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I've also discovered that reguardless of what anyone on any boards has to say no one will ever be truly happy. Some like it, some love it, some hate, and some are way too critical(myself included). And to Rahvin there' are no other games like BG out there, so give PS:T a whirl. I know I would if I could find it.

Ok, while we are on the subject of the single player story let me say a few things, I totaly agree with everyone who said that is lacks personality and I also think it lacks any realism. I realize this is fantasy, but even fanstasy has to make some sense. I mean seriously, the world is about to come to an end and the only person that can stop it is you, a nobody, just another adventurer hired by the good people of NW. If there was a call for adventurers you would think that someone with a bit more skills then you would show up to save the world. Atleast in BG there was a reason why you and only you was the one involved in the story. In Torment there was a reason why you and only you was the one involved in a story (I mean how many immortal amnesiacs are there). Hell even Arcanum had a reason for you being in the center of the plot. I realise that some of you don't need a reason other then money or that you will be doing a good thing. I mean money is good, but not every adventurer is out to get rich, and certainly not every adventurer is the type to do things just because it's the right thing to do.

I play the game realtime because I want to be prepared for multiplayer. The only time I pause is when I'm going AFK. The game is still too damn easy.

I use the SHIFT hotkeys for buff spells and the CTRL hotkeys for (spontaneous) cure spells (and a few henchmen commands since Tomi is an idiot). The regular hotkeys I use for battle stuff: club & shield, bow, best healing potion, turn undead, the rest is combat spells. You don't have many options anyway; shoot stuff, bash stuff, cast spells at stuff. All buff spells can be cast right after resting, since you know the next battle is only minutes away.

Originally posted by Xyx
I use the SHIFT hotkeys for buff spells and the CTRL hotkeys for (spontaneous) cure spells (and a few henchmen commands since Tomi is an idiot). The regular hotkeys I use for battle stuff: club & shield, bow, best healing potion, turn undead, the rest is combat spells. You don't have many options anyway; shoot stuff, bash stuff, cast spells at stuff. All buff spells can be cast right after resting, since you know the next battle is only minutes away.

Actually, you *do* have many options; it's just that you want to play things your way, @Xyx, and I have no problems with this. But to deny that your character has many options and that some people would object to playing the game in realtime flies in the face of fact. Bioware maintained for over a year that only realtime was needed and sent NWN to its beta testers without a pause control. The majority of the beta testers said the game was unplayable because they couldn't pause and figure which weapon, spell, or item they needed, or where it was hotkeyed, while they were being attacked by four melee monsters and another was casting spells. So pause was placed in.

You're not wrong, but please, don't assume that your views are the only ones that are right. We're talking about a spectrum of opinions, each one accurate *for that particular player.*

I want more hotkeys! 36 is not enough! =(

-Cross

Originally posted by Crosswind
I want more hotkeys! 36 is not enough! =(

With the pause/stop game we have now, I certainly didn't find it enough; had it been realtime, I wouldn't have used more than 10 hotkeys at most, and complained about far too little time and too many choices (especially when the pathing and AI of assisting characters, henchmen, summoned creatures and such, are really bad). I doubt I would have played NWN for more than a day, in fact, had it been in realtime. I wouldn't have enjoyed trying to help out panthers get stuck in doorways, henchmen who ignored spellcasters and summoned creatures who stood around, oblivious despite being ordered to attack. It's hard enough making my assistants' actions bearable with the game in its pauseable state at the moment.

But like I said earlier in this thread, my main objection to the game was the numbing boredom introduced by repetitive gameplay. Walk from hall into room, kill things, look for tiny bits of treasure, heal, walk into next room, kill things, look for tiny bits of treasure, heal, etc. It was, as I remarked earlier, all too like the kind of early dungeon hack-style game that PS:T satirized in the Modron Maze.

I'm currently playing a legit beta of IWD2, and find myself in the amazing position of loving the game after NWN. Bioware has really done something well--for BIS.

hey fable I know this is kinda off the topic but I was just wondering is IWD2 a game that is more like IWD1 or BG or is it somewhere in between?

I think you guys are giving Bioware too much credit for the BG games. Bioware created the Infinity Engine, that was a lot of their contribution to the original BG, Black Isle Studios had as much to do with creating the game. Look at Icewind Dale, it was more similar to BG than NWN, although purposely more of a hack and slash game. In fact it was the lawsuit over Icewind Dale that caused Bioware to switch publishers. Interplay and Black Isle Studios created Icewind Dale using the IE but didnt cut Bioware in on it and this caused the problem. Hehe Im probably gonna get flamed for this but oh well.

@Ares, post your question up in the IWD2 area and I'll answer it. @Mathurin, the BG series *was* Bioware's. They wrote it, they built it, from start to finish.

Hmm. I was always under the impression that Black Isle had as much to do with it. Oh well.

Originally posted by Mathurin
Hmm. I was always under the impression that Black Isle had as much to do with it. Oh well.

BIS did PS:T and IWD 1/2.

Add one more to the hate list:

15 MB save files.

15 MB save files.

yeah I have several saved files they range anywhere from 9 to 25MB, I have a total of 7 saved files for a combined 100MB of space. Good thing I have a 40GB hard drive.

