I got tired of the first NWN, and the sequel was crying on the shelf to be played. So instead of finishing all the expansions of NWN1, I started NWN2.
Here is my verdict. The graphics for NWN2 are much better, I don't know where I heard it, but I think someone said they weren't as good. Well that person would be wrong.
The 3d avatars are good in my opinion because they match the character you make, as opposed to NWN1, where you could have a big black dude as your avatar, but play as a small little white guy in the game. I like that you can be anyone in your party, but I dislike having less inventory spots. I think I like the four-person party, but I'm still early on in the game.
I dislike the lack of the radial menu. The radial menu was good because it only took a few seconds to access the options for almost anything you wanted in-game to control your characters. For example, in NWN2, when I am curious about an enemy, I can't right click on them and think about what I want to do to them or find out about them. This isn't too bad, since there are hotkeys and side-menus, but I've gotten so used to the radial menu, it hurts to have it ripped away. I'll get over it, I hope.
I love the character creation aspect of this game. It is deep enough in customization and the new races and sub-races are fun. I like the feel of the game, as opposed to NWN1. The areas in NWN1 seemed more blocky and there was no roof to the ceilings when you would zoom down to your character. The colours seem richer to me.
If I had a better rig, this game would be good for graphics, but I have to dumb it down to play. I'm rather an eye-candy guy when it comes to games, but NWN2 suffices.
When I first started the game, this dude started talking, and he sounded like he had eaten a bottle of anti-freeze and was dying. Seriously, it was a bad voice-over. I came away asking, "Do all elves sound like they are trying to talk with fecal matter spraying out of their mouths?" The other voices have been pretty decent, but to start a game off that way seems in bad form. "SooOoO manny yeeeers ago...."
That brings me to the PC's voices. I think there should have been all new ones, since the way it is makes NWN2 feel a little like it's just NWN1.5. Of course, the rest of the game picks up the slack, but that was also bad form. I know it's money-wise to reuse those resources, but people have been around them for so long, and frankly most of them sucked to begin with. I get more comical relief out of them than anything else, and it disappoints me that when I want to have a serious game session I have to laugh at it because of how lame it is (if I don't laugh, I get depressed that it sucks, so it's kind of like the annoying friend that is funny but you don't want to laugh at him because you are trying to get your homework done, but he won't stop doing stuff, and to make him think you are still his friend, you have to do the fake laugh and look at him and acknowledge him until he stops his actions temporarily, but he'll repeat them soon enough).
It also disappoints me that in CRPG's there aren't always options for just being sarcastic. I want to play a character that is always sarcastic. Not necessarily mean, but someone that makes fun of everything because everything usually deserves to be made fun of. Like, the elf in the beginning. I'd say something like, "Your voice sounds sweet." Of course, it takes insight into how people will think of something (I'm pretty sure they thought they had a winner with that horrible voice), but I have confidence that a company like Obsidian could do this. Unless it would be too much work... but it seems like if they keep with the written dialogue system, the response could be treated as a neutral one, and it wouldn't be too hard to add it in. Whatevs, NWN2 is fine for dialogue, I just think this would be a good addition.
I wonder if what Mass Effect is doing, voicing over even the PC's dialogue, will become popular with CRPG's. We'll see in the future.
I'm not far enough into the story to tell you how good I think it is, but NWN1's OC was absolutely terrible. I did recently play it, so my opinion is fresh. The expansions were also lackluster.
Oblivion really takes the cake right now when it comes to RPG's. I realize that I actually like the story, and it isn't too different from a CRPG. I got an expansion for it called something like "Pirate's Cove" and it was small but I thought it was really good. Story-wise, it simply had a guy's journal you could read after you find it in the cave, but the story inside was really good. It added meaning to the place and I felt like I was a spelunker. In no part of NWN1 did I ever feel like a spelunker, even though I was in a freakin cave for what felt like 3/4 of my PC's existence.
I might say more later, thanks for reading if you did.
