Neverwinter Nights

Rating:
Summary: Typical RPG problems, disappointing toolset.
Review: While the game itself is fairly entertaining, it still has those typical design flaws programmers just can't seem to see. Inspite of being told to stay put, characters with you magicly show up next to you as you pass through some doorways, often right into a scene best handled alone. More often, very imaginative strategies will gather fewer experience than rushing blindly into battle. "Scripted events" (where your character is magicly thrown into a new situation or plot line which he or she has the power to control, but can not) can make thinking gamers feel cheated.
The much hyped toolset is a disaster for imaginative Dungeon Masters as the vast majority of "monsters" are of the humanoid type. If as game creator, you don't mind using the same basic type of creaures over and over, the toolset will work for you. Anyone very creative however, will see that most of those fantastic creations from the Monster Manuals can not be included in their game. Professional graphic artists may (in a conciderable amount of time) be able to create unique creatures. Anyone else however, is out of luck. Even if one would be satisfied using the provided monsters, they will be bombarded with the program language "scripting" needed to make events happen within their world. NWN had the potential to be great, but falls victim to typical computer RPG problems and unproductive tools for one's own imagination.

Rating:
Summary: Surprisingly mediocre single-player campaign
Review: This review is based solely on my experience with the single-player campaign of Neverwinter Nights. Thus, I can't comment on the on-line capacity of the game. I bought this game thinking that it was the successor of Bioware's excellent Baldur's Gate series, which are among my all-time favorite video games. In a few ways it does improve upon these earlier masterpieces, but in many more ways it proved to be an inferior gaming experience. Unless you have the time and patience to explore this game's on-line side, don't bother getting it. There are many better computer roleplaying games out there (e.g., Morrowind, Baldur's Gate, Diablo 2, etc.).

Gameplay: This is a D&D-style fantasy adventure that Bioware has made a reputation for presenting well. You create a character at the beginning and build him/her up with experience points during a 70-80 hour main quest. The basic idea is similar to other such games, but the implementation here is unexciting. First, this is a single-character game in which you don't have a party. You can hire a mercenary, but for the most part you are on your own. It makes for a rather uninteresting experience, since your hired hand does not have much of a personality and specializes primarily in poor pathfinding and suicidal behavior while in combat. Unlike great games by Bioware such as Baldur's Gate and Knights of the Old Republic, you virtually have no control over your mercenary, who is often a liability.

Another problem with the game is its structure. It is largely comprised of dungeon crawl after dungeon crawl after dungeon crawl. A few of the dungeons are well done and memorable, and the game does pack in an awful lot of monsters. But the experience is rather claustrophobic insofar as your adventures are boxed into four chapters in which you simply explore a town, its countryside, and underground areas. Unlike Baldur's Gate, you can't revisit towns that were in previous chapters, and there is really no reason to since they are rather generic in feel.

The story itself is not a bad one, but is full of cliches and rather predictable. You can take the noble good-guy route or be an outright villain, but the main story will unfold in the same way. The main deficiency with the single-player campaign is the almost utter lack of connection that you feel with your character and the other NPCs you'll encounter. There is none of the banter, bickering, and cameraderie that made the characters so memorable in Baldur's Gate. Here, your mercenary has no stories to tell and even main characters like Aribeth and Aarin Gend are just there to push the story alone.

Perhaps even more distressing is how unstable this game was on my computer. I had the 1.23 patch and it crashed to desktop about every 30 minutes. The current patch (1.65) is available at Bioware's website, but it's 66MB! If you have a dial-up internet connection like me, you know what that means (hours of waiting to download). It's really a shame that Bioware has fallen into the pattern of other developers and has begun releasing games that still have technical issues (I had similar crash problems with Knights of the Old Republic, but the Baldur's Gate games were models of stability). I hope that they avoid this with Neverwinter Nights 2.

Graphics: The game looks good, but not great. Graphics are largely an evolutionary improvement over Baldur's Gate. There are a few interesting changes, such as more combat moves, spell effects, and so forth. You can zoom the camera in close to the action, but things get blocky looking. Those who do use the Aurora toolset that comes with the game should have a lot to choose from, though this game is not the best looking RPG available.