Originally posted by fable


BIS did PS:T and IWD 1/2.

Yeah that much I knew . IWD 1 is what got Interplay in trouble in the first place since they failed to credit Bioware for the use of the Infinity Engine.

Originally posted by Mathurin


Yeah that much I knew . IWD 1 is what got Interplay in trouble in the first place since they failed to credit Bioware for the use of the Infinity Engine.

Huh? They pre-marketed IWD as using Bioware's Infinity Engine. There was never any problem, because Interplay had made an arrangement to license the engine for several of BIS' games, including IWD, PS:T, and their followups.

I just got the game this week and am at the beginning of Chapter 1 now.

My first impressions are:

The 'Look' - I find the graphics way too cartoonish, which detracts from the 'seriousness' and, hence, the realism of the game. The IE games, with their elaborately-detailed hand-drawn art, had a deliberateness to them which significantly enchanced the seriousness of the undertaking, which greatly contributed to the sense of realism these games achieved. This sense of realism is lacking so far in NWN, I feel. Having read many of the posts in this thread concerning the shallowness of the story-line, I fear this may not improve as the game progresses.

This isn't to say that I'm not enjoying the game. It's more the feeling of "How do you top the epic grandeur of BG/SoA/ToB? Well, obviously, you don't." NWN reminds me of Dungeon Siege, except with a story thrown in for good measure.

The Interface - these right-click satellite menus are goofy enough but the multi-layers of transparency makes them even worse. The right-click context menu system in PoR2 (say what you will about the game itself) was much better than this.

Well, that's my initial gripes. I'm looking forward to an enjoyable romp, nonetheless. Coming off of 6 weeks of Morrowind, everything else is bound to pale a bit by comparison, I realize.

Originally posted by fable
Actually, you *do* have many options

Pray, tell me then, what options *do* I have besides...

• whacking stuff normally
• whacking stuff in a different way (with Feats)
• shooting stuff
• toasting stuff with spells

Can't walk around too much or I'll get pounded with Attacks of Opportunity. Can't set up good formations because the henchman AI simply doesn't give a d@mn and the fighting "animation" causes my character to sidestep into doorways and in between enemies.

Basically, I have the same set of options Diablo II gave me. Didn't hear anyone complain about that being realtime.

Originally posted by Nygma
15 MB save files.

The game saves the whole module.

*** possible minor Chapter 2 spoilers ***

Right. I complete this dumb druid circle / spirit of the wood quest, and the head honcho druid gets all high and mighty on me, saying he won't give me the promised reward. I'm like "No way!", he's like "Bite me!", so I rest, buff, save and start kicking his butt.

Nothing happens! He just stands there taking zero damage per hit. Doesn't even get angry and fight back. I stop attacking (it's obviously not working) and find out I can still talk to him, after which he thanks me for one of the rescues!

What is this? Diablo!? That's just lame for a supposedly "revolutionary" role-play-ing game.

Some time later, I mess up settling a dispute between the Port Last harbor master and a ship captain. The captain refuses to help poor, suffering Neverwinter and starts to walk out. I decide to run after him and "apply some pressure". I follow him out, but when I reemerge outside he's nowhere to be found. Vanished into thin air! Very funny, Bio!

My problems with NwN are as follows:

Needing someone to disarm traps totally limits my choices of Henchman. I wouldn't mind if there were just fewer traps.

I am currently playing through the game in multiplayer as a Barbarian, it is amusing enough but the most important thing for me is depriving my LAN colleague from getting the next plot item that will get me the most money...something i hate doing but i find it's the only incentive.

Killing hordes of enemies is very tiresome, and all for what exactly? I couldn't give a monkeys about the plot really, not one moment in this game have i felt anything for the characters

Spoiler

i didn't care about Desthers betrayal, Fenthick(just put a p and an r in there somewhere ) was totally uninteresting, and Aribeth is pathetically incompetent...

My main concern at the moment is taking the game for as much cash as i can, which for a Neutral Good Half Elf Fighter/Cleric is somewhat of a contradiction.

One of the things i enjoyed about BG2 was the sheer amount of replayability, i played through that game time after time enjoying it over and over again.

I actually prefer the plot of BG and IWD over BG2 and this trend is continued through to NwN.

At the moment tinkering with the Toolset is the most fun, although i haven't got much of a handle on scripting yet. A few things bug me about the toolset like the tilesets not being interchangable and things like that...

I agree that the plot is not all that compelling. Of these types of games, I find the personal journeys are much, much more interesting. I found Icewind Dale somewhat of a bore it's just a dungeon crawl with no real interest. Tell me again, why do I care about this hapless town in the middle of nowhere?

The Planescape:Torment and BG series were much, much more interesting, because the game is all about YOU, your main character. P:T is a great mystery, you want to learn who you are, where you came from, why you must do what it is you're doing. In BG, you want to learn why everyone wants to kill you, you want to get your soul back and gain immortality/live a normal life. The NPC interaction in those games adds a great deal of depth that NWN and IWD lack.