Neverwinter Nights 1 Area Design

This post is just about the visual aspects of area design and tilesets. It is not about area design as it pertains to combat encounters, quest structure or anything like that. What concerns me here is aesthetics, and aesthetics alone.

The area design in Ossian's Darkness Over Daggerford is covered in detail in this post.

There are aspects of DoD that I dislike (its cutscenes, its itemization) and aspects that I appreciate (its charming writing, its characterizations, its theme music, and its world map). But one thing I also appreciate, which I have not commented on enough, is its outstanding area design. The main thing that separates DoD's areas from most (not all) amateur-made ones is the density of buildings, gentle undulation of terrain, and emphasis on elevation (cliffs).

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe terrain undulation was made possible through the DLA-built TNO tilesets that came out later in Aurora's lifespan, and whose concept has since been expanded upon by many tileset designers. The OC, in contrast, mostly has flat areas whose tiers are accessed by means of primitive triangular ramps.

A tiered district in the Original Campaign (ramps)

The placeable density is also increased in DoD. There are more trees, shrubs, flowers, livestock, wildlife and man-made objects populating the areas. This makes each area more interesting to explore, and adds more texture, depth and color to them as well. There are also many placeables on placeables. Another thing is the lightning. Aurora isn't very powerful in regard to lightning and shadows, but still, some of DoD's areas harness its potential in that respect.

What follows are zoomed out, in-game screencaps of the following areas from DoD's world map:

The City of Daggerford, main hub of the campaign:

It's worth pointing out the density of the buildings:

The Docks of Daggerford:

Note the placeable density.

Western Farmlands:

This is the first example of subtle, sloping terrain. This adds a lot to the realism of wilderness areas.

Eastern Farmlands:

The Eastern Farmlands are one of the most atmospheric areas on Aurora: the wheel of the mill creaking as it's gently turned by the water flowing down the stream.

Gillian's Hill:

This is another charming area with subtle, sloping terrain.

Lonely Barrens:

A tower encircled by a moat. It's notable how many of DoD's areas employ strips of water to carve an area up and add detail. It makes a big difference.

Brush of Barbs:

There is more to this area than meets the eye. Let's peel off some of the thick canopy and have look underneath it:

These are basically tunnels. Tunnels which are blocked by spider webs that need to be pulled down in order to progress.

There is a mini-Stone Henge as well (wildflowers and butterflies):

Wild Hills:

This is one of my fave areas in DoD: narrow, natural bridges and curvy staircases leading into caves:

Wild Pastures:

Again, it's not dead-flat.

Lizard Marsh:

Is there a swamp on Aurora that looks better than the above? Note the inclusion of taller trees. 

Lizardfolk Village:

Note the custom huts.

Blade Cliffs:

I like how the bridge extends out to the fortress. Nice shipwreck, too.

Crab's Claw Coast:

These two coastal areas have a similar atmosphere to the ones in Baldur's Gate. Yes, the sandbars can be walked upon; they lead to secret caves (one of which is a smuggler's base).

Trollbark Forest:

Again, there are taller trees and a babbling brook running through the zone.

Liam's Hold:

Throw in the OST, throw in the ambience of the wind blowing the leaves, wait for the rain to start falling, and this place feels like home.

Note the wildflowers hedging the tents, stone walls and treeline of the forest. You just don't see such simple but effective touches in most modules.

Each and every area in DoD is of the same visual quality, and there is a sense of consistency in its landscape. We don't have snow here and then suddenly desert there because its scope is limited: swamp aside, it's basically the same climate throughout, with vegetation only differing slightly. The architecture is consistent as well; it all fits and nothing looks out of place.

Now, I mentioned lighting earlier. Lighting and shadows can add a lot to mood. If every area sports similar lighting, or stock lighting, then there is little mood and the areas look washed out and generic. This is something that almost no builder pays attention to, maybe because it's not easy to get right. But take a look at the dimly-lit Stop Hole Abbey in Daggerford city:

Not only does it convey the appropriate mood (the proprietor, who can barely be seen here, is under-handed and cunning), but darkening the area also conceals the low polygon count and low resolution of the textures to a degree. Another effect that can be achieved through limited lightning is silhouetting. Again, it adds greatly to mood. 

Let's now take a look at the most well-trodden urban zones in Fairloch of the Aielund Saga...

Note the snow accumulating around the buildings. It's winter. Later in the campaign, spring breaks , the snow melts and the city feels different (as do some of its outlying areas; they are transformed).

... and Darromar of Crimson Tides of Tethyr:

Now, compare that with the Babylon tileset as employed in Swordflight's Calimport:

Note the glow around the base of the Temple of Helm. A really nice touch.

The contrast between OC-ish tilesets and the custom tileset is quite stark, isn't it? To be fair to the latter two, Calimport is Arabian-esque, the latter are Euro-medieval, and there were no custom tilesets for Euro-medieval when the latter were built.

Let's do Aielund and CToT some justice, since they both exhibit custom tilesets that many people don't know about.

Check out, for example, the recent change made by Savant to the Stoneguard mountains in Aielund's Act II:

That is epic. This is what the mountain range looked like pre-v3.0 [pic]. It's just OC-level "flat-tiering".

The above tileset reminds me of Bedine terrains. This is Tel-Badir:

The abyss in Swordflight Ch.III is also quite complex in respect to terrain shaping and deformation:

Here we have the smooth and elegant Elven City Tileset representing Suldanessellar in CToT: 

It provides a great sense of elevation:

The opulent interiors are nice, too:

CToT is an old module, one of the first epics on Aurora, so alazander deserves credit for employing a custom tileset. I don't know who originally created the tileset.

There is also some interesting area design in Elventree of Tyrants of the Moonsea:

For me, it evokes DragonLance.

Elven city tileset employed by the Aielund Saga (removed in v.3.0):

 As we can see, even just with a small sample such as this, a lot has been done on Aurora in regards to area design and custom tileset employment. Despite the copy-paste, comparitively inflexible  nature of tilesets (in comparison to NWN2's terrain sculpting), builders have managed to make many of their areas unique, interesting and visually appealing, thanks to the tileset designers. 

Overall, I would say that, of the campaigns I have played, the Babylon tileset is probably the most striking and memorable of the urban-themed tilesets, and its employment in Swordflight Ch.II results in a masterpiece of urban sprawl. Couple that with the amount of questing available in Calimport, and we've got one of the best urban hubs in cRPG history.

In regards to wilderness area design, though, I think DoD's areas are the best from a visual and atmospheric standpoint, but they are smaller -- and DoD itself is small compared to the panoramic vistas that are the Aielund and Swordflight campaigns. Still, from what I've shown here, I think we can admit that DoD is something special, and the FR Trilogy has its visual highlights, too.

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