Sounds: The music was good and set the atmosphere. Voice acting was hit-and-miss, with the whiny main character, Aribeth, being the worst offender. Overall, the sounds in the game served their purpose, but didn't rescue the otherwise mediocre plot or excuse the lack of real character development.

Replay/value: Since I don't play games on-line or have an interest in downloading mods by others, Neverwinter Nights had a short shelf-life for me. Due to the ho-hum story, bland characters, and crashing, I won't be rushing out to buy Neverwinter Nights 2. If you like dungeon crawling for dungeon crawling's sake and haven't played some truly extraordinary games like Morrowind or Baldur's Gate, then this game might be worth a try (be sure to get the latest patch). Otherwise, skip this one, since it doesn't begin to measure up to the high standards previously set by Bioware.

Rating:
Summary: Okay
Review: I was deciding whether or not to join a RPG club, and I wound up playing this game. I played for the entire time! Part of this was learning how to set up magic and all the other controls, but once I figured most of the stuff I had fun with it anyway. What I liked about this was that I think it allowed for both mouse and cursor movement (I think, but I played this awhile ago), which is good because I hate trying to click on a moving object. I also liked how the game progressed, and even allowed for multiclassing. The other thing that took so long was that I wanted to get every little treasure, and for the most part I managed it.

There was one thing that wasn't correct, though. A friend and I sat down one time and wrote a character sheet, and it turned out that the druid learned one spell per day (plus perhaps one or two extra for his wisdom), but could use it up to three times per day at the start. NWN seemed to be designed backward in this respect, as it said spells per day was different spells that the druid possessed, but they were only useable one time per day. The sorceror seemed to have normal uses per day, but I believe they were just starting out, and this might account for it being normal rather than backwards as well. As we understood it, spells per day actually meant just that, the spells that were used per day, whereas this spells known meant sepearate spells known. While the spells known might plausibly have given up to 9 different spells, each with 4 uses (spells per day), though I doubt it, I really don't think it was designed to have four different spells, each with up to 9 individual uses. It seemed like it would make more sense to have it as a mana pool, especially since wizards have unlimited arcana, this would mean spells per day was actually 4 uses per day, with any spell, and in a mana pool once 4 spells were cast from that spell level it gets expended. Rather than 4 spells and unlimited uses, which is why I pretty sure it was backward.

Rating:
Summary: Greatest rpg yet
Review: Neverwinter Nights is basically the wet dream of every pnp rpg geek out there. Good graphics, great implementation of the 3rd ad&d edition rules, long, complex storyline.
The multiplayer side of this game is simply amazing. Included is the Aurora Toolset which allows you to build your own world. Too bad for the relatively small areas, otherwise, hand in hand with a persistent world, this game would have turned out to be just like a free mmorpg.

Rating:
Summary: I could play it for weeks...
Review: Everyone knows that the retarted developers havent made the obviously easy to make best rpg/adventure game. Well, neverwinter nights stands in the top ten for the list of those awesome games so far. What I fail to see said about the game here is the amount of depth you go into with character creation. Its my favorite part of the game. If I end up bored out of my mind with the storyline or the dying, *and I dont just turn godmode on*, I am creating dozens of characters just to have a thrill! By far the look of your character in play just blows! They need to make the playable character designable the same way as THUG or Madden 04 does it. But I know that some people wont get a thrill out of this game... I also know that most will. So therefore I give this game a 5 star creation.

Rating:
Summary: A Disaponting Game
Review: This game was extremly disaponting. I am a hard core baulder's gate and icewind dale fan. I was looking forward to neverwinter nights as the next leval of play. It is the most thorough game yet with more spelles and classes than ever before it is lacking somthing however. It feels like an action game. The plot is boring and uncomplex, it failed to hold me for even an hour compared to icewind dale witch I was able to play all day. Also the way it is set up, it just does not feel like an RPG it feels like a shooter. All the plot points involve killing somthing. All in all this was a disapointing game for a hard core RPG fan.