Okay, time for a minor rant about the graphical problems with IWD2....

Remove all ads!

Considering this game got delayed from May 28 all the way to August 28, a full 3 months later, you'd think they could have worked on the following:

1. No Half-Orc avatar? Come on, in BG2 I liked seeing my bad boy Kahless tower a bit more over my party, and as such, having a half-orc character isn't even cool, since they all look the same.

2. Weapon models-yes, I'm playing a Drizzt party-been reading the books for 10 years, I'm entitled-and when I finally equip Drizzt with 2 scimitars, guess what? They look just like longswords, unlike in BG2. Another gripe.

3. And of course, its already been addressed, the lack-of-attack-animation for monks. Jeez guys, how hard could it have been to work up some unarmed attack animation that doesn't look like some drunk guy flailing in a bar? Takes all the fun out of playing a monk character.

4. One last thing-where's all the good weapons/armor? This game is supposed to take you to level 20 or more, where's the stuff living up to it? I've found good items, but nothing super, definetely no armor. My guy's AC is all in the mid-20's for crying out loud.

 

Well you will find better armor(I've found an armor that gives a +7 bonus no max dexterity and doesn't have a spell failure and two mithral field plates +2) and better weapons (like a +5 greataxe that does an extra 2d6 slashing damage and the Xvim soldiers always carry a +5 greatsword that drains 2d4 damage from the opponent and gives them to you) but you'll mostly get good items at chapter 6. If you want really really good items try heart of fury.
The other point you make is quite good. The character graphics suck big time. They haven't changed them one bit from BG2. They still look like their waist is broken when attacking and they hold two handed weapons as if they were marching with a flag on a parade. The animations are awful, fallout has better animations and it's 5 years old, and would it kill them if they made five or more different sounds for spell casters when casting spells?
phew I'm glad I got all that off my chest
buh buh

 

Personally, I'd say PST has the best graphics of any of the IE games, but IWD2 is certainly alright. The graphics in it seem to be better than in BG2. I haven't noticed any problems with graphics interfering with gameplay. The game is still fun.

 

What bugs me is that BG2 had a special sprite for Monks that had varying hand-to-hand attacks, and IWD2 doesn't- at least for PC's. I noticed that the Black Raven monks had those particular sprites. I suppose this is to take into account the fact that two-handed weapons are now equippable by monks and that animation can't handle them, instead showing a floating spear attacking by itself as the Monk flails away at the air.

 

One word of agreement here, ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH. My monk looks SO dumb flailing around, I wanted some spin kicks, jumps kicks, flurry of blows, SOMETHING better than a drunken lurch.

Dan

 

I'm not going to nitpick here. I'll put up the classic "I don't care so much about the graphics as I do the gameplay" argument. In fact, we're mainly just complaining about battle graphics. They're not so bad. When you get in the thick of melee (something that happens a lot in IWD II ) you can't distuingish every single swing anyways.

 

BigB, as much as I agree with your point, you gotta admit, having the stuff that was already in BG2, like the Halforc avatar and scimitars, shouldn't be too hard to implement in IWD2. They should've done that.

Gameplay is important, the most important in my opinion, but style comes in a close second I want my characters to look good. If I have a halforc, make my human paladin look small. If I'm dualwielding scimitars for the sake of looks (did this in BG2, looks great) I don't want to look like I'm dualwielding longswords...

Style baby, yeah!