satisfaction?

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I love BG especially early in the game when one or two low level enemies can take out your solo player! My question is after playing BG 1 and 2 solo multi times and multi characters am I going to be satisfied with NWN (it is the next in the series right?) if you are satisfied tell me why or why not.

 

It's not the next in the series at all. It doesn't have a thing to do with the Baldur's Gate games.

 

It's an entirely different game using a variation of the DnD 3.0 game mechanics. If you liked playing solo, you may well like NWN because that's the only option you have in NWN, one player, one character (at a time).

I have been playing it since the day it came out and am more than satisfied. I love the multiplayer aspect. I also like playing downloaded or Official Campaign mods when I don't feel like being sociable.

Hope this helps.

 

Neverwinter Nights is more than satisfying, it's magically delicious! But it is a completely different type of D&D game compared to the infinity engine games (BG/IWD) or ToEE (turn-based, but resembles the infinity engine in overall look). Just make sure you have the CPU power to back it up and get the most visually out of NWN and it's expansions. I recommend a 1.0ghz or higher P4 with at least 256 mb ram and a 64mb ati radeon/nvidia graphics card. I got a 128 ati radeon 9600xt card recently and man oh man is it sweet. Also in the HotU expansion if you have Windows XP it recommends 512mb ram. Needless to say a little more demanding than BG 1!

 

NWN runs perfectly fine on a P3 450 MHz with 352 MB RAM and a TNT2 graphics card (if it's got Win XP). Only if you get HotU do you need serious power.

You can have a party in HotU, but it's still primarily solo (you can't have the kind of control over party members that you did in BG). NWN can be done either real-time or turn-based.

Many people find the campaigns with it to be crap, but I must be easy to please as I found them to be enjoyable.

 

True. Many people find offical campaigns very sucky compared to masterpieces of BG series. Me amongst them. It's not as much that it's bad, but i wouldnt spend money on the game as well as two expansions if it werent for multiplayer.
Though OC of HotU is a much better experience than the previous ones. You do need to buy all of it to play.
So: If you dont intend/cant play multiplayer dont bother to buy it. If you can/will play multiplayer than, by all means, do get it.

 

"NWN runs perfectly fine on a P3 450 MHz with 352 MB RAM and a TNT2 graphics card (if it's got Win XP). Only if you get HotU do you need serious power."

Not quite true! Your video card does not support DDS textures, which is the preferred format for NWN. As of HoTU, Bioware is not really supporting TGA textures (the ones in "compatibility mode" that are compatible with everything). Indeed, the bonus creatures and skies that come with the new patches only have DDS textures, so they won't show up on your system. Also, the much-lauded Community Expansion Pack has *NO* support for TGA textures, so you'll need at least a GeForce 1 to use it.

(Note that the decision to forgo TGA support was made by the community largely because only less than 1% of the community - as shown by various polls - have pre-Geforce/Radeon hardware. BTW you can pick up the first Geforce for $50 used to easily solve the missing texture problem, if you so desire)

 

konny666, nothing that you said proves my statement as incorrect. NWN and SoU do support TGA textures, which is the same thing that I said.

 

Fair enough, *but* plenty of community mods (which may still be compatible with basic NWN) use HAK paks which contain DDS textures only - rendering them incompatible on a TNT2-equipped system.

Also, it is interesting to note that even if you install basic NWN and patch it up to v1.62, you'll still get missing textures on at least a few creatures since Bioware wasn't careful enough to respect the system requirements for the original NWN, when it comes to patches. So it's still safer to go with a more modern video card.

 

Agreed there.

 

With TNT2 and such you can play it high rez with all of the detail maxed out but the frame rate would drop to around 18-20 and worse in cities. It will run most certainly but it is hardly enjoyable to play. It would run great with low rez and no detail but that is no fun is it.

 

With the ati 9600xt i crank everything up and turn everything on (the high-res text is more pleasing to read) and man it looks beautiful. This is by far the first D&D pc game where you can really juice it if you have a high-end graphics card. I cant wait to get to Hordes of the Underdark.

 

Well...back to the original topic.....

NWN (especially with the expansions) is, IMO, a very satisfying game. And this coming from someone who can't play it on multiplayer (ie gaming comp isn't hooked up to the net, and this POS can't even run BG2...much less NWN).

I really like (note: present tense, because I haven't beaten it yet) the single-player campaign. Even though you'll find lots of people bashing it on these boards, I think the story has a fair amount of merit, and is fun to play through. Not sure about the expansions yet though, since I refuse to play them out of order (so, NWN, then SoU, and finally HotU).

The Toolset's also a lot of fun. I'm currently working on a very ambitious mod...which will never actualy get completed; because if I ever finish it, it'll be similar in size to one of the NWN campaign chapters...

It bugs me to no end that I can't play multiplayer...but if you're like me, you won't let that get in the way of your enjoying the game.

 

Hey Faerus,

Just a note of advice since you seem to be new to the NWN franchise. The 2 expansion packs have no connection with the first campaign. In SoU you are supposed to create a new 1st-level character and you're expected to use that character to play HoTU. So you can go ahead and try SoU; I think you'll like it even more than the first campaign.

 

Neverwinter Nights and the expansions are great games (in my mind they're in the same league as BG, IWD and PS:T. They're damn similar too )

Like Konny said, be sure to use a different character for Shadows of Undrentide and Hordes of the Underdark.
You should of course play the Neverwinter Nights Campaign first, you will appreciate quite a few things in HOTU more if you do.

[ May 03, 2004, 00:47: Message edited by: Jesper898 ]

 

Actually, from a standpoint of timing and characters, don't the campaigns go like this?:

1. SoU Character A
2. NWN Character B
3. HotU Character A

I read somewhere that the OC is actually sandwiched between the two expansions...although I don't remember why or for what reason. If you play through SoU you will end up with a level 12-15 character...and that is the character who experiences HotU...but only after he Neverwinter events and the "Hero of Neverwinter".

 

Generally, you'll finish both SoU and NWN OC at level 15, so either character is good for HotU.

 

Hacken,

Actually, the first OC seems to take place simultaneously with the SOU campaign. So while your SoU character is at level 1, running around the snowy marshes, your OC character is running around Neverwinter. Once SoU finishes, the idea is that your SoU hero meets the *henchmen* of your OC hero, and they decide to embark on the quest together.

~~~

You won't believe how many angry players were posting messages on the Bioware boards when HoTU came out, "How come Sharwyn can't remember me??!!!! WAH!!"

 

Thanks for the great info people. Iam a non multiplayer player but this game sounds good to me. I'll let you know if I get ss s s satiCCFACTion.

 

Actually I finished NWN at level 17 one time and 20 another time. Both time through SOU I finished at level 13. SO if I'd taken my NWN finishing character into HOTU, he'd have been really overpowered for the start of the game.