Neverwinter Nights 2
Release Date: 10/06
Overall 6.3Release Date: 10/06
Story:9
Graphics:7
Sound:6
Control:3
Expandability:5
Replay Value:8
By the nines! This game is almost 4 years old now. Damn, time flies. I was there putting it on the shelf when it released. It was my first winter at Circuit City working in the games department which is like the bottom of the totem pole and a huge pay cut from my previous jobs but I didn't care at the time. I got to work with what I loved. Back then I was still rolling Fable with my BFG Nvidia 5500 (which is still running strong on my parents Desktop to this day I might add). Here we are 2009 I finally have found time to play this stunning followup to the strategy RPG demi-god which is Neverwinter Nights. To begin there is a rich story here with characters constantly interacting with each other in short cut scenes and sometimes in the form of dialog. There are 15 playable personalities (without expansions) and you can play with up to 6 players in your party at any given time with a simple code. The cut-scenes can be skipped easily if you are not in the mood. Also I will add that you can skip all of the opening videos and logos. Click, Click, Click, Click Title Menu. Fast; how all games should start.
Fuck Yeah 6 characters to control!
The conversations in the game change depending on who is in your party at a given time which is a plus when considering replay value. The story plays out in 3 acts and is almost completely railroaded. Most of the characters are entertaining and react with voice acting to your decisions. There are lots of decisions in this game which modify a trait called "Alignment". Alignment affects whether you can use certain items and sometimes dictates which quests you do. The graphics (always on highest) are tolerable by 2009 standards and the colors are highly reminiscent of NwN1 as to be expected. The music and effect sounds seem to be exactly the same as the first NWN. It is good but I had music turned off by Act2 as it gets old.
Choices, Choices...
Now lets talk about the controls. (Sigh*) Have you ever heard of arthritis of the middle finger? :/ Before you pop in these installation discs you better damn well make sure you have some kind of health insurance plan because you are about have fucking arthritis of the middle fucking finger. There are 3 camera modes in this game. They are all (insert AVGN quote). I don't know what they were trying to do here but it failed. The patch updater is very simple and fast. There are 3 available expansions I have not played which has saved me about 30 bucks. However, I did install a few of the popular user mods found in the IGN:NwN2:Vault but they proved very unstable and I warn against using any of them as every time I installed one I had to re-install. Much like NwN1, the best part of this game is how many items and spells there are and all the different ways there is to do everything. In a nutshell, the strategy. I recommend NWN2 to anyone who craves this kind of rpg experience and is willing to suffer some finger pain for their fill of it.
Dishing out turds of hellfire d20 style
