So it has been three years of Neverwinter Nights 2...

[Starwars]

NWN2 has filled up quite a lot of my gaming time, which is pretty funky considering it's a game that started with a main campaign that I think sucked for the most part, and with a very questionable engine. Though at this point, I don't really have any problems with it as I've learned to control it I guess. Performance/looks is by comparison poor still, but it flows well for me now and looks good to boot.

1. What is your absolute favourite build for Neverwinter Nights 2?

Not really sure to be honest. For the levels of Storm of Zehir, I liked creating a Warlock/Hellfire Warlock there. Never liked the vanilla Warlock, but Hellfire Warlock just made it... cool. Like, fanboy cool.

2. What are your three most favourite community modules/campaigns for Neverwinter Nights 2?

I probably like Harp & Crysanthemum the best. It's not amazing story wise, not amazing roleplaying wise, not amazing combat wise etc. But it just was put together in a very satisfactory way I thought. Very enjoyable. I also liked the Conan Chronicles a lot, and Fate of a City has a lot of potential, especially with its c&c though it doesn't quite live up to it. It feels a bit bland somehow, but it was still worth playing.

3. What unused or barely used D&D setting would be ideal for a Neverwinter Nights 2 campaign?

I'm not really into D&D all that much, but just going to previously unexplored (in cRPGs) places would be nice. I also wouldn't mind exploring Rashemen and Chult more. But yeah, just... new places which don't feel as vanilla as the Sword Coast.

4. Who was the coolest NPC in the official campaigns of Neverwinter Nights 2?

I liked Kaelyn a lot, and think she's one of the best written companions there is. What I especially liked is that I found her quite likeable when playing a character who sympathizes with her views. But she is also excellent as a counterpoint if you're playing a character that doesn't sympathize with her. And I thought it was really excellent that the game gave you the chance to constantly Bluff her and stuff instead of simply just closing you out of her content because you don't share her views.

5. What was the single most awesome fight in all of the official campaigns of Neverwinter Nights 2?

There are some nice fights in Mysteries of Westgate to be sure, but the greatest one is probably the end boss of Storm of Zehir. Very challenging, but also a great visual design of the boss and area that makes it memorable. One of my most favourite battles in a RPG in a very long time.

 

[Relayer71]

MoTB will probably have a place in history - for an expansion pack it was very well done. Obsidian deserves kudos for that (and for trying something different with SoZ). And from the latest reviews it seems Ossian's offering is also pretty decent.

But overall, NWN2 isn't that different from NWN1.

Both have mediocre OC's although I would say NWN2's was a whole lot better.
It's all relative though, mediocrity is still mediocrity.

Both were redeemed by their expansion packs.

And in both cases, one expansion pack was very good and worthwhile, the other was decent.

Again NWN2 gets the edge - SoU retained some of the dullness of NWN's OC and at least both the NWN2 expansion packs tried to go for wholly different experiences whereas NWN's didn't really do anything different but improve upon the horrid OC experience.

Still, just because the CRPG genre has been so stale the last few years - actually, I think the last really good CRPG year was 2002 - it doesn't all of a sudden by default make Obsidian heroes. MoTB was great but it was still marred by the clunky NWN2 engine and the OC was still dull and tedious.

And so I find myself in a time warp, STILL replaying or messing around with Wizardy 8, BG 2 (I actually JUST picked up Throne of Bhall which I never played so replaying BG2), Fallout, Divine Divinity, Arcanum and Morrowind while Jade Empire, Mass Effect, Fallout 3, Oblivion, NWN2 and others sit in the Box Of Shame on my desk.

 

[Volourn]

"SoZ is played even less because retards who didn't reach the Sword Coast basically destroyed the game with their false opinions and reviews."

Not my fault SOZ is so SOZZY that I couldn't play anymore. It was shit, shit, shit. And, continuing to play shit won't make it better. It will still be shit.

And, 6/10 is way too generous. That's TOEE numbers which was not a favorite of mine but at leats had things that were good about it.

SOZ is SOZZY. SOZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZY! 2.5/10, and that's being GENEROUS!

 

[MetalCraze]

It has been 3 years and NWN2 is still shit.

 

[Dele]

carp

Shitty engine, a massive step down from nwn1 which had a somewhat good engine for custom content(actually nwn1 is better in every way possible, it even has less bloom)

Motb was ok though.

 

[Lim-Lim]

It has been 3 years and NWN2 is still shit.

Surprise! à la skyway.

 

[oldschool]

- The game is an acceptably close representation of PnP D&D

 

[1eyedking]

NWN2...Campaign: Shit. Dialogue? Shit. Sound? Shit.
MotB...Campaign: Shit. Dialogue? Reasonable. Needed more intelligence. Sound? Shit.
SoZ...Campaign: Shit. Dialogue? Utter shit. Sound? Shit.

