Game News NWN2 updates continue apace

[suibhne]

Tags: Neverwinter Nights 2; Obsidian Entertainment

Yes, it's one-day-old news, but I figured it was worth posting: despite the naysaying of naysayers, <a href="http://www.obsidianent.com/">Obsidian</a>'s overseas RPG-coding child-labor sweatshops are still toiling away at <a href="http://www.atari.com/nwn2/">Neverwinter Nights 2</a>. Monday night's patch brings the game up to <a href="http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=545765&forum=109">1.04 (and some other small numbers)</a>, adding new features and fixing bugs and errors in the game, the toolset, and the DM client.
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Check out <a href="http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=545765&forum=109">the release thread</a> for the full changelog. I've long bewailed the unreliability of modal actions in both NWN and NWN2, so these fixes particularly stuck out at me:
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<blockquote>• All combat modes can now be triggered instantly, except for Parry, Rapid Shot, and Flurry of Blows, which are deferred until the beginning of the next round.
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o Your pending combat modes are now displayed on the action queue UI, with a countdown ticker, tooltip, and mouse click support.
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o You can now toggle of and off a pending combat mode.</blockquote>
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Not much snarky to say, really. I'm glad to see the continuing commitment to fixing the game.
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Spotted at: <A HREF="http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=545765&forum=109">NWN2 forums</A>

 

[sheek]

Are there any NWN2 combat videos I can see? I'm still considering buying this, for the mods but not if combat is as shitty as the first game.

Also is it possible to slow down the combat below the default speed?

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

Combat is pretty much the same. Though, it may just be me, but it seems a bit faster.

 

[suibhne]

I find the combat both more frustrating and more satisfying than the first one - more frustrating because of the bone-stupid companion AI, but also much more interesting because of the greater tactical considerations offered by controlling an entire party. Aside from those two changes, it's pretty much the same system as the original NWN - RTwP, but round-based and with an action queue.

 

[sheek]

So you can't adjust combat speed?

 

[suibhne]

It's not Myth. :wink:

 

[Volourn]

Admiral 4 THA W!

Now, there ar eonly 2 fixes for the toolset i want, and thousands of fixes for MP.

Plus, the fans better get crackin' on user made on. Only one 'full' module out and it was rather dissapointing (and, subsequently overrated) by fanboys.

 

[sheek]

It's not Myth. :wink:

It's a pretty obvious feature to have. How can you make use of the tactical options if people are dying every few seconds?

 

[mister lamat]

So you can't adjust combat speed?

if you turn on all the lighting options and graphic shaders it runs like a fat kid... that kinda slows the combat down some.

It's a pretty obvious feature to have. How can you make use of the tactical options if people are dying every few seconds?

they don't really get killed every few seconds, it moves at a pretty decent pace to be honest. it's more focused on prep and position rather than reaction. most of the fights are determined in the opening salvo rather than minor adjustments and a good chunk of them are screwed over by moving your avatar to the front of the pack for 'dialogue'.

wait til they box it with an expansion or two. a lot of the mods are still pretty shit anyways.

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

It's not Myth. :wink:

It's a pretty obvious feature to have. How can you make use of the tactical options if people are dying every few seconds?

You won't have any such problems in the OC, believe me.

 

[Volourn]

Unless you are a pussy who sucks at video games.

 

[sheek]

OK, I just saw some videos with fireballs going off in all directions, monsters being summoned, NPCs moving around and all kind of shit. Maybe I'll just stay away from the high-level characters. NWN1 had not too awful combat right at the beginning.

 

[Volourn]

That's why there's a pause button. Also, NWN1's combat liekjly doens't seem as fast because you only need to control one character (with some order giving for npcs); but if you are trying to control npcs in NWN2 like you would in an IE game than, yeah, you should be using pause.

 

[sheek]

Good point. I dislike having to pause the game constantly, I shouldn't need to that's just bad design. Either have turn based, adjustable speed real-time or last option auto-pause at end of round.

 

[Durwyn]

A little bit too actiony for me... Even though i'm playing character-diplomat, smooth talker, for which battle is the last option, i still must fuck with many battles. Action-RPG i say, but enjoyable, in the end.

 

[Volourn]

"I shouldn't need to that's just bad design"

Bullshit. It's BRILLANT design.


"Action-RPG i say, but enjoyable, in the end."

No. It's an RPG. Period. Whetehr a game has lots of combat or not is irrelevant to whether or not it's an Action RPG or a RPG.

 

[Baphomet]

• Script Debugger - The NWN2 script debugger has been included with this version. It is located in the Utils directory, filename DebugServer.exe.

Spiffy!!

 

[suibhne]

Good catch, Baphomet. That really is a nice step forward.

 

[Elwro]

Obsidian does a horrible job communicating with CD Projekt. Our distributor sent the localised files for 1.03 before Christmas. Then, supposedly, there were some problems and we were supposed to get 1.03 with 1.04 at the same day as everyone else. But last Friday Obsidian sent CDP... a whole new master with 1.04 integrated into it, while they were supposed just to send the patch. What's more, the 1.04 version (which CDP subsequently "stripped" from the master) does not include corrections to numerous translation bugs CDP made, and then corrected for 1.03.
As it is, one fan has checked more than 16.000 audio samples and provided a patch fixing all audio problems in the Polish version of NWN2. (E.g. involivng sounds from NWN). Yeah, a fan, in his free time.
Due to Obsidian's being unprofessional, we still can't play on any international servers. Way to show they care for their paying customers.

 

[Texas Red]

At first I was a NWN 2 OC fanboy but now I realise that I was wrong. The moral choises and skills checks were excellent. But I just cant imagine myself going through those endless tunnels upon tunnels of effortless orcs with those huge piles of loot that I have to constantly monitor any time soon.

God damnit, those orc dungeons have to be the worst designed areas in a long time. What were they thinking?! Bunch of lazy developers.

And unfortunetly those are not the worst dungeons. The warehouse thing gave me brain AIDS.

 

[suibhne]

The warehouse and the long merchant's house "dungeons" (around the same time) were the worst in the entire game. Ugh.

 

[Texas Red]

The warehouse and the long merchant's house "dungeons" (around the same time) were the worst in the entire game. Ugh.

And that area had ridiculous lagg as well. Even when I decreased everything it was still barely playeable. And apperantly the beta testers never noticed the enemies popping up right in front of your nose.

 

[Elwro]

Uh, I thought that was the way the game handled hiding. They're rogues, ya know. They hide and try to make surprise attacks.

 

[suibhne]

Not so. I made all the necessary Spot checks and the rogues were visible, but they still got Sneak Attacks on me even when I'd attacked them first (and therefore was not flat-footed). I'm not sure if this was fixed in 1.03 or 1.04, but it was one of the factors that made those two dungeons supremely frustrating.

 

[Elwro]

Hm. I didn't notice that. In fact, the "rescue the informer" quest with all the rogues made me 1)do all other quests to level up 2)notice that it's still frustrating 3)notice that when I kicked the druid out and got Qara, the fights suddenly became a breeze since she could cast fireballs before a fight, just aiming at a location.
When I got to the second floor, I noticed that closing the doors makes the enemies totally oblivious of my existence... at least for a while. When I got to the informer, the other guys finally opened their doors and joined the fight. So, it turned out that I was supposed to kill them all, after all.

I became bored and went back to Warp Rogue Not that I have time for gaming now, anyway.
And I quite enjoyed NWN2 up to the informer quest.