I think they made NWN better by giving it an original campaign that was actually worth playing. All of the other issues you mention are being fixed, but I have a feeling that Atari is slowing down the process by forcing them to nail down discrete chunks of things to fix per patch.
As for making “D&D worse” I’m not sure if your gripe is towards the appropriate people. D&D 3.5E is pretty accurately represented in NWN2. It just isn’t the same as 3.0E, which shouldn’t be any surprise.
See, I haven’t played past Act I yet. I’m just having a hard time slogging through it, so I won’t argue about the story. Up to the end of Act I though? BORING.
As for the 3.5 mechanics, sure, pretty acurate representation. The UI and AI kill it though. KILL IT.
I honestly didn’t find the UI that big of a deal. The AI gripe I can understand but I think you and others are overreacting a bit. Some pausing with the space bar can alleviate most problems, and on Normal difficulty the game is so forgiving that it doesn’t matter a whole lot if one of your companions casts the wrong spell(s). I tend to try to buff up before major fights so they don’t stand around trying to cast fourty different buffs right after the initiative is rolled.
I played through the whole game with practically all the gameplay defaults, and except for modifying to a much smaller number for the context menu delay I didn’t modify anything for the UI.
I made extensive use of the quickcast bar and hot-buttoned every item, spell, and useable feat to my hotbars. I also made sure to queue up at least four or five spells for each caster in the party if I want to control the battle flow better. Most of the time I didn’t even use the animal companions, and I didn’t use any of the familiars. Honestly instead of wasting spell slots on buffing up your druid’s animal companion you can instead take more damage and protection spells, which are ultimately more useful in ending fights quickly. That animal companion gets squished far too easily.
I guess if you’re anal retentive about what to cast when and where and what modes to be in then the game might drive you nutty. There were only two fights in the whole game that proved difficult for me, but some “stand here” commands issued from two characters and manual positioning at the beginning of each fight and replenishing action/spell queues constantly solved those issues. Babysitting the item special use action, such that it doesnt get canceled by a spell casting action, for a certain quest item way later in the game is a known issue that should be fixed with 1.04, which was the only irritating thing for me.
Also, Isaac’s Greater Missile Storm is probably one of the best spells in the game.
Here’s the problem with the game as it shipped… the combat felt nothing like 3.5 combat. NWN was MUCH closer. The reason being as the AI is so stupid and the UI didn’t/doesn’t work. That killed a lot of the enjoyment for me.
I’ll give another chance in a couple few patches.
How… gracious of you. Although I have no familiarity with the scripting system, the pause mechanism is already in place (bound to the spacebar) and I assume there is some scripting function which could be hooked into each PC’s action while in combat. Thus, no engine modding needed. In fact a friend of mine who also liked ToEE’s turn based setup does exactly what I asked for, except he’s willing to pound away at the spacebar.
I guess the text uses <playerrace> but the spoke dialog? Does it have something for alternate races, or am I just going to be called ‘human’?
I’m not seeing how NWN1 was better than NWN2. The UI, that I might agree with, but not the AI. I fail to see how anyone could play NWN1 as a wizard/sorceror. In my experience the NWN1 AI required constant babysitting, as your companion/familiar would constantly go off and agro every enemy on the map. I was constantly telling my companion “please get your butt back here and stop chasing after enemies 2-3 screens away”.
At least in NWN2 you have the option of taking direct control of your companions. In NWN1 you just had to put up with the stupid AI. I’m not saying the NWN2 AI is necessarily better, but you don’t have to use it.
Bottom line for me: Yes the interface is wonky. However, other than that NWN2 has better graphics, better story, option to disable companion AI and take direct control, ability to have a real party instead of you and one companion, and 3.5 rules intead of 3.0 (which isn’t that different, but is generally better in most ways). So overall, yes NWN2 is much, much better than NWN1.
The graphics in NWN2? Ain’t really doing it for me. Played Guild Wars recently? Blows it away. NWN2 feels muddy and has pretty lousy models.
Yeah, being able to stop combat and take control of your buddies is a good thing…except when you want them to do something they can’t do (cast defensively, play specific song first, etc) that they should be able to do.
shrugs
The UI…unforgivable, almost. From kludgy interfaces to requiring LOTS of running (why can’t I click there on the map and go there?).
Oh, and nitpick of mine, which isn’t really fair, but here it is. You get the city…and you can’t go in any of the buildings. Yes, it would have been annoying had they required you to go in all the buildings…but somehow it felt very hollow and empty. Huge city, only can enter two doors and people selling things? They do that on the streets of all places.
No, not really. I don’t know of any added script function that toggles the game pause. Also, while there are hooks for the PC or creature getting hit and you can pull some tricks with heartbeat scripts, there really isn’t the level of real-time interaction in NWN scripting that I think you’re looking for. If a scriptable pause existed, any kind of script based turn-based system would be clumsy at best.
Yeah its insanity. Shit like that, its hard for me as a the player/customer to imagine the dev/publisher even played the game let alone beta tested it. Its infuriating and something that if I was creating the game, I would have fixed a long time ago. I mean it happens all the fucking time. And there are 100s of combats. Impossible to not have noticed it. Why not fix it?
That improved AI mod fixes mode changing btw, its a must have mod.
That isn’t exactly turn-based. Turn-based would be actions taking discrete amounts of points and each mobile based on their dexterity or some other arbitrarily defined statistic would receive a certain amount of action points in a pool per turn. You know, like X-Com. Traditional turn-based games also let you move all of your units before the opponent as well, but I suppose it isn’t mandatory.
What you’re describing is real-time combat with action execution delays and pausing frequently. It isn’t really the same.
I dunno, I just don’t use any modal abilities if I can avoid it. Only reason to take Power Attack is to get Cleave anyway.
Maybe this will change when they fix the AI behaviors a bit in 1.04 and future patches.
Guild Wars single player experience seriously blows. And I don’t feel like having to endanger some kind of internet social pact when I feel like dropping out of the game because Real Life intervenes. I find the graphics in NWN2 are pretty comparable to Guild Wars, but I can understand that if your machine isn’t a small supercomputer and you haven’t patched it then you might be running at some less than stellar settings (textures set to anything lower than the max look progressively worse and worse, leading to the NWN1 look).
I agree with you on Power Attack but there is no reason you ever want Flurry of Blows off IMO, if you have a Monk. Same for the Ranger Rapid Shot or whatever its called. And I like to leave Defensive Casting on as well. The AI will turn all that shit off the first round it has a character to itself.
You really think they have a similar graphics level? Disregarding gameplay and everything else, you really think graphics wise, GW and NWN2 are on similar footing? Having you played GW anytime recently? They are on completely different planes of existence imho.
And yes, I do have a supar computer. It’s lovely. And it runs everything I own at max settings… max settings in NWN2? Pooish.
I wish there was a way to play Guild Wars with only henchmen.
Guild Wars
NWN2
NWN2 lacks the full-screen glow filter, but the models are higher polygon. I dunno, but Guild Wars just doesn’t blow me away either.
Screenshots are so deceptive.
Guild Wars looks great because the overall artistic design is (IMO) more polished, and because the lighting really enhances the look of the game.
That said, NWN2 has better animations and will probably look better a year from now when I have a PC capable of running it with everything maxed out at a high res.
You guys aren’t giving me fun stuff for my NWN2.
I already did on the first page. How about you give me some more fun stuff?
Fine.
Playable Companions. Play as Bishop, etc as your main character, if you feel like it for some weird reason, in any module or campaign.
Playable NPCs. Play as Torio, Mephasm, etc as your main character, if you feel like it for some weird reason, in any module or campaign.