The only good thing out of NWN2 was The Witcher's use of its engine, and even then they had to completely revamp the piece of crap.

 

[Redeye]

I bought SoZ but can't play it.

Why?

Because I have to reinstall NWN2 to play it.

Why can't I reinstall NWN2?

Because Securom decided it doesn't like my DVD drive.

Must have been an update, as it is the same DVD drive and computer that I used to install NWN2 the first time.

I can't reinstall Stalker, either.
Same with many of my other games.

Same DVD drive, same everything.

After trying every combination (all the standard checklist shit that the unhelpful troubleshooting FAQs always suggest), I updated with a new HD and clean operating system install.
The problems remain.

Perhaps Securom did something to the firmware on the drive.

No, I will not get a new DVD drive.
Yes it's a burner.
It used to be able to see the various disks and now it cannot.

 

[Dele]

NWN2...Campaign: Shit. Dialogue? Shit. Sound? Shit.
MotB...Campaign: Shit. Dialogue? Reasonable. Needed more intelligence. Sound? Shit.
SoZ...Campaign: Shit. Dialogue? Utter shit. Sound? Shit.

The only good thing out of NWN2 was The Witcher's use of its engine, and even then they had to completely revamp the piece of crap.

I wonder if CD PROJEKT red used nwn1 aurora or the new one? Truly an impressive feat they did if they managed to fix that pos what nwn2 was to such playable levels.

Here's to hoping obsidian wont fuck up gamebryo for fallout new vegas.

 

[1eyedking]

I wonder if CD PROJEKT red used nwn1 aurora or the new one? Truly an impressive feat they did if they managed to fix that pos what nwn2 was to such playable levels.

Here's to hoping obsidian wont fuck up gamebryo for fallout new vegas.

I stand corrected, sir, they indeed used NWN1's engine.

Conclusion? Nothing good came out of NWN2.

 

[King Crispy]

- The game is an acceptably close representation of PnP D&D

[James Woods]
Go on.
[/James Woods]

 

[bat_boro]

I can understand every other complain about NWN 2, but I honestly thought that the OST, particularly in MotB was pure awesome.

 

[oldschool]

- The game is an acceptably close representation of PnP D&D

[James Woods]
Go on.
[/James Woods]

TOEE is an acceptably close representation of PnP D&D. NWN2 is some horrible whack-a-mole abomination. It's a choose-your-own-dialogue story with terrible gameplay.

 

[poocolator]

No game has done more for the computer roleplaying genre in the past five years than Neverwinter Nights 2.

Wat. It's just D&D all over again. I hardly count that as a productive contribution to the RPG genre since it's not giving us anything new. The only thing NWN2 contributed to was in giving me a headache with it's shitty camera.

Well it can only help resurrect D&D gameplay, which sure as shit beats FO3/Beth-esque action games.

 

[Rhalle]

I can't really think of another franchise of NWN's popularity and importance whose sequel was as ignored.

NWN2 OC was OK, but it was no NWN1.

 

[King Crispy]

TOEE is an acceptably close representation of PnP D&D. NWN2 is some horrible whack-a-mole abomination. It's a choose-your-own-dialogue story with terrible gameplay.

ToEE was an almost perfect representation of PnP D&D, at least combat-wise. NWN2 does an acceptable job in that area, and has added potential and functionality in terms of cinematic content, the inclusion of which in the criteria of whether something is a good representative of D&D being completely subjective.

 

[oldschool]

TOEE is an acceptably close representation of PnP D&D. NWN2 is some horrible whack-a-mole abomination. It's a choose-your-own-dialogue story with terrible gameplay.

ToEE was an almost perfect representation of PnP D&D, at least combat-wise. NWN2 does an acceptable job in that area,

Acceptable to you, maybe. Not to me by a long shot.

and has added potential and functionality in terms of cinematic content, the inclusion of which in the criteria of whether something is a good representative of D&D being completely subjective.

We were discussing PnP D&D. How does cinematic content represent that at all?

Anyway(s), NWN2 is one of the few games that actually made me nerd rage. I've got a bit calmer perspective on it now, but I still think it sucks balls on many different levels. It doesn't come anywhere close to replicating PnP D&D for me. It just adds to the decline.

 

[felicity]

Most things NWN2 have done have been done in NWN1. NWN2 is a weird game that it has many things done well, yet so many things are lacking. The biggest improvement over NWN1 is total party control, which is still clunky after all this time(selection by clicking at avatar is still bugged). Fast cast and ToEE's like AoE targeter are also nice touches. More advance toolsets yes. However many NWN2's basic functions are backward. An example that I think pinpoints the problem: in previous game the animations show when you are bumping into another character. In NWN2, the avatar simply won't move, makes you wonder why he wasn't moving. Encumbered? Paralyzed? Stuned? Pathing defect? The engine doesn't tell you wtf is happening. There are many similar instances in NWN2 that hinders enjoyment of the game.

