Neverwinter Nights: The Blades of Netheril Announced

Remember when you played the original Neverwinter Nights campaign and thought it could be going places? And then Shadows of Undrentide arrived and you didn’t play it because everyone was saying it was short and not very good? And then when you did play Hordes of the Underdark by importing your OC character, it kept making references to things you had no knowledge of?

And then you went back and played SoU after all, and it turned out that it had no connection to the OC whatsoever, and this was the character you were supposed to be playing in HotU? And that made you feel like you just got swindled?

Well, Luke Scull, who you may know for his work on a number of premium Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2 modules, including Darkness over Daggerford and Mysteries of Westgate, is about to right this terrible injustice, two decades after Neverwinter Nights’ original release.

To that end, he has announced The Blades of Netheril, a direct continuation of the NWN OC. This upcoming unofficial sequel will be split into three chapters, each clocking at roughly 20 hours of gameplay. The first of them is currently slated for a June 18, 2022 release.

Here’s the announcement itself:

Fantasy author and Ossian Studios lead designer Luke Scull is thrilled to announce The Blades of Netheril, an unofficial sequel to the Neverwinter Nights original campaign! The story is a direct continuation of the Wailing Death storyline. Cast out in disgrace and erased from Neverwinter’s history, the hero is thrust into a struggle between ancient powers that could ultimately rewrite the fate of Faerûn. Familiar faces will return alongside new allies and enemies as the player embarks on an epic quest that is both world-changing and deeply personal.

The Blades of Netheril will be split into three chapters each approaching an expansion in scope. Each chapter will include:

• 20+ hours of gameplay
• A fully narrated intro cinematic
• Deadly new monsters to fight
• New portraits and a gorgeous world map
• New music
• The level of quality one would expect from an official campaign or premium module

The first chapter begins in Skullport, also known as the Port of Shadows—a city of slavers, monsters and villains festering far below Waterdeep. Waking up in a dark cell with no memory of they how they came to be there, the hero will discover a dark conspiracy that spans the breadth of the Forgotten Realms.

As well as acting as a direct sequel to the original campaign, The Blades of Netheril will serve as a sequel to Shadows of Undrentide, Hordes of the Underdark, and Luke’s previous AL series of modules.

The first chapter of the Blades of Netheril is targeting a release date of June 18th, 2022—exactly 20 years after Neverwinter Nights was originally released on Microsoft Windows. Subsequent chapters will follow six to 12 months later.

The Blades of Netheril is currently planned to be available free for owners of Neverwinter Nights Enhanced Edition on Windows/Mac OS X, while other versions may follow later. Multiplayer is planned but may be added post-release.