Dhruin
SasqWatch
My recollection is that they want to do an MMO but don't have the resources, so they took the world design and lore and used it to create a single-player open-world RPG in the setting they want to use later for the MMO. So there is a connection, in the same sense that there's a connection between KOTOR and the Old Republic MMO.
Sort of right, sort of wrong.
Ken Rolston was hired Big Huge Games (who were owned by THQ) to make an open-world CRPG. THQ hit financial trouble and wanted to close or sell the studio. 38 Studios bought BHG and got the Big Huge RPG with it.
38 Studios does indeed have the resources and is building an MMO (Project Copernicus) but sees the Big Huge RPG as an entry-point game, so Big Huge Games retrofitted the Copernicus lore into the game.
I'm sure Schilling has input but the design was well under way before the studio was bought, so I doubt there are too many MMO design elements -- unless Rolston made it that way in the first place. Of course, we don't know for sure.
Given that Schilling has his dream MMO in production, I would suggest this is still mostly Rolston's game with some Salvatore lore and McFarlane art shoved in.