Besides the inventory and camera UI, the dumbed down animations and over the top sfx is one of the more crippling defects . Feedbacks in previous game were intuitive, you could tell what is going on, just by looking at the animations and recognizing the sound effects. I could guess at good odds which spell is being casted from the chants and spell sfx. Knockdown, stun, daze, entangle, web, stonehold, paralze, energy drain, killed by death spells etc. all had distinct and clear animations and sounds that an experience player could recognize them intuitively and immediately without the need of refering to character sheet. And if you somehow missed the animations, you could right click at your enemies to see its inflictions. This is sorely missing in NWN2, the only way you can tell besides decoding the super small and obscure status icon is search in the rolls log window, which has all the rolls and dialogs log dumped into it. You can't filter or split the log into 2 windows like you could in previous game.

3 years and the combat in NWN2 still looks fuzzy to me. It took me a lot of time to familiar myself to the NWN2 engine, it has grown on me now, still nowhere the same as NWN1. NWN2 has potentially better combat because of full party control, but NWN1 is a better game to me, it does well on what it does - a single character perspective. In contrast to party perspective, I find single character perspective has its own charm too, like more familiar with your character abilities and more sophisticate inventory management(can't micro that much with a party). When a party is required I usually play casters or bard/rogue and recruit low mirco-required meat shields. It makes the party experience a lot less frustrating and more enjoying.

 

[ricolikesrice]

NWN2 OC and drakensang are roughly on par. NWN2 OC has slightly better story, slightly more CnC and a lot better dialogue. Drakensang has better combat, much better art direction / graphics and doesnt drown you in uberloot. i enjoyed both games when they were new but i ll admit i dont have the highest standards around here. slightly biased towards drakensang because i really like how loot is done in DS and really hate how its done in NWN2.

NWN2 MOTB would be awesome if it didnt suffer from NWN2 combat and even more uberloot. instead its just great.

NWN2 SOZ is the worst cRPG i had the misfortune of playing in the last 10 years and that includes oblivion. only good thing about it was creating your own party on the ship.
not just the swordcoast, the whole game sucks in every possible area aside from being able to make your own party and thus ignore the shitty companions.
as already said regarding the OC, my standards arent exactly the highest around here. i found FO3 playable, i enjoyed mass effect. while i do agree that "Back then, everything was better - Heil Fallout 1, Planescape and most importantly realms of arcania" i can still enjoy newer games even aknowleding them paling compared to the good old times.
how low someones standards have to be to enjoy SoZ though is a mystery to me, especially if the same people bash bethesda/bioware at every opportunity when even their worst games look solid compared to SoZ.

if you cant get enough of NWN2 after MOTB i d suggest ignoring that piece of crap and try out some mods instead. sublety of thay and conan chronicles are quite okay. havent touched NWN2 since SoZ though, actually uninstalled it a few weeks ago - maybe there s some other decent mods out now.

 

[King Crispy]

We were discussing PnP D&D. How does cinematic content represent that at all?

I should have been more clear. The story content delivered through cut scenes, sets and other techniques represents that which would be otherwise delivered by a DM's descriptions and narratives in PnP.

NWN2 having these capabilities rounds out its "D&D experience". I do not claim it does so better than ToEE; I merely claim that it does so adequately, on its own.

Edit: Also, please bear in mind that the above refers to NWN2's potential, not its OC. I think MoW is a great representation of how PnP D&D should be represented on PC, on a general level.

 

[drexciya]

Hey drakensang was a great firrst attempt by a new comapny. Cut them some slack guys. Also despite being noobs they knoew how to optimize their games. Unlike Obsidian.

Indeed. The character system was interesting and has a lot of potential. The execution needs some work, but hey it's their first game. And the game was very very stable (I didn't use the patch at all), even on Vista x64.

 

[FeelTheRads]

So far the only redeeming thing about NWN that I found is the mention of Dak'kon by that githzerai chick. Are there any other Torment references in the game?

Note: I haven't yet played MoB or SoZ.

 

[FeelTheRads]

but hey it's their first game.

I thought this lie was already called on.

http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/radon-labs-gmbh/

 

[felicity]

Speaking of tough battles, the end battle of Harp & Crysanthemum was quite unexpectedly tough. I tried conventional tactics and wiped many times. The boss is invulnerable until all the elementals are dead. He spams hammer of god and flame strike which does divine damage and inflict daze. No pre-buff despite you were supposed to be prepared, this made it hard on my wizard. After exhausting my conventional tactical options, I tried to use the dismissal spell to see if the elementals counted as "summoned", and they were. Winning was easy then.