Over the weekend, I bought Neverwinter Nights 2. Not because I really want to play the game (though I will), but because I want to teach myself how to use the scenario creator to write my own adventures.
I’m not sure NWN2’s editor is what I’m looking for; it doesn’t have that sense of freedom while editing that I’d like. I would prefer to edit things in a sort of “god” mode – quickly sketch the layout of the rooms in an overhead view (as this editor does allow), but then walk around inside the room, placing things so they look good from the player’s perspective.
And a word on that perspective – as an MMO player, what I really want is a camera that just follows what I do, turns with me, and basically disappears – I never want to have to fight the camera to make it see something my character would be able to see. Fights are so frustrating.
I did with the editor what everyone probably does with it first – make a room, then place nice stuff in it. My first room was also filled with monsters, that attacked each other and the Dungeon Master character I’d placed in it. That didn’t really work. My second room (above) just had one monster that I could experiment with – Badger Jones is his name.
It’s going to take a fair amount of practice before I can even START with the real things I want to explore in an MMO setting. I’m still not even sure I shouldn’t be using the Unreal 2 scenario creator, as it looks to be more in sync with the tools used by actual MMO developers.