwN, and then possible make extras.
And this convertion is neasecary if importing into NwN from BG2, because there would be no fun in importing a character, if he didn't look the same.

It would take a lot of work.

ZealZilla · Post by **ZealZilla** » Sat May 01, 2004 8:19 am

No, they would use the models found in NWN. They would use the data from BG2 and convert them to a NWN model. To what extend we're talking only they can say. Probably, importing items would be problematic as i'm sure BG2 has items unique to BG2 only. However, raw character data would be very simple if both games used the same rulebook.

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Sat May 01, 2004 8:37 am

Changing from 2D drawn characters in one graphics engine to 3D mesh/skin models in another engine isn't mearly a matter of taking some numbers and putting them into a new graphics engine. It takes quite an amount of work to develop compability between two different ways of handeling and displaying such information.

Bioware themselves even mentions in their FAQ that the graphics engine is one of the reasons (amongst the others I mentioned in my first post) that they skipped import.

ZealZilla · Post by **ZealZilla** » Sat May 01, 2004 8:59 am

I'm not talking about converting anything. I'm not talking about models or anything. I'm talking about the raw character data that exists in all BG2 export files.

All the character models and everything is already in NWN. For example if i want to create a character that's stastically identical to a character i made in BG2, it would be easy as hell to simply generate a character based on these stats. So i could begin a game in NWN as a 10 level monk. The export files tells the game to create a NWN monk with 14 STR, 16 DEX, XXXX amount of dextery, these skills, and those feats. Probably that monk would have to start with a clean inventory. There's no 2d-3d conversion involved at all. This is NOT the kind of export and important you do in BG2, but it's easy as hell to implement.

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Sat May 01, 2004 10:06 am

You are right that the staticstically data (strenght, constitution etc) are all plain numbers, but there is more to importing a character.

Importing and Exporting a character has nothing to do with graphics engine.

Importing a character from one game to another also means keeping "appearance"/look and not only statistics. The character you import should look (graphically) like the one you export.

That is the reason why graphics enginens (and especially shifting from 2D characters to 3D characters) have something to do with import/export also. And then it takes time to build up a compability.

ZealZilla · Post by **ZealZilla** » Sat May 01, 2004 10:42 am

I'm not talking about that kind of importing. A monk imported from BG2 wouldn't look like a monk from BG2 but like a monk from NWN.

Xandax · Post by **Xandax** » Sat May 01, 2004 11:38 am

Well - that was what I was talking about when mentioning that the graphics engine was one reason for why importing characters were cut from NwN.
Because it would be time consuming and not very cost-effective to create a compability between the character looks of BG2 and the character looks/models of NwN.

ZealZilla · Post by **ZealZilla** » Sun May 02, 2004 9:34 am

You can't read? Re-read what i just said. It meant use the existing character models in NWN, NO CONVERTING NEEDED.

Rob-hin · Post by **Rob-hin** » Sun May 02, 2004 11:48 am

Xandax, I think ZealZilla mean taking a characters stat's from BG to NwN. Not clothing or items, just stats and skills etc. Skin etc can be newly selected by the player when creating the "new" character.

ZealZilla, this is not possible since a character has gotten to strong in BG. For instance, every 4 levels you can raise your stats with 1 point. So your character would have higher stat's then a new one made in NwN. Plus there would be issues since BG is 2 ed. rules and NwN is 3 ed. rules. Some skills or feats existed in Bg but are deleted in NwN.

lancelot10911 · Post by **lancelot10911** » Sun May 02, 2004 11:47 pm

No. Even items could be compatible. Characters and items such as weapons/clothing etc. wouldnt have a BG2 look, but all there stats, names etc. could be imported to NWN without even entering into the graphics engine.
I imagine the game code for items and characters is written standard, thus anything has a)properties, and b)graphics.
Xandax is right in that originally I think they were planning to somehow make it a STRAIGHT transfer of characters/items into NWN. My how times change in the computer world though. Hee heee. Graphics engine updates make it impossible. You are both right.

Noober · Post by **Noober** » Mon May 03, 2004 12:04 am

There would be quite a few problems with converting items. One of them would be magic resistance. In BG magic resistance is based on percentages, rather then spell resistance which is based on checks. Another example is Robe of Vecna. How do you get NWN to reduce casting time by 4 (especially since that mechanic doesn't exist)?

In BG2 during random load screens it says somthing like "You will be able to import your BG2 character into the upcoming game Neverwinter Nights".

ZealZilla · Post by **ZealZilla** » Mon May 03, 2004 3:29 am

Noober, if you read my first posts i already stated that it was not possible since NWN uses a different rulebook than Baldur's Gate 2, this essentially makes importing impossible unless a middle way is acceptable, other than that you understood me perfectly.

Noober · Post by **Noober** » Mon May 03, 2004 4:09 am

My most sincere apologies, I was merely responding to the post above.

lancelot10911 · Post by **lancelot10911** » Mon May 03, 2004 8:31 pm

What Im saying is, that was what game designers were toying with before deciding (probably), not to interface BG2 with neverwinter.
Even though these engines are not compatible, they would have to script the neverwinter game code to "re-format" BG2 items and characters. Its not impossible AT ALL. My best friend (I am 39 and so is he), majored in computer language, and has some long assed name for making computer languages talk to each other. This is what would have to be done. Its a long drawn out process and probably not worth their time to convert BG2 code into the neverwinter engine. It is however, NOT impossible
Anything coming from BG2 would have to enter a de-coder prog, reassigned neverwinter code (using the new ruleset), then placed into the working program. Its a pain in the